Turkic languages

Turkic
Geographic
distribution		Eastern Europe
Caucasus
West Asia
Central Asia
North Asia (Siberia)
East Asia (Far East)
Linguistic classificationOne of the world's primary language families
Proto-languageProto-Turkic
Subdivisions
Language codes
ISO 639-5trk
Glottologturk1311
Distribution of Turkic languages

The Turkic languages are a language family of some thirty languages. They are spoken by Turkic peoples across an area from Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean to Siberia and Western and Northern China. Traditionally, people think that they are part of the Altaic languages.

Turkic languages are spoken by some 150 million people as a native language; and the total number of Turkic speakers is about 180 million, including speakers as a second language. The Turkic language with the greatest number of speakers is the Turkish, or Anatolian Turkish. Its speakers are about 40% of all Turkic-speakers.

History

The geographical distribution of Turkic-speaking peoples across Eurasia spreads from Turkey to Siberia.

Classification

The number of speakers derived from statistics or estimates (2019) and were rounded:

Relative numbers of speakers of Turkic languages (2007)
NumberBranchLanguagesStatusNative SpeakersMain Writing System
1 Oghuz languages8Normal108,000,000Latin
2 Karluk languages4Normal69,000,000Latin
3 Kipchak languages12Normal31,300,000Latin
4 Siberian Turkic languages9Vulnerable800,000Cyrillic
5 Oghur languages1Vulnerable1,200,000Cyrillic
6 Arghu Turkic language1Vulnerable20,000Perso-Arabic
Total Turkic languages35Normal210,000,000Latin

Languages by native speakers

The Turkic languages are a language family of at least 35 documented languages, spoken by the Turkic peoples. The number of speakers derived from statistics or estimates (2019) and were rounded:

NumberNameBranchStatusNative SpeakersMain CountryMain Writing System
1 Turkish languageOghuz languagesNormal76,000,000 TurkeyLatin
2 Uzbek languageKarluk languagesNormal35,000,000 UzbekistanLatin / Cyrillic
3 Azerbaijani languageOghuz languagesNormal30,000,000 AzerbaijanLatin
5 Uyghur languageKarluk languagesNormal25,000,000 ChinaPerso-Arabic
4 Kazakh languageKipchak languagesNormal19,000,000 KazakhstanCyrillic / Latin
6 Turkmen languageOghuz languagesNormal7,000,000 TurkmenistanLatin
7 Tatar languageKipchak languagesNormal5,500,000 RussiaCyrillic / Latin
8 Kyrgyz languageKipchak languagesNormal5,000,000 KyrgyzstanCyrillic
9 Bashkir languageKipchak languagesVulnerable1,500,000 RussiaCyrillic
10 Chuvash languageOghur languagesVulnerable1,200,000 RussiaCyrillic
11 Qashqai languageOghuz languagesNormal1,000,000 IranPerso-Arabic
12 Khorasani Turkic languageOghuz languagesVulnerable1,000,000 IranPerso-Arabic
13 Karakalpak languageKipchak languagesNormal650,000 UzbekistanLatin
14 Crimean Tatar languageKipchak languagesSeverely endangered600,000 UkraineLatin
15 Kumyk languageKipchak languagesVulnerable450,000 RussiaCyrillic
16 Karachay-Balkar languageKipchak languagesVulnerable400,000 RussiaCyrillic
17 Yakut languageSiberian Turkic languagesVulnerable400,000 RussiaCyrillic
18 Tuvan languageSiberian Turkic languagesVulnerable300,000 RussiaCyrillic
19 Urum languageOghuz languagesDefinitely endangered200,000 UkraineCyrillic
20 Gagauz languageOghuz languagesCritically endangered150,000 MoldovaLatin
21 Siberian Tatar languageKipchak languagesDefinitely endangered100,000 RussiaCyrillic
22 Nogai languageKipchak languagesDefinitely endangered100,000 RussiaCyrillic
23 Salar languageOghuz languagesVulnerable70,000 ChinaLatin
24 Altai languageSiberian Turkic languagesSeverely endangered60,000 RussiaCyrillic
25 Khakas languageSiberian Turkic languagesDefinitely endangered50,000 RussiaCyrillic
26 Khalaj languageArghu Turkic languageVulnerable20,000 IranPerso-Arabic
27 Äynu languageKarluk languagesCritically endangered6,000 ChinaPerso-Arabic
28 Western Yugur languageSiberian Turkic languagesSeverely endangered5,000 ChinaLatin
29 Shor languageSiberian Turkic languagesSeverely endangered3,000 RussiaCyrillic
30 Dolgan languageSiberian Turkic languagesDefinitely endangered1,000 RussiaCyrillic
31 Krymchak languageKipchak languagesCritically endangered200 IsraelHebrew
32 Ili Turki languageKarluk languagesSeverely endangered100 ChinaCyrillic
33 Tofa languageSiberian Turkic languagesCritically endangered100 RussiaCyrillic
34 Karaim languageKipchak languagesCritically endangered100 UkraineCyrillic
35 Chulym languageSiberian Turkic languagesCritically endangered50 RussiaCyrillic
Total Turkic languagesCommon Turkic languagesNormal179,000,000 TurkeyLatin

Further reading

Other websites

References

  1. 1 2 Katzner, Kenneth (March 2002). Languages of the World, Third Edition. Routledge, an imprint of Taylor & Francis Books Ltd. ISBN 978-0415250047.
  2. ↑ Turkic Language family tree entries provide the information on the Turkic-speaking populations and regions.
  3. ↑ Turkic Language tree entries provide the information on the Turkic-speaking regions.
  4. 1 2 https://www.ethnologue.com/
  5. 1 2 https://glottolog.org/
  6. ↑ Dybo A.V., Chronology of Türkic languages and linguistic contacts of early Türks, Moscow, 2007, p. 766, "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2005-03-11. Retrieved 2005-03-11.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) (In Russian)