Ci uzhe ti esm’ zaděla sъl’uci: on the meaning of the verb zaděti in birch bark letter 752

The article discusses the meaning of the verb zaděti in the Novgorod birch bark letter 752, a woman's letter from the late 11th — first half of the 12th century. Reproaching the addressee for indifference, the author asks with bitter irony whether she zaděla him with her letters sent earlier. Translating letter 752, A. A. Zaliznyak suggested as an equivalent for zaděti the modern verb zadet’ 'to offend', but such an interpretation is not supported by Old East Slavic material; in addition, the feeling of resentment seems inappropriate as a person's emotional reaction to excessive attention. This forces us to give preference to the “backup” hypothesis put forward by A. A. Zaliznyak in his comments to the letter, namely, to consider the meaning of the verb close to the meaning ‘to burden’. In developing this hypothesis, the article puts forward and substantiates the assumption that, while the basic meaning of zaděti, recorded in the dictionaries, is ‘to fasten some object to a person’s body so that the person can carry it’, in the text of letter 752 this verb is used in the figurative sense based on the metaphor of a heavy load hanging over the shoulders
and expresses the meaning ‘to burden with the duty to meet’ or ‘to be a burden’.