Ancient Dargin migrations and the formation of Dargin languages and dialects

Mutalov Rasul Osmanovich Doctor of Philology Professor, Chief Scientific Associate, Institute of Linguistics of the Russian Academy of Sciences 125009, Russia, Moscow, lane. Bolshoy Kislovsky, 1/1 mutalovr@mail.ru Other publications by this author

The Darginian languages (an East Caucasian family of languages) are spoken in the Central part of mountainous Dagestan. The total number of speakers is 625,000 (2021 census). The sociolinguistic situation in the region is characterized by the fact that due to globalization and changes in the traditional ways of life of the highlanders, small languages are subject to rapid extinction. Children and young people, even in remote mountain villages, already communicate with each other and their elders only in Russian.

Meanwhile, the Darginian languages, like other Dagestan and Caucasian languages in general, have a multi-thousand-year history of their development. Nevertheless, it remains unexplored for the time being; there is no comparative historical grammar of the Darginian languages, there are no etymological dictionaries that could shed light on the formation of Darginian languages and dialects, as well as, in general, on the history of the Darginian people. Therefore, the task of collecting and systematizing the field material of the Darginian languages remains urgent.

During the years of Soviet rule, Darginian idioms were considered dialects of the same Darginian language, although in early classifications Kubachinsky and Kaitagsky languages were distinguished as independent languages. Recently, several Dargish languages have been singled out, which is quite reasonable, since they have many differences at all linguistic levels.

So far, there is also the problem of classifying Darginian dialect units, which is due to two circumstances. On the one hand, they represent a linguistic continuum where neighboring idioms are closer to each other than the extreme ones, and it is quite difficult to establish a boundary between them. On the other hand, many dialects and dialects still remain unexplored. In the Atlas of Caucasian Languages, Yu.B. Koryakov identifies 17 languages of the Dargin group based on the lexicostatistical method. ^{[5, pp. 33-36]}. In the article "Classification of Darginian languages and dialects", we distinguish six languages of the Darginian group: Northern Darginian, Megebian, Tsudakharian-Sirkhin, Kaitag, Kubachinsky, Chiragsky ^{[8, p. 20]}. The above classification became the basis for the allocation of Darginian languages in the list of languages of the Russian Federation (http://jazykirf.iling-ran.ru /).

This article discusses the problems of the Dargins' initial settlement and their subsequent migrations. The issues of the Darginian ancestral homeland and the formation of Darginian dialects have not previously been the subject of detailed research, although there are several different hypotheses. According to one of them, the Dargins, like other Dagestani peoples, migrated from south to north along the Caspian lowland and settled in Central Dagestan towards the mountains, from east to west. However, it is difficult to agree with this assumption, since the linguistic data does not confirm it.

For more than a century and a half of the scientific study of Darginian dialects, Darginian studies have accumulated a significant amount of linguistic material. The available linguistic materials, which include many aspects of the phonetic system, grammatical structure and lexical composition of various Darginian languages and dialects, as well as the reconstruction of the original sounds and grammatical forms, give us the opportunity to move on to some generalizations and make an assumption about the historical ancestral homeland of the Darginians. There is reason to believe that their first habitat in the Dagestan mountains was the upper reaches of the Ulluchai River, located in the southwestern part of the current settlement of Dargins. From there, the migration of the ancient Dargins took place in different directions. Although it is difficult to talk about exact dates, it can be assumed that there were several such migration waves.

At the new location, the first settlement was initially created, which later became the central one; as the number grew, members of the community settled from the center to the farms. As a result, the speech of the settlements changed over the centuries, became isolated, and new dialects and dialects emerged. The essence of our methodology is that after a certain period of time, new linguistic phenomena appear in the speech of residents of new settlements that are absent in other idioms. They serve as confirmation that these settlements arose later than others – each new wave of migration is accompanied by the appearance of innovations in the language.

Some settlements expanded, new farms and villages appeared, dialects and dialects were formed. Others, due to a number of objective factors – wars, diseases, famine, lack of resources, etc., remained in the form of one or more villages, or disappeared altogether.

One of the first migrations was the relocation of part of the Dargins to the northeast; they settled in caves and gorges near the village of Mekegi (Levashinsky district of the Republic of Dagestan) ^[9]. The speech of these settlements later became the basis of the current northern Darginian languages. "The entire northern part of the Darginsky area originally spoke Mekeginsky, which is confirmed by numerous linguistic facts – in various places there are villages whose speech to one degree or another contains characteristic features of the Mekeginsky dialect. They are widespread in the territory of modern Levashinsky, Akushinsky, Dahadayevsky, Sergokalinsky, Karabudakhkentsky, Buinaksky and Gunibsky districts of Dagestan. In particular, these are the villages of Deibuk and Harbuk located on the periphery of the Dahadaevsky district, whose speech traditionally belongs to the Muirin dialect; the speech of the village of Mugri in the Sergokalinsky district, which is considered a dialect of the Urakhinsky dialect, and the Gapshimin speech, in which the features of the Mekeginsky were noted" ^{[9, p. 342]}.

