Tabasaran (or Tabassaran) is a member of the Lezgi subfamily of the Northeast Caucasian languages. It is spoken in the southern parts of the Russian Caucasus republic of Dagestan. Tabasaran speakers, Tabasaran people, live in the basin of Upper Rubas-chai and Upper Chirakh-chai. There are two main dialects: North (Khanag) and South Tabasaran. It has a literary language based on the Southern dialect, one of six in the Dagestan Republic. The Republic of Dagestan (Russian: ), older spelling Daghestan, is a federal subject of the Russian Federation (a republic). ... Current distribution of Human Language Families Most languages are known to belong to language families. ... The Northeast Caucasian languages, also called East Caucasian, Caspian, Nakh-Dagestanian, or Dagestanian, are a family of languages spoken mostly in the Dagestan, Chechnya, and Ingushetia regions of Russia, in Northern Azerbaijan, and in Georgia. ... ISO 639-1 is the first part of the ISO 639 international-standard language-code family. ... ISO 639-2:1998 Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code Twenty-two of the languages have two three-letter codes: a code for bibliographic use (ISO 639-2/B) a code for terminological use (ISO 639-2/T). ... ISO 639-3 is in process of development as an international standard for language codes. ... The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is a system of phonetic notation devised by linguists to accurately and uniquely represent each of the wide variety of sounds (phones or phonemes) used in spoken human language. ... Phonetics (from the Greek word φωνή, phone = sound/voice) is the study of sounds (voice). ... Because of technical limitations, some web browsers may not display some special characters in this article. ... This is a concise version of the International Phonetic Alphabet for English sounds. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... The Northeast Caucasian languages, also called East Caucasian, Caspian, Nakh-Dagestanian, or Dagestanian, are a family of languages spoken mostly in the Dagestan, Chechnya, and Ingushetia regions of Russia, in Northern Azerbaijan, and in Georgia. ... The Republic of Dagestan (Russian: ), older spelling Daghestan, is a federal subject of the Russian Federation (a republic). ... The Tabasarans are an ethnic group who live mostly in Dagestan, Russia. ...

Tabassaran is an ergative language. It is remarkable for its case system (nouns have about 48 cases). The verb system is relatively simple; verbs agree with the noun in number, person and (in North Tabassaran) class. North Tabassaran has two noun classes, while Southern Tabassaran has none. In linguistics, declension is a feature of inflected languages: generally, the alteration of a noun to indicate its grammatical role. ...

Sample

uwu aldakurawu "Уву алдакураву" — "I fall."

uzuz uwu kunzhazuz "Узуз уву ккундузуз" — "I love you."

Bibliography

• Chanmagomedov, B.G.-K. & K.T. Šalbuzov. 2001. Tabasaransko-russkij slovar’. Moskva: Ilim. ISBN 5-02-022620-3 [Includes outline of Tabasaran grammar (Grammatičeskij očerk tabasaranskogo jazyka) by K.K. Kurbanov (p. 395-476)]

External links

• Entry in the Red Book of the Peoples of the Russian Empire
• Sample text
• The consonant system of Tabasaran
• Description at Languages of the World
• Entry at the Rosetta Project