Northeast Caucasian languages

The classification of the Northeast Caucasian languages has undergone some reorganization in recent years. The following tree is a typical recent proposal, based on the work of linguist Bernard Comrie and others. Population data is from Ethnologue 15th ed. Northeast Caucasian languages - Nakh family. Spoken in Chechnya, Ingushetia, and Georgia. Chechen and Ingush are official languages of their respective republics. Batsbi (Bats) (3400 speakers) Veinakh languages Chechen (955,00 ...

See also:

Northeast Caucasian languages, Northeast Caucasian languages - Linguistic features, Northeast Caucasian languages - Language classification, Northeast Caucasian languages - Nakh family, Northeast Caucasian languages - Avar-Andi family, Northeast Caucasian languages - Tsez Dido family, Northeast Caucasian languages - Lak isolate, Northeast Caucasian languages - Dargi Dargin dialect continuum, Northeast Caucasian languages - Khinalug Xinalug isolate, Northeast Caucasian languages - Lezgian family, Northeast Caucasian languages - Connections to other families, Northeast Caucasian languages - North Caucasian family, Northeast Caucasian languages - Connections to Hurrian and Urartian, Northeast Caucasian languages - Agricultural vocabulary

Read more here: » Northeast Caucasian languages: Encyclopedia II - Northeast Caucasian languages - Language classification

Urartu (Biainili in Urartian) was an ancient kingdom in eastern Anatolia, centred in the mountainous region around Lake Van (present-day Turkey), which existed from about 1000 BC, or earlier, until 585 BC. The name may correspond to the Biblical Ararat. At its apogee, Urartu stretched from northern Mesopotamia through the southern Caucasus, involving parts of present-day Armenia up to Lake Sevan. Its archaeological sites include Altintepe, Toprakkale, Patnos and Cavustepe. Urartu fortresses are found in Van ...

Including:

• Urartu - Name
• Urartu - History
• Urartu - Origins
• Urartu - Main period
• Urartu - Decadence
• Urartu - Arcaheological rediscovery
• Urartu - Economy and politics
• Urartu - Language
• Urartu - The Urartian legacy
• Urartu - Literature

Read more here: » Urartu: Encyclopedia - Urartu

In phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language that is characterized by an open configuration of the vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure above the glottis. This contrasts with consonants, which are characterized by a constriction or closure at one or more points along the vocal tract. A vowel is also understood to be syllabic: an equivalent open but non-syllabic sound is called a semivowel. In all languages, vowels form the nucleus or peak of syllables, whereas consonants form the onset and (in languag ...

Including:

• Vowel - Articulation
• Vowel - Height
• Vowel - Backness
• Vowel - Roundedness
• Vowel - Nasalization
• Vowel - Phonation
• Vowel - Tongue root retraction
• Vowel - Secondary narrowings in the vocal tract
• Vowel - Tenseness/checked vowels vs. free vowels
• Vowel - Acoustics
• Vowel - Prosody and intonation
• Vowel - Monophthongs diphthongs triphthongs
• Vowel - Vowels in languages
• Vowel - Vowel systems
• Vowel - Written vowels
• Vowel - Written vowels in writing systems

Read more here: » Vowel: Encyclopedia - Vowel

Abkhaz is a Northwest Caucasian language spoken in Abkhazia and Turkey by the Abkhazians. Abkhaz has about 100,000 speakers in Abkhazia with up to 500,000 more living in Turkey. Abkhaz language - Classification. Abkhaz is a Northwest Caucasian language, indicating it originated in the northwest Caucasus. Northwest Caucasian languages have been suggested as being related to the Northeast Caucasian languages and both are often merged under the blanket term "North Caucasian languages." Sometimes North Caucasia ...

Including:

• Abkhaz language - Classification
• Abkhaz language - Geographical distribution
• Abkhaz language - Official status
• Abkhaz language - Dialects
• Abkhaz language - Sounds
• Abkhaz language - Vowels
• Abkhaz language - Typology
• Abkhaz language - Writing system
• Abkhaz language - History
• Abkhaz language - Bibliography

Read more here: » Abkhaz language: Encyclopedia - Abkhaz language

The languages of the Caucasus are a large and extremely varied array of languages spoken by more than ten million people in the Caucasus region of Eastern Europe and Western Asia, between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. Linguistic studies allow those languages to be classified into several language families, with little or no discernible affinity to each other. Some of those language families have no known members outside the Caucasus area. The term Caucasian languages may refer to these families specifically, or more ...

