Linguists describe the speech of the Ahıska Turks from recordings of living speech. The examples below come from a study of Ahıska speakers in Antalya (Elif Aydın, 2022, drawing on Demiray, 2011). The Ahıska word comes first, standard Turkish next to it.
Sounds
- “kh” instead of “k” — perhaps the dialect’s clearest mark: çoḫ — “çok” (much), çocuḫlar — “çocuklar” (children), yaparduḫ — “yapardık” (we used to do).
- Doubled consonants in numerals: doḳḳuz — “dokuz” (nine), ottuz — “otuz” (thirty), seḳḳizde — “sekizde” (at eight).
- Old forms standard Turkish has lost: alma — “elma” (apple), ḳardaş — “kardeş” (brother), degül — “değil” (not).
- Sounds absent from standard written Turkish — such as “ė”, between “e” and “i”, and “ñ”: yeñgi — “yeni” (new), yüñgül — “hafif” (light).
- An added vowel: urus — “Rus” (Russian).
Grammar
- Present tense in -er/-yer: oḫiyėrler — “okuyorlar” (they read), konuşersin — “konuşuyorsun” (you speak), istiyėrlerdi — “istiyorlardı” (they wanted).
- “kimi” instead of “gibi” (like).
Traces of the roads
After 1944 Russian words entered the speech — for example tsepim (“my chain”), and with them the sound “ts”. Researchers study how speech changes with age and under the influence of standard Turkish and Russian.
Keeping the voice
The dialect lives in the elders’ speech. Record your grandmother or grandfather in Oral history, and send a word that is missing from the dictionary to “Word of the day” through support.