In Old Russian "" was a standard greeting which is still present in Russian folk fairy tales. In Czech and Slovak, 'Ahoj' () is a commonly used as an informal greeting, comparable to ""Hello"". It was borrowed from English and became popular among people engaged in water sports. It gained wide currency by the 1930s. Two discoveries in Middle High German literature reveal interjections similar to "ahoi". Their forms show no links to the middle English form "hoy" and their meanings offer little connection to the call used to establish contact. In around 1290 Heinrich von Freiberg used the form "ahiu" twice in his adaptation of Tristan as a greeting: "ahiu, Parmenois Tristan!", alongside "ahiu, wie schône sie het sich ûz gefêgetieret", English: "ahiu, how prettily she has dressed!". "Ahiu" has the same meaning as the interjections "ahiv, ahiw" and "hiu", which occur in this text as well. As part of a group of words consisting of "ahî, ay" and "ahei", which express pain, desire and admiration, "ahiu" can be found before exclamative or optative sentences and in emphatic greetings. Between 1331 and 1341, in his work "Kronike von Pruzinlant", Nikolaus von Jeroschin inserted the expression "â hui! sô wêr ich hôchgemût / sô ich ir stirne sêhe blôz". Ahui, together with "aheia, ahi" and "ahu", belongs to a group of words that express incommensurable joy, esteem and similar positive attitudes. Seamen had been using ahoy long before the first recorded use in print in well-known seafaring songs or Shanties. There is a lack of research into handwritten letters and records from seamen. Therefore, printed works concerning the use of the "Ahoy"-word family have only restricted significance regarding the temporal and geographical distribution. "Ahoy" represents the original English form and its first maritime use was recorded in 1751 as a new word in nautical language. The first evidence for the German word "ahoi" is found in 1828. Ahoy is widely used in the Northern and Baltic Maritime World. It expresses semantically a change in distance or presupposes it.