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===Indo-European===
===Indo-European===
According to Maenchen-Helfen, Otto J. there are three known words of, possibly Hunnic (medos, kamos, strava), do not seem to be Turkic,<ref name="MH1973">[[Otto J. Maenchen-Helfen|Maenchen-Helfen, Otto J.]] (ed. Max Knight). 1973. ''[http://www.kroraina.com/huns/mh/mh_9.html The World of the Huns: Studies in Their History and Culture]''. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-01596-7</ref> but probably a ''satem'' Indo-European language similar to Slavic and Dacian.<ref>Schenker, Alexander. 1995. ''The Dawn of Slavic: an introduction to Slavic philology. Yale University Press.</ref> Maenchen-Helfen suggests that "strava" may have come from an informant who spoke Slavic. Other names were classified as [[Germanic languages|Germanic]]<ref>http://www.kroraina.com/huns/mh/mh_4.html O. Maenchen-Helfen The World of the Huns. Chapter IX. Language. 5. Iranian names</ref> and [[Iranian Languages|Iranian]],<ref>http://www.kroraina.com/huns/mh/mh_5.html O. Maenchen-Helfen The World of the Huns. Chapter IX. Language. 4. Germanized and Germanic Names</ref> which also suggests that the Hunnic language could have been [[Indo-European]] instead of Turkic. The [[Gothic language]] was widely used, and was learned by non-Gothic subjects of the Huns.<ref>[[Priscus]] fr. 8 ("For the subjects of the Huns, swept together from various lands, speak, besides their own barbarous tongues, either Hunnic or Gothic, or--as many as have commercial dealings with the western Romans--Latin")</ref>
According to Maenchen-Helfen, Otto J. there are three known words of, possibly Hunnic (medos, kamos, strava), do not seem to be Turkic,<ref name="MH1973">[[Otto J. Maenchen-Helfen|Maenchen-Helfen, Otto J.]] (ed. Max Knight). 1973. ''[http://www.kroraina.com/huns/mh/mh_9.html The World of the Huns: Studies in Their History and Culture]''. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-01596-7</ref> but probably a ''satem'' Indo-European language similar to Slavic and Dacian.<ref>Schenker, Alexander. 1995. ''The Dawn of Slavic: an introduction to Slavic philology. Yale University Press.</ref> Maenchen-Helfen suggests that "strava" may have come from an informant who spoke Slavic. Other names were classified as [[Germanic languages|Germanic]]<ref>http://www.kroraina.com/huns/mh/mh_4.html O. Maenchen-Helfen The World of the Huns. Chapter IX. Language. 5. Iranian names</ref> and [[Iranian Languages|Iranian]],<ref>http://www.kroraina.com/huns/mh/mh_5.html O. Maenchen-Helfen The World of the Huns. Chapter IX. Language. 4. Germanized and Germanic Names</ref> which also suggests that the Hunnic language could have been [[Indo-European]] instead of Turkic. The [[Gothic language]] was widely used, and was learned by non-Gothic subjects of the Huns.<ref>[[Priscus]] fr. 8 ("For the subjects of the Huns, swept together from various lands, speak, besides their own barbarous tongues, either Hunnic or Gothic, or--as many as have commercial dealings with the western Romans--Latin")</ref> However, there is a controversial and maybe not correct opinion regarding the word ''kamos'', according to Hermann Vámbéry it would resemble the Turkic ''kimiz'', a drink made of milk. The incorrectness of this opinion is given by the fact that the Hunnic ''kamos'' is made of barley and not milk. Still, a linguistic affinity with Turkic is existent.<ref>[http://books.google.de/books?ei=xtUhT-XgJY22hAeevK3fBA&id=570FAAAAQAAJ&dq=Der+Ursprung+der+Magyaren%3A+Eine+ethnologische+Studie Ármin Vámbéry, Der Ursprung der Magyaren: Eine ethnologische Studie, F.A. Brockhaus, 1882, p.28]</ref>


===Uralic===
===Uralic===

Revision as of 22:43, 26 January 2012

Hunnic
Regionfrom Eurasian steppe into Europe
Extinctafter 453 CE
Uncertain, possibly Turkic
Language codes
ISO 639-3xhc

