Languages of Caucasus

[Sergiu]

Hi language lovers!

I was all the time interested in languages of the Caucasus. There is an old saying that Caucasus has nothing than languages. Also it is commonly argued that a major factor of the instability in the region is the language diversity.

So, what's the problem with these languages? Does anybody really think that this language diversity is one, of the many premises, that caused the wars during the history, three recent wars in Chechnya and the proliferation of terrorism in the region?

I would like to offer the background for a future discussion on this topic.



The indigenous language families of the Caucasus are:

• Kartvelian or South Caucasian, a family about 4500 years old comprising Georgian and its three sister languages. It probably dispersed in the vicinity of central to eastern Georgia, in the foothills or southern plains. Georgian has a written history going back to the creation of a special alphabet after Georgia became Christianized in the fourth century; the same alphabet is still used. Most Georgians and other Kartvelians are Christians, but some of those in the south are Muslim.

• Northwest Caucasian or Abkhaz-Adyghe (or Abkhaz-Circassian), a family of uncertain age (evidently older than the Romance or Slavic families and younger than Indo-European, which is about 6000 years old) with three or four daughter languages. The structural type of this family is exotic in Eurasia. It may have dispersed near the Black Sea coast. Speakers of Northwest Caucasian languages are mostly Muslims. There are sizable diasporic communities in Turkey and elsewhere in the Near East, descendants of emigrants from the Russian conquest of the Caucasus in the 19th century; they retain the languages to varying extents.

• Northeast Caucasian or Nakh-Daghestanian, a much-diversified family about 6000 years of age, with some 30 daughter languages spoken in the central and eastern Caucasus. It probably dispersed in the southeastern foothills of the Caucasus, near the Caspian Sea and in present-day Azerbaijan. Islam spread into Azerbaijan early and from there to the northern Caucasus, reaching the Chechen and Ingush in the 17th-18th centuries. Though most speakers of Northeast Caucasian languages are Muslims, the Udi (who now inhabit three villages in Azerbaijan and Georgia and are remnants of a larger pre-Georgian population) are monophysite Christians. There are sizable Chechen-Ingush diasporic communities in Turkey and Jordan, descendants of emigrants and deportees from the Russian conquest of the Caucasus in the 19th century; they retain the language, generally quite well.

Languages not indigenous to the Caucasus but long resident there include:

• Ossetic, a member of the northeastern branch of the Iranian subfamily of Indo-European. A descendant of the Alanic division of Sarmatian, which was part of the Scythian state of the Iron Age steppe, it straddles the Caucasus across the central pass and must have entered during the first millennium BCE.

• Karachay-Balkar, two closely related dialects of northwestern Turkic. Now spoken in the western central highlands of the northern slope, they must have come into the Caucasus after the spread of Kipchak Turkic to the western steppe in the early middle ages.

• Kumyk, another Turkic language of the northeastern lowlands which also entered the area in the early middle ages. The Kumyk people may well descend from the Khazars, Turkic speakers whose empire extended from the Volga to the Daghestan foothills, but the Kumyk language itself goes back to the Kipchak Turkic that began spreading into the North Caucasian steppe in the middle ages.

• Azerbaijani (Azeri), a Southwest Turkic language that spread from Central Asia to formerly Iranian-speaking Azerbaijan in about the ninth century. Azerbaijan has been culturally important since the time of the ancient Persian empire, and Islam spread here early. Thelanguage has been written since the 14th century, originally in the Arabic script.

• Tat, a southwestern Iranian language spoken in Azerbaijan and along the Caspian littoral. It is a survivor of the Iranian-speaking population that was dominant in Azerbaijan before the spread of Turkic, and is spoken now by Jewish, Muslim, and Christian enclaves.

• Talysh, a northwestern Iranian language spoken in Azerbaijan and also a survivor of a pre-Turkic language.

• Armenian, an independent branch of Indo-European. The Armenian language spread into the former kingdom of Urartu in the seventh century BCE. Armenia converted to Christianity in 300 AD, and an Armenian alphabet was created not long thereafter, originally as a vehicle for disseminating Christianity. The oldest surviving documents in classical Armenian date to the ninth and tenth centuries. The language has been written more or less continuously since then, and the original alphabet has been retained.

• The ancient Urartean language and its still earlier ancestor Hurrian, attested in cuneiform inscriptions. The range of Urartean was approximately the territory of medieval Armenia.

Sergiu,o):-?

[Montekristo]

Hello Sergiu,

Let me say you chosen a very difficult topic. I hardly can imagine that there is somebody acknowledged with this issue, though we can try to analyze it in different ways to the extent our knowledge allows us to di it

On my side I know little about this issue. I know that there are always happening bad things, but never thought it may be because of languages. Chechnya is struggling for independence, there is also this conflict with Nagornyi Karabah and in Georgia with Abkgazia and Ossetia. perhaps one reason is indeed languages, but I think there is much more than that. Ethnic cleansing and other issues are more important, though they derive from languages differencies, cultural diffrences, wealth disparities, etc.

So I don't really know if we can imply that languages in Caucasus play a major role in the breeding of conflicts, terrorism and so on. Perhaps somebody is of other opinion. let's see what people think about this!

Yours always,
Montekristo

[Ethnotour]

Hi Sergiu,thenks for the thread ,it's realy a very interesting theme.

Originally Posted by Sergiu

Hi language lovers!
I was all the time interested in languages of the Caucasus. There is an old saying that Caucasus has nothing than languages. Also it is commonly argued that a major factor of the instability in the region is the language diversity.

Partly this saying is right but ,Caucasus has not only languages,but a very rich culture and a very unique social structure.Caucasus region is also one of the most fascinating on earth, what is rich with its intense diversity of languages, its wild beauty, and its celebrated liquors. In recent years, it has also become one of the most troubled regions, as ethnic conflicts have proliferated.
The languages you've mentioned are just the small part of the languages of Caucasus.There are some nations ,whose number are less then 3000.
The nations that comprise today's Caucasus include Armenia,Georgia, Azerbaijan, and parts of Russia( Krasnodar Krai, Stavropol Krai and the autonomous republics Adygea, Kalmykia, Karachay-Cherkessia, Kabardino-Balkaria, North Ossetia, Ingushetia, Chechnya and Dagestan). The northern section of the Caucasus is known as the Ciscaucasus, and the southern as the Transcaucasus.

In Greek mythology, the Caucasus, or Kaukasos was one of the pillars supporting the world. Prometheus was chained there by Zeus. The Roman poet Ovid placed Caucasus in Scythia and depicted it as a cold and stony mountain which was the abode of personified hunger.

I have a rich staff of this theme ,and I'll share it with you ,soon.

[Anubis]

:'o I think it's quite possible that people may use language specificity to unleash a war to serve their evel purposes. And unfortunately they are quite successful at it. Because they may as well understand that a separate language is a separate culture with its traditions, customs, indigenous traits and properties, all of them interdepending and bound with the language...and play the cards.
If two religions might cause a war, the differences between languages, provided with all the dependants, do also cause it in reality, though the very same languages should unite us, and make the life more colourful through it's linguistic wealthy difersity.

[Sergiu]

Hi guys,

I can see some of you got interested in this subject. I agree with Ecotour that there are a lot more languages in this region, but I "followed the book of law" and referred to the most important ones and which have a large number of speakers. But of course, this language diversity is much more perceived as you get deeper into the subject.

History played a huge role in the development of this region and there were lots of turmoils, wars and this as well as other factors have had a big impact on the languages of Caucasus.

But if you think about nowadays politics in this region, how would you link it to language issue and what would be the basic assumptions?

Sergiu,o):-?