The Mari language has two standard forms and various dialects. In this dictionary, the vocabulary of all of these forms of the language is presented in the form of a reverse- alphabetized word list. The main purpose of the dictionary is to serve as a source for the study of derivation and word structure. Reverse dictionaries have already been published of the following Uralic languages: Hungarian (1969), Mansi (1971), Finnish (1972), Estonian (1979), Ludian (1986), Ingrian (1986), Livonian (1988), Votian (1989) and Udmurt (1992). A reverse dictionary of the Mordvin languages is being compiled at the University of Turku. The first reverse-alphabetized word-list of Mari was published in Sebeok, Т. A., Zeps, V. J. (ed.), Concordance and Thesaurus of Cheremis Poetic Language (1961), but the construction of the list was not entirely successful. Another reverse dictionary of Mari, Gordeyev et ак, Обратный словарь марийского языка was printed in Yoshkar-Ola in 2002. Wolfgang Veenker has also published the Verzeichnis der ceremissischen Suffixe und Suffixkombinationen (1975), a reverse-alphabetized list of Mari suffixes.