The Huns were a heterogenous, multi-ethnic tribal confederation during the 4th and 5th centuries. A contemporary reports that the Hunnic Empire had a "Hunnic language", or "Hunnish", which was spoken alongside Gothic and the languages of other tribes subjugated by the Huns[1][2][3] A variety of languages were spoken within the Hun pax.[4] Roman sources, e.g. Priscus, recorded that Latin, Gothic, "Hun" and other local 'Scythian" languages were spoken. Based on etymological interpretation of the words strava and medos, and subsequent historical appearance of Slavic languages in this region, these other languages have been taken to include a form of proto-Slavic.[5]

The literary records for this language are sparse, consisting of a few names and three non-Turkic words, thus scholars currently conclude that the Hunnic language cannot presently be classified, and there is no firm scholarly consensus on its affinities.[6][7][8][9][10] Its study is complicated by its relevance to the Turanian hypothesis, which includes nationalist claims of linguistic and racial affinity between modern Turks, Hungarians, and others.

Surviving material

The literary sources, Priscus and Jordanes, preserve only a few names and three words of the language of the Huns, which have been studied for more than a century and a half. The sources themselves do not give the meaning of any of the names, only of the three words. We also have the names of some known Hunnic chieftains and groups, and the inscription on the Khan Diggiz plate has been interpreted as giving the name of a known Western Hunnic king, Dengizich, son of Attila, in a form of Turkic.[11][12]

Possible affiliations

Turkic

Notable studies include that of Pritsak 1982, "The Hunnic Language of the Attila Clan.",[13] who studied the names of known Huns and concluded, "It was not a Turkic language, but one between Turkic and Mongolian, probably closer to the former than the latter. The language had strong ties to Old Bulgarian and to modern Chuvash, but also had some important connections, especially lexical and morphological, to Ottoman and Yakut... The Turkic situation has no validity for Hunnic, which belonged to a separate Altaic group." On the basis of the existing name records, a number of scholars suggest that the Huns spoke a Turkic language of the Oghur branch, which also includes Bulgar, Avar, Khazar and Chuvash languages.[14] English scholar Peter Heather called the Huns "the first group of Turkic, as opposed to Iranian, nomads to have intruded into Europe".[15]: 5  Maenchen-Helfen held that many of the tribal names among the Huns were Turkic.[16]

Hunnic has been theoretically considered by most of the historians, with the languages Bulgar, Khazar, Turkic Avar and Chuvash, to be a member of the Oghuric branch of the Turkic language family.[17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24] All except for Chuvash are extinct and known only from very scant records.

Indo-European

According to Maenchen-Helfen, Otto J. there are three known words of, possibly Hunnic (medos, kamos, strava), do not seem to be Turkic,[16] but probably a satem Indo-European language similar to Slavic and Dacian.[25] Maenchen-Helfen suggests that "strava" may have come from an informant who spoke Slavic. Other names were classified as Germanic[26] and Iranian,[27] which also suggests that the Hunnic language could have been Indo-European instead of Turkic. The Gothic language was widely used, and was learned by non-Gothic subjects of the Huns.[28] However, there is a controversial and maybe not correct opinion regarding the word kamos, according to Hermann Vámbéry it would resemble the Turkic kimiz, a drink made of milk. The incorrectness of this opinion is given by the fact that the Hunnic kamos is made of barley and not milk. Still, a linguistic affinity with Turkic is existent.[29]

Uralic

Attempts have been made to identify the Hunnic language as related to Hungarian.[30] Hungarian legends and histories from medieval times onwards assume close ties with the Huns. The name Hunor is preserved in legends and (with a few Hunnic names, such as Attila) is used as a given name in modern Hungary and in Turkey as Atilla and Onur respectively. Some Hungarian people share the belief that the Székelys, a Hungarian ethnic group living in modern-day Transylvania, are descended from a group of Huns who remained in the Carpathian Basin after 454; this myth was recorded in the medieval Gesta Hungarorum.[31]

Xiongnu

It has been suggested that the Hunnic language was related to that of the Xiongnu, itself of unknown affiliation.[32][33]

