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Kyrgyz
Кыргыз тили قىرعىز تىلى‎
Kyrgyz written in Cyrillic and Perso-Arabic scripts
Pronunciation	[qɯɾʁɯzˈtʃɑ]
Native to	Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Pakistan, China
Region	Central Asia
Ethnicity	Kyrgyz
Native speakers	5.15 million (2009 census)
Language family	Turkic Common Turkic Kipchak Kyrgyz–Kipchak Kyrgyz
Dialects	Pamiri Kyrgyz
Writing system	Kyrgyz alphabets (Cyrillic script, Perso-Arabic script, Kyrgyz Braille) Historically, Old Turkic script
Official status
Official language in	Kyrgyzstan  China Kizilsu Kyrgyz Autonomous Prefecture Organisations:  Organization of Turkic States  Collective Security Treaty Organization
Recognised minority language in	Uzbekistan  Tajikistan
Language codes
ISO 639-1	ky
ISO 639-2	kir
ISO 639-3	kir
Glottolog	kirg1245
Linguasphere	44-AAB-cd
Places where Kyrgyz is spoken
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

Kyrgyz is a Turkic language of the Kipchak branch spoken in Central Asia. Kyrgyz is the official language of Kyrgyzstan and a significant minority language in the Kizilsu Kyrgyz Autonomous Prefecture in Xinjiang, China and in the Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region of Tajikistan. There is a very high level of mutual intelligibility between Kyrgyz, Kazakh, and Altay. A dialect of Kyrgyz known as Pamiri Kyrgyz is spoken in north-eastern Afghanistan and northern Pakistan. Kyrgyz is also spoken by many ethnic Kyrgyz through the former Soviet Union, Afghanistan, Turkey, parts of northern Pakistan, and Russia.

Kyrgyz was originally written in Göktürk script, gradually replaced by the Perso-Arabic alphabet (in use until 1928 in the USSR, still in use in China). Between 1928 and 1940, a Latin-script alphabet, the Uniform Turkic Alphabet, was used. In 1940, Soviet authorities replaced the Latin script with the Cyrillic alphabet for all Turkic languages on its territory. When Kyrgyzstan became independent following the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991, a plan to adopt the Latin alphabet became popular. Although the plan has not been implemented, it remains in occasional discussion.

Classification

Kyrgyz is a Common Turkic language belonging to the Kipchak branch of the family. It is considered to be an East Kipchak language, forming a subfamily with the Southern Altai language within the greater Kipchak branch. Internally, Kyrgyz has three distinct varieties; Northern and Southern Kyrgyz.

Language should not be confused with Old Kyrgyz (Yenisei Kyrgyz) language which classified as a member of the South Siberian branch of Turkic languages. The successor of the Yenisei Kyrgyz language today are the Khakas in Russian Federation and Fuyu Kyrgyz in Northeastern China.

History

In 925, when the Liao dynasty defeated the Yenisei Kyrgyz and expelled them from the Mongolian steppes, some Ancient Kyrgyz elites settled in Altai and Xinjiang where they mixed with the local Kipchaks, resulting in a language shift.

After the Mongol conquest in 1207 and a series of revolts against the Yuan dynasty, Kyrgyz-speaking tribes started to migrate to Tian Shan, which was already populated by various Turco-Mongol tribes. As Chaghatai Ulus subjects, the Kyrgyz converted to Islam. Persian and Arabic vocabulary loaned to the Kyrgyz language, but to a much lesser extent than Kazakh, Uzbek and Uyghur.

Dialects

Kyrgyz is divided into two main dialects, Northern and Southern. Northern having more Mongolian loanwords and Southern having more Uzbek ones. Standard Kyrgyz is based on Northern Kyrgyz. There is also a third smaller dialect called Pamiri Kyrgyz.

Phonology

/a/ appears only in borrowings from Persian or when followed by a front vowel later in the word (regressive assimilation), e.g. /ajdøʃ/ 'sloping' instead of */ɑjdøʃ/. In most dialects, its status as a vowel distinct from /ɑ/ is questionable.

The United States Peace Corps trains its volunteers using a "Left-Right Shift" method when carrying out language training in Kyrgyzstan.

1. ^ /f, v, t͡s, x/ occur only in foreign borrowings from Russian, Arabic and English.

Lexicon

Kyrgyz has spent centuries in contact with numerous other languages, and as such has borrowed extensively from them. These languages include: Uzbek, Oirat, Mongolian, Russian, and Arabic.

