Middle Mongolian language
Encyclopedia
Middle Mongolian is an ancient Mongolic
language formerly spoken in the Mongol Empire
and later on in Greater Mongolia
during the 13th to at least the early 15th century.
, which would to set at the time when Genghis Khan
united a number of tribes under his command and formed the Mongol clan federation. The term "Middle Mongolian" is somewhat misleading as what would generally by language naming rules be termed "Old Mongolian" in this terminology is actually Proto-Mongolic. The existence of another ("old") Mongol clan federation in Mongolia
during the 12th century is historical, but there is no language material from this period. The Khitan language
seems to share a common ancestor with Proto-Mongolic, thus is further remote.
Middle Mongolian survived in a number of scripts, namely notably Phagspa
(decrees during the Yuan Dynasty
), Arabic
(dictionaries), Chinese
, Mongolian script
and a few western scripts. Usually, the Stele of Yisüngge is considered to be its first surviving monument. It is a sports report written in Mongolian writing that was already fairly conventionalized then and most often dated at the verge of 1224 and 1225. However, Igor de Rachewiltz
argues that it is unlikely that the stele was erected at the place where it was found in the year of the event it describes, suggesting that it is more likely to have been erected about a quarter of a century later, when Yisüngge had gained more substantial political power. If so, the earliest surviving Mongolian monument would be an edict of Töregene
of 1240 and the oldest surviving text arguably the Secret History of the Mongols, a document that must originally have been written in Mongolian script arguably in 1228, but which only survives in an edited version as a textbook for learning Mongolian from the Ming period
, thus reflecting the pronunciation of Middle Mongolian from the second half of the 14th century.
The term Middle Mongolian is problematic insofar as there is no body of texts that is commonly called "Old Mongolian". While a revision of this terminology for the early period of Mongolian has been attempted, the lack of a thorough and linguistically based periodization of Mongolian up to now has constitutes a problem for any such attempts. The related term Preclassical Mongolian is applied to Middle Mongolian documents in Mongolian script that show some distinct linguistic peculiarities.
phoneme
s /p, m, tʰ, t, s, n, l, r, t͡ʃʰ, t͡ʃ, j, kʰ, k, h/ and the vowel
phonemes /i, e, y, ø, a, u, o/. The main difference to older approaches is that <γ> is identified with /h/ and /ɡ/ (sometimes as [p] before /u/ and /y/), so that *pʰ for Proto-Mongolic cannot be reconstructed from internal evidence that used to be based solely on word-initial /h/ and the then rather incomplete data from Monguor.
es. The word order is subject–object–predicate if the subject is a noun and also object–predicate–subject if it is a pronoun
. Arabic Middle Mongolian rather freely allows for predicate–object, which is due to language contact. There are nine case
s, the nominative being unmarked. The verbal suffixes can be divided into finite suffixes, participle
s and converbal suffixes. Some of the finite suffixes inflect for subject number
and sex. Adjective
s precede their modificatum and agree in number with it.
construction that is peculiar to it and maybe Buryat
as well, but is not present in the other dialect
s or in the other Mongolic languages. While it might also have fulfilled the function to foreground the patient
, it usually seems to mark actions which either affect the subject
directly or indirectly affect it in a harmful way.
In §131, Belgütei is negatively affected by an unknown actor. In §112, the addressee is the passive subject. While it is possible for the speech content to be passive subject, it is far less frequent. In §178, the referent of the subject is directly affected, but syntactically, the affected noun phrase
is marked with the reflexive-possessive suffix (that on its own can resemble the accusative case
in other contexts). In §163, it is not the referent of the subject noun phrase, but people related to it that are directly affected to the distress of the subject.
