Languages of Azerbaijan
Encyclopedia
Many different languages have dominated in the territory of the Republic of Azerbaijan.
. The Azerbaijani language
is spoken by 96.6 % of the population , while English
and Russian
play significant roles as languages of education and communication. Lezgian, Talysh
, Avar
, Georgian
, Budukh
, Juhuri
, Khinalug
, Kryts
, Rutul
, Tsakhur
, Tat, and Udi
are all spoken by minorities.
All these (with exception of Lezgian, Talysh, Avar and Georgian which have much larger number of speakers outside Azerbaijan, but nevertheless their usage is steadily declining) above mentioned languages are endangered language
s which are threatened with extinction as they are spoken by few (less than 10,000) or very few (less than 1,000) people and their usage is steadily declining with immigration and modernisation.
, in his book Al-Fihrist, however, mentions that all the Median and Persian lands of antiquity (including what is today the Republic of Azerbaijan) spoke one language. There, he quotes the great scholar Abdullah Ibn al-Muqaffa
as such:
He then reports that Dari is the official language of the royal courts, and is from Khorasan
and Balkh
and eastern Iran; Parsi is the language of the Zoroastrian Moobeds, and is from Fars; Khuzi is the unofficial language of the royalty and is from Khuzestan; and Seryani originates from Mesopotamia.
This has also been reported by reputed medieval historians such as Al-Tabari
, Ibn Hawqal
, Istakhri, Moqaddasi, Yaghubi, Masudi, and Mostowfi Qazvini
as well. Al-Khwarizmi also mentions this in chapter 6, vol 6, of his book Mafatih-ol-Olum.
Etymological studies also further indicate that current dialects spoken from Baku
to Khalkhal
to Semnan, all originated from a common source. In other words, the people of ancient Azerbaijan spoke the same language spoken by the Medes
. (see Columbia University
's distinguished professor Ehsan Yarshater
's report in: Majjaleh-ye Daaneshkadehye Adabiyaat, 5, No 1-2, p35-37)
The medieval historian Yaqut al-Hamawi
also used the phrase Al-ajam-ol-Azariyah ("The Azeri Iranian") in his books Mo'ajjem ol-Odabaa and Mo'jem ol Baladaan. In other sources such as Surat-ol-Arz by Ebne Hoghel, Ahsan ol-Taqaaseem by Moqaddasi, and Masaalik va Mamaalik by Istakhri, the people of Azerbaijan are recorded to be speaking Iranian languages. Obviously, this was before the Turkic cultural arrival. And Tabari in 235 A.H. also mentions that poets in Maragheh
recited poetry in Pahlavi. Some Azerbaijani poets however, such as Qatran Tabrizi
(d465 A.H.), used the word "Persian" and "Pahlavi" interchangeably to describe their native language.
The historian Hamdollah Mostowfi
even goes as far as describing variants of "Pahlavi" spoken in different areas of Azerbaijan. In his book Tarikh Gozideh, he describes 8 poets from Azerbaijan, calling them "Ahl-ol She'r Men-al-Ajam" (Iranian poets), all Persian by tongue. By now of course, Dari and Pahlavi had merged into one, as successive dynasties moved from east to west, bringing with them the Dari version of the Iranian language.
Suffice to say that the number of records and documents from Azerbaijan in Pahlavi language are so numerous that it has left little doubt that this was indeed the native tongue of Azerbaijan before the arrival of the Turks. Many words in the current Azeri vocabulary in fact are of Pahlavi origin. (see studies in Nashriyeh Adabiyaat of Tabriz University, by Dr Mahyar Navabi, 5,6. Also see Farhang e Kamaleddin Teflisi, Ajayeb ol-Makhluqaat by Najibeddin Hamadani, and also the books: Majmal-ol-Tavarikh wa al-qasas
, Iskandar-Nameh e Qadeem, and others for lists of words)
It is agreed that the current Turkic form of the Azeri language supplanted and replaced Pahlavi in Azerbaijan before the Safavid dynasty, perhaps starting with the arrival of Seljukian Turks, and during a gradual course. But some historians report of Pahlavi being spoken in Tabriz
as late as the 17th century. (see Rowdhat ul-Jinan by Hafez Hosein Tabrizi (d997 A.H.), and Risaleh ye Anarjani written in 985 AH). Even the Ottoman Turkish explorer Evliya Celebi
(1611-1682), mentions this in his Seyahatname
. He also reports that the elite and learned people of Nakhichevan
and Maragheh
spoke Pahlavi, during his tours of the region.
