Other forms: russians
Russian is the language of Russia and the adjective for the country and its people. Speak Russian, a Russian novel, Russian history.
It is always capitalised. Russian is a Slavic language written in the Cyrillic alphabet, which has thirty-three letters and takes an English speaker a few days rather than a few weeks to read. It is the most widely spoken Slavic language and is close enough to Ukrainian and Belarusian that speakers can partly follow each other. Note Russian roulette, Russian doll and Russian salad, none of which are especially Russian.
1adjectiverussianBelonging to Russia or its people.
“The Russian coastline is the longest in the northern hemisphere.”
2nounslavicThe Slavic language written in the Cyrillic alphabet.
“He learned Russian in the army and never used it again.”
russian is a nationality or language.
orv
Русь
English
Russian
English, today
russian
Built from
Russian comes from Medieval Latin - (11th century) Russiānus, from Russia, a Latinization of the orv Русь) + -ānus (“of or pertaining to”). Attested in English (both as a noun and as an adjective) from the 16th century. by surface analysis, Russia + -an. Rossiyan.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA