Bashkir language

Bashkir or Bashkort (, ; Башҡорт теле, ) is a Turkic language belonging to the Kipchak branch. It is co-official with Russian in Bashkortostan. It is spoken by 1.09 million native speakers in Russia, as well as in Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Estonia and other neighboring post-Soviet states, and among the Bashkir diaspora. It has three dialect groups: Southern, Eastern and Northwestern.

Speakers
Speakers of Bashkir mostly live in the republic of Bashkortostan (a republic within the Russian Federation). Many speakers also live in Tatarstan, Chelyabinsk, Orenburg, Tyumen, Sverdlovsk and Kurgan Oblasts and other regions of Russia. Minor Bashkir groups also live in Kazakhstan and other countries.

Classification
Bashkir together with Tatar belongs to the Kipchak-Bulgar (кыпчакско-булгарская) subgroup of the Kipchak languages. These languages have a similar vocabulary by 94.9%, and they not only have common origin, but also a common ancestor in the written language — Volga Turki. However, Bashkir differs from Tatar in several important ways:
 * Bashkir has dental fricatives and  in the place of Tatar (and other Turkic)  and  . Bashkir  and, however, cannot begin a word (there are exceptions: ҙур – "zur"  'big', and the particle/conjunction ҙа – "za"  or ҙә – "zə" . The only other Turkic language with a similar feature is Turkmen. However, in Bashkir,  and  are two independent phonemes, distinct from  and , whereas in Turkmen [θ] and [ð] are the two main realizations of the common Turkic  and . In other words, there are no  and  phonemes in Turkmen, unlike Bashkir which has both  and  and  and.
 * The word-initial and morpheme-initial is turned into . An example of both features can be Tatar сүз (süz) and Bashkir һүҙ (hüz), both meaning "word".
 * Common Turkic (Tatar ) is turned into Bashkir, e.g., Turkish ağaç , Tatar агач ağaç  and Bashkir ағас – ağas , all meaning "tree".
 * The word-initial in Tatar always corresponds to  in Standard Bashkir, e.g., Tatar җылы cılı  and Bashkir йылы – yılı, both meaning "warm". However, the eastern and northern dialects of Bashkir have the  > /~/ shift.

The Bashkir orthography is more explicit. and are written with their own letters Ҡ ҡ and Ғ ғ, whereas in Tatar they are treated as positional allophones of  and, written К к and Г г.

Labial vowel harmony in Bashkir is written explicitly, e.g. Tatar тормышым tormışım and Bashkir тормошом – tormoşom, both pronounced, meaning "my life".

Latin script
Bible in Bashkir

1: İsrailda xakimdar idara itkәn osorźa ildә yot başlandı. Şul arqala Yәhüźә bilәmәhendәge Beyt-Lәxәm tigәn qalanan ber keşe qatını hәm ike ulı menәn Moav yerenә küsende.

2: Bıl keşeneñ iseme – Әlimәlәx, qatınınıqı – Noğomi, ә uldarınıqı Maxlon menәn Kilyon ine. Yәhüźә bilәmәhendәge Beyt-Lәxәm qalahınan, Әfraś yerźәrenәn bulğan bıl ğailә Moav ilenә küsep kilep, şunda töyәklәnde.

3: Noğomiźıñ ire Әlimәlәx oşonda vafat buldı, qatın uldarı menәn genә qaldı.

4: İke ulı la moav qıźźarına öylәnde: ularźıñ bereheneñ iseme – Ğorpa, ikenseheneke Rut ine. Un yıl samahı unda yәşәgәs,

5: Maxlon menän Kilyon da ülep kitte. Noğomi ike ulınan da, irenәn dә mәxrüm qaldı.

6: Rabbınıñ Üź xalqına iltifat kürhәtep, ikmәk birgәnen işetkәs, Noğomi kilendәre menәn Moavtan tıwğan ilenә qaytırğa buldı.

7: Yәşәp yatqan urındarın taşlap, ul kilendәre menәn Yәhüźә tarafına yünәlde. Kitep barışlay,

8: Noğomi kilendәrenә: – Barığıź, әsәyźәregeź yortona qaytığıź. Heź mәrxümdәrgә hәm miñә qarata igelekle bulğan kewek, Rabbı heźgә qarata la mәrxәmәtle bulhın.

9: Rabbı hәr beregeźgә yañı ir yortonda rәxәtlek tabırğa nasip ithen, – tine. Ul xuşlaşıp kilendәren üpte, lәkin ular qısqırıp ilay-ilay:

10: – Beź hineñ menәn barabıź, hineñ xalqıñ arahında yәşәybeź, – tinelәr.

Source: https://ibt.org.ru/ru/text?m=BSK&l=Ruth.1.1.1&g=0

Orthography
After the adoption of Islam, which began in the 10th century and lasted for several centuries, the Bashkirs began to use Turki as a written language. Turki was written in a variant of the Arabic script.

In 1923, a writing system based on the Arabic script was specifically created for the Bashkir language. At the same time, the Bashkir literary language was created, moving away from the older written Turkic influences. At first, it used a modified Arabic alphabet. In 1930 it was replaced with the Unified Turkic Latin Alphabet, which was in turn replaced with an adapted Cyrillic alphabet in 1939.

The modern alphabet used by Bashkir is based on the Russian alphabet, with the addition of the following letters: Ә|Ә ә, Ө|Ө ө , Ү|Ү ү , Ғ|Ғ ғ , Ҡ|Ҡ ҡ , Ң|Ң ң , Ҙ|Ҙ ҙ , Ҫ|Ҫ ҫ , Һ|Һ һ.

Vowels
Bashkir has nine native vowels, and three or four loaned vowels (mainly in Russian loanwords).

Phonetically, the native vowels are approximately thus (with the Cyrillic letter followed by the usual Latin romanization in angle brackets): In Russian loans there are also, , and , written the same as the native vowels: ы, е/э, о, а respectively.

Historical shifts
Historically, the Old Turkic mid vowels have raised from mid to high, whereas the Old Turkic high vowels have become the Bashkir reduced mid series. (The same shifts have also happened in Tatar.)

Consonants

 * Notes
 * The phonemes, , are found only in loanwords, and, in the case of , in a few native onomatopoeic words.
 * is an intervocal allophone of, and it is distinct from . is an allophone of  in back vowel contexts.  and  occur as allophones of  and  before , and both occur only in front vowel contexts.


 * are dental, and is apical alveolar . The exact place of articulation of the other dental/alveolar consonants is unclear.

Grammar
A member of the Turkic language family, Bashkir is an agglutinative, SOV language. A large part of the Bashkir vocabulary has Turkic roots; and there are many loan words in Bashkir from Russian, Arabic and Persian sources.

Plurality
The form of the plural suffix is heavily dependent on the letter which comes immediately before it. When it's a consonant, there is a four-way distinction between "л" (l), "т" (t), "ҙ" (ź) and "д" (d); The vowel's distinction is two-way between "а" (after back vowels "а" (a), "ы" (ı), "о" (o), "у" (u)) and "ә" (after front vowels "ә" (ə), "е" (e), "и" (i), "ө" (ö), "ү" (ü)). Some nouns are also less likely to be used with their plural forms such as "һыу" (hıw, "water") or "ҡом" (qom, "sand").