Orkhon Turkic language
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Orkhon Turkic (also Göktürk) is the language used in the oldest known written Turkic texts. It is the first stage of
Old Turkic Old Turkic (also East Old Turkic, Orkhon Turkic language, Old Uyghur) is the earliest attested form of the Turkic languages, found in Göktürks, Göktürk and Uyghur Khaganate inscriptions dating from about the eighth to the 13th century. It ...
, preceding
Old Uyghur Old Uyghur () was a Turkic language which was spoken in Qocho from the 9th–14th centuries and in Gansu. History The Old Uyghur language evolved from Old Turkic after the Uyghur Khaganate broke up and remnants of it migrated to Turfan, Qomu ...
. It is generally used for the language in which the Orkhon and Yenisei inscriptions are written.


Vocabulary

Most of the vocabulary includes words of Turkic origin in Orkhon Turkic. In addition, a few words used are based on origin languages such as Sogdian and
Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...
. Mehmet Ölmez claims that about 20% of the vocabulary in Orkhon Turkic comes from neighboring cultures. The borrowed words of the Orkhon Turkic period include Chinese, Sogdian, Mongolian, and
Tibetan Tibetan may mean: * of, from, or related to Tibet * Tibetan people, an ethnic group * Tibetan language: ** Classical Tibetan, the classical language used also as a contemporary written standard ** Standard Tibetan, the most widely used spoken dial ...
loanwords, although primarily Chinese. In the period of Old Uyghur Turkic that will come right after, Sogdian loanwords increase exponentially. The main reason for the increase of Sogdian influence is that the Uyghurs accepted the Mani religion. In this context, we can say that Orkhon Turkic has a vocabulary that is less influenced by Sogdian and more heavily influenced by Chinese.


Phonology

Orkhon Turkic is a Shaz Turkic language, also a d-type Turkic language (''e.g; Turkish: ayak, Chuvash: ура (ura) but Old Turkic: 𐰑𐰴 (adaq)'') which belongs to the Siberian Turkic branch. Orkhon Turkic sometimes has long vowels.


Dialects

Turkic people used a common literary language in the 5th-8th centuries, but there were some differences. It is possible to examine the Orkhon Turkic under two Yenisei and the Classical Orkhon Turkic headings. Orkhon Turkic had two main dialects, both written in
Orkhon script The Old Turkic script (also known as variously Göktürk script, Orkhon script, Orkhon-Yenisey script, Turkic runes) was the alphabet used by the Göktürks and other early Turkic khanates from the 8th to 10th centuries to record the Old Tu ...
.


Yenisei Kyrgyz Inscriptions and the Dialect

The language used in the inscriptions found along the
Yenisei river The Yenisey (russian: Енисе́й, ''Yeniséy''; mn, Горлог мөрөн, ''Gorlog mörön''; Buryat: Горлог мүрэн, ''Gorlog müren''; Tuvan: Улуг-Хем, ''Uluğ-Hem''; Khakas: Ким суғ, ''Kim suğ''; Ket: Ӄук, ...
is called the ''Yenisei Kyrgyz'' ''dialect''. (''See more at Yenisei Inscriptions'')


Phonetic Features

In Yenisei inscriptions, the letters ''e'' and ''i'' change places from time to time. The same change is seen in ''b'' with ''m'', ''g'' with ''k'', ''ş'' with ''s'', and ''z'' with ''s''. It has also been seen once in the letters ''ı'' and ''i''.


Morphonological Features

A completely morphological difference was not detected in the Yenisei Inscriptions. But there are some points: * In Orkhon inscriptions, the case of direction takes the suffix ''-a/-e'' after the possessive suffix, while in the Yenisei inscriptions it sometimes takes the suffixes ''-qa/-ke/-ğa/-ge'' when the same is the case. * In the locative case, the letters ''l'' and ''n'' sometimes have the suffix ''-te/-ta'' but sometimes the suffix ''-de/-da''. * The past tense begins irregularly, sometimes with a hard consonant and sometimes with a soft consonant.


Orkhon Turkic Inscriptions and the Dialect (Classical)

The language used in the inscriptions, most of which are found along the Orkhon river is called the ''Orkhon Turkic language''. It contains not only tombstones but also diaries describing state events. For this reason, it is richer in terms of language and the language used expertly. (''See more at Orkhon inscriptions'')


Other Inscriptions Written in Orkhon Turkic language


Talas Inscriptions

They are found around the Talas,
Issyk-Kul Issyk-Kul (also Ysyk-Köl, ky, Ысык-Көл, lit=warm lake, translit=Ysyk-Köl, , zh, 伊塞克湖) is an endorheic lake (i.e., without outflow) in the Northern Tian Shan mountains in Eastern Kyrgyzstan. It is the seventh-deepest lake i ...
and
Kochkor Kochkor ( ky, Кочкор; russian: Кочкорка, Kochkorka) is a large village in northern Naryn Region of Kyrgyzstan. It is the administrative centre of Kochkor District. The village was established in 1909 as Stolypino and renamed to Kochko ...
. They were written with the Yenisei variants of the Orkhon alphabet. It is believed that these inscriptions were also written by the Kyrgyzs. The language of the texts used in the inscriptions is the same as the language used in the Orkhon and Yenisei inscriptions. The suffix ''-ka'' after the possessive suffix, which is seen in some of the Yenisei Kyrgyz inscriptions, is not seen in these inscriptions.


References

*Talat Tekin, ''A Grammar of Orkhon Turkic'', Uralic and Altaic Series Vol. 69, Indiana University Publications, Mouton and Co. (1968). (review:
Gerard Clauson Sir Gerard Leslie Makins Clauson (28 April 1891 – 1 May 1974) was an English civil servant, businessman, and Orientalist best known for his studies of the Turkic languages. The eldest son of Major Sir John Eugene Clauson, Gerard Clauson atten ...
, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 1969); Routledge Curzon (1997), . {{Turkic languages Turkic languages Extinct languages of Asia Göktürks Agglutinative languages