Declinability of Neuter Gender Toponyms Ending in -ovo/-evo/-yovo, -ino/-yno

In East Slavic languages, the declension of neuter gender toponyms always poses a certain problem. This research covered neuter toponyms ending in -ovo/-evo/-yovo, -ino/-yno in Russian and East Slavic languages. If used in their initial form, neuter proper names violate the rules of morphology and syntax. The author investigated the structure of such toponyms, their origin, and morphological peculiarities. The tendency for retaining  their initial form persisted for several reasons. The first one was the need to distinguish between masculine and neuter topomyms. The second was the impact of adopted nouns. The third reason was the generally poor level of philological culture. Another reason could be the declinability of the first part in two-part names. This article focuses on common nouns ending in -o that were adopted in the 18th century, which tended to retain the form of the nominative case in spite of the fact that they were similar to the original Slavic names of neuter morphological gender. Often considered a typically Soviet trend, the non-changing of flections of toponyms, ending in -ovo/-evo/-yovo, -ino/-yno started in the pre-Soviet period. These toponyms are generally declinable, and that matches other Slavic synthetic idioms. 

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