Orthography

Historically the Old Turkic Script was the first script used to write Kyrgyz.

The Kyrgyz in Kyrgyzstan use a Cyrillic alphabet, which uses all the Russian letters plus ң, ө and ү. Though in the Xinjiang region of China, an Arabic alphabet is used. Between 1928 and 1940, a Latin alphabet was used for many minority languages in the USSR, including Kyrgyz. There have been attempts after 1990 to introduce other Latin alphabets which are closer to the Turkish alphabet, e.g. the Common Turkic Alphabet. There are political shades to the Cyrillic-Latin debate. In April 2023, Russia suspended dairy exports to Kyrgyzstan after a proposal by the chairman of Kyrgyzstan's National Commission for the State Language and Language Policies, Kanybek Osmonaliev, to change the alphabet from Cyrillic to Latin to bring the country in line with other Turkic nations. Osmonaliev was reprimanded by President Sadyr Japarov, who later clarified that Kyrgyzstan had no plans to replace the Cyrillic alphabet.

Morphology and syntax

Kyrgyz follows a subject-object-verb word order, Kyrgyz also has no grammatical gender with gender being implied through context. Kyrgyz lacks several analytic grammatical features that english has, these include: auxiliary verbs (ex: to have), definite articles (ex: the), indefinite articles (ex: a/an), and modal verbs (ex: should; will), dependent clauses, and subordinating conjugations (ex: that; before; while). Kyrgyz instead replaces these with various synthetic grammatical substutes.

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Case

Nouns in Kyrgyz take a number of case endings that change based on vowel harmony and the sort of consonant they follow (see the section on phonology).

Normally the decision between the velar (, ) and uvular ( and ) pronunciation of ⟨г⟩ and ⟨к⟩ is based on the backness of the following vowel—i.e. back vowels imply a uvular rendering and front vowels imply a velar rendering—and the vowel in suffixes is decided based on the preceding vowel in the word. However, with the dative suffix in Kyrgyz, the vowel is decided normally, but the decision between velars and uvulars can be decided based on a contacting consonant, for example банк /bank/ 'bank' + GA yields банкка /bankka/, not /bankqa/ as predicted by the following vowel.

Pronouns

Kyrgyz has eight personal pronouns:

The declension of the pronouns is outlined in the following chart. Singular pronouns (with the exception of сиз, which used to be plural) exhibit irregularities, while plural pronouns don't. Irregular forms are highlighted in bold.

In addition to the pronouns, there are several more sets of morphemes dealing with person.

Verbs

Verbs are conjugated by analyzing the root verb: 1) determine whether the end letter is a vowel or consonant 2) add appropriate suffix while following vowel-harmony/shift rules.

Subordinate clauses

To form complement clauses, Kyrgyz nominalises verb phrases. For example, "I don't know what I saw" would be:

Мен

Men

I

эмнени

emneni

what-ACC.DEF

көргөнүмдү

körgönümdü

see-ing-1SG-ACC.DEF

билбейм

bilbeym

know-NEG-1SG

Мен эмнени көргөнүмдү билбейм

Men emneni körgönümdü bilbeym

I what-ACC.DEF see-ing-1SG-ACC.DEF know-NEG-1SG

roughly "I don't know my having seen what," where the verb phrase "I saw what" is treated as a nominal object of the verb "to know."

The sentence above is also an excellent example of Kyrgyz vowel harmony; notice that all the vowel sounds are front vowels.

Several nominalisation strategies are used depending on the temporal properties of the relativised verb phrase: -GAn(dIK) for general past tense, -AAr for future/potential unrealised events, and -A turgan(dɯq) for non-perfective events are the most common. The copula has an irregular relativised form экен(дик) which may be used equivalently to forms of the verb бол- be (болгон(дук), болор). Relativised verb forms may, and often do, take nominal possessive endings as well as case endings.

Sample text

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

Cyrillic script

Бардык адамдар өз беделинде жана укуктарында эркин жана тең укуктуу болуп жаралат. Алардын аң-сезими менен абийири бар жана бири-бирине бир туугандык мамиле кылууга тийиш.

Arabic script

باردىق ادامدار ۅز بەدەلينده جانا وُقوُقتارىندا ەرکین جانا تەڭ ۇقۇقتۇۇ بولۇپ جارالات. الاردىن اڭ-سەزیمی مەنەن ابئییری بار جانا بئرى-بئرینه بئر توُوُعاندىق مامئلە قىلوُوُعا تئییش.

