boiarin

From Russian боя́рин (bojárin).

boiarin (plural boiarins or boiare)

1. Alternative form of boyar.
   • 1625, [Samuel] Purchas, “The Points of the Embassage of the Russian Messenger Sent to His Sacred Maiestie, Briefly Collected”, in Purchas His Pilgrimes. […], 3rd part, London: […] William Stansby for Henrie Fetherstone, […], →OCLC, 4th book, page 788, lines 40–43 and 56–58:

     And taking counſell with the Boiarins, at that time remayning with Suiskey [i.e., Vasili IV Ivanovich Shuisky] in the chiefe Citie, we ſent our Meſſengers to his Maieſtie at that time, being at Smolensko, viz. Michael Salticoue, and others, requeſting that his Maieſtie would grant vs his Sonne to be our Lord. […] How the Boiarins handled other Gentlemen, and principall perſons of the Ruſſe Religion, although more inclined vnto them: but eſpecially the Officers and Seruants of the Wors, as alſo ſuch as had fled over.

   • 1871, A. C. Edmunds, Pen Sketches of Nebraskans […], Lincoln, Neb.: R. & J. Wilbur, […], →OCLC, page 366:

     JOHN M[ILTON] THAYER—Something of a boiarin; a physical and intellectual autochthon, but not exolete by over use.

   • 2010, Richard Wortman, “[Fedor] Solntsev, [Alexey] Olenin, and the Development of a Russian National Aesthetic”, in Cynthia Hyla Whittaker, editor, Visualizing Russia: Fedor Solntsev and Crafting a National Past (Russian History and Culture; 4), Leiden: Brill, →ISBN, →ISSN, page 40:

     “Our travelers,” he [Mikhail Pogodin] wrote, “were captivated only when the Russian spirit was realized before their eyes, when they saw the way our pretty Russian girls and our fine fellows (molodtsy) were dressed. They appeared before us in their grandfathers’ kaftans—staid boiars, majestic boiarins. What delight, what splendor, what variety, what beauty, what poetry!”

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:boiarin.

• “boyar, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.