The agent may be marked by the dative (-a and -da, but in contrast to Classical Mongolian
never -dur) or the nominative:
In both of these examples, the verb
stems to which the passive subject is suffixed are intransitive
. Passive suffixes get suffixed to phrase
s, not verbal stems, e.g.:
In modern Mongolian
, neither the passivization of ir- nor the suffixing of passive suffixes to phrases are possible, so the modern translation of §200 runs:
Next to the passive, there is also a causative
that is, however, less notable. Subjects of intransitive verbs of clauses that are causativized get accusative marking (as in §79), while former subjects of transitive verb
s get marked with dative or instrumental case
(as in §188 and §31). In contrast to the passive suffix, the causative suffix doesn't attach to a phrase, but to single verbs (as long as they denote different actions):
Next to these morphemes, Middle Mongolian also had suffixes to express reciprocal
and cooperative meaning, namely -ldu- ~ -lda- and -lča-. On the other hand, while the plurative/distributive -čaγa- is Common Mongolic, it is not attested in Middle Mongolian.
Mongolic languages
The Mongolic languages are a group of languages spoken in East-Central Asia, mostly in Mongolia and surrounding areas plus in Kalmykia. The best-known member of this language family, Mongolian, is the primary language of most of the residents of Mongolia and the Mongolian residents of Inner...
language formerly spoken in the Mongol Empire
Mongol Empire
The Mongol Empire , initially named as Greater Mongol State was a great empire during the 13th and 14th centuries...
and later on in Greater Mongolia
Greater Mongolia
Greater Mongolia as a region, is the contiguous territories primarily inhabited by ethnic Mongols. It approximately includes the modern state of Mongolia, the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in the People's Republic of China , and the Buryat Republic as well as a few smaller territories in...
during the 13th to at least the early 15th century.
Definition and historical precessors
Middle Mongolian is close to Common Mongolian, the ancestor language of the modern Mongolic languagesMongolic languages
The Mongolic languages are a group of languages spoken in East-Central Asia, mostly in Mongolia and surrounding areas plus in Kalmykia. The best-known member of this language family, Mongolian, is the primary language of most of the residents of Mongolia and the Mongolian residents of Inner...
, which would to set at the time when Genghis Khan
Genghis Khan
Genghis Khan , born Temujin and occasionally known by his temple name Taizu , was the founder and Great Khan of the Mongol Empire, which became the largest contiguous empire in history after his death....
united a number of tribes under his command and formed the Mongol clan federation. The term "Middle Mongolian" is somewhat misleading as what would generally by language naming rules be termed "Old Mongolian" in this terminology is actually Proto-Mongolic. The existence of another ("old") Mongol clan federation in Mongolia
Mongolia
Mongolia is a landlocked country in East and Central Asia. It is bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south, east and west. Although Mongolia does not share a border with Kazakhstan, its western-most point is only from Kazakhstan's eastern tip. Ulan Bator, the capital and largest...
during the 12th century is historical, but there is no language material from this period. The Khitan language
Khitan language
The Khitan language is a now-extinct language once spoken by the Khitan people . Khitan is generally deemed to be genetically linked to the Mongolic languages. It was written using two mutually exclusive writing systems known as the Khitan large script and the Khitan small script...
seems to share a common ancestor with Proto-Mongolic, thus is further remote.
Corpus
The temporal delimitation of Middle Mongolian causes some problems as shown in definitions ranging from the 13th until the early 15th or until the late 16th century. This discrepancy is mainly due to the fact that there are very few documents written in Mongolian language to be found between the early 15th and late 16th century. It is not clear whether these two delimitations constitute conscious decisions about the classification of e.g. a small text from 1453 with less than 120 words or whether the vaster definition is just intended to fill up the time gap for which little proper evidence is available.Middle Mongolian survived in a number of scripts, namely notably Phagspa
Phagspa script
The Phags-pa script was an alphabet designed by the Tibetan Lama 'Gro-mgon Chos-rgyal 'Phags-pa for Yuan emperor Kublai Khan, as a unified script for the literary languages of the Yuan Dynasty....
(decrees during the Yuan Dynasty
Yuan Dynasty
The Yuan Dynasty , or Great Yuan Empire was a ruling dynasty founded by the Mongol leader Kublai Khan, who ruled most of present-day China, all of modern Mongolia and its surrounding areas, lasting officially from 1271 to 1368. It is considered both as a division of the Mongol Empire and as an...
