Aghul language
Aghul is a Northeast Caucasian language spoken by the Aghuls in southern Dagestan, Russia and in Azerbaijan. It is spoken by about 29,300[3] people (2010 census).
Aghul | |
---|---|
агъул чӀал / Ağul ҫ̇al | |
Native to | Russia, also spoken in Azerbaijan |
Region | Southeastern Dagestan |
Ethnicity | Aguls |
Native speakers | 29,300 (2010 census)[1] |
Northeast Caucasian
| |
Cyrillic | |
Official status | |
Official language in | ![]() |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | agx |
Glottolog | aghu1253 [2] |
Classification
Aghul belongs to the Eastern Samur group of the Lezgic branch of the Northeast Caucasian language family.
Geographic distribution
In 2002, Aghul was spoken by 28,300 people in Russia, mainly in Southern Dagestan, as well as 32 people in Azerbaijan.[4]
Phonology
Aghul has contrastive epiglottal consonants.[5] Aghul makes, like many Northeast Caucasian languages, a distinction between tense consonants with concomitant length and weak consonants. The tense consonants are characterized by the intensiveness (tension) of articulation, which naturally leads to a lengthening of the consonant so they are traditionally transcribed with the length diacritic. The gemination of the consonant itself does not create its tension, but morphologically tense consonants often derive from adjoining two single weak consonants. Some Aghul dialects have an especially large number of permitted initial tense consonants.[5]
Consonants
Labial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Pharyn- geal |
Glottal | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
plain | lab. | ||||||||||
Nasal | m | n | |||||||||
Plosive | voiced | b | d | ɡ | |||||||
voiceless | fortis | pː | tː | kː | qː | ||||||
lenis | p | t | k | q | ʡ | ʔ | |||||
ejective | pʼ | tʼ | kʼ | qʼ | |||||||
Affricate | voiced | d͡ʒ | d͡ʒʷ | ||||||||
voiceless | fortis | t͡sː | t͡ʃː | t͡ʃːʷ | |||||||
lenis | t͡s | t͡ʃ | t͡ʃʷ | ||||||||
ejective | t͡sʼ | t͡ʃʼ | t͡ʃʷʼ | ||||||||
Fricative | voiceless | fortis | fː | sː | ʃː | ʃːʷ | xː | χː | |||
lenis | f | s | ʃ | ʃʷ | x | χ | ħ | ||||
voiced | v | z | ʒ | ʒʷ | ʁ | ʢ | ɦ | ||||
Trill | r | ʜ | |||||||||
Approximant | l | j |
- The glottal stop transcribed here is named rather ambiguously a "glottalic laryngeal" by the source.
- The epiglottal stop is included by Omniglot in the phoneme list, but not by Titus Didactica.
- Omniglot says that the lenis voiceless stops are aspirated. It also says that the epiglottals are in fact pharyngeals.[8]
Alphabet
А а | Б б | В в | Г г | Гъ гъ | Гь гь | ГI гI | ||
Д д | Дж дж | Е е | Ё ё | Ж ж | З з | И и | Й й | |
К к | Кк кк | Къ къ | Кь кь | КI кI | Л л | М м | Н н | |
О о | П п | Пп пп | ПI пI | Р р | С с | Т т | Тт тт | |
ТI тI | У у | Уь уь | Ф ф | Х х | Хъ хъ | Хь хь | ХI хI | |
Ц ц | ЦI цI | Ч ч | Чч чч | ЧI чI | Ш ш | Щ щ | ъ | |
I | ы | ь | Э э | Ю ю | Я я |
Grammar
Case
There are four core cases: absolutive, ergative, genitive, and dative, as well as a large series of location cases. All cases other than the absolutive (which is unmarked) and ergative take the ergative suffix before their own suffix.
Adjectives
Independent and predicative adjectives take number marker and class marker; also case if used as nominal. As attribute they are invariable. Thus idžed "good", ergative, idžedi, etc. -n, -s; pl. idžedar; but Idže insandi hhuč qini "The good man killed the wolf" (subject in ergative case).
Pronouns
Personal pronouns
Singular (Aghul) | Plural (Aghul) | Singular (Tokip) | Plural (Tokip) | |
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | zun | čin (ex), xin (in) | či (ex), xi (in) | či, xi |
2 | wun | čun | čun | ču |
Vocabulary
Writing system
Examples
Cyrillic writing
Іисайи пуная гебурис: – ДуьгІе акье миштти: «Дад, Ве ттур гирами хьурай; Ве Паччагьвел адирай. ТІалаб аркьая чин Вакес гьер ягьас гуни. Гъил гьушен че гунагьарилас, чинна гьил гьуршанду кІилди час Іайвелар аркьаттарилас. ХІа темехІера хьас амарта час».[9]
Transliteration
ˡisaji punaja geburis: – Du’gˡe ak’e mištti: "Dad, Ve ttur girami x’uraj; Ve Paččag’vel adiraj. Tˡalab ark’aja čin Vakes g’er jag’as guni. G″il g’ušen če gunag’arilas, činna g’il g’uršandu kˡildi čas ˡajvelar ark’attarilas. Xˡa temexˡera x’as amarta čas." [8]
Translation
And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. Give us day by day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.[10]
References
- Aghul at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
- Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Aghul". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
- "Aghul".
- "Aghul".
- Ladefoged & Maddieson (1996:167–168)
- Magometov, Aleksandr Amarovic. 1970. Agul'skij jazyk: (issledovanie i teksty). Tbilisi: Izdatel'stvo "Mecniereba".
- Gippert, Jost. "Titus Didactica: North-East Caucasian Consonant Systems". titus.fkidg1.uni-frankfurt.de.
- "Photo" (GIF). www.omniglot.com.
- "Aghul lp". Archived from the original on 2011-07-04. Retrieved 2016-07-12.
- "Bible Gateway passage: Luke 11 - King James Version". Bible Gateway.
Bibliography
- Haspelmath, Martin. 1993. A grammar of Lezgian. (Mouton grammar library; 9). Berlin & New York: Mouton de Gruyter. – ISBN 3-11-013735-6
- Ladefoged, Peter; Maddieson, Ian (1996), The Sounds of the World's Languages, Oxford: Blackwell, ISBN 0-631-19815-6
- Talibov, Bukar B. and Magomed M. Gadžiev. 1966. Lezginsko-russkij slovar’. Moskva: Izd. Sovetskaja Ėnciklopedija.
External links
![]() |
Aghul language test of Wikipedia at Wikimedia Incubator |
- Languages of the World report
- UCLA phonetics lab data for Aghul
- Aghul word lists from the UCLA phonetics lab archive
- Aghul basic lexicon at the Global Lexicostatistical Database