Pamir languages
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The Pamir languages are a subgroup of the Iranian languages, spoken in the Pamir Mountains, primarily along the Panj River and its tributaries in the southern Gorno-Badakhshan region of Tajikistan around the administrative center Khorog (), and the neighboring Badakhshan province and is in Pamir Area Afghanistan.
Members of the group are Shughni, Sarikoli, Yazgulyam, Munji, Sanglechi-Ishkashmi, Wakhi, and Yidgha. These are Southeastern Iranian languages and have the Subject Object Verb syntactic typology. The vast majority of their speakers are bilingual in the Tajik language (one of the Southwestern Iranian (Persid) languages. Sarikoli is spoken further east, beyond the Sarikol ridge which forms the border of Badakhshan of Afghanistan and China, and is thus the eastern most of the extant Iranian languages. The group is endangered, with total number of speakers roughly around 100,000 (as of 1990).
The Bulgar language spoken by the ancestors of modern-day Bulgarians is believed by some to have been a Pamir language before being replaced by Turkic. After the Bulgars migrated to the Balkans in 7th century, Bulgars were assimilated by the local Slavs and adopted their South Slavic language, from which modern Bulgarian developed.
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[edit] Shugni-Yazgulami
The Shughni, Sarikoli, and Yazgulyam languages belong to the Shugni-Yazgulami sub-branch. There are about 75,000 speakers of languages in this family in Afghanistan and Tajikstan (including the dialects of Rushani, Oroshani, Bartangi, Oroshor, Khufi, and Shughni). As of 1982, there were about 20,000 speakers of Sarikoli in the Sarikol Valley located in the Tashkorgan Tajik Autonomous County in Xinjiang Province, China. Shughni and Sarikoli are not mutually intelligible. In 1994, there were 4000 speakers of Yazgulyam along the Yazgulyam River in Tajikistan. Yazgulyam is not written.
[edit] Munji
The Munji language is closely related to Yidgha, and in 1992 there were around 2500 speakers in the Munjan and Mamalgha Valleys of northeastern Afghanistan.
[edit] Sanglechi-Ishkashimi
There are about 2500 speakers of Sanglechi-Ishkashmi in Afghanistan and Tajikistan (dialects: Sanglechi, Ishkashmi, Zebaki). Sanglechi-Ishkashimi is not a written language.
[edit] Wakhi
There are around 29,000 speakers of the Wakhi language in Afghanistan, Tajikistan, China, and possibly still in Pakistan.
[edit] Yidgha
There are about 6000 speakers of Yidgha in Pakistan. Yidgha is closely related to the Munji language of Afghanistan.
[edit] Vanji
The Vanji language was spoken in the Vanj river valley the Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Province in Tajikistan. In the 19th century the region was forcibly annexed to the Bukharan Emirate and a violent assimilation campaign was undertaken. By the end of the 19th century the Vanji language had disappeared.
[edit] See also
[edit] Literature
- Payne, John, "Pamir languages" in Compendium Linguarum Iranicarum, ed. Schmitt (1989), 417–444.
