Tocharian A

Tocharian A, also known as Tokharian A, Eastern Tocharian, Agnean, Karashahrian or Turfanian is a dead language that was in use in the 1st millennium AD in the Karashahr and Turfan region of the Tarim Basin, present-day Xinjiang, Western China. First discovered from Buddhist texts dating back to around the 7th century AD, it coexisted with a related language, Tocharian B that together possibly with Tocharian C form the Tocharian branch of the Indo-European languages. This language was notably used in what China's Han dynasty then called the Kiu-che Kingdom. It is believed that Tocharian A died out with the other Tocharian languages when the Uyghurs and the Yenisei Kyrgyz moved into the Tarim Basin.

Writing

Tocharian A is known from around the 2000 manuscripts found. From these series of texts which are majority Buddhist liturgical texts are transcribed in a script derived from Brahmi. Unlike Tocharian B, there are no secular texts in Tocharian A. One possible explanation is that at the time these texts were written, Tocharian A survived only as a liturgical language and Tocharian B would still have been a living language.
Another hypothesis, however, is that this absence is simply explained by the very fragmentary attestation of Tocharian languages in general.
From the work of Georges-Jean Pinault and Melanie Malzahn in 2007, it is now recognized that it was also a living, spoken language.

Morphology

Nouns

The Tocharian A word for horse is declined as follows:

Pronunciation

One of the innovations of Tocharian A is the presence of a sibilant consonant ṣ.

Glossary

Words

The following are some examples of Tocharian A words with English words:

English	Tocharian A
always	skam
art	amok
away	lo
beyond	pät
cattle	śemäl
come	käm
despicable	appärmāt
enemy	yäslu
few	tsru
gift	el
go	kälk
god	ñkät
island	praṅk
lotus	oppal
net	sopi
or	pat
part	pāk
ready	ārṣal
root	tsmār
say	träṅk
serpent	ārwar
son	se
time	praṣt
water	wär

The following is also a comparison of some numbers in Tocharian A and other Indo-European languages:

English	Tocharian A	Spanish	French	German	Persian	Armenian
one	sas	uno	un	eins	yak	mi
two	wu	dos	deux	zwei	do	erku
three	tre	tres	trois	drei	se	erek'
four	stwar	cuatro	quatre	vier	cahar	cork'
five	pän	cinco	cinq	fünf	panj	hing
six	säk	seis	six	sechs	shesh	vec
seven	spät	siete	sept	sieben	haft	ewt'n
eight	okät	ocho	huit	acht	hasht	ut
nine	nu	nueve	neuf	neun	noh	inn
ten	säk	diez	dix	zehn	dah	tasn
hundred	känt	ciento	cent	hundert	sad	hariwr

''Maitreyasamitināṭaka''

The Maitreyasamitināṭaka is a Buddhist drama about the life of the Maitreya written in Tocharian A and is the most well-known Tocharian text about Maitreya. It was translated into Old Uyghur, which has been used to interpret Tocharian A. The Maitrisimit is not an exact translation as it was adapted to meet the requirements of Old Uyghur and the Maitreyasamitināṭaka was written in the campū style, which has a mixture prose and verse.
The following is one of the translations of the Tocharian A manuscript of Maitreyasamitināṭaka:
klā k. SA trakṣināṃ opṣlyā plāc weñeñc¨ˎkāvvintu yāmeñc¨ˎ///
ñ¨•klyoMAˎ lyMAnTˎ metraKAṃ oñantyo tri ñemintwaṃ KAlymeyā spārtwe ///
Pˎ metRAkyāp . ps. lāntuneṣi ṣeKˎ artantRA•kus pat nu tanā SArki tu.i///
s weñeñc¨ˎ klyo ◯ṣnā plāc¨ˎ metRA yärkanTˎ ārtantRA
pālantRA anumodin yāmeñc¨ˎ pukāk ṣakk ats e ///
t pi koriSˎ ṢAk-KAnTˎ r◯ne KAtkeñc¨ˎ kātka ārkiśoṣṣaṃ PAttāñKATˎ: śmantRA cem wrasañ¨ˎ tām praṣṭaśśä..///
kyo napeṃsaṃ : ṣo«me» metRA señc¨ ˎ MArkampaL*ˎ tSAlpeñc¨ˎ kloPA yomneñc¨ˎ puttiśparnac¨ˎ vyākariTˎ: TAmyo metRAkyāp kā /// -
lsasuntāPˎ skaMˎ skenaLˎ : 1 || sātāgiri tRAṅKAṢˎ kāsu weñā++Rˎ TAmyo TAṣ metRAkyāp waSAātṣiṃ opṣlyac poñcäṃ ārki ///
e tṅKAṢˎ ceṣ ṣome ñäktañ¨ˎ epreRAṢˎ kāKArpuRAṢ*ˎ daki¨ˎ yiñc¨ˎ ṣome nu pāṣānak lac¨ˎ yiñc¨ˎ || sātā