Present-day
The main language of Azerbaijan is AzerbaijaniAzerbaijani language
Azerbaijani or Azeri or Torki is a language belonging to the Turkic language family, spoken in southwestern Asia by the Azerbaijani people, primarily in Azerbaijan and northwestern Iran...
. The Azerbaijani language
Azerbaijani language
Azerbaijani or Azeri or Torki is a language belonging to the Turkic language family, spoken in southwestern Asia by the Azerbaijani people, primarily in Azerbaijan and northwestern Iran...
is spoken by 96.6 % of the population , while English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
and Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
play significant roles as languages of education and communication. Lezgian, Talysh
Talysh language
The Talyshi language is a Northwestern Iranian language spoken in the northern regions of the Iranian provinces of Gilan and Ardabil and the southern regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan. Historically, the language and its people can be traced through the middle Iranian period back to the ancient...
, Avar
Avar language
The modern Avar language belongs to the Avar–Andic group of the Northeast Caucasian language family....
, Georgian
Georgian language
Georgian is the native language of the Georgians and the official language of Georgia, a country in the Caucasus.Georgian is the primary language of about 4 million people in Georgia itself, and of another 500,000 abroad...
, Budukh
Budukh language
Budukh or Budugh is a Samur language of the Northeast Caucasian language family spoken in parts of the Quba Rayon of Azerbaijan. It was reportedly spoken by approximately 1,000 Budukhs in 1990, but Authier reports at most 200 speakers....
, Juhuri
Juhuri language
Juhuri, Juwuri or Judæo-Tat is a form of the Tat language and is the traditional language of the Mountain Jews of the eastern Caucasus Mountains, especially Azerbaijan and Dagestan, now mainly spoken in Israel....
, Khinalug
Khinalug language
Khinalug is a Northeast Caucasian language spoken by about 1,500 people in the villages of Khinalug and Gülüstan in the mountains of Quba Rayon, northern Azerbaijan...
, Kryts
Kryts language
Kryts , or Jek , is a Samur language of the Northeast Caucasian language family spoken in parts of the Quba Rayon of Azerbaijan by 6,000 people in 1975....
, Rutul
Rutul language
Rutul is a language spoken by the Rutuls, an ethnic group living in Dagestan and some parts of Azerbaijan. It is spoken by 29,400 people in Dagestan and the remaining 110 in Azerbaijan...
, Tsakhur
Tsakhur language
Tsakhur is a language spoken by the Tsakhurs, an ethnic group, which populates northern Azerbaijan and southwestern Dagestan . It is spoken by about 13,000 people in Azerbaijan and by about 9,770 people in Dagestan...
, Tat, and Udi
Udi language
The Udi language, spoken by the Udi people, is a member of the Lezgic branch of the Northeast Caucasian language family. It is believed an earlier form of it was the main language of Caucasian Albania, which stretched from south Dagestan to current day Azerbaijan.The language is spoken by about...
are all spoken by minorities.
All these (with exception of Lezgian, Talysh, Avar and Georgian which have much larger number of speakers outside Azerbaijan, but nevertheless their usage is steadily declining) above mentioned languages are endangered language
Endangered language
An endangered language is a language that is at risk of falling out of use. If it loses all its native speakers, it becomes a dead language. If eventually no one speaks the language at all it becomes an "extinct language"....
s which are threatened with extinction as they are spoken by few (less than 10,000) or very few (less than 1,000) people and their usage is steadily declining with immigration and modernisation.
History
The medieval author Ibn al-NadimIbn al-Nadim
Abu'l-Faraj Muhammad bin Is'hāq al-Nadim , whose father was known as al-Warrāq was a Shia Muslim scholar and bibliographer. Some scholars regard him as a Persian, but this is not certain. He is famous as the author of the Kitāb al-Fihrist...
, in his book Al-Fihrist, however, mentions that all the Median and Persian lands of antiquity (including what is today the Republic of Azerbaijan) spoke one language. There, he quotes the great scholar Abdullah Ibn al-Muqaffa
Abdullah Ibn al-Muqaffa
Abū-Muhammad Abd-Allāh Rūzbeh ibn Dādūya/Dādōē , known as Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ , Ibn Muqaffa/Ebn-e Moghaffa , or Rūzbeh pūr-e Dādūya , was a Persian thinker and a Zoroastrian convert to Islam.-Biography:...
as such:
- "The Iranian languages are Fahlavi (Pahlavi), Dari, Khuzi, Persian, and Seryani. But Fahlavi comes from the word Fahleh. And Fahleh is a name that refers to 5 regions: Isfahan, RayRay, IranRey or Ray , also known as Rhages and formerly as Arsacia, is the capital of Rey County, Tehran Province, Iran, and is the oldest existing city in the province....
