This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Northwest Caucasian languages" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR(January 2010) (Learn how and when to remove this message)
Northwest Caucasian
West Caucasian Abkhazo–Circassian Abkhaz–Adyghean North Pontic Pontic
Geographic distribution
Ciscaucasia in Eastern Europe
Linguistic classification
One of the world's primary language families
Proto-language
Proto-Northwest Caucasian
Subdivisions
Abazgi
Circassian
Ubykh †
Glottolog
abkh1242
Circassian
Abazgi
Ubykh (extinct)
The Northwest Caucasian languages,[1] also called West Caucasian, Abkhazo-Adyghean, Abkhazo-Circassian,[2]Circassic, or sometimes Pontic languages, is a family of languages spoken in the northwestern Caucasus region,[3] chiefly in three Russian republics (Adygea, Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachay–Cherkessia), the disputed territory of Abkhazia, Georgia, and Turkey, with smaller communities scattered throughout the Middle East.
The group's relationship to any other language family is uncertain and unproven. One language, Ubykh, became extinct in 1992, while all of the other languages are in some form of endangerment, with UNESCO classifying all as either "vulnerable", "endangered", or "severely endangered".[4]
The Northwest Caucasian languages possess highly complex sets of consonant distinctions paired with a lack of vowel distinctions, often providing archetypical cases of vertical vowel systems, also known as "linear" vowel systems.[5][6]
^"Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original on 13 August 2017. Retrieved 20 May 2017.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
^Matthews, W. K. (2013). Languages of the USSR. Cambridge University Press. p. 147. ISBN 9781107623552.
^Hoiberg, Dale H. (2010)
^"UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in danger". www.unesco.org. Retrieved 3 June 2018.
^Liljencrafts, Johan and Lindblom, Björn. 1972. "Numerical Simulation of Vowel Quality Systems: The Role of Perceptual Contrast". Language, vol 48, no 4. Page 845: ", a 'linear' vowel system, is described by Trubetzkoy (1958:87). He attributes such systems to Caucasian languages ... Abkhaz and Adyge... and with some hesitation Ubykh... The phonetic realizations of these vowels exhibit rich consonant-determined variation." page 857: "These observations bear to mind the phonological systems of Caucasian languages such as Kabardia whose underlying vowel segments are confined to /a/ and /a/ but whose consonant system is extreme".
^Halle, M. 1970. "Is Kabardian a vowel-less language?". Foundations of Language 6: pages 95–103.
and 26 Related for: Northwest Caucasian languages information
The NorthwestCaucasianlanguages, also called West Caucasian, Abkhazo-Adyghean, Abkhazo-Circassian, Circassic, or sometimes Pontic languages, is a family...
the Caspian Sea, in contrast to Pontic languages for the NorthwestCaucasianlanguages), is a family of languages spoken in the Russian republics of Dagestan...
The Caucasianlanguages comprise a large and extremely varied array of languages spoken by more than ten million people in and around the Caucasus Mountains...
Chakobsa is a NorthwestCaucasianlanguage, possibly in the Circassian subgroup. According to linguist John Colarusso, Chakobsa is also known as shikwoshir...
The North Caucasianlanguages, sometimes called simply Caucasic, is a proposed language family consisting of a pair of well established language families...
is a subdivision of the NorthwestCaucasianlanguage family, spoken by the Circassian people. There are two Circassian languages, defined by their literary...
identified in 2015 NorthwestCaucasianlanguages Northeast Caucasianlanguages South Caucasianlanguages Dené–Caucasianlanguages Certain types of animals:...
is a NorthwestCaucasianlanguage most closely related to Abaza. It is spoken mostly by the Abkhaz people. It is one of the official languages of Abkhazia...
Kartvelian languages (/kɑːrtˈvɛliən, -ˈviːl-/ kart-VEL-ee-ən, -VEEL-; Georgian: ქართველური ენები, romanized: kartveluri enebi; also known as South Caucasian, Kartvelic...
Ubykh is an extinct NorthwestCaucasianlanguage once spoken by the Ubykh people, a subgroup of Circassians who originally inhabited the eastern coast...
linguistics, the term preverb is used in Caucasian (including all three families: NorthwestCaucasian, Northeast Caucasian and Kartvelian), Caddoan, Athabaskan...
Abazgi is the branch of the NorthwestCaucasianlanguages that contains the Abaza and Abkhaz languages. "Abazgi" was once the preferred designation, but...
addition, the Adyghe language is spoken by the Cherkesogai in Krasnodar Krai. Adyghe belongs to the family of NorthwestCaucasianlanguages. Kabardian (also...
abaza byzshwa; Adyghe: абазэбзэ) is a NorthwestCaucasianlanguage spoken by Abazins in Russia. The language has gone through several different orthographies...
Siberian Turkic Living NorthwestCaucasianlanguages are generally written using Cyrillic alphabets. Abaza is a Caucasianlanguage, spoken by Abazins in...
Vyacheslav V. (1985). "On the Relationship of Hattic to the NorthwestCaucasianlanguages," in B.B. Piotrovskij, Vyacheslav V. Ivanov, and Vladislav G...
The Nakh languages are a group of languages within Northeast Caucasian family, spoken chiefly by the Chechens and Ingush in the North Caucasus. Bats is...
Pontic is a proposed language family or macrofamily, comprising the Indo-European and NorthwestCaucasianlanguage families, with Proto-Pontic being its...
The Caucasian Imamate, also known as the North Caucasus Imamate (Arabic: إمامة شمال القوقاز, romanized: Imāmat Shamal al Qawqāz), was a state established...
Kaskian language may have been an Indo-European language, perhaps related to Thraco-Phrygian. There may also be connections to the NorthwestCaucasian languages;...
Inuit; several Turkic languages such as Uyghur and Yakut; several NorthwestCaucasianlanguages such as Abkhaz; several Mongolic languages such as Mongolian...
oblique is also used for languages without a nominative case, such as ergative–absolutive languages; in the NorthwestCaucasianlanguages, for example, the oblique-case...
the Maykop culture people probably spoke languages which are ancestral to the NorthwestCaucasianlanguages found in the same region today. Nonetheless...
Global Information
