Western Yugur (Western Yugur: yoɣïr lar[4] (Yugur speech) or yoɣïr śoz (Yugur word)) also known as Neo-Uygur[5] is the
Turkic language spoken by the
Yugur people. It is contrasted with
Eastern Yugur, a
Mongolic language spoken within the same community. Traditionally, both languages are indicated by the term "Yellow Uygur", from the
endonym of the Yugur.
There are approximately 4,600 Turkic-speaking Yugurs.
Classification
Besides similarities with Uyghuric languages, Western Yugur also shares a number of features, mainly
archaisms, with several of the
Northeastern Turkic languages, but it is not closer to any one of them in particular. Neither Western nor Eastern Yugur are
mutually intelligible with
Uyghur.[6]
Western Yugur also contains
archaisms which are attested in neither modern Uyghuric nor Siberian, such as its
anticipating counting system coinciding with Old Uyghur, and its
copuladro, which also originated from Old Uyghur but substitutes the Uyghur copulative personal suffixes.[7]
A special feature in Western Yugur is the occurrence of
preaspiration, corresponding to the so-called
pharyngealised or low
vowels in
Tuva and Tofa, and
short vowels in
Yakut and
Turkmen. Examples of this phenomenon include /oʰtɯs/ "thirty", /jɑʰʂ/ "good", and /iʰt/ "meat".
The
vowel harmony system, typical of Turkic languages, has largely collapsed. However, it still exists for a-suffixes (back a : front i), however for stems containing last close vowels are chosen unpredictably (/pɯlɣi/ "knowing" vs. /ɯstqɑ/ "pushing").
Voice as a
distinguishing feature in
plosives and
affricates was replaced by
aspiration, as in
Chinese.
Consonants
West Yugur has 28 native consonants and two more (indicated in parentheses) found only in loan words.
Western Yugur has eight vowel phonemes typical of many Turkic languages, which are /i,y,ɯ,u,e,ø,o,ɑ/.
Diachronical processes
Several sound changes affected Western Yugur phonology while evolving from its original
Common Turkic form, the most prolific being:
Vowels
High vowels were delabialized in non-initial syllables: CT *tütün > *tütin > WYu tuʰtïn "to smoke", CT *altun > *altïn > WYu aʰltïm "gold"
CT *u was lowered to WYu o in some words, most commonly around velars and r: CT *burun > WYu pʰorn "before, front"
All high vowels were merged – as front vowels in palatal contexts, and as back otherwise: CT *üčün > WYu utɕin "with, using", CT *yïlan > WYu yilan "snake"
This had several consequences:
It made the Common Turkic allophonic difference between *k and *q phonemic.
Vowel harmonic class of resulting words was thus determined lexically in Western Yugur.
Former vowel harmonic suffixes with high vowels became invariable: CT: *-Ki/*-Kï > WYu -Kï "attributive noun suffix"
Front vowels *ä, *e, *ö were raised to *i, *ü except before *r, *l, *ŋ and (excluding *ö) *g: CT *ärän > WYu erin "man", CT *kȫk > WYu kük, CT *-lar/*-lär > WYu -lar/-lir "plural suffix"
CT *ay is reflected as WYu ey~e in the initial syllable and as i otherwise.
In the initial syllable exclusively, short vowels acquire pre-aspiration of the following consonant, length distinction is otherwise lost.
Consonants
As in most Turkic language, initial *b was assimilated to *m in words containing nasals.
Initial plosives and affricates, CT *b, *t, *k, *g, *č, are all reflected as voiceless with unpredictable aspiration: CT *temir > WYu temïr, CT *bog- > WYu pʰoɣ- "to tie with a rope"
Labials are merged into *w intervocally and after liquids which later in some cases forms diphthongs or get elided: CT *yubaš > WYu yüwaʂ "calm", CT *harpa > WYu harwa "barley"
Finally and in most consonant clusters *p is preserved and *b elided.
Dental and velar voiceless plosives are preserved in most positions, with aspiration occurring almost exclusively in the initial position.
CT *g is spirantized into ɣ and CT *d into z.
With some exceptions, CT *š develops into s: CT *tāš > WYu tas "stone"
CT *z is preserved, except for devoicing when final in polysyllabic words: CT *otuz > WYu oʰtïs "thirty"
CT *č generally becomes WYu š in syllable codas.
CT *ñ develops into WYu y; initial CT *y- is mostly preserved; CT *h- is seemingly preserved in some words but the extent to which WYu h- corresponds to it is unclear.
Vocabulary
Western Yugur has retained many words from East
Old Turkic language and is the only Turkic language that preserved the anticipating counting system, known from
Old Turkic.[8] In this system, upper decimals are used, i.e. per otus (per: one, otus: thirty) means "one (on the way to) thirty", is 21.[9]
For centuries, the Western Yugur language has been in
contact with Mongolic languages,
Tibetan, and Chinese, and as a result has adopted a large amount of
loanwords from these languages, as well as grammatical features. Chinese dialects neighboring the areas where Yugur is spoken have influenced the Yugur language, giving it loanwords.[10]
Grammar
Personal markers in
nouns as well as in
verbs were largely lost. In the verbal system, the notion of
evidentiality has been
grammaticalised, seemingly under the influence of Tibetan.
Grammatical cases
After obstruents
After nasals
After -z
Nominative
-∅
Accusative
-ti
-ni
Genitive
-tiŋ
-niŋ
Dative
Back
-qa
-ɣa
Front
-ki
Locative
Back
-ta
Front
-ti
Ablative
Back
-tan
Front
-tin
Four kinship terms have distinct vocative forms, and used when calling out loudly: aqu (← aqa "elder brother"), qïzaqu (← qïzaqa "elder sister"), açu (← aça "father"), and anu (← ana "mother"). There are two possessive suffixes, first and second person -(ï)ŋ and third person -(s)ï, but these suffixes are largely not used outside of kinship terms (anaŋ, anasï "mother"), similar to the concept of
inalienable possessions. Four kinship nouns have irregular 1st and 2nd person forms by eliding the final vowel and using the consonantic variant: aqa → aqïŋ "elder brother".
Verbs
Yellow Uyghur verbal system, like
Salar, is characterized by contact-induced (namely, under the influence of
Chinese) loss of person-number copular markers in finite verb forms, e.g. contrast the sentence “I have eaten enough” Men toz-dï in Yellow Uyghur and the
Uzbek equivalent Men to’y-dïm; the latter has a first-person marker suffix -(I)m attached to the verb while the equivalent Yellow Uyghur sentence doesn't.
^Roos, Marti (1998).
"Preaspiration in Western Yugur Monosyllables". In Johanson, Lars (ed.). The Mainz Meeting: Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Turkish Linguistics, August 3–6, 1994. Turcologica Series. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. p. 28.
ISBN3-447-03864-0.
^Clauson, Gerard (1965). "[Review of the book An Eastern Turki-English Dictionary by Gunnar Jarring]". The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (1/2). Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland: 57.
doi:
10.1017/S0035869X00123640.
JSTOR25202808.
S2CID163362680.