Latin script

Bardyk adamdar öz bedelinde jana ukuktarynda erkin jana teng ukuktuu bolup jaralat. Alardyn ang-sezimi menen abiiri bar jana biri-birine bir tuugandyk mamile kyluuga tiish.

IPA transcription

English translation

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

See also

• BGN/PCGN romanization of Kyrgyz
• Kyrgyz people
• Romanization of Kyrgyz

Notes

1. • English: /ˈkɪərɡɪz, kərˈɡiːz/
   • Cyrillic: Кыргыз тили / Кыргызча
   • Latin: Kyrgyz tili / Kyrgyzcha
   • Arabic: قىرعىز تئلى / قىرعىزچا
   • pronounced [qɯrˈʁɯz tɪˈlɪ]

References

1. Kyrgyz at Ethnologue (26th ed., 2023)
2. Кызласов И. Л., Рунические письменности евразийских степей (Kyzlasov I.L. Runic scripts of Eurasian steppes), Восточная литература (Eastern Literature), Moscow, 1994, pp. 80 on, ISBN 978-5-02-017741-3, with further bibliography.
3. Altynbayev, Kanat. "Kyrgyzstan considers switch to Latin alphabet from Cyrillic". Caravanserai. Retrieved 2022-07-29.
4. "Glottolog 4.3 - Kirghiz". glottolog.org. Retrieved 2021-05-03.
5. Tchoroev (Chorotegin) 2003, p. 110.
6. Pozzi & Janhunen & Weiers 2006, p. 113.
7. Giovanni Stary; Alessandra Pozzi; Juha Antero Janhunen; Michael Weiers (2006). Tumen Jalafun Jecen Aku: Manchu Studies in Honour of Giovanni Stary. Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. pp. 112–. ISBN 978-3-447-05378-5.
8. ^ "Kyrgyz (Kirgiz, Kyrghyz, Kirghiz)". University of Cambridge.
9. Callahan, Ted (2007). "The Kyrgyz of the Afghan Pamir Ride On". Nomadic Peoples. 11 (1): 39–48. doi:10.3167/np.2007.110103. ISSN 0822-7942. JSTOR 43123791.
10. Kara (2003:10)
11. Washington (2007:11)
12. Washington (2006b:2)
13. ^ Kara (2003:11)
14. Hays, Jeffrey. "KYRGYZ IN CHINA | Facts and Details". factsanddetails.com. Retrieved 2024-09-25.
15. Alimov, Rysbek (2024-04-01). "Western Mongolian (Oirat-Kalmyk) loanwords in Kyrgyz". Orientalia Suecana. 73: 5–27. doi:10.33063/os.v73.501. ISSN 2001-7324.
16. Acar, Ömer (2024-08-29). "Kırgız Türkçesi İle Türkiye Türkçesindeki Ortak Arapça Kelimelerin Ses Değişimleri". Journal of Turkish Studies (in Turkish). 10 (8): 273–298. doi:10.7827/TurkishStudies.8219.
17. "Russian Loanwords in Kyrgyz - PhD thesis - Dissertation". www.dissertationtopic.net. Retrieved 2024-09-25.
18. ^ Jumabaeva, Guliam; Abylkasymove, Miriam (June 1996). Kyrgyz Language Manual (in English and kgz). Bishkek: Peace Corps, Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan). pp. 13–18.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: unrecognized language (link)
19. Russia Suspends Dairy Products From Kyrgyzstan After Calls In Bishkek To Drop Cyrillic Script. Radio Free Europe, 21 April 2023. Retrieved 22 June 2023
20. "Kyrgyz language and alphabets". omniglot.com. Retrieved 2024-09-24.
21. Kyrgyz edition of Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Bibliography