), Arabic
Arabic alphabet
The Arabic alphabet or Arabic abjad is the Arabic script as it is codified for writing the Arabic language. It is written from right to left, in a cursive style, and includes 28 letters. Because letters usually stand for consonants, it is classified as an abjad.-Consonants:The Arabic alphabet has...
(dictionaries), Chinese
Chinese character
Chinese characters are logograms used in the writing of Chinese and Japanese , less frequently Korean , formerly Vietnamese , or other languages...
, Mongolian script
Mongolian script
The classical Mongolian script , also known as Uyghurjin, was the first writing system created specifically for the Mongolian language, and was the most successful until the introduction of Cyrillic in 1946...
and a few western scripts. Usually, the Stele of Yisüngge is considered to be its first surviving monument. It is a sports report written in Mongolian writing that was already fairly conventionalized then and most often dated at the verge of 1224 and 1225. However, Igor de Rachewiltz
Igor de Rachewiltz
Igor de Rachewiltz is an Italian historian and philologist specializing in Mongol studies.Igor de Rachewiltz was born in Rome, the son of Bruno Guido and Antonina Perosio. The de Rachewiltz family was of Polish noble roots. His grandmother was a Tatar from Kazan in eastern Russia who claimed...
argues that it is unlikely that the stele was erected at the place where it was found in the year of the event it describes, suggesting that it is more likely to have been erected about a quarter of a century later, when Yisüngge had gained more substantial political power. If so, the earliest surviving Mongolian monument would be an edict of Töregene
Töregene Khatun
Töregene Khatun was the Great Khatun and regent of the Mongol Empire from the death of her husband Ögedei Khan in 1241 until the election of her eldest son Güyük Khan in 1246.-Background:...
of 1240 and the oldest surviving text arguably the Secret History of the Mongols, a document that must originally have been written in Mongolian script arguably in 1228, but which only survives in an edited version as a textbook for learning Mongolian from the Ming period
Ming Dynasty
The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic...
, thus reflecting the pronunciation of Middle Mongolian from the second half of the 14th century.
The term Middle Mongolian is problematic insofar as there is no body of texts that is commonly called "Old Mongolian". While a revision of this terminology for the early period of Mongolian has been attempted, the lack of a thorough and linguistically based periodization of Mongolian up to now has constitutes a problem for any such attempts. The related term Preclassical Mongolian is applied to Middle Mongolian documents in Mongolian script that show some distinct linguistic peculiarities.
Phonology
Middle Mongolian had the consonantConsonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are , pronounced with the lips; , pronounced with the front of the tongue; , pronounced with the back of the tongue; , pronounced in the throat; and ,...
phoneme
Phoneme
In a language or dialect, a phoneme is the smallest segmental unit of sound employed to form meaningful contrasts between utterances....
s /p, m, tʰ, t, s, n, l, r, t͡ʃʰ, t͡ʃ, j, kʰ, k, h/ and the vowel
Vowel
In phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language, such as English ah! or oh! , pronounced with an open vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure at any point above the glottis. This contrasts with consonants, such as English sh! , where there is a constriction or closure at some...
phonemes /i, e, y, ø, a, u, o/. The main difference to older approaches is that <γ> is identified with /h/ and /ɡ/ (sometimes as [p] before /u/ and /y/), so that *pʰ for Proto-Mongolic cannot be reconstructed from internal evidence that used to be based solely on word-initial /h/ and the then rather incomplete data from Monguor.
Grammar
Middle Mongolian is an agglutinating language that makes nearly exclusive use of suffixSuffix
In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns or adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs...
es. The word order is subject–object–predicate if the subject is a noun and also object–predicate–subject if it is a pronoun
Pronoun
In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun is a pro-form that substitutes for a noun , such as, in English, the words it and he...