It is also possible that this migration took place gradually, along the southern and eastern parts of the Forest mountain range; ancient settlements could have been formed in the vicinity of the current villages of Harbuk, Deibuk, Mugri, etc.

There are a number of linguistic changes, both phonetic and grammatical, that occurred in the northern languages after this migration. First of all, this is the transition of geminated consonants, which existed in the Proto-Darginian language, into voiced consonants and affricates ^{[14, p. 117]}. In the northern idioms, some initial sounds have also passed into other sounds: Dr. (du "ya" – nu), Dr. (personal indicators -yes (1st l.)/-di (2nd l.) – -ra (1st l.)/-ri (2nd l.), y – s (ending of the dative and infinitive), g1 – x1 (g1u "you" - x1u), etc. In addition, in the northern dialects there was a reduction in the number of local cases, as well as the unification of many grammatical forms, including tenses and moods ^{[8, p. 14]}.

The Akushin-Urakhin and Mugin-Muirin branches separated from the Mekegin dialect. Akushinsky was widespread in the northern part of the Levashinsky plateau; Urakhinsky spun off from Akushinsky. The Urakhin people have developed new lands in the eastern part of the Darginian-speaking area. There have been some changes in the Akushin dialect, including partial palatalization – the transition of the back-lingual explosive to the affricate h: kebaes (mekeginsk) "to see" - chebaes (akush.)). Further, in Urakhinsky, the palatalized sound h underwent spirantization: h – sh (chebyes "to see" – shchibais).

Significant changes in the location of Severodarginian idioms also occurred as a result of the invasion of Tamerlane's troops at the end of the 13th century. According to the testimony of historian R. Magomedov, the Akushins were forced to leave for the west, where they settled in the vicinity of Tsudakhar-speaking villages ^[6].

The Megebians, who lived in the vicinity of the village of Mugi and spoke the Mekegin dialect, also moved to the Gunib district after the war with Tamerlane, where their speech was significantly influenced by the neighboring Avar and Lak languages, as a result of which it became incomprehensible to other Darginians. Thus, there are four grammatical classes in the Megebian language, whereas in all Darginian languages There are three classes of idioms. There is also no personal indicator of the 2nd person in this speech. The auxiliary verb sabi "is" is replaced by the existential indicator loeb "is" ^[12].

Several early migration waves of speakers of the Mekegin dialect were directed to the north and east. In the northern part, the Kadar settlement arose, the speech of the inhabitants of which was also significantly isolated from others: the back-lingual deaf bowed sound of k in it underwent spirantization (kacha "calf" – gacha). There are also cases of abruptness in Kadar speech (t – t1: talat "Tuesday" – talatI), deafening of voiced ones (g1yaib "wine" – gIaip), etc. ^{[3, p. 67]}. The Mekegin people who migrated to the northeast settled the village of Gubden, and the Mekegin-speaking village of Murego arose in the east.

Muginsky and Muirinsky dialects are common in the center of the Dargino-speaking area. Although they are close to Mekegin in their grammatical features, they have always been exposed to the contact influences of neighboring dialects. Thus, labialized consonants have disappeared in Muginsky, as in Akushinsky, palatalization does not occur in it, as in Mekeginsky. But these dialects have geminated consonants, which were restored in them, perhaps under the influence of the Kaitag language – at one time, the Muir society was part of the Kaitag utsmiystvo, the most powerful and powerful state in medieval Dagestan.

Early migrations include the migration of Dargins from the upper reaches of the Ulluchai to the south and east, where the Proto-Yugnodargin language subsequently split into Chirag, Kubachin, Itsarin, Kaitag, and Sirh idioms.

The movement of part of the Dargins to the south contributed to the formation of the settlement of Chirag, whose speech preserved many archaic phenomena. The speech of the neighboring village of Kunki is also close to the Chirag language. Although there are many innovations in these idioms (for example, the reduction of vowels at the base of verbs: chakdatur "planted" (chirag.); chekadtur (kunk.)), they most likely preserved the proto-Darginian state of the language. Thus, in Chirag, more archaic forms function in the formation of plural nouns: bets1 "wolf" – barts1e, cf. akush. buts1i. The ancient forms are marked in Chirag and in the marking of ergative forms.: kjal "cow" – kjul-ud (erg.). Causative constructions in Chirag and Kunk are formed analytically: Idrisli Syag1id shsha vach1i yahyib "Idris forced Said to come to the village." In other Darginian dialects, the morpheme -ah is used: b=uts-ah-eu "to force to hold" (akush.)".

Kubacha speech is considered to be the most distant from other Darginian languages. Some of the Dargins migrated from their historical homeland to the southeast, to the valley of the Dirbagkatta River, which became the land of the Ashtins, who are close in language to the Kubachins. Later, some of the Ashtynians moved to the rocks located to the east of the present Kubachi, whose descendants later settled modern Kubachi. Kubachin's speech is replete with both numerous innovations and archaic phenomena. The sounds p and x1 drop out in it, as a result of which the preceding vowels become long. The affricate c in Kubachinsky can be spirantized: c – c (ca "one" - ca) ^{[7, p. 62]}. It also notes the desp- rantization of sounds: c – t (simi "anger" – tim), z – d (vase "honey" – vada). In the suffix of adjectives and participles -zi-b (-zi-v, -zi-y, -zi-d) in Kubachinsky, lively class indicators have been preserved, which is characteristic of the more ancient state of the language ^{[7, p. 131]}.

