Adyghe language

Adyghe, also known as West Circassian, is a Northwest Caucasian language spoken by the western subgroups of Circassians. Native to Circassia in the Caucasus, it is one of the two official languages of Adygea, the other being Russian. It is spoken mainly in Turkey and Russia, as well as in Jordan, Syria, Iraq and Israel, where Circassians settled after the Circassian genocide by the Russian Empire. Adyghe literary language is largely based on the Temirgoy dialect, which was chosen for its simplicity, although there was significant input from Shapsug and Bzhedug dialects.
Adyghe is closely related to the Kabardian or East Circassian language; some reject the distinction between the two languages in favour of both being dialects of a unitary Circassian language. Despite phonological differences, Circassian languages are reciprocally intelligible, with speakers being able to communicate. While the self-designation for both Adyghe and Kabardian language is Adyghe, in linguistic and administrative terms, "Adyghe" refers specifically to the language of the western tribes of Circassians, while "Kabardian" refers to the language of the two eastern tribes. Ubykh, Abkhaz and Abaza are more distantly related to Adyghe.

Classification and History

Adyghe belongs to the Northwest Caucasian language family. Glottochronological studies suggest that the common Proto-Northwest Caucasian language split into the Circassian, Abkhaz, and Ubykh branches roughly 5,000 years ago. For most of its history, Adyghe was an oral language. The folklore, particularly the Nart sagas, served as a repository for the language.
Besides native vocabulary, the Adyghe language has accepted loanwords from Turkic, Arabic, Persian, and Russian languages. The appearance of Turkic loanwords in the Adyghe language can be dated to the 14th century due to interactions with the Golden Horde and Crimean Khanate. Words such as chapych are pre-revolutionary loans from Russian, while internationalisms like revolutsiye entered later. As a rule, the phonetic composition of borrowed words is adapted to the phonological system of the Adyghe language.
Following the Circassian Genocide and expulsion in 1864, the majority of Adyghe speakers were scattered across the Ottoman Empire. The language spoken in the diaspora has diverged from the literary forms in the Caucasus. Diaspora communities often use Arabic or Turkish loanwords where the literary language uses Russian ones.

Dialects

Black Sea coast dialects

Shapsug dialect
*North Shapsugs, Great Shapsugs, Kuban Shapsugs dialect
**Kfar Kama dialect
*Temirgoy-Shapsugs, Pseuşko accent
*South Shapsugs, Small Shapsugs, Coastal Shapsugs, Black Sea Shapsugs dialect
*Hakuchi dialect
Natukhai dialect
Zhaney dialect
Kuban River dialects
Bzhedug dialect : spoken by Circassians in the Republic of Adygea and the Biga district of the city of Çanakkale in Turkey
Temirgoy : literary standard of Adyghe. Also spoken by Circassians in the Republic of Adygea
Abzakh dialect : spoken by Circassians in the village of Rehaniya in Israel and Circassians in Syria from the Golan Heights
Mamkhegh dialect
Yegeruqay dialect
Hatuqay dialect
Makhosh dialect
Phonology

Adyghe exhibits between 50 and 60 consonants depending on the dialect. All dialects possess a contrast between plain and labialized glottal stops. A very unusual minimal contrast, and possibly unique to the Abzakh dialect of Adyghe, is a three-way contrast between plain, labialized and palatalized glottal stops. The Shapsug dialect of Adyghe contains a very uncommon sound: a voiceless bidental fricative, which corresponds to the voiceless velar fricative found in other varieties of Adyghe. This sound is only known to be used in the Black Sea dialect.

These consonants exist only in borrowed words.
In the Black Sea coast Adyghe dialects there exist a palatalized voiced velar stop, a palatalized voiceless velar stop and a palatalized velar ejective that were merged with, and in most Adyghe dialects. For example the Shapsug words "гьанэ" "shirt", "кьэт" "chicken" and "кӏьапсэ" "rope" are pronounced in other dialects as "джанэ", "чэт" and кӏапсэ.

In contrast to its large inventory of consonants, Adyghe has only three phonemic vowels in a vertical vowel system.