. Arabic Middle Mongolian rather freely allows for predicate–object, which is due to language contact. There are nine case
Grammatical case
In grammar, the case of a noun or pronoun is an inflectional form that indicates its grammatical function in a phrase, clause, or sentence. For example, a pronoun may play the role of subject , of direct object , or of possessor...
s, the nominative being unmarked. The verbal suffixes can be divided into finite suffixes, participle
Participle
In linguistics, a participle is a word that shares some characteristics of both verbs and adjectives. It can be used in compound verb tenses or voices , or as a modifier...
s and converbal suffixes. Some of the finite suffixes inflect for subject number
Grammatical number
In linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions ....
and sex. Adjective
Adjective
In grammar, an adjective is a 'describing' word; the main syntactic role of which is to qualify a noun or noun phrase, giving more information about the object signified....
s precede their modificatum and agree in number with it.
Voice
Middle Mongolian exhibits a passivePassive voice
Passive voice is a grammatical voice common in many of the world's languages. Passive is used in a clause whose subject expresses the theme or patient of the main verb. That is, the subject undergoes an action or has its state changed. A sentence whose theme is marked as grammatical subject is...
construction that is peculiar to it and maybe Buryat
Buryat language
Buryat is a Mongolic variety spoken by the Buryats that is either classified as a language or as a major dialect group of Mongolian. The majority of Buryat speakers live in Russia along the northern border of Mongolia where it is an official language in the Buryat Republic, Ust-Orda Buryatia and...
as well, but is not present in the other dialect
Dialect
The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...
s or in the other Mongolic languages. While it might also have fulfilled the function to foreground the patient
Patient (grammar)
In linguistics, a grammatical patient, also called the target or undergoer, is the participant of a situation upon whom an action is carried out. A patient as differentiated from a theme must undergo a change in state. A theme is denoted by a stative verb, where a patient is denoted by a dynamic...
, it usually seems to mark actions which either affect the subject
Subject (grammar)
The subject is one of the two main constituents of a clause, according to a tradition that can be tracked back to Aristotle and that is associated with phrase structure grammars; the other constituent is the predicate. According to another tradition, i.e...
directly or indirectly affect it in a harmful way.
- belgütei teyin čabčiqdaju bö’et (§131) so chop-passive-converbum_imperfecti be_converbum_perfecti
- ‘Belgütei, having been chopped in that manner’
- ke’üt minu qat bolju’u ke’ekdemüi bi (§112)
- son-plural my khan-plural become-past say-passive-present I
- ‘I am told that my sons have become khans’
- ma’ui setki’esü ene metü čisuban qarqaqdasu (§178)
- bad think-converbum_conditionale this like blood-one’s_own come_out-passive-voluntative
- ‘If I think evil I shall be subject to letting out my blood like this’
- ‘Now if I think evil ..., let my blood by shed like this!’
- naimana irge orqoban eme kö’üben da’uliqdaba bi (§163)-dative people homestead-one’s_own woman son-one’s_own pillage-past I
- ‘I have been spoiled by the Naiman in respect of my people and folk and wives and sons’
In §131, Belgütei is negatively affected by an unknown actor. In §112, the addressee is the passive subject. While it is possible for the speech content to be passive subject, it is far less frequent. In §178, the referent of the subject is directly affected, but syntactically, the affected noun phrase
Noun phrase
In grammar, a noun phrase, nominal phrase, or nominal group is a phrase based on a noun, pronoun, or other noun-like word optionally accompanied by modifiers such as adjectives....
is marked with the reflexive-possessive suffix (that on its own can resemble the accusative case
Accusative case
The accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of prepositions...
in other contexts). In §163, it is not the referent of the subject noun phrase, but people related to it that are directly affected to the distress of the subject.
The agent may be marked by the dative (-a and -da, but in contrast to Classical Mongolian
Classical Mongolian language
Classical Mongolian is an extinct Mongolic language formerly used in Mongolia, China, and Russia. It is a standardized written language used in a number of written texts such as the translation of the Kanjur and Tanjur and several cronicles roughly between 1700 and 1900...
never -dur) or the nominative:
- Ögödei qahan ebetčin gürtejü (§272) Khan illness reach-passive-converbum_imperfecti
- ‘Ögödei Khan being befallen by an illness’
- qalqa kene boldaquyu bi (§111)
- shield who-dative become-passive-present I
- ‘By whom shall the office of shield be done for me?’
