| Also Known As: Hinukh Language,Ginukh,Ginukhtsy,Ginux,Hinux
Description:
The Hinukh language (Hinukh: гьинузас мец hinuzas mec, also known as Ginukh or Hinux) is a Northeast Caucasian language of the Tsezic subgroup. It is spoken by about 200 to 500 people, the Hinukhs, in the Tsunta district of southwestern Dagestan, mainly in the village of Genukh (Hinukh: Hino). Hinukh is very closely related to Tsez, but they are not entirely mutually intelligible.
Only half of the children of the village speak the Hinukh language. As Hinukh is unwritten, like the other members of the Tsezic family, Avar and Russian are used as literary language. Hinukh is not considered to have dialects, but due to its linguistic proximity to Tsez it was once considered a Tsez dialect.
The Hinukh people were already mentioned in the Georgian chronicles of the Early Middle Ages. The language itself was first described in 1916 by Russian ethnographer A. Serzhputovsky.
Hinukh distinguishes 6 vowel qualities (a, e, o, i, u and a rounded vowel ü), all of which can be either long or short. Two vowels can occur pharyngealized: ˤa and ˤe — however, they're only used by the older generation. Today it is usually replaced by i.
It is an agglutinative language which makes mainly use of..... full article at Wikipedia |