Including:

• Languages of the Caucasus - Language families
• Languages of the Caucasus - Families restricted to the Caucasus area
• Languages of the Caucasus - Families with wider distribution
• Languages of the Caucasus - Proposed higher-level classifications
• Languages of the Caucasus - North Caucasian languages
• Languages of the Caucasus - Ibero-Caucasian languages
• Languages of the Caucasus - Possible affinities with other languages
• Languages of the Caucasus - Hattic
• Languages of the Caucasus - Hurrian and Urartian
• Languages of the Caucasus - Basque
• Languages of the Caucasus - Western Iberian language
• Languages of the Caucasus - Dene-Caucasian family

Read more here: » Languages of the Caucasus: Encyclopedia - Languages of the Caucasus

Like most aspects of Hurrian society, their origins are still a mystery. The Hurrians spoke an agglutinative language, conventionally called Hurrian, unrelated to neighboring Semitic or Indo-European languages, but clearly related to Urartian — a language spoken about a millennium later in northeastern Anatolia — and possibly, very distantly, to the present-day Northeast Caucasian languages. By about 2400 BC, the Hurrians had expanded, perhaps southward from the Zagros Mountains, or from the highlands of Anatolia. In the following ...

See also:

Hurrians, Hurrians - History, Hurrians - Material culture, Hurrians - Impact, Hurrians - Connections and origin theories, Hurrians - Notes, Hurrians - Books

Read more here: » Hurrians: Encyclopedia II - Hurrians - History

The term "polysynthesis" was probably first used in a linguistic sense by Peter Stephen Duponceau (a.k.a. Pierre Étienne Duponceau) in 1819 as a term to describe American languages. "Three principal results have forcibly struck my mind... They are the following: 1. That the American languages in general are rich in grammatical forms, and that in their complicated construction, the greatest order, method and regularity prevail 2. That these complicated forms, which I call polysynthesis, appear ...

See also:

Polysynthetic language, Polysynthetic language - Definition, Polysynthetic language - Origin of term, Polysynthetic language - Examples, Polysynthetic language - Chukchi, Polysynthetic language - Classical Ainu, Polysynthetic language - Western Greenlandic, Polysynthetic language - Northwest Caucasian, Polysynthetic language - Distribution of polysynthetic languages, Polysynthetic language - Theoretical issues, Polysynthetic language - Bibliography

Read more here: » Polysynthetic language: Encyclopedia II - Polysynthetic language - Origin of term

There are five recognized languages in the Northwest Caucasian family: Abkhaz, Abaza, Kabardian or East Circassian, Adyghe or West Circassian, and Ubykh. They are classified as follows: Abkhaz-Abaza dialects Abaza (45,000 speakers) Abkhaz (Abxaz) (110,000) Circassian dialects (Cherkess) Adyghe (Adyge) (500,000) Kabardian (1,000,000) Ubykh (Ubyx) (extinct) Northwest Caucasian languages - Circassian dialect continuum. Circassian (or Cherkess) is a cover term for the series of diale ...

See also:

Northwest Caucasian languages, Northwest Caucasian languages - Main features, Northwest Caucasian languages - Phonetics, Northwest Caucasian languages - Grammar, Northwest Caucasian languages - Classification, Northwest Caucasian languages - Circassian dialect continuum, Northwest Caucasian languages - Abkhaz-Abaza dialect continuum, Northwest Caucasian languages - Ubykh Ubyx language, Northwest Caucasian languages - Relationship to other language families, Northwest Caucasian languages - Connections to Hattic, Northwest Caucasian languages - Connections to Indo-European, Northwest Caucasian languages - North Caucasian family, Northwest Caucasian languages - Higher-level connections

Read more here: » Northwest Caucasian languages: Encyclopedia II - Northwest Caucasian languages - Classification

Following the typology of Aikhenvald (2003), there are two broad types of evidential marking: indirectivity marking ("type I") evidential marking ("type II") The first type (indirectivity) indicates whether or not evidence exists for a given statement, but does not specifiy what kind of evidence. The second type (evidentiality proper) specifies the kind of evidence (such as whether the evidence is visual, reported, or inferred) ...