In both of these examples, the verb
Verb
A verb, from the Latin verbum meaning word, is a word that in syntax conveys an action , or a state of being . In the usual description of English, the basic form, with or without the particle to, is the infinitive...
stems to which the passive subject is suffixed are intransitive
Intransitive verb
In grammar, an intransitive verb is a verb that has no object. This differs from a transitive verb, which takes one or more objects. Both classes of verb are related to the concept of the transitivity of a verb....
. Passive suffixes get suffixed to phrase
Phrase
In everyday speech, a phrase may refer to any group of words. In linguistics, a phrase is a group of words which form a constituent and so function as a single unit in the syntax of a sentence. A phrase is lower on the grammatical hierarchy than a clause....
s, not verbal stems, e.g.:
- Jamuqa nökötte'en bariju irekdejü (§200) companion-dative-one's_own seize-converbum_imperfecti come-passive-converbum_imperfecti
- 'Jamuqa, being seized by his companions and forced to come (unto Genghis Khan)'
In modern Mongolian
Mongolian language
The Mongolian language is the official language of Mongolia and the best-known member of the Mongolic language family. The number of speakers across all its dialects may be 5.2 million, including the vast majority of the residents of Mongolia and many of the Mongolian residents of the Inner...
, neither the passivization of ir- nor the suffixing of passive suffixes to phrases are possible, so the modern translation of §200 runs:
- Jamuha nöhöddöö barigdaž ireed friend-dative-one's_own seize-passive-converbum_imperfecti come-converbum perfecti
Next to the passive, there is also a causative
Causative
In linguistics, a causative is a form that indicates that a subject causes someone or something else to do or be something, or causes a change in state of a non-volitional event....
that is, however, less notable. Subjects of intransitive verbs of clauses that are causativized get accusative marking (as in §79), while former subjects of transitive verb
Transitive verb
In syntax, a transitive verb is a verb that requires both a direct subject and one or more objects. The term is used to contrast intransitive verbs, which do not have objects.-Examples:Some examples of sentences with transitive verbs:...
s get marked with dative or instrumental case
Instrumental case
The instrumental case is a grammatical case used to indicate that a noun is the instrument or means by or with which the subject achieves or accomplishes an action...
(as in §188 and §31). In contrast to the passive suffix, the causative suffix doesn't attach to a phrase, but to single verbs (as long as they denote different actions):
- Temüjin-i morila’ulju (§79)-accusative mount_a_horse-causative-converbum_imperfecti
- 'they had Temüjin mount a horse'
- mori-yan Kököčü aqtači-da'an bari’ulju’ui (§188)
- horse-one's_own (person name) keeper_of_geldings-dative-one's_own seize-causative-past
- 'He gave his horse to his equerry Kököčü to hold'
- qarčiqai-bar bari’uluqsan noqut (§31)
- hawk-instrumental seize-causative-perfect_participle duck-plural
- 'the ducks ... caught by his hawk'
- berined-iyen berile’üljü ötökle’üljü qu’urda’ulju (§189)
- daughter-in-law-one's_own to_daughter-in-law-converbum_imperfecti present_ötög-c_i play_qu'ur-c_i
- 'She had her daughter-in-law perform the rites pertaining to a daughter in law, ordered that the ceremonial wine be drunk and the horse fiddle be played, and ...'
- 'making the daughters in law perform the rites of a daughter in law, making one to present the ötög, making one to play the qu'ur'
Next to these morphemes, Middle Mongolian also had suffixes to express reciprocal
Reciprocal (grammar)
A reciprocal is a linguistic structure that marks a particular kind of relationship between two noun phrases. In a reciprocal construction, each of the participants occupies both the role of agent and patient with respect to each other...
and cooperative meaning, namely -ldu- ~ -lda- and -lča-. On the other hand, while the plurative/distributive -čaγa- is Common Mongolic, it is not attested in Middle Mongolian.
External links
- Monumenta Altaica grammars, texts, dictionaries and bibliographies of Mongolian and other Altaic languages
- Lingua Mongolia information on Classical Mongolian, including an online dictionary