Etymology

oblast

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Today it means: A region or province in Slavic or Slavic-influenced countries. Full definition →

Slavic ← Russian о́бласть ← Old Church Slavonic область
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The story

  1. Proto-Slavic · derived from*obolstь
  2. Old Church Slavonic · derived fromобласть
  3. Russian · derived fromо́бласть“region, province”
  4. Slavic · derived from
  5. English todayoblast

From a Slavic language, probably Russian о́бласть (óblastʹ, “region, province”), borrowed from Old Church Slavonic область (oblastĭ), from Proto-Slavic *obolstь, from earlier *obvolstь, *obvoldtь, a compound of *o(b)- (“over”) + *volstь (“rule, power, authority”), thus originally probably meaning "a region ruled over". Compare Proto-Slavic *obvoldati (“to rule”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.