See also:

Evidentiality, Evidentiality - Grammatical evidentiality, Evidentiality - Types of grammatical evidentiality, Evidentiality - Indirectivity type I, Evidentiality - Evidentiality type II, Evidentiality - Evidential-marking & other categories, Evidentiality - Evidentiality & epistemic modality, Evidentiality - Evidentiality in English non-grammatical, Evidentiality - References and further reading

Read more here: » Evidentiality: Encyclopedia II - Evidentiality - Types of grammatical evidentiality

Urartu - Origins. Assyrian inscriptions of Shalmaneser I (ca. 1270 BC) first mention a loose confederation called the Uruartri or Nairi in North-East Anatolia, in the region around Lake Van. They were repeatedly subjected to attacks by the Assyrians, especially under Tukulti-Ninurta I (ca. 1240 BC), Tiglath-Pileser I (ca. 1100 BC), Ashur-bel-kala (ca. 1070 BC), Adad-nirari II (ca. 900), Tukulti-Ninurta II (ca. 890), and Ashurnasirpal II (883-859 BC). These towns or tribes became a unified kingdom under king Aramu (ca. 860-843 BC), whose capital at Arzashkun was captured by Shalmaneser III. See also:

Urartu, Urartu - Name, Urartu - History, Urartu - Origins, Urartu - Main period, Urartu - Decadence, Urartu - Arcaheological rediscovery, Urartu - Economy and politics, Urartu - Language, Urartu - The Urartian legacy, Urartu - Literature

Read more here: » Urartu: Encyclopedia II - Urartu - History

Since the birth of comparative linguistics in the 19th century, the riddle of the apparently isolated Caucasian language families has attracted the attention of many scholars who have strenuously tried to relate them to other languages outside the Caucasus region. While most linguists do not accept these proposals, there may be connections between the Northwest and Northeast Caucasian families and some extinct languages formerly spoken in Anatolia and ...

See also:

Languages of the Caucasus, Languages of the Caucasus - Language families, Languages of the Caucasus - Families restricted to the Caucasus area, Languages of the Caucasus - Families with wider distribution, Languages of the Caucasus - Proposed higher-level classifications, Languages of the Caucasus - North Caucasian languages, Languages of the Caucasus - Ibero-Caucasian languages, Languages of the Caucasus - Possible affinities with other languages, Languages of the Caucasus - Hattic, Languages of the Caucasus - Hurrian and Urartian, Languages of the Caucasus - Basque, Languages of the Caucasus - Western Iberian language, Languages of the Caucasus - Dene-Caucasian family

Read more here: » Languages of the Caucasus: Encyclopedia II - Languages of the Caucasus - Possible affinities with other languages

Grammatical gender - Algonquian languages. The Ojibwe language and other members of the Algonquian languages distinguish between animate and inanimate classes. Some sources argue that the distinction is between things which are powerful and things which are not. All living things, as well as sacred things and things connected to the Earth are considered powerful and belong to the "animate" class. Still, the assignment is somewhat arbitrary, as "raspberry" is animate, but "strawberry" is ...

See also:

Grammatical gender, Grammatical gender - Types of noun classes, Grammatical gender - Manifestations of noun classes, Grammatical gender - Agreement, Grammatical gender - Morphological marking on nouns, Grammatical gender - Other manifestations, Grammatical gender - Natural gender and grammatical gender, Grammatical gender - Gender agreement and marking of natural gender, Grammatical gender - The role of convention, Grammatical gender - Animals, Grammatical gender - Personal names, Grammatical gender - Noun classes in specific linguistic families, Grammatical gender - Algonquian languages, Grammatical gender - Athabaskan languages, Grammatical gender - Australian Aboriginal languages, Grammatical gender - Caucasian languages, Grammatical gender - Indo-European languages, Grammatical gender - Niger-Congo languages, Grammatical gender - Noun classes in specific languages, Grammatical gender - List of languages without grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - List of languages with grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - Two genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - Three grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - More than three grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - Bibliography

Read more here: » Grammatical gender: Encyclopedia II - Grammatical gender - Noun classes in specific linguistic families

Like the other Northwest Caucasian languages, Abkhaz is very rich in consonants, with 58, but has only a few vowels (either two or three, depending upon the analysis). Below is the IPA phoneme chart for the standard dialect (Abzhuy); the Bzyp dialect has nine additional consonants, and the Sadz dialect has a few less. Labials: p pʼ b v f w m Dentals: t tʼ d n Labialized dentals: See also:

