Raamatukogu (Raamatukogu)

Library, public library, lit. book collection. Soviet occupation renaming (1950-1989) of Kiriku. While raamat is a loan from old Pskov and Novgorod Russian гра́мота (gramota, book or writing-paper), borrowed from Greek γράμματα (grammata, letters, evolving into modern ‘grammar’), modern Russian for book is кни́га (kniga, said to trace back through Danube-Bulgarian *küiniv and ancient Turkic *küinig to a Chinese word for ‘scroll’). Interestingly, while this part (loosely) of the world’s history uses birch bark as writing substrate (see Tohu), Germanic languages’ ‘book’ comes from Proto-Germanic *bōk(ō)-, from *bokiz (beech) and Italic languages’ ‘liber’‑type words from Latin librum, the inner bark of trees.