Wakhi language
| Wakhi | |
|---|---|
| x̌ik zik | |
| Native to | Afghanistan, China, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Russia |
| Ethnicity | Wakhi |
|
Native speakers
|
(58,000 cited 1992–2012) |
| Arabic, Cyrillic, Latin | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | |
| Glottolog | wakh1245 |
| Linguasphere | 58-ABD-c |
Wakhi is an Indo-European language in the Eastern Iranian branch of the language family spoken today in Wakhan District, Afghanistan and also in Northern Pakistan, China, and Tajikistan.
Wakhi is one of several languages that belong to the areal Pamir language group. Its relationship to the other Iranian languages is not clear; in certain features Wakhi shows affinity to the extinct Saka language in particular.
The Wakhi people are occasionally called Pamiris and Guhjali. The origin of this language is Wakhan and it is, according to many sources, more than four thousand years old. It is spoken by the inhabitants of the Wakhan Corridor of Afghanistan, parts of Gilgit–Baltistan (the former NAs) of Pakistan, Gorno-Badkhshan (mountainous-Badakhshan, in Russian) region of Tajakistan, and Xinjiang in western China. The Wakhi use the self-appellation ‘X̌ik’ (ethnic) and suffix it with ‘wor’/’war’ to denote their language as ‘X̌ik-wor’ themselves. The noun ‘X̌ik’ comes from *waxša-ī̆ka- (an inhabitant of *Waxša- ‘Oxus’, for Wakhan, in Wakhi ‘Wux̌’. There are other equivalents for the name Wakhi (Anglicised) or Wakhani (Arabic and Persian), Vakhantsy (Russian), Gojali/Gojo (Dingrik-wor/Shina), Guyits/Guicho (Borushaski), Wakhigi/Wakhik-war (Kivi-wor/Khow-wor) and Cert (Turki). The language belongs, as yet to be confirmed according to studies and sources, to the southern group of the Pamir languages, in the Iranian group of the Indo-European family (450) of languages, where the different Ishkashmi, Shighni/…nani and Wakhi languages are included. A very rough estimate of the population of Wakhis is 58,000 worldwide. The Wakhi live in six different countries. In the Gilgit–Baltistan region of Pakistan, the Wakhi people mainly live in Gojal, Ishkoman, Darkut and in Chitral District's Broghol. They also live in some parts of Wakhan in Afghanistan, Gorno-Badakhshan in Tajikistan, Xinjiang in China, Russia and Turkey
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