Notes

  1. ^ Priscus: Byzantine History, available in the original Greek in Ludwig Dindorf : Historici Graeci Minores (Leipzig, Teubner, 1870) and available online as a translation by J.B. Bury: Priscus at the court of Attila
  2. ^ Wang Shiping, Where Did the Huns Go? http://www.chinesejy.com/yuwen/259/305/2005122925403.html Wang Zu, Scourge of God http://www.amazon.cn/dp/bkbk705875
  3. ^ Lin Gan, A Study of Northern Nationalities in Ancient China http://www.amazon.cn/dp/zjbk600291 [unreliable source?]
  4. ^ Blockley, R. C. 1983. The Fragmentary Classicising Historians of the Later Roman Empire. Liverpool: Francis Cairns.; citing Priscus
  5. ^ Walter Pohl. 1999. Huns. Late Antiquity: a guide to the postclassical world, ed. Glen Warren Bowersock, Peter Robert Lamont Brown, Oleg Grabar. Harvard University Press. pp.501-502
  6. ^ Otto J. Maenchen-Helfen. The World of the Huns: Studies in Their History and Culture. University of California Press, 1973
  7. ^ Otto Maenchen-Helfen, Language of Huns
  8. ^ Template:De icon Doerfer, Gerhard. Zur Sprache der Hunnen. Central Asiatic Journal, 17(1): 1-50.
  9. ^ Sinor, Denis. 1977. The Outlines of Hungarian Prehistory. Journal of World History, 4(3):513-540.
  10. ^ Poppe, Nicholas. 1965. Introduction to Altaic linguistics. Wiesbaden: O. Harrassowitz. Ural-altaische bibliothek; 14.
  11. ^ Azgar Mukhamadiev. "The Khan Diggiz Dish Inscription". Excerpts from the article "Turanian Writing", in: Problems Of Linguoethnohistory Of The Tatar People, Kazan, 1995, pages 36–83 [1]
  12. ^ Muhamadiev A. "Ancient coins of Kazan", Kazan, 2005, pp. 37–41, ISBN 5-298-04057-8
  13. ^ Pritsak, Omeljan. 1982. The Hunnic Language of the Attila Clan. Harvard Ukrainian Studies, 6: 428-476.
  14. ^ Johanson, Lars; Éva Agnes Csató (ed.). 1998. The Turkic languages. Routledge.
  15. ^ Heather, Peter. 1995. The Huns and the End of the Roman Empire in Western Europe. English Historical Review, 90: 4-41.
  16. ^ a b Maenchen-Helfen, Otto J. (ed. Max Knight). 1973. The World of the Huns: Studies in Their History and Culture. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-01596-7
  17. ^ "It is assumed that the Huns also were speakers of an l- and r- type Turkic language and that their migration was responsible for the appearance of this language in the West." Johanson (1998); cf. Johanson (2000, 2007) and the articles pertaining to the subject in Johanson & Csató (ed., 1998).
  18. ^ Pritsak, Omeljan. 1982 "The Hunnic Language of the Attila Clan." Harvard Ukrainian Studies, vol. 6, pp. 428–476.[2]
  19. ^ Dybo A.V., "Linguistic contacts of early Türks. Lexical fund: Pra-Türkic period" Moscow, 2007, p. 103, ISBN 98-5-02-036320-5 (In Russian)
  20. ^ Dybo A.V., "Chronology of Türkic languages and linguistic contacts of early Türks", Moskow, 2007, p. 786, [3] (In Russian)
  21. ^ Starostin S.A. (project "Tower of Babel"), [4] the database includes Sinicisms borrowed into the Pra-Türkic (i.e., present in both Pra-Türkic and Bulgar branches)
  22. ^ Murdak O.A. "Pra-Türkic metallurgical lexicon", “Monumenta Altaica”, [5]
  23. ^ Tzvetkov P.S., "The Turks, Slavs and the Origin of the Bulgarians"//The Turks, Vol 1, pp. 562–567, Ankara, 2002, ISBN 975-6782-55-2, 975-6782-56-0
  24. ^ Shervashidxe I.N., "Fragment of Ancient Türkic lexicon. Titles"//Problems of Linguistics, No 3, pp. 81–91, (In Russian)
  25. ^ Schenker, Alexander. 1995. The Dawn of Slavic: an introduction to Slavic philology. Yale University Press.
  26. ^ http://www.kroraina.com/huns/mh/mh_4.html O. Maenchen-Helfen The World of the Huns. Chapter IX. Language. 5. Iranian names
  27. ^ http://www.kroraina.com/huns/mh/mh_5.html O. Maenchen-Helfen The World of the Huns. Chapter IX. Language. 4. Germanized and Germanic Names
  28. ^ Priscus fr. 8 ("For the subjects of the Huns, swept together from various lands, speak, besides their own barbarous tongues, either Hunnic or Gothic, or--as many as have commercial dealings with the western Romans--Latin")
  29. ^ Ármin Vámbéry, Der Ursprung der Magyaren: Eine ethnologische Studie, F.A. Brockhaus, 1882, p.28
  30. ^ http://www.kroraina.com/huns/mh/mh_4.html O. Maenchen-Helfen. The World of the Huns. Chapter IX. Language. 4. Germanized and Germanic Names "the thesis that Kéẓai, who dedicated his Gesta Hungarorum to Ladislaus IV (1272–1290), preserved genuine Magyar traditions about the Huns has long been refuted. Eighty years ago Hodgkin wrote: "The Hungarian traditions no more fully illustrate the history of Attila than the Book of Mormon illustrates the history of the Jews.""
  31. ^ Kordé Zoltán: A székelykérdés története
  32. ^ Étienne de la Vaissière, Xiongnu. Encyclopedia Iranica online, 2006
  33. ^ Dr. Obrusánszky, Borbála : The History and Civilization of the Huns. Paper of the University of Amsterdam, 8 October 2007. Page 60. [6]