	Central
Mid
Near-open
Open

Grammar

Adyghe, like all Northwest Caucasian languages, has a basic subject–object–verb typology and is characterised by the ergative construction of sentences.

Alphabet

Orthography

History

Widespread literacy in Adyghe did not exist until the modern era. The official alphabet for Adyghe is the Cyrillic script, which has been used since 1936.
In the 13th–15th centuries, as a result of the influence of Byzantine Empire and the Genoese Republic, Adyghe used Greek and, to a lesser extent, Italian scripts. In the 14th century, along with Islam, the Arabic script was adopted for Adyghe. It was referred to as Ajam, a writing system for the native language based on the Perso-Arabic script. Since Adyghe has many more consonants than Arabic, the Ajam system required adding special diacritical marks or inventing new letters to represent sounds.
In 1853, the Adyghe educator Umar Bersey published the first "Primer of the Circassian Language" based on the Arabic script. The Arabic script was used until 1927, when as a part of the Soviet "Latinisation" campaign, a Latin-based alphabet was adopted. It was developed by the linguist N.F. Yakovlev and the Adyghe scholar Daud Ashkhamaf. In the late 1930s, the script was converted to Cyrillic to align with Russian.

Date	Author / Creator	Script Base	Description & Historical Context
17th Century	Evliya Çelebi	Arabic / Ottoman	Recorded Adyghe linguistic material in his travel notes.
c. 1820s	Sheretluk Hadji-Notauk	Arabic	A Shapsug nobleman educated in the "Arab East", considered the founder of the Adyghe Enlightenment. He opened a school on the Bogundyr River and created one of the first Arabic-based Circassian grammars. However, he burned his manuscripts, "to preserve traditional oral culture against "civilizational" threats".
1830s	Sultan Khan-Giray	Cyrillic	Adapted the Cyrillic alphabet for his ethnographic work "Notes on Circassia" to record Circassian legends.
1840–1843	Shora Nogmov	Cyrillic / Arabic	A Kabardian noble who initially developed a Cyrillic alphabet before switching to Arabic/Persian.
1846	Leonty Lyulye	Cyrillic	Published a dictionary using a modified Russian alphabet. Criticized by Pyotr Uslar for failing to reflect phonetics.
1853	Umar Bersey	Arabic	Published the "Primer of the Circassian Language" in Tiflis on March 14, 1853. This date is celebrated as the "Day of the Adyghe Language and Writing."
1860s	Kazi Atazhukin & Pyotr Uslar	Cyrillic	Developed a Kabardian alphabet based on Cyrillic, believing the Russian script was politically and practically suitable for Caucasian languages.
1897	Tharxet Ahmet Cavit Pasha	Arabic	Created an alphabet later used in the newspaper Ghuaze, published by the Circassian Union and Mutual Aid Society.
1902–1912	Various Diaspora Authors	Arabic / Latin	Various attempts in the Ottoman diaspora: 1902 Dr. Pçehatluk Mehmet Ali 1905: Majid Fenziy 1909: Neğuç Yusuf Suat & Tsağo Ahmet Nuri 1910: Huaj Kemal 1910s: Şemsettin Bey 1910s: Yusuf İzzet Pasha 1912: Dr. Pçehatluk Mehmet Ali
1918	Seferbiy Siyukhov / Ahmed Bekukh	Arabic	Siyukhov prepared an alphabet for the Adyghe dialect, officially adopted for teaching and publishing. It remained in use until 1927.
1918–1929	Blanau Batok	Latin / Arabic	Published a Latin primer in Constantinople and an Arabic primer in Damascus.
1923	N. F. Yakovlev	Cyrillic	A Cyrillic project proposed by Yakovlev prior to the shift toward Latinization.
1927	N. F. Yakovlev & D. A. Ashkhamaf	Latin	Officially adopted for the West Circassian language by the Regional Department of Public Education. It established the Temirgoy dialect as the literary standard.
1936	T'ut'e Borikey	Cyrillic	Early transition to Cyrillic for Kabardian.
1937–1938	N. F. Yakovlev & D. A. Ashkhamaf	Cyrillic	Due to shifting Soviet nationality policies, scripts were converted to Cyrillic. The Adyghe alphabet followed the Kabardian one in 1938. It uses di- and trigraphs and remains the basis for the modern script.
1952	K’ube Şaban	Latin	A Latin alphabet prepared in the diaspora.
1989	Official Standard	Cyrillic	Legislative consolidation of the alphabet. Phonetic definitions established: * Гъ: Velar voiced spirant * Дж: Alveolar palatalized voiced affricate * Ӏ: Laryngeal plosive ejective
2012	R.I. Dawur	Tamga / Symbols	Prepared "Circassian Calligraphy", attempting to create a unique alphabet by converting ancient family symbols into letters.
2012	Ali İhsan Tarı	Latin	Prepared by the founder of the Adyghe Language Association in Konya.
2018	Nezhdet Meshvez	Cyrillic	An experimental textbook replacing most digraphs/trigraphs with diacritical marks to simplify learning.

