|
( Kurdish language)
The Kurdish language (Kurdish Kurdî or ?????) is a term used for the language spoken by Kurds. It is mainly concentrated in the parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey.[4] Kurdish belongs to the northwestern sub-group of the Iranian languages, which themselves belong to the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European language family. The most closely related languages to Kurdish are Balochi, Gileki and Talysh, all of which belong to the north-western branch of Iranian languages. Also related to Kurdish is the Persian language, which belongs to the south-western branch, especially the Lori and Bakhtiari dialects. From about the 10th century BC, Iranian tribes spread in the area now corresponding to Kurdistan, among them Medes, speakers of a Northwest Iranian dialect. Gradual linguistic assimilation of the various indigenous peoples to this Median language in the course of the Iron Age marks the beginning of Kurdish ethnogenesis.[5] Some evidence of Hurrian influence on Kurdish is detected in its ergative grammatical structure.[6] A linguistic group influential on Kurdish to a lesser degree was Aramaic. M. R. Izady (1993) identifies three-quarters of Kurdish clan names and roughly two-third of toponyms are as deriving from Hurrian,[7][not in citation given] e.g., the names of the clans of Bukhti, Tirikan, Bazayni, Bakran and Mand; the rivers Murad, Balik and Khabur; Lake Van; the towns of Mardin, Ziwiya and Dinawarand Barzan. Although Kurdish has a northwestern Iranian root, little is known about Kurdish in pre-Islamic times. The most notable language in this group is Median, of which little is known either. From the 15th to 17th centuries, classical Kurdish poets and writers developed a literary language. The most famous classical Kurdish poets from this period are Ali Hariri, Ahmad Khani, Malaye Jaziri and Faqi Tayran. Today, Kurdish is an official language in Iraq, while it is banned in Syria where it is forbidden to publish material in Kurdish.[8]
|
Kurdish language Subcategories
Kurdish language Articles
|
|
