Northeast Caucasian languages

[1] In addition to numerous front obstruents, many Northeast Caucasian languages also possess a number of back consonants, including uvulars, pharyngeals, and glottal stops and fricatives.

Northeast Caucasian phonology is also notable for its use of numerous secondary articulations as contrastive features.

Nouns display covert nominal classification, but partially overt cases of secondary origin can be observed too.

Evidentiality is prominent, with reported, sensory and epistemic moods all appearing as a way of conveying the evidence.

Subjects of transitive sentences, however, carry a different marking to indicate that they belong to a separate case, known as the ergative.

[3] In these languages, nouns are grouped into grammatical categories depending on certain semantic qualities, such as animacy and gender.

Ø-iguI.AGR.SG-goodaħoshepherdØ-igu aħoI.AGR.SG-good shepherdGood shepherdy-iguII.AGR.SG-goodbaruwifey-igu baruII.AGR.SG-good wifeGood wifeb-iguIII.AGR.SG-goodʕomoydonkeyb-igu ʕomoyIII.AGR.SG-good donkeyGood donkeyr-iguIV.AGR.SG-goodʕoƛ’spindler-igu ʕoƛ’IV.AGR.SG-good spindleGood spindleIn many Northeast Caucasian languages, as well as appearing on adjectives and verbs, agreement can also be found on parts of speech which are not usually able to agree in other language families – for example on adverbs, postpositions, particles, and even case-marked nouns and pronouns.

[11][12] In the example from Archi below, doːʕzub ‘big’ and abu ‘made’, but also the adverb ditːabu ‘quickly’ and the personal pronouns nenabu ‘we’ and belabu ‘to us’, all agree in number and gender with the argument in the absolutive case, χʕon ‘cow’.

nenau1PL.INCL.ERGdoːʕzu-bbe.big.ATTR-III.SGχʕoncow(III)[SG.ABS]b-elauIII.SG-1PL.INCL.DATditːauquicklyχirbehindaumake.PFVnenau doːʕzu-b χʕon b-elau ditːau χir au1PL.INCL.ERG be.big.ATTR-III.SG cow(III)[SG.ABS] III.SG-1PL.INCL.DAT quickly behind make.PFV‘We quickly drove the big cow to us (home).’ [13]This kind of clausal agreement has been labelled ‘external agreement’.

This is seen in the following example from Northern Akhvakh, where mīʟō ‘not having gone’ has a masculine adverbial suffix (-ō), agreeing with hugu ek’wa ‘the man’.

‘long time not having gone’), the man died.’ [15] Unknown glossing abbreviation(s) (help);A long-time classification divided the family into Nakh and Dagestanian branches, whence the term Nakho-Dagestanian.

[19] These languages are spoken in the following rayons of Dagestan: Axvax, Botlikh, Buynaksk (Shura), Čarodinsky (Tsurib), Gergebil, Gumbetovsky (Baklul), Gunib, Karabudaxkent, Kazbekovsky (Dylym), Lavaša, Tsumada (Agvali), Untsukul, Xebda, Xunzaq and Zaqatala rayon in Azerbaijan.

They are spoken in the following rayons of Dagestan: Agul, Akhty, Derbent (Kvevar), Kasumxur, Kurakh, Magaramkent, Rutul, Tabasaran, Usukhchay, Khiv and Quba and Zaqatala in Azerbaijan.

Formerly classified geographically as East Tsezic (Hinukh, Bezta) and West Tsezic (Tsez, Khwarshi, Hunzib), these languages may actually form different subgroupings[clarification needed] according to the latest research by Schulze (2009): All figures except for Khwarshi were retrieved from Ethnologue.

[32] Some linguists—notably Igor M. Diakonoff and Starostin—see evidence of a genealogical connection between the Northeast Caucasian family and the extinct languages Hurrian and Urartian.

Some scholars, however, doubt that the language families are related[33] or believe that, while a connection is possible, the evidence is far from conclusive.

[34][35] Below are selected Proto-Northeast Caucasian reconstructions of basic vocabulary items by Johanna Nichols, which she refers to as Proto-Nakh-Daghestanian.