Abkhaz language, Abkhaz language - Classification, Abkhaz language - Geographical distribution, Abkhaz language - Official status, Abkhaz language - Dialects, Abkhaz language - Sounds, Abkhaz language - Vowels, Abkhaz language - Typology, Abkhaz language - Writing system, Abkhaz language - History, Abkhaz language - Bibliography

Read more here: » Abkhaz language: Encyclopedia II - Abkhaz language - Sounds

The articulatory features that distinguish different vowels in a language are said to determine the vowel's quality. Daniel Jones developed the cardinal vowel system to describe vowels in terms of the common features height (vertical dimension), backness (horizontal dimension) and roundedness (lip position). These three parameters are indicated in the schematic IPA vowel diagram on right. There are however still more possible features of vowel quality, such the velum position (nasality), type of vocal fold vibration (phonation), and tongue root position.

See also:

Vowel, Vowel - Articulation, Vowel - Height, Vowel - Backness, Vowel - Roundedness, Vowel - Nasalization, Vowel - Phonation, Vowel - Tongue root retraction, Vowel - Secondary narrowings in the vocal tract, Vowel - Tenseness/checked vowels vs. free vowels, Vowel - Acoustics, Vowel - Prosody and intonation, Vowel - Monophthongs diphthongs triphthongs, Vowel - Vowels in languages, Vowel - Vowel systems, Vowel - Written vowels, Vowel - Written vowels in writing systems

Read more here: » Vowel: Encyclopedia II - Vowel - Articulation

A vowel sound whose quality doesn't change over the duration of the vowel is called a monophthong. Monophthongs are sometimes called "pure" or "stable" vowels. A vowel sound that glides from one quality to another is called a diphthong, and a vowel sound that glides between three qualities is a triphthong. All languages have monophthongs and many languages have diphthongs, but triphthongs or vowel sounds with even more target qualities are relatively rare cross-linguistically. English has all three types: the vowel sound in hit ...

See also:

Vowel, Vowel - Articulation, Vowel - Height, Vowel - Backness, Vowel - Roundedness, Vowel - Nasalization, Vowel - Phonation, Vowel - Tongue root retraction, Vowel - Secondary narrowings in the vocal tract, Vowel - Tenseness/checked vowels vs. free vowels, Vowel - Acoustics, Vowel - Prosody and intonation, Vowel - Monophthongs, diphthongs, triphthongs, Vowel - Vowels in languages, Vowel - Vowel systems, Vowel - Written vowels, Vowel - Written vowels in writing systems

Read more here: » Vowel: Encyclopedia II - Vowel - Monophthongs, diphthongs, triphthongs

The semantic significance of vowels varies widely depending on the language. In some languages, particularly Semitic languages, vowels mostly serve to denote inflections. This is similar to English man vs. men. In fact, the alphabets used to write the Semitic languages, such as the Hebrew alphabet and the Arabic alphabet, do not ordinarily mark all the vowels. These alphabets are called abjads. Although it is possible to construct simple English sentences that can be understood without written vowels (cn y rd ths?), extended pa ...

See also:

Vowel, Vowel - Articulation, Vowel - Height, Vowel - Backness, Vowel - Roundedness, Vowel - Nasalization, Vowel - Phonation, Vowel - Tongue root retraction, Vowel - Secondary narrowings in the vocal tract, Vowel - Tenseness/checked vowels vs. free vowels, Vowel - Acoustics, Vowel - Prosody and intonation, Vowel - Monophthongs diphthongs triphthongs, Vowel - Vowels in languages, Vowel - Vowel systems, Vowel - Written vowels, Vowel - Written vowels in writing systems

Read more here: » Vowel: Encyclopedia II - Vowel - Vowels in languages

The name "vowel" is often used for the symbols used for representing vowel sounds in a language's writing system, particularly if the language uses an alphabet. In the Latin alphabet, the vowel letters are usually A, E, I, O, U, and in some languages Y, as in English and W, as in Welsh. There is necessarily not a direct one-to-one correspondence between the vowel sounds of a language and the vowel letters. Many languages that use a form of the Latin alphabet have more vowel sounds than ...

