Mator language

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Mator
Motor, Mator-Taigi-Karagas
Native to	Russia
Region	northern Sayan Mountains
Ethnicity	Mators [ru], possibly also Soyots, Karagas
Extinct	1839
Language family	Uralic Samoyedic Mator
Dialects	Mator Taygi Karagas
Language codes
ISO 639-3	mtm
Glottolog	mato1250  Mator-Taigi-Karagas nucl1288  Nuclear Mator
Traditional distribution of the extinct Sayan Samoyedic languages including Mator‍‍

Mator or Motor is an extinct Samoyedic language, extinct since around 1839. It was spoken in the northern region of the Sayan Mountains in Siberia, close to the Mongolian north border. The speakers of Mator, Matorians or Mators [ru], lived in a wide area from the eastern parts of the Minusinsk District ( okrug ) along the Yenisei River to the region of Lake Baikal. Three dialects of Mator were recorded: Mator proper as well as Taygi and Karagas (occasionally portrayed as separate languages, but their differences are few). Mator was influenced by Mongolic, Tungusic and Turkic languages before it went extinct, and may have even been possibly influenced by the Iranic languages.‍^{[page needed]} It went extinct as a result of the Mator people shifting linguistically to the related Kamas language or nearby Altaic-sprachbund languages, like Buryat, Soyot, Khakas, Evenki and Tatar.‍

Today the term "Mator people" is simply a name of a seok of the Koibal, one of the five territorial sub-division groups of the Khakas. (Note that the name "Koibal" likewise derives from the related Samoyedic Koibal language).

Mator has been frequently grouped together with Selkup and Kamassian as "South Samoyedic". This is however a grouping by geographical area, and not considered to constitute an actual sub-branch of the Samoyedic languages.

Phonology

Lexicon

Below are some Mator words from Helimski 1997.‍^{[page needed]}

kälä

fish

mondoh

root

sörüh

rain

kaduh

storm

baada

word

kaasa

human

ämdä

horn

täjbä

nail

täär

divide, share

köhö

winter

öröh

autumn

teite

four

mən

me, I

tən

you

ter

hair

ajba

head

siime

eye

References

Bibliography

• Helimski, Eugen (1997). Die Matorische Sprache: Wörterbuch – Grundzüge der Grammatik – Sprachgeschichte [The Mator Language: Dictionary – Principles of Grammar – Language History] (PDF). Studia Uralo-Altaica [Uralic-Altaic Studies] (in German). Vol. 41. University of Szeged. ISBN 9630481-881-1. Archived (PDF) from the original on 29 January 2021. Retrieved 24 January 2021.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: ignored ISBN errors (link)

External links

• Mator–English glossary (archived 4 March 2016)