In the diaspora, a new Latin alphabet based on the Turkish alphabet was designed to better facilitate Adyghe and Kabardian education in Turkey.

Cyrillic	Arabic	Latin	IPA	Pronunciation	Examples
А а	ا	italic=no
Б б	ب	italic=no
В в	ڤ	italic=no			,
Г г	ݝ	italic=no
Гу гу	گو	italic=no			гущыӏ, gwśyx̧, 'word'
Гъ гъ	غ	italic=no
Гъу гъу	غو	italic=no
Д д	د	italic=no
Дж дж	ج	italic=no
Дз дз	ذ	italic=no
Дзу дзу	ذو	italic=no
Е е	ئە / ەي	italic=no
Ё ё	–	italic=no
Ж ж	ڒ	italic=no
Жъ жъ	ظ	italic=no
Жъу жъу	ظو	italic=no
Жь жь	ژ	italic=no
З з	ز	italic=no
И и	ئي / ي	italic=no
Й й	ي	italic=no
К к	ك	italic=no
Ку ку	کو	italic=no
Къ къ	ق	italic=no
Къу къу	قو	italic=no
Кӏ кӏ	ڃ	italic=no
Кӏу кӏу	ࢰو	italic=no
Л л	ل	italic=no
Лъ лъ	ݪ	italic=no
Лӏ лӏ	ࢦ	italic=no
М м	م	italic=no
Н н	ن	italic=no
О о	ئۆ / ۆ	italic=no
П п	پ	italic=no
Пӏ пӏ	ࢠ	italic=no
Пӏу пӏу	ࢠو	italic=no
Р р	ر	italic=no			rix̧on 'to tell'
С с	س	italic=no
Т т	ت	italic=no
Тӏ тӏ	ط	italic=no
Тӏу тӏу	طو	italic=no
У у	و	italic=no
Ф ф	ف	italic=no
Х х	ݗ	italic=no
Хъ хъ	خ	italic=no
Хъу хъу	خو	italic=no
Хь хь	ح	italic=no
Ц ц	ث	italic=no
Цу цу	ثو	italic=no
Цӏ цӏ	ڗ	italic=no
Ч ч	چ	italic=no
Чъ чъ	x15px	italic=no			чъыӏэ čyx̧e 'cold'
Чӏ чӏ	x15px	italic=no
Ш ш	x18px	italic=no
Шъ шъ	ص	italic=no
Шъу шъу	صو	italic=no
Шӏ шӏ	ض	italic=no
Шӏу шӏу	ضو	italic=no
Щ щ	ش	italic=no
	–	–	–
Ы ы	ئہـ‍ / ‍ہ‍	italic=no
	–	–
Э э	ئە / ە	italic=no			ӏэтаж x̧etaž 'floor'
Ю ю	یو	italic=no
Я я	یا	italic=no
Ӏ ӏ	ئ	X̧ x̧			ӏэ x̧e 'hand'
Ӏу ӏу	ؤ	X̧w x̧w			ӏукӏэн x̧wḉen 'to meet'ӏусын x̧wsyn 'to be sitting near'ӏудан x̧wdan 'thread'