See also:

Vowel, Vowel - Articulation, Vowel - Height, Vowel - Backness, Vowel - Roundedness, Vowel - Nasalization, Vowel - Phonation, Vowel - Tongue root retraction, Vowel - Secondary narrowings in the vocal tract, Vowel - Tenseness/checked vowels vs. free vowels, Vowel - Acoustics, Vowel - Prosody and intonation, Vowel - Monophthongs diphthongs triphthongs, Vowel - Vowels in languages, Vowel - Vowel systems, Vowel - Written vowels, Vowel - Written vowels in writing systems

Read more here: » Vowel: Encyclopedia II - Vowel - Written vowels

Northwest Caucasian languages - Phonetics. The entire family is characterised by a paucity of phonemic vowels (two or three, depending upon the analysis) coupled with rich consonantal systems that include many forms of secondary articulation. Ubykh (Ubyx), for example, had both the minimal number of vowels (two), and probably the largest inventory of consonants outside Southern Africa. Linguistic reconstructions suggest that both the richness of the consonantal systems and the poverty of the vocalic system ...

See also:

Northwest Caucasian languages, Northwest Caucasian languages - Main features, Northwest Caucasian languages - Phonetics, Northwest Caucasian languages - Grammar, Northwest Caucasian languages - Classification, Northwest Caucasian languages - Circassian dialect continuum, Northwest Caucasian languages - Abkhaz-Abaza dialect continuum, Northwest Caucasian languages - Ubykh Ubyx language, Northwest Caucasian languages - Relationship to other language families, Northwest Caucasian languages - Connections to Hattic, Northwest Caucasian languages - Connections to Indo-European, Northwest Caucasian languages - North Caucasian family, Northwest Caucasian languages - Higher-level connections

Read more here: » Northwest Caucasian languages: Encyclopedia II - Northwest Caucasian languages - Main features

The use of gender-based classification of nouns (as is common in Indo-European and Semitic) languages can sometimes be confusing, because the mere fact that a language distinguishes between men and women in some way does not mean it uses gender to grammatically classify nouns. All languages represent natural gender - the biological distinction between men and women - in some way. These distinctions can exist at various levels. e.g., male and female, man and woman, uncle and aunt Even Finnish, ...

See also:

Grammatical gender, Grammatical gender - Types of noun classes, Grammatical gender - Manifestations of noun classes, Grammatical gender - Agreement, Grammatical gender - Morphological marking on nouns, Grammatical gender - Other manifestations, Grammatical gender - Natural gender and grammatical gender, Grammatical gender - Gender agreement and marking of natural gender, Grammatical gender - The role of convention, Grammatical gender - Animals, Grammatical gender - Personal names, Grammatical gender - Noun classes in specific linguistic families, Grammatical gender - Algonquian languages, Grammatical gender - Athabaskan languages, Grammatical gender - Australian Aboriginal languages, Grammatical gender - Caucasian languages, Grammatical gender - Indo-European languages, Grammatical gender - Niger-Congo languages, Grammatical gender - Noun classes in specific languages, Grammatical gender - List of languages without grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - List of languages with grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - Two genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - Three grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - More than three grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - Bibliography

Read more here: » Grammatical gender: Encyclopedia II - Grammatical gender - Natural gender and grammatical gender

Grammatical gender - List of languages without grammatical genders/noun classes. This is an incomplete list, which may never be able to satisfy certain standards for completeness. Revisions and additions are welcome. Afrikaans Armenian Basque Bengali Bislama Bugis Burmese Cebuano Central Yup'ik Chinese Chol English English ...

See also:

Grammatical gender, Grammatical gender - Types of noun classes, Grammatical gender - Manifestations of noun classes, Grammatical gender - Agreement, Grammatical gender - Morphological marking on nouns, Grammatical gender - Other manifestations, Grammatical gender - Natural gender and grammatical gender, Grammatical gender - Gender agreement and marking of natural gender, Grammatical gender - The role of convention, Grammatical gender - Animals, Grammatical gender - Personal names, Grammatical gender - Noun classes in specific linguistic families, Grammatical gender - Algonquian languages, Grammatical gender - Athabaskan languages, Grammatical gender - Australian Aboriginal languages, Grammatical gender - Caucasian languages, Grammatical gender - Indo-European languages, Grammatical gender - Niger-Congo languages, Grammatical gender - Noun classes in specific languages, Grammatical gender - List of languages without grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - List of languages with grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - Two genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - Three grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - More than three grammatical genders/noun classes, Grammatical gender - Bibliography

Read more here: » Grammatical gender: Encyclopedia II - Grammatical gender - Noun classes in specific languages