Bibliography

  • Clark, Larry. 1998. "Chuvash." In: Johanson & Csató, pp. 434–452.
  • Gmyrya, L. 1995. Hun country at the Caspian Gate: Caspian Dagestan during the epoch of the Great Movement of Peoples. Makhachkala: Dagestan Publishing.
  • Golden, Peter B. 1998. "The Turkic peoples: A historical sketch." In: Johanson & Csató, pp. 16–29.
  • Heather, Peter. 1995. "The Huns and the End of the Roman Empire in Western Europe." English Historical Review 110.4–41.
  • Johanson, Lars & Éva Agnes Csató (ed.). 1998. The Turkic languages. London: Routledge.
  • Johanson, Lars. 1998. "The history of Turkic." In: Johanson & Csató, pp. 81–125.[7]
  • Johanson, Lars. 1998. "Turkic languages." In: Encyclopaedia Britannica. CD 98. Encyclopaedia Britannica Online, 5 September 2007.[8]
  • Johanson, Lars. 2000. "Linguistic convergence in the Volga area." In: Gilbers, Dicky, Nerbonne, John & Jos Schaeken (ed.). Languages in contact. Amsterdam & Atlanta: Rodopi. (Studies in Slavic and General linguistics 28.), pp. 165–178.[9]
  • Johanson, Lars. 2007. Chuvash. Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics. Oxford: Elsevier.
  • Kemal, Cemal. 2002. "The Origins of the Huns: A new view on the eastern heritage of the Hun tribes." (Text edited from conversations with Kemal Cemal, Turkey, 1 November 2002.) In: The History Files, Features for Europe, Barbarian Europe.[10]
  • Krueger, John. 1961. Chuvash Manual. Bloomington: Indiana University Publications.
  • Maenchen-Helfen, Otto J. 1973. The world of the Huns: Studies in their history and culture. Berkeley: University of California Press.[11]
  • Mukhamadiev, Azgar G. 1995. "The inscription on the plate of Khan Diggiz." In: In: Problems of the lingo-ethno-history of the Tatar people. Kazan: Tatarskoe knizhnoe izd-vo, pp. 36–83. (ISBN 5-201-08300, in Russian). Translated from the Russian into English, www.turkicworld.org.[12]
  • Pritsak, Omeljan. 1982. "The Hunnic Language of the Attila Clan." Harvard Ukrainian Studies, vol. 6, pp. 428–476.
  • Róna-Tas, András. 1998. "The reconstruction of Proto-Turkic and the genetic question." In: Johanson & Csató, pp. 67–80.
  • Schönig, Claus. 1997–1998. "A new attempt to classify the Turkic languages I–III." Turkic Languages 1:1.117–133, 1:2.262–277, 2:1.130–151.
  • Samoilovich, A. N. 1922. Some additions to the classification of the Turkic languages. Petrograd.[13]
  • Thompson, E.A. 1948. A History of Attila and the Huns. London: Oxford University Press. Reedited by Peter Heather. 1996. The Huns. Oxford: Blackwell.
  • The World of the Huns by Otto Maenchen-Helfen, University of California Press, 1973. Chapter: IX. Language
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