Dargins migrated to the east along the valley of the Ulluchai River. One of the early settlements may have been the village of Itsari, whose speech has significant linguistic features. In particular, in this dialect, adverbs of place function, which differentiate the direction or location of an object both in horizontal or vertical planes, as well as depending on the angle of inclination between these planes, and from the cardinal directions. Itsarinsky also contains an indicator of the present adverbial participle, tti, which is unusual for other dialects. A number of tenses and moods (jussive, rogative) are found only in this dialect ^[15].

The Kaitag people settled on the rocky slopes of both sides of Ulluchai; the earliest villages of the Kaitag people can be considered the now-defunct villages of Misragi, Abdarshka, etc., located on the southern slope of the Varkhata range, as well as the forest town of Zhilagi, which, according to legend, was the historical center of Kaitag. Gradually, the Kaitag people descended into the river valleys and moved east towards the Caspian lowland, forming new settlements. Some of them turned south and settled in the northern part of the Rubas River.

In the dialects and dialects of the Kaitag language, there are many new linguistic phenomena characteristic only of this speech. The process of palatalization in Kaitag has become more widespread than in other Dargish idioms: in the position before the vowels i, e, labialized back-lingual consonants can be palatalized. The infinitive forms are formed by the suffixes -ara, -ana. There are forms of inclusivity and exclusivity. One of the features of the Kattagnin and Irchamul dialects of this language is the loss of class indicators in the auxiliary verb tsabi "is" – ca. In the system of local cases in Kaitag, the category of orientation functions; the suffix -ah/-yah acts as an indicator of the causative. ^{[11, p. 42]}.

The largest number of current Darginian settlements is localized in the Sirkha-Tsudakhar area. The Sirkhins, who moved from their historical ancestral homeland to the north, began to inhabit the upper reaches of the Jivus River, the northern tributary of the Ulluchai, forming the settlements of the Nazis, Kassagumakhi, Nakhki, etc. The settlement of the Sirkhin settlements went along the river valleys towards the east (the villages of Urari, Tsugni, Dzilebki, Urtsaki, Amuzgi, Shiri, etc.); some of the Sirkhins turned away to the south (the villages of Khuduts, Sanzhi ^[13]).

And another part of the Sirkhins migrated north (village of Tanta ^[10]) and further beyond the Forest ridge, where settlements of Butri, Usisha, Ginta arose, whose speech is traditionally attributed by researchers to the dialects of the Tsudakhar dialect ^{[1, p. 8]}. The village of Tsudakhar itself arose as a result of the migration of the inhabitants of these villages to the north – along the valley of the Akusha River they reached the Kazikumukhsky Koisu, where Tsudakhar settlements appeared (Tebekmakhi, Khajalmakhi, Kuppa ...).

Pharyngalization has become widespread in the Sirhin speech; in addition to the pharyngeal consonant g1, the pharyngeal spirant g1 also functions in it. The Tsudakhar-Sirkha dialects also have a well-developed system of demonstrative pronouns ^[4].

Of particular interest are the dialects of the transitional type, which combine the properties of several neighboring idioms. As an example, we can mention Gapshiminsky, which is phonetically close to the Sirkha-Tsudakharian language, and grammatical dialects of the Mekegin type. The village of Gapshima (lit. "three villages") was formed as a result of the merger of the inhabitants of three villages. Apparently, in one of them (the western one), Sirkha-Tsudakhari was spoken, and in the others, the Mekegin dialect, as a result of which the features of both dialects were mixed in the modern speech of the Gapshimin people.

Thus, the article examines the problems of the migration of the ancient Darginians and the formation of Darginian languages and dialects. A hypothesis is made about the ancestral homeland of the Dargins. As a result of the conducted research, it was established that it was located in the upper reaches of the Ulluchai River. The resettlement of some Dargins to the northeast, in the area of the modern village of Mekegi, became one of the early migrations. The speech of this settlement later became the basis of the Northern Darginian languages. Over time, new linguistic phenomena appear in the speech of residents of new settlements, which are not found in other dialects. This means that settlements appeared later than others – each new wave of migration is accompanied by the appearance of innovations in the language.

Another part of the Dargins moved to the south and east, as a result of which the Proto-Yuzhnodargin language split into Chirag, Kubachin, Itsarin, Kaitag, and Sirh idioms. The migration of some Dargins to the south contributed to the formation of the village of Chirag, Kubachi and Kaitag villages appeared in the eastern part. The Sirkhin settlements were formed to the northeast of the historical ancestral homeland, and the movement of the Sirkhin people was also to the southeast. The formation of the Tsudakhar settlements is a consequence of the fact that some of the Sirkhins migrated to the north. The results of the research will contribute to the creation of a comparative historical grammar of the Darginian languages, as well as the preparation of a history of the ancient period of the Darginian and other Dagestani peoples.