Hertevin is a dialect of Northeastern Neo-Aramaic originally spoken by Chaldean Catholics in a cluster of villages in Siirt Province in southeastern

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

. Speakers of Hértevin Aramaic have emigrated mostly to the West, and are now scattered and isolated from one another. A few speakers remain in Turkey. The closest related language variety is Bohtan Neo-Aramaic.THE STORY OF MEM U ZINE IN THE NEO-ARAMAIC DIALECT OF BOHTAN SE Fox - … LINGUISTICS PRESENTED TO GENE B. GRAGG, 2007 https://oi.uchicago.edu/sites/oi.uchicago.edu/files/uploads/shared/docs/saoc60.pdf#page=97 Hertevin also shares many similarities with

Turoyo Turoyo (), also referred to as Surayt (), or modern Suryoyo (), is a Central Neo-Aramaic language traditionally spoken by the Syriac Christian community in the Tur Abdin region located in southeastern Turkey and in northeastern Syria. Turoyo ...

Origins

Hértevin was 'discovered' by linguist Otto Jastrow in 1970, and first described in publication by him two years later. His recordings of the language are available o
Heidelberg University's Semitic Sound Archive
The speakers of the Hértevin dialect of Neo-Aramaic are traditionally Chaldean Catholics. Their area of habitation in and around the village of Hertevin (called Hertevinler in Turkish and Härtəvən in Kurdish), near the town of Pervari in Siirt Province is at the very northeastern extreme of the area where Eastern Neo-Aramaic languages were traditionally spoken. Thus, Hértevin is a peripheral dialect that has developed quite differently from related languages. All Hértevin speakers are bilingual in Kurdish, and many also speak other languages. The

Syriac alphabet The Syriac alphabet ( ) is a writing system primarily used to write the Syriac language since the 1st century. It is one of the Semitic languages, Semitic abjads descending from the Aramaic alphabet through the Palmyrene alphabet, and shares sim ...

is used for writing, but almost no literature in the Hértevin dialect exists. Church liturgy is in Syriac.

Phonology

Its major phonetic feature is the loss of the

voiceless velar fricative The voiceless velar fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. It was part of the consonant inventory of Old English and can still be found in some dialects of English, most notably in Scottish English, e.g. in ''lo ...

''x'', which has become a

voiceless pharyngeal fricative The voiceless pharyngeal fricative is a type of consonantal sound, used in some Speech communication, spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is an h with stroke, h-bar, , and the equivalent ...

, ''ħ''. The original voiceless pharyngeal fricative has retained that pronunciation. In all the other dialects of eastern Neo-Aramaic the opposite is true: the voiceless pharyngeal fricative has been lost and merged with the voiceless velar fricative. /x/ does occur in loanwords to Hertevin. The [] and [] that occur in some other dialects of NENA merged back to [t] and [d]. Another feature of Hértevin Neo-Aramaic is its set of demonstratives. As with other languages of the eastern group, Hértevin makes no distinction between 'this' and 'that', and uses a single set of

pronoun In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun (Interlinear gloss, glossed ) is a word or a group of words that one may substitute for a noun or noun phrase. Pronouns have traditionally been regarded as one of the part of speech, parts of speech, but so ...

s to cover both meanings: āwa (m. sg.), āya (f. sg.) and āni (pl.). However, unlike the other languages, Hértevin has developed an emphatic form of these pronouns that indicates 'this one right here': ōhā, ēhā and anhī. Although belonging to the eastern, or northeastern, group of Neo-Aramaic dialects, Hértevin shares some features with the

Turoyo language Turoyo (), also referred to as Surayt (), or modern Suryoyo (), is a Central Neo-Aramaic language traditionally spoken by the Syriac Christian community in the Tur Abdin region located in southeastern Turkey and in northeastern Syria. Turoyo ...

, of the central group, originating from nearby

Mardin Province Mardin Province (; ; ; ) is a province and metropolitan municipality in Turkey. Its area is 8,780 km2, and its population is 870,374 (2022). The largest city in the province is Kızıltepe, while the capital Mardin is the second largest ci ...

. * They are phonetically noted as long sounds * and are phonetically slightly lowered as and . * can be raised to when preceding a pharyngeal , and an unstressed can be heard as a more front when preceding.

References

External links

Semitisches Tonarchiv: Dokumentgruppe "Aramäisch/Neuostaramäisch (christl.)" (text in German)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hertevin Language Eastern Aramaic languages Christian Northeastern Neo-Aramaic dialects Languages of Turkey Endangered Afroasiatic languages Languages of Kurdistan

Origins

Phonology

See also

References

Further reading

External links