Brief intro to the Avar Language

1. Avar Language
Авар мацӀ

2. ВорчӀами!

3. ● Avar is a region
of Dagestan
whose population
Avar spreads to
Azerbaijan,
shown here as
region 7
● Dagestan has 6
literary languages
including Avar
which has more
than 780,000
speakers
worldwide.

4. Avar Language
● Cyrillic alphabet (has a history of Georgian and
Arabic alphabet too)
● Avar is an ergative language
● The Caucasian Avar language possibly has
some affinity with ancient Mesopotamian
agglutinative languages like Hurrian, Sino-
Tibetan and Ket
● Belongs to Avar-Andi-Tsez subgroup of the
Alarodian Northeast Caucasian (or Nakh-
Dagestanian) language family

5. Northeast Caucasion Languages
Schulze (2009)

6. East Caucasian Language
family
Latest attempt at internal classification. (Schulze (2009))

7. Traditional classification
The Avar-Andic-Tsezic Languages are spoken in the Northwest Dagestan
highlands and western Dagestan.
Avar is the lingua franca for these languages, and the only literary language.

8. Dialects of Avar
● There are two main dialect groups:
● The northern, which includes Khunzakh,
Kazbek, Gunib, Gumbet and others;
● The southern, which includes Andalal, Gidatl',
Antsukh, Charoda, Tlyarata, Cumada, Cunta
and others.
● Avar has fifteen spoken dialects: Avar, Bagulal,
Chamalal, Budukh, Botlikh, Andi, Godoberi,
Tindi, Karati, Akhvakh, Dido, Khvarshi, Ginukh,
Hunzib, and Bezhiti, each named after its
speaking tribe.

9. References
SCHULZE, Wolfgang (2009), "The Languages of the Caucasus"