Khitan or Kitan ( in large script or in

small Small means of insignificant size Size in general is the Magnitude (mathematics), magnitude or dimensions of a thing. More specifically, ''geometrical size'' (or ''spatial size'') can refer to three geometrical measures: length, area, or ...

, ''Khitai''; , ''Qìdānyǔ''), also known as Liao, is an extinct language once spoken in

Northeast Asia Northeast Asia or Northeastern Asia is a geographical Subregion#Asia, subregion of Asia. Its northeastern landmass and islands are bounded by the Pacific Ocean, North Pacific Ocean. The term Northeast Asia was popularized during the 1930s by Ame ...

by the

Khitan people The Khitan people (Khitan small script: ; ) were a historical Eurasian nomads, nomadic people from Northeast Asia who, from the 4th century, inhabited an area corresponding to parts of modern Mongolia, Northeast China and the Russian Far East. ...

(4th to 13th century CE). It was the official language of the Liao Empire (907–1125) and the

Qara Khitai The Qara Khitai, or Kara Khitai ( zh, t=喀喇契丹, s=哈剌契丹, p=Kālā Qìdān or zh, c=黑契丹, p=Hēi Qìdān, l=Black Khitan, links=no), also known as the Western Liao ( zh, t=西遼, p=Xī Liáo, links=no), officially the Great L ...

(1124–1218). Owing to a narrow corpus of known words and a partially undeciphered script, the language has yet to be completely reconstructed.

Classification

Khitan appears to have been related to the

Mongolic languages The Mongolic languages are a language family spoken by the Mongolic peoples in North Asia, East Asia, Central Asia, and Eastern Europe mostly in Mongolia and surrounding areas and in Kalmykia and Buryatia. The best-known member of this languag ...

;

Juha Janhunen Juha Antero Janhunen (born 12 February 1952) is a Finnish linguist whose wide interests include Uralic and Mongolic languages. Since 1994, he has been Professor in East Asian studies at the University of Helsinki. He has done fieldwork on Samo ...

states: "Today, however, the conception is gaining support that Khitan was a language in some respects radically different from the historically known Mongolic languages. If this view proves to be correct, Khitan is, indeed, best classified as a

Para-Mongolic Para-Mongolic is a proposed group of languages that is considered to be an extinct sister branch of the Mongolic languages. Para-Mongolic contains certain historically attested extinct languages, among them Khitan language, Khitan and Tuyuhun lang ...

language."

Alexander Vovin Alexander Vladimirovich Vovin (; 27 January 1961 – 8 April 2022) was a Soviet-born Russian-American linguist and philologist, and director of studies at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS) in Paris, France. He wa ...

(2017) argues that Khitan has several Koreanic loanwords. Since both the Korean

Goryeo Goryeo (; ) was a Korean state founded in 918, during a time of national division called the Later Three Kingdoms period, that unified and ruled the Korea, Korean Peninsula until the establishment of Joseon in 1392. Goryeo achieved what has b ...

dynasty and the Khitan Liao dynasty claimed to be successors of

Goguryeo Goguryeo (37 BC – 668 AD) (; ; Old Korean: Guryeo) also later known as Goryeo (; ; Middle Korean: 고ᇢ롕〮, ''kwòwlyéy''), was a Korean kingdom which was located on the northern and central parts of the Korea, Korean Peninsula an ...

, it is possible that the Koreanic words in Khitan were borrowed from the language of Goguryeo.

Script

Khitan was written using two mutually exclusive

writing system A writing system comprises a set of symbols, called a ''script'', as well as the rules by which the script represents a particular language. The earliest writing appeared during the late 4th millennium BC. Throughout history, each independen ...

s known as the

Khitan large script The Khitan large script () was one of two writing systems used for the now-extinct Khitan language (the other was the Khitan small script). It was used during the 10th–12th centuries by the Khitan people, who had created the Liao Empire in no ...

and the

Khitan small script The Khitan small script () was one of two writing systems used for the now-extinct Khitan language. It was used during the 10th–12th century by the Khitan people, who had created the Liao Empire in present-day northeastern China. In addition to ...

. The small script, which was a

syllabary In the Linguistics, linguistic study of Written language, written languages, a syllabary is a set of grapheme, written symbols that represent the syllables or (more frequently) mora (linguistics), morae which make up words. A symbol in a syllaba ...