, Hamedan, Mah-NahavandNahavandNahavand is a city in and capital of Nahavand County, Hamadan Province, Iran. At the 2006 census, its population was 72,218, in 19,419 families. It is located south of Hamadan, east of Malayer and northwest of Borujerd...
, and AzerbaijanAzerbaijan (Iran)Azerbaijan or Azarbaijan , also Iranian Azerbaijan, Persian Azarbaijan is a region in northwestern Iran. It is also historically known as Atropatene and Aturpatakan....
."
He then reports that Dari is the official language of the royal courts, and is from Khorasan
Greater Khorasan
Greater Khorasan or Ancient Khorasan is a historical region of Greater Iran mentioned in sources from Sassanid and Islamic eras which "frequently" had a denotation wider than current three provinces of Khorasan in Iran...
and Balkh
Balkh
Balkh , was an ancient city and centre of Zoroastrianism in what is now northern Afghanistan. Today it is a small town in the province of Balkh, about 20 kilometers northwest of the provincial capital, Mazar-e Sharif, and some south of the Amu Darya. It was one of the major cities of Khorasan...
and eastern Iran; Parsi is the language of the Zoroastrian Moobeds, and is from Fars; Khuzi is the unofficial language of the royalty and is from Khuzestan; and Seryani originates from Mesopotamia.
This has also been reported by reputed medieval historians such as Al-Tabari
Ali ibn Sahl Rabban al-Tabari
Abu al-Hasan Ali ibn Sahl Rabban al-Tabari also given as 810-855 and 783-858 was a Persian Muslim hakim, Islamic scholar, physician and psychologist of Zoroastrian descent, who produced one of the first encyclopedia of medicine. He was a pioneer of pediatrics and the field of child development...
, Ibn Hawqal
Ibn Hawqal
Muḥammad Abū’l-Qāsim Ibn Ḥawqal was a 10th century Muslim writer, geographer, and chronicler. His famous work, written in 977, is called Ṣūrat al-’Arḍ ....
, Istakhri, Moqaddasi, Yaghubi, Masudi, and Mostowfi Qazvini
Hamdollah Mostowfi
Hamdollah Mostowfi was a Persian historian, geographer and epic poet.Mostowfi is the author of Nozhat ol-Gholub , Zafar-Nameh , and the Tarikh e Gozideh . His tomb is a structure with a blue turquoise conical dome, at Qazvin.-References and notes:...
as well. Al-Khwarizmi also mentions this in chapter 6, vol 6, of his book Mafatih-ol-Olum.
Etymological studies also further indicate that current dialects spoken from Baku
Baku
Baku , sometimes spelled as Baki or Bakou, is the capital and largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and of the Caucasus region. It is located on the southern shore of the Absheron Peninsula, which projects into the Caspian Sea. The city consists of two principal...
to Khalkhal
Khalkhal
Khalkhal or Khalkhāl may refer to:*Xalxal, Nakhchivan, Azerbaijan*Xalxal, Oghuz, Azerbaijan*Khalkhal County, a subdivision of Ardabil Province, Iran*Herowabad, a city in Ardabil Province, Iran...
to Semnan, all originated from a common source. In other words, the people of ancient Azerbaijan spoke the same language spoken by the Medes
Medes
The MedesThe Medes...
. (see Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
's distinguished professor Ehsan Yarshater
Ehsan Yarshater
Ehsan Yarshater is the founder and director of The Center for Iranian Studies, and Hagop Kevorkian Professor Emeritus of Iranian Studies at Columbia University. He was the first full-time professor of Persian at a U.S. university since World War II....
's report in: Majjaleh-ye Daaneshkadehye Adabiyaat, 5, No 1-2, p35-37)
The medieval historian Yaqut al-Hamawi
Yaqut al-Hamawi
Yāqūt ibn-'Abdullah al-Rūmī al-Hamawī) was an Islamic biographer and geographer renowned for his encyclopedic writings on the Muslim world. "al-Rumi" refers to his Greek descent; "al-Hamawi" means that he is from Hama, Syria, and ibn-Abdullah is a reference to his father's name, Abdullah...
