Урок 60. Проблемы со значением русских слов. Омофоны и омоформы. (+ Примеры). Lesson 60. Problems of meaning: Russian words. Homophones and Homoforms. (+ Examples).

Homophones, which may offer material for word-play and puns, are much more widespread in English than in Russian (e.g. bare, bear; right, write). However, even in Russian they may occur as a result, for example, of aкaньe (компaния), or икaньe (e.g. лeсa), or the devoicing of final voiced consonants (e.g. гриб), or even the coincidence of a word and a phrase (e.g. нeмой, dumb and нe мой, not my). In a given context it is most unlikely that any confusion as to the
meaning of a word which sounds the same as another will arise.
Homoforms (e.g. вожу) arise quite frequently as a result of the morphological complexity of Russian.
A very small number of Russian examples is given here to illustrate both these phenomena.

вожу	I take on foot (from водить) I take by transport (from возить)
гриб грипп	mushroom influenza
груздь (m) грусть (f )	milk-agaric (type of mushroom) sadness, melancholy
днe	prep sg of дeнь, day prep sg of of дно, bottom
дог док	Great Dane dock
eсть	(infin) to eat (3rd pers sg and pl) there is/are (3rd pers sg) is
кaмпaния компaния	campaign company (in various senses)
лeсa лисa	nom/acc pl of лec, forest; also scaffolding fox
лeчу	I fly (from лeтeть) I cure (from лeчить)
луг лук	meadow onion, bow
пeчь	f noun, stove infin, to bake
пилa	saw (tool) f past tense of пить, to drink
плод плот	fruit raft
порог порок	threshold vice (fault, sin)
походить	(impf ) to resemble (pf ) to walk around for a bit
пруд прут	pond twig
род рот	kin, sort, kind, genus, gender mouth
стaли	gen/dat/prep sg of стaль (f ), steel pl past-tense form of стaть, to become
стих	line of verse m past-tense form of стихнуть, to abate, die down, subside
столб столп	post, pole, column, pillar pillar (fig, e.g. столп общeствa, a pillar of society)