Sogdian language

Information about Sogdian language

Sogdian ()
Spoken in:
Region:Sogdiana
Total speakers:
Ranking:
Genetic classification:
Official status
Official language of:
Regulated by:
Language codes
ISO 639-1
ISO 639-2sog
SIL
See also: Language – List of languages


The Sogdian language is an extinct Middle Iranian language that was spoken in Sogdiana (Zarafshan River Valley), located in modern day Uzbekistan and Tajikistan (chief cities: Samarkand, Panjakent, Fergana).

Sogdian is one of the most important Middle Iranian languages with a large literary corpus, standing next to Middle Persian and Parthian. The language belongs to the Northeastern branch of Iranian languages. No evidence of an earlier version of the language (*Old Sogdian) have been found, although the mention of the area in Old Persian inscriptions means that a separate and recognisable Sogdiana existed since at least the Achaemenid era (ca. 550-323 BCE). Sogdian possesses a more conservative grammar and morphology than Middle Persian.

The economic and political importance of the language guaranteed its survival in the first few centuries after the conquest of Sogdiana by the Muslims in the early eighth century CE. The fact that the earliest texts of Modern Persian have been written in the territory of Sogdiana under the patronage of Samanid Kings means that many Sogdian words have entered Modern Persian as well. Only a dialect of Sogdian, called Yaghnobi language, has survived into the 21st century and is spoken by the mountain dwellers of the Yaghnob valley.

Like all the writing systems employed for Middle Iranian languages, Sogdian script ultimately derives from Aramaic. Like its close relative the Pahlavi writing system, written Sogdian also contains many logograms or ideograms, which were Aramaic words written to represent native spoken ones. Various Sogdian pieces, almost entirely religious works of Manichaean and Christian writers, have also been found in the Turfan text corpus. Sogdian script is the direct ancestor of Uyghur script, itself the forerunner of the Mongolian script.

Sample Sogdian text (transliteration): MN sγwδy-k MLK’ δy-w’šty-c ’t x’xsrc xwβw ’pšwnw δrwth γ-rβ nm’cyw

Word-by-word translation: From Sogdiana's King Dewashtic to Khakhsar's Khuv Afshun, (good) health (and) many salutation...

External links

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Iranian languages
Old
Middle
Modern
 Legend: † Extinct language (no surviving native speakers and no spoken descendant)
Sogdiana or Sogdia (Tajik: Суғд - Old Persian: Sughuda; Persian: سغد; Chinese:
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This is a list of languages, ordered by the number of native-language speakers, with some data for second-language use. Languages are listed for secondary locations only when spoken by more than 1% of the population.
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A language family is a group of languages related by descent from a common ancestor, called the proto-language. As with biological families, the evidence of relationship is observable shared characteristics.
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This is a list of bodies that regulate standard languages.

Afrikaans Die Taalkommissie, South Africa
Arabic Academy of the Arabic Language (مجمع اللغة العربية, Syria, Egypt, Jordan,
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ISO 639 is the set of international standards that lists short codes for language names.

ISO 639 consists of different parts, of which two parts have been approved and a third part that is in the final approval (FDIS) stage. The other parts are works in progress.
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Ethnologue: Languages of the World is a web and print publication of SIL International (formerly known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics), a Christian linguistic service organization which studies lesser-known languages primarily to provide the speakers with Bibles in
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See Language (journal) for the linguistics journal.


A language is a system of symbols and the rules used to manipulate them. Language can also refer to the use of such systems as a general phenomenon.
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lists of languages:
  • List of languages by name
  • List of languages by writing system
  • List of languages by number of native speakers
  • Ethnologue list of most spoken languages

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An extinct language is a language which no longer has any native speakers, in contrast to a dead language, which is a language which has stopped changing in grammar, vocabulary, and the complete meaning of a sentence.
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Middle Iranian may refer to any of a group of Iranian languages spoken between the 4th century BC and the 9th century AD:

Western:
  • Parthian
  • Middle Persian
Eastern:
  • Bactrian
  • Sogdian
  • Khwarezmian
  • Saka
  • Old Ossetic (Scytho-Sarmatian)

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Sogdiana or Sogdia (Tajik: Суғд - Old Persian: Sughuda; Persian: سغد; Chinese:
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The Zeravshan or Zarafshan river (from the Persian word زر افشان, meaning "the sprayer of Gold"), whilst smaller and less well-known than the two great rivers of Central Asia, the Amu Darya (or Oxus) and the Syr Darya (or Jaxartes),
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Anthem
National Anthem of the Republic of Uzbekistan


Capital Tashkent

Largest city Tashkent
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Ҷумҳурии Тоҷикистон
Jumhūrī-yi Tojīkiston

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State Party  Uzbekistan
Type Cultural
Criteria i, ii, iv
Reference 603
Region Asia-Pacific

Inscription History
Inscription 2001  (25th Session)
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Panjakent (:Панҷакент/پنجکنت) also spelled Panjikent or Panjekent, Пенджикент in Russian, is a city in the Sughd province of
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Fergana or Farghana (Uzbek: Farg'ona [Фарғона], Russian: Фергана, Tajik: Фарғона
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Middle Persian}}}
Language codes
ISO 639-1: none
ISO 639-2: pal (see text left)
ISO 639-3: pal

Middle Persian is the Middle Iranian language/ethnolect of Southwestern Iran that during Sassanid times (224-654 CE) became a
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Parthia[1] was an Iranian civilization situated in the northeast of modern Iran, but at its height covering all of Iran proper, as well as regions of the modern countries of Armenia, Iraq, Georgia, eastern Turkey, eastern Syria, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan,
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Eastern Iranian languages are a subgroup of the Iranian languages emerging in Middle Iranian times (from ca. the 4th century BC) The Avestan language is often classified as early Eastern Iranian, but this is uncertain.
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Iranian languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family. With the Indo-Aryan languages they form the Indo-Iranian languages group. Avestan and Old Persian are the oldest recorded Iranian languages.
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Old Persian}}} 
Writing system: Old Persian Cuneiform
Language codes
ISO 639-1: none
ISO 639-2: peo
ISO 639-3: peo

Old Persian is one of the two attested forms of Old Iranian languages.
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Epigraphy (Greek, ἐπιγραφή — "written upon") is the study of inscriptions or epigraphs engraved into stone or other durable materials, or cast in metal, the science of classifying them as to cultural context and
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Achaemenid Empire (Persian: هخامنشیان IPA: [haχɒmaneʃijɒn]) (559 BC–330 BC), or
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Grammar is the study of the rules governing the use of a given natural language, and as such a field of linguistics. Traditionally, grammar included morphology and syntax, in modern linguistics commonly expanded by the subfields of phonetics, phonology, orthography, semantics, and
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For other uses, see Morphology.
Morphology is the field within linguistics that studies the internal structure of words. (Words as units in the lexicon are the subject matter of lexicology.
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Muslim (Arabic: مسلم) is an adherent of the religion of Islam. The feminine form of 'Muslim' is Muslimah (Arabic: مسلمة).
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fɒːɾˈsiː in Perso-Arabic script (Nasta`liq style):  
Pronunciation: [fɒːɾˈsiː]
Spoken in: Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and areas of Uzbekistan and Pakistan.
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The Samanids (819–999)[1] (Persian: سامانیان Sāmāniyān
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Yaghnobi language[1] is a living Northeastern Iranian language (the only other living member being the Ossetic), and is spoken in high valley of the Yaghnob River in the Zarafshan area of Tajikistan by Yaghnobi people.
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