, was used until the Jurchen-speaking

Jin dynasty (1115–1234) The Jin dynasty (, ), officially known as the Great Jin (), was a Jurchen people, Jurchen-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and empire ruled by the Wanyan clan that existed between 1115 and 1234. It is also often called the ...

replaced it with the

Jurchen script The Jurchen script (Jurchen: ; ) was the writing system used to write the Jurchen language, the language of the Jurchen people who created the Jin Empire in northeastern China in the 12th–13th centuries. It was derived from the Khitan scrip ...

in 1191. The large script was

logographic In a written language, a logogram (from Ancient Greek 'word', and 'that which is drawn or written'), also logograph or lexigraph, is a written character that represents a semantic component of a language, such as a word or morpheme. Chinese c ...

like Chinese.

Records

Prior to the 19th century, only one Khitan text, the Langjun inscription, was known to scholarship in China; however, the inscription was thought by Ming and Qing scholars to be written in the Jurchen script. The '' History of Liao'' contains a volume of Khitan words transcribed in

Chinese characters Chinese characters are logographs used Written Chinese, to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represe ...

titled "Glossary of National Language" (國語解). It is found in Chapter 116. The

Qianlong Emperor The Qianlong Emperor (25 September 17117 February 1799), also known by his temple name Emperor Gaozong of Qing, personal name Hongli, was the fifth Emperor of China, emperor of the Qing dynasty and the fourth Qing emperor to rule over China pr ...

of the

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

erroneously identified the Khitan people and their language with the Solons, leading him to use the Solon language to "correct" Chinese character transcriptions of Khitan names in the ''History of Liao'' in his ''Imperial Liao-Jin-Yuan Three Histories National Language Explanation'' (欽定遼金元三史國語解) project. The Liao dynasty referred to the Khitan language with the term Guoyu (國語, "National language"), which was also used by other non-

Han Chinese The Han Chinese, alternatively the Han people, are an East Asian people, East Asian ethnic group native to Greater China. With a global population of over 1.4 billion, the Han Chinese are the list of contemporary ethnic groups, world's la ...

dynasties in China to refer to their languages like

Manchu The Manchus (; ) are a Tungusic peoples, Tungusic East Asian people, East Asian ethnic group native to Manchuria in Northeast Asia. They are an officially recognized Ethnic minorities in China, ethnic minority in China and the people from wh ...

of the Qing,

Classical Mongolian Classical Mongolian was the literary language of Mongolian that was first introduced shortly after 1600, when Ligdan Khan set his clergy the task of translating the whole of the Tibetan Buddhist canon, consisting of the Kangyur and Tengyur, into ...

during the

Yuan dynasty The Yuan dynasty ( ; zh, c=元朝, p=Yuáncháo), officially the Great Yuan (; Mongolian language, Mongolian: , , literally 'Great Yuan State'), was a Mongol-led imperial dynasty of China and a successor state to the Mongol Empire after Div ...

, Jurchen during the Jin, and

Xianbei The Xianbei (; ) were an ancient nomadic people that once resided in the eastern Eurasian steppes in what is today Mongolia, Inner Mongolia, and Northeastern China. The Xianbei were likely not of a single ethnicity, but rather a multiling ...

during the

Northern Wei Wei (), known in historiography as the Northern Wei ( zh, c=北魏, p=Běi Wèi), Tuoba Wei ( zh, c=拓跋魏, p=Tuòbá Wèi), Yuan Wei ( zh, c=元魏, p=Yuán Wèi) and Later Wei ( zh, t=後魏, p=Hòu Wèi), was an Dynasties of China, impe ...

. Even today,

Mandarin Mandarin or The Mandarin may refer to: Language * Mandarin Chinese, branch of Chinese originally spoken in northern parts of the country ** Standard Chinese or Modern Standard Mandarin, the official language of China ** Taiwanese Mandarin, Stand ...

is referred to in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

as Guoyu.

Vocabulary

There are several closed systems of Khitan lexical items for which systematic information is available. The following is a list of words in these closed systems that are similar to Mongolic. Mongolian and Daur equivalents are given after the English translation:

Seasons

Numerals

Animals

Directions

Time

Personal relations

Tribal administration

Basic verbs

Natural objects

The Liaoshi records in Chapter 53: 'Tao Saiyier' corresponds to Mongolian 'tavan sar' (fifth moon/month).

References

Bibliography

* *

External links

New Developments of the Studies on Khitai Language and Khitai Scripts
{{DEFAULTSORT:Khitan Language Languages attested from the 10th century Agglutinative languages Mongolic–Khitan languages Languages of China Medieval languages Extinct languages of Asia

Language Language is a structured system of communication that consists of grammar and vocabulary. It is the primary means by which humans convey meaning, both in spoken and signed language, signed forms, and may also be conveyed through writing syste ...