• Kara, Dávid Somfai (2003), Kyrgyz, Lincom Europa, ISBN 978-3-89586-843-6
• Krippes, Karl A. (1998). Kyrgyz: Kyrgyz-English/English-Kyrgyz: Glossary of Terms. Hippocrene Books, New York. ISBN 978-0-7818-0641-1.
• Library of Congress, Country Studies, Kyrgyzstan.
• Comrie, Bernard. 1983. The languages of the Soviet Union. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Beckwith, Christopher I. 1987/1993. "The Tibetan Empire in Central Asia." Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• Tchoroev, Tyntchtykbek. 2003. The Kyrgyz.; in: The History of Civilisations of Central Asia, Vol. 5, Development in contrast: from the sixteenth to the mid-nineteenth century /Editors: Ch. Adle and Irfan Habib. Co-editor: Karl M. Baipakov. – UNESCO Publishing. Multiple History Series. Paris. – Chapter 4, p. 109–125. (ISBN 978-92-3-103876-1).
• Washington, Jonathan North (2006b), Root Vowels and Affix Vowels: Height Effects in Kyrgyz Vowel Harmony (PDF), archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-01-13, retrieved 2007-04-12
• Washington, Jonathan North (2007), Phonetic and Phonological Problems in Kyrgyz: A Fulbrighter's plans for gathering data in the field (PDF), archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-01-13, retrieved 2015-06-29

External links

• Language Policies, Attitudes, and Beliefs in Kyrgyzstan
• El-Sozduk – English-Kyrgyz online dictionary, phrasebook, Android app
• Ferdinand, S. & Komlósi, F. 2016. Vitality of the Kyrgyz Language in Bishkek. IJORS, 5/2, pp. 210–226.
• Kyrgyz language
• Root Vowels and Affix Vowels: Height Effects in Kyrgyz Vowel Harmony
• (in Japanese) "事前学習補助教材Кыргыз тили （キルギス語）" (Kyrgyz exercises; Archive) - Japan International Cooperation Agency
• The Talking Kyrgyz Phrasebook
• Кыргыз тили – Kyrgyz language resources (in Russian)
• Кербен Translit – Easy Kyrgyz-Cyrillic–Latin converter
• Kyrgyz Cyrillic–Arabic–Latin converter
• Kyrgyz–Russian–English Dictionary
• Kyrgyz Latin Alphabet
• Kyrgyz-Turkish Dictionary
• Kyrgyz<>Turkish dictionary (Pamukkale University)
• Russian-Kyrgyz Kyrgyz-Russian Dictionary
• Kyrgyz – Apertium

v t e Turkic languages
Proto-language	Proto-Turkic
Common Turkic	Argu Argu Khalaj Karluk Western Northern Uzbek Southern Uzbek Eastern Ili Turki Uyghur Khoton Lop Äynu Old Chagatai Karakhanid Khorezmian Kipchak Bulgar Bashkir Tatar Mishar Tatar Nagaibak Old Tatar Cuman Armeno-Kipchak Crimean Tatar Cuman Karachay-Balkar Karaim Krymchak Kumyk Mamluk-Kipchak Urum Kyrgyz Fergana Kipchak Kyrgyz Pamir Kyrgyz Siberian Tatar Baraba Tom Southern Altai Telengit Teleut Nogai Dobrujan Tatar Karakalpak Kazakh Nogai Siberian Tatar Tobol-Irtysh Oghuz Salar Eastern Khorasani Turkic Turkmen Trukhmen Southern Afshari Chaharmahali Turkic Qashqai Sonqori Western Azerbaijani North Azerbaijani South Azerbaijani Ajem-Turkic Balkan Gagauz Gagauz Karapapakh Turkish Karamanli Turkish Old Anatolian Turkish Ottoman Turkish Siberian Northern Dolgan Yakut Southern Chulym Lower Chulym Sayan Steppe Tuvan Taiga Dukhan Soyot Tofa Yenisei Fuyu Kyrgyz Khakas Northern Altai Chelkan Kumandy Tuba Shor Western Yugur Old Old Uyghur Orkhon Turkic
Oghur	Bulgar Chuvash
Disputed classification	Khazar Pecheneg
Potentially Turkic languages	Di Hunnic Jie Pannonian Avar Tuoba Wusun Xiongnu
Creoles and pidgins	Hezhou Kurbet Qoqmončaq
Italics indicate extinct languages Languages between parentheses are varieties of the language on their left.

• Turkic languages
• Kyrgyz language
• Agglutinative languages
• Vowel-harmony languages
• Languages of China
• Languages of Kyrgyzstan
• Languages of Pakistan
• Languages of Russia
• Languages of Kazakhstan
• Turkic languages of Afghanistan
• Languages of Uzbekistan
• Languages of Tajikistan
• Languages of Turkey
• Ethnic Kyrgyz people
• Subject–object–verb languages