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I know the title might sound strange since these words convey exactly opposite meaning, but I came across the following text:

Крестьянин спросил моряка, который собирался плыть в Индию:

  • Где умер Ваш отец?

  • Он вышел в море и погиб там во время шторма.

  • А дедушка?

  • Он вышел в океан и погиб во время катастрофы.

  • На Вашем месте я никогда не выходил бы в море.

Моряк тоже поинтересовался:

  • А где умер Ваш отец?

  • На своей кровати, в спальне.

  • А Ваш дедушка и прадедушка?

  • Там же.

  • На Вашем месте я никогда бы не входил в спальню.

My question is why is the phrase "На Вашем месте я никогда не выходил бы в море" translated as "If I were You, I would never go to sea."?

The verb выходить was translated as "entering/going", but the suffix вы suggests the contrary, that is "leaving/exiting". Can someone explain what's going on here?

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  • The verb выходить was translated as "entering/going" - entering? Can you quote the dictionary saying this?
    – tum_
    Commented Mar 27, 2020 at 0:00
  • @tum_ I used yandex
    – Trey
    Commented Mar 27, 2020 at 0:05
  • You typed входить, not выходить then if you got enter as a translation. Check again.
    – tum_
    Commented Mar 27, 2020 at 0:18
  • ... and вы is a prefix, not a suffix.
    – tum_
    Commented Mar 27, 2020 at 0:20
  • @tum_ no I haven't. See this translate.yandex.ru/…. Anyway,Sergey cleared this out
    – Trey
    Commented Mar 27, 2020 at 16:45

3 Answers 3

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"Выйти в море" is a set phrase meaning "to set out to sea".

Notice how English uses 'out' and Russian uses 'вы-'.

You could also say "войти в море" but that would mean walking into the sea.

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  • 1
    I think it is not a set phase.
    – Anixx
    Commented Mar 28, 2020 at 12:07
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The prefix (and not a suffix) “вы-” means here (in movement's verbs) a movement from a limited space in a wider one space. "выйти" в море, в поле, в степь,в космос, выйти на простор..

"Войти" will mean the opposite,enter in a more limited space. "войти" в комнату, в порт, в бухту ... в женщину:>

As said above - you can "войти в море" also - but this will mean the entry into the very water of the sea. But we don’t say at this style for submarines, usually about life land creatures only. Or, in rare cases (and from coast or air into the sea f.e. - like from large space into smaller) and for an inanimate object, maybe there is a certain metaphor here too - "со стапелей субмарина плавно вошла в море" ... "торпеда вошла в море, как нож в масло"...

Or, for a more global case -"эскадра вошла в Черное Море" ( from the Mediterranean to the Black, for example; entering in a limited space, in this view );

The same applies to other verbs of movement, such as выехать-въехать, вылететь-влететь, etc...

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Because you are going out from the port. You can say "Корабль вышел в море из Новороссийского порта".

The same way we say "выйти в космос", "выйти на улицу", "выйти на природу", "выйти в рейс", "выйти за город" и т.д.

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  • It doesn’t explain why выйти в море. Вышел из порта - yes, but why not вошел в море?
    – Abakan
    Commented Mar 28, 2020 at 18:16

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