The Hurro-Urartian Substratum in Kurdish (3)

We have so far discussed two aspects of Hurro-Urartian substratum in Kurdish; the place-names and vocabulary.
 This time we will look into morphological traces of Urartian in Kurdish.

Nominal morphology:
Out of nine noun cases in Urartian six have nearly identical Kurdish equivalents:

1) Absolutive: In Urartian, subject of intransitive verbs, direct objects and predicate nouns take no suffixes as in Kurdish. In plural Urartian uses ''-le'' and Kurdish ''-êl''.

2) Ergative: In Urartian subject of transitive verbs take /-shê/ suffix. Similarly in Kurdish, subject of transitive verbs take /-ê/ suffix; note that according to Kurdish historical phonetic changes  /sh/ has regularly developed into /-h or nil/ ( hence we got: -shê>-ê). Under foreign languages influence (Turkish, Persian, Arabic) this ergative case ending is eroding in Kurdish, and it remains only in a few northern Kurdish variants.

3) Genitive: in Urartian /-i/-ie--ei/ was used. In Kurdish /-i/ is used especially in central Kurdish.

4) Dative: in Urartian -e/-ie/ was used. Similarly in Kurdish -ê is used, especially in northern Kurdish.

5) Locative: In Urartian /-a/ was used. Similarly in Kurdish /-a/ is used, especially in central Kurdish. In northern Kurdish, probably under influence of foreign languages /-da/ is used.

6) Comitative: in Urartian /-rani/ was used. The Kurdish equivalent is /-ra/, especially in northern Kurdish.

7) For directive cases Urartian used /-edi/, whereas Kurdish /-ê/ could be a later contraction of it.

8) and 9) for Urartian instrumental ablative and ablative, there does not remain any case endings in modern Kurdish.

Urartian and Kurdish agree in another morphological feature, called ''suffixaufnahme''.
Both languages follow SOV order in their syntax. Both use ya/ye as relative pronouns.

Verbal morphology:
In the verbal morphology, we find a very interesting archaism in central Kurdish. In order to create passive forms of transitive verbs, it uses a /-re-/-ra-/ morpheme, deriving from Hurrian /iri/ and Urartian /-auri/. Northern Kurdish uses an auxilary verb 'hatin' (Indo-Iranic feature?), and southern Kurdish uses /-iya-/ which is common in both Hurrian and old Iranic. However, the morpheme /iya/ is not limited only to south Kurdish, as it is also used more and less, in all other dialects.

Imperative: Both Urartian and Kurdish use an /-a/ suffix after verb roots to form imperative forms.

Jussive: Both Urartian and Kurdish (plural third person) take /-in/ after the verbal root.

Intransitive verbs in Urartian just as in Kurdish (and Iranic) take personal enclitics (identifying the subject) after the verbal root. But, what is more interesting is the use of personal suffixes after transitive verbal roots to identify direct objects; this  is typical for Kurdish, especially the northern Kurdish, where exactly like Urartian, it is only personal suffixes of direct objects that follow the verbal roots, while no personal suffixes for subjects are used.

Causative: in Hurrian ''-ann'' is used, as in Kurdish ''-an'' or ''-and''.

In Urartian, verbal roots of intransitive verbs are marked with / -a/ just as in Kurdish, while verbal roots of transitive verbs are marked with /-u/, where according to Kurdish historical phonology /u>i/, its modern Kurdish equivalent is /-i/.
In Hurrian perfect tens is made by adding /osh/ to verbal root. In central Kurdish, /u[h]/ is sused (sh>h).

As can be seen, Kurdish language appears to be a creole language formed after an amalgamation of Hurro-Urartian and Iranic languages. The Hurro-Urartian layer, showing itself as an older substratum in which Urartian is stronger, while the Iranic layer, which began undoubtedly with the Scytho-Cimmerian invasion of Urartu emerges as a superstratum. The Iranic layer was further intensified with a wave of clearly identifiable  middle Persian loanwords under the Sassanid period, during which, Iranic aristocrats played a prominent role in local affairs. The Islamic conquest of Kurdistan, resulting in collapse of the Sassanids, however, rescued Kurdish from further Iranicization, forever.


6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Keep up the good work.

I want to ask you if it is ok, i want to make a facebook group and share your blog and stuff that open up for kurdish history.

Regards
Barham

Tigris said...

You are welcome.
You can share the content of the blog wherever you like.
Regards.

Anonymous said...

This is really interesting!
Please post more information!

Anonymous said...

Ahem I am highly doubtfull to this post. Kurdish is not seen nor regognized as a creole but as a Indo-European language part of the Iranian branch that has a Hurro-Urartian substratum.

The language is in fact in some regards in it's grammar more typical indo-european than Persian. Many dialects preserve grammatical gender and noun cases.
It's prounouns are clearly Indo-European.
Ez corrospond with English I and German ich and Greek Ego and Swedish jag. Tu with older English thou and German du and etc.
It's sound laws corrospond with other Iranian languages and Indo-European languages.
And the overall bulk of Kurdish vocabulary is Iranian in origin and it preserves some Indo-European roots that has been lost in many other Iranian languages.

What sources to support your case ?

As far as all I can get Kurdish do not have the structure typicaly seen in creoles and it's place in the Indo-European langauge familiy is not disputed.

Substrantum does not make a language a creol.

Kind regards.
Jasmine

Tigris said...

''The language is in fact in some regards in it's grammar more typical indo-european than Persian. Many dialects preserve grammatical gender and noun cases.''

Central and southern Kurdish have no grammatical gender and Kurdish noun cases correspond most often to Hurro-Urartian ones.

''It's prounouns are clearly Indo-European.''

What about ''hin'' from Hurro-urartian shin? [you, plural]. (Kurdish renders sh to h as in old-Iranian ''shuma'' to ''heve''?)

'''It's sound laws corrospond with other Iranian languages and Indo-European languages.'''

No, Kurdish has its own sound laws such as m to v, p to w, initial hbefore vowels, x to k, sh to h, and so on.

''And the overall bulk of Kurdish vocabulary is Iranian in origin''

At least half of the Kurdish vocabulary is not Iranian. It's true that there are many Iranian loanword but there is for almost each Iranian word a native Kurdish equivalent.

''it preserves some Indo-European roots that has been lost in many other Iranian languages''

This proves nothing. Armenian preserves a lot of Parthian words which have otherwise lost in other Iranian languages.

''What sources to support your case ?''

Historical facts indicate that an Indo-Iranian aristocracy ruled over ancient Kurdistan (corresponding with Hurro-urartian-Mannean-Kassit linguistic area) at least since secod millenium BC.

''As far as all I can get Kurdish do not have the structure typicaly seen in creoles and it's place in the Indo-European langauge familiy is not disputed.''

This needs to be discussed. Once Armenian language was regarded as an Iranian language based on numerous Iranian loans. It's time to reconsider Kurdish too.

''Substrantum does not make a language a creol.''

But all creole languages have a substratum

Anonymous said...

Every where , every time some peoples asked/aks us , if we have any cloud or sources to support our theses.
By the way, every where you have the origin of everything, but when it is kurds, no scientifique in the world have time to discuss it...
Kurds are the legal descendants/sons of the marriage of non-indoeuropeans (hurrian hatti sumerian hittite elamite... and medic/daylamite: that's all !
take care my friend

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