also used the phrase Al-ajam-ol-Azariyah ("The Azeri Iranian") in his books Mo'ajjem ol-Odabaa and Mo'jem ol Baladaan. In other sources such as Surat-ol-Arz by Ebne Hoghel, Ahsan ol-Taqaaseem by Moqaddasi, and Masaalik va Mamaalik by Istakhri, the people of Azerbaijan are recorded to be speaking Iranian languages. Obviously, this was before the Turkic cultural arrival. And Tabari in 235 A.H. also mentions that poets in Maragheh
Maragheh
Maragheh also Romanized as Marāgheh and Marāghen) is a city in and the capital of Maragheh County, East Azerbaijan Province, Iran. At the 2006 census, its population was 146,405, in 38,891 families....
recited poetry in Pahlavi. Some Azerbaijani poets however, such as Qatran Tabrizi
Qatran Tabrizi
Abū-Mansūr Qatrān-i Tabrīzī was a royal Persian poet.He was born in Sahar near Arrah, bihar Tabriz and was the most famous panegyrist of his time in Iran. His full name according to an old manuscript handwritten by the famous poet Anvari Abivardi is Abu Mansur Qatran al-Jili al-Azerbaijani...
(d465 A.H.), used the word "Persian" and "Pahlavi" interchangeably to describe their native language.
The historian Hamdollah Mostowfi
Hamdollah Mostowfi
Hamdollah Mostowfi was a Persian historian, geographer and epic poet.Mostowfi is the author of Nozhat ol-Gholub , Zafar-Nameh , and the Tarikh e Gozideh . His tomb is a structure with a blue turquoise conical dome, at Qazvin.-References and notes:...
even goes as far as describing variants of "Pahlavi" spoken in different areas of Azerbaijan. In his book Tarikh Gozideh, he describes 8 poets from Azerbaijan, calling them "Ahl-ol She'r Men-al-Ajam" (Iranian poets), all Persian by tongue. By now of course, Dari and Pahlavi had merged into one, as successive dynasties moved from east to west, bringing with them the Dari version of the Iranian language.
Suffice to say that the number of records and documents from Azerbaijan in Pahlavi language are so numerous that it has left little doubt that this was indeed the native tongue of Azerbaijan before the arrival of the Turks. Many words in the current Azeri vocabulary in fact are of Pahlavi origin. (see studies in Nashriyeh Adabiyaat of Tabriz University, by Dr Mahyar Navabi, 5,6. Also see Farhang e Kamaleddin Teflisi, Ajayeb ol-Makhluqaat by Najibeddin Hamadani, and also the books: Majmal-ol-Tavarikh wa al-qasas
Majmal al-tawarikh
Mojmal al-Tawarikh wa al-Qasas was a book written in Persia in 1126 CE by an unknown author. The title means "The Collection of histories and Tales"....
, Iskandar-Nameh e Qadeem, and others for lists of words)
It is agreed that the current Turkic form of the Azeri language supplanted and replaced Pahlavi in Azerbaijan before the Safavid dynasty, perhaps starting with the arrival of Seljukian Turks, and during a gradual course. But some historians report of Pahlavi being spoken in Tabriz
Tabriz
Tabriz is the fourth largest city and one of the historical capitals of Iran and the capital of East Azerbaijan Province. Situated at an altitude of 1,350 meters at the junction of the Quri River and Aji River, it was the second largest city in Iran until the late 1960s, one of its former...
as late as the 17th century. (see Rowdhat ul-Jinan by Hafez Hosein Tabrizi (d997 A.H.), and Risaleh ye Anarjani written in 985 AH). Even the Ottoman Turkish explorer Evliya Celebi
Evliya Çelebi
Evliya Çelebi was an Ottoman traveler who journeyed through the territory of the Ottoman Empire and neighboring lands over a period of forty years.- Life :...
(1611-1682), mentions this in his Seyahatname
Seyahatname
Seyâhatnâme is a Persian term, also used in Ottoman Turkish, which means "book of travels", denoting a literary form and tradition whose examples can be found throughout centuries in the Middle Ages around the Islamic world, starting with the Arab travellers of the Umayyad period.An outstanding...
. He also reports that the elite and learned people of Nakhichevan
Nakhichevan
The Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic is a landlocked exclave of Azerbaijan. The region covers 5,363 km² and borders Armenia to the east and north, Iran to the south and west, and Turkey to the northwest...
and Maragheh
Maragheh
Maragheh also Romanized as Marāgheh and Marāghen) is a city in and the capital of Maragheh County, East Azerbaijan Province, Iran. At the 2006 census, its population was 146,405, in 38,891 families....
spoke Pahlavi, during his tours of the region.