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Are "перекрестье" and "перекрестие" two different words with different meanings? Or are they two variants of the same word? Can they be used interchangeably?

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  • They have different meanings.
    – V.V.
    Oct 19, 2017 at 15:23
  • @V.V. Do you mind posting an answer?
    – enkryptor
    Oct 19, 2017 at 15:36

3 Answers 3

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перекре́стие, -я (в оптике)

Refers to optics, such as cross hairs in a gun optical scope

перекре́стье, -я, р. мн. -тий

Refers to an intersection of something or something that forms a cross.

src: http://orfo.ruslang.ru/search/word

src: https://www.efremova.info/word/perekrestje.html#.Wei6iIZrxYg

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  • I think this answer is almost correct. Having analysed the examples from the national corpus you can clearly see that the form "перекрестие" appears only in connection with optics, but we should mention that both forms are equally used in this meaning.
    – V.V.
    Oct 19, 2017 at 19:17
  • Colloquial "перекрестье "(см.shabunc's answer) appeared only in the 20th century and has two corresponding non-colloquial pairs "перекресток"(дорог) and "перекрещение"(судеб, линий).
    – V.V.
    Oct 19, 2017 at 19:24
  • Thank you for the clarification, I couldn't locate the historical aspect. :)
    – scotopic
    Oct 20, 2017 at 11:47
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Words ending with '-ие' such перекрестие, мерцание, создвездие and so on quite often have alternative form ending with -ье, like in перекрестье, мерцанье, созвездье.

Generally speaking, -ье form is either poetic, obsolete and/or used in colloquial speech.

The answer provided is strictly speaking wrong. Let's refer to the link provided:

перекре́стье ср. разг. Место пересечения чего-л. То, что имеет форму креста.

So, this is just a colloquial form. The other thing is that for some words there's indeed a tendency to designate different things - like воскресенье for Sunday and воскресение for the Resurrection.

May be we are facing the same kind of process with перекрестье and перекрестие but I'd rather say they these words are interchangeable but перекрестие is preferable.

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  • What about "перепутье"? Is "перепутие" preferable?
    – enkryptor
    Oct 19, 2017 at 15:16
  • @enkryptor well, not every possible pair exists, so the only valid word would be "перепутье" (the same about "распутье")
    – shabunc
    Oct 19, 2017 at 18:24
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They have exactly the same meaning. In written Russian, nouns ending in '-вие', '-тие' or '-лие' are often changed to use '-ье' instead for a poetic, sublime, or 'old-fashioned' effect: призванье, долголетье, страданье, тренье, понятье, бесправье. - however, you won't encounter those in nowadays speech very often.

A reverse substitution can sometimes be observed in some nouns ending in '-ье': похмелие, веселие, бездорожие, although one will typically find such usage only in pre-20th-century written sources or in texts mimicking those.

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    в принципе согласен, но есть и исключения: никогда не слышал "Приветствье". Это про In written Russian, nouns ending in '-вие'
    – d.k
    Oct 19, 2017 at 17:42
  • Согласен, исправил. Oct 19, 2017 at 17:46
  • It's fine as a general idea for the majority of words, but every rule has its exceptions, so it doesn't asnswer the question at all.
    – V.V.
    Oct 20, 2017 at 3:34

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