Yassi

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Yassi
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Native toAfghanistan, China, Pakistan, Tajikistan
Native speakers150 (2004)
Uralic
  • (Para-?)Samoyedic
    • Yassi
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Yassi is a Uralic language spoken in the Yas River Valley in north-eastern Afghanistan, northern Pakistan, China and Tajikistan.

Classification

For a long time, Yassi was seen as one of the languages that belong to the areal Pamir language group. Nowadays it's classified as a Uralic language, though its exact relationship to the Uralic languages is a matter of debate.

There are certain words of the basic vocabulary which show a closer relation to the Samoyedic than to the Finno-Ugric subgroup, like nǝk (PS *näk- instead of FU *kolme 'three') and swam (PS *time instead of FU *piŋe 'tooth'). However, research has shown that it's often not possible to derive these words from mainstream Proto-Samoyed: Rather, both Yassi swam 'tooth' and Proto-Samoyed *time 'tooth' seem to go back to PU *sewimä 'tooth'. Furthermore, Yassi pǝn 'comb' is assumed to be a cognate to FU *piŋe 'tooth'. Therefore, and as the subgrouping of the Uralic languages is still controversial, Yassi must remain classified an independent branch of Proto-Uralic.

Phonology

Vowels

Front Central Back
Close i u
Mid e ə o
Open a ɑ

Yassi also has the diphthongs /ai/, /ɑi/, /əi/, /ɑw/, /aw/, /oi/, /ui/.

Consonants

Labial Dental Alveolar Retroflex Post-
alveolar
Palatal Velar Uvular Glottal
Nasal m n ɳ ŋ
Plosive voiceless p ʈ k q ʔ
voiced b ɖ ɡ
Affricate voiceless t͡s t͡ʃ
voiced d͡z d͡ʒ
Fricative voiceless f s ʂ ʃ ç x h
voiced z ʐ ʒ ʝ ɣ
Approximant l j w
Rhotic r ɺ̢ 

The words that have been borrowed and are non-native to Yassi, are colour coded. The phonemes /q/, /f/ tend to be replaced by /k/, /p/.

Dialects

Slight differences in pronunciation and vocabulary show that Yassi can be divided in to mutually intelligible dialects. One surrounding the headwaters of River Yas, the other in the lower valley.

The former dialect has preserved various conservative peculiarities, whereas the latter has been influenced more deeply by neighboring Iranian languages. However, as far as the dichotomy in the vocabulary is concerned, it seems to have existed for a long time.

Grammar

Yassi has four cases.


  • nominative: ('I') am ('mother') ǝx̌t ('son')
  • accusative: mǝn ('me') am ('mother') ǝx̌t ('son')
  • prepositional: min ('to me') mal ('to the mother') x̌tal ('to the son')
  • genitive: mǝnǝy ('mine') amǝy ('mother's') ǝx̌tǝy ('son's')

Vocabulary

The huge amount of the basic vocabulary is inherited from Proto-Uralic. However, there are also ancient loans from neighboring Iranian dialects or Proto-Iranian itself. Rather recent loans into Yassi include Persian (and through that, Arabic) and Hindustani.

Numerals

Numeral Inherited
Yassi
Loan from
Proto-Iranian
one ǝs
two kas
three nǝk
four per
five wit
six špağ
seven ow
eight ksorǝy at
nine sowr, swor
ten kǝswit las
eleven
twelve
thirteen
twenty
thirty
forty
hundred sǝl
two hundred
thousand zǝr
ten thousand wewar