Editing Saka (section)

== Language ==
{{Main|Saka language}}
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| caption2 = Drawing of the [[Issyk inscription]].
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Modern scholarly consensus is that the [[Eastern Iranian language]], ancestral to the [[Pamir languages]] in [[Central Asia]] and the medieval Saka language of [[Xinjiang]], was one of the [[Scythian languages]].<ref>Kuz'mina, Elena E. (2007). ''The Origin of the Indo Iranians''. Edited by J.P. Mallory. Leiden, Boston: Brill, pp 381–382. {{ISBN|978-90-04-16054-5}}.</ref> Evidence of the Middle Iranian "Scytho-Khotanese" language survives in [[Northwest China]], where Khotanese-Saka-language documents, ranging from medical texts to [[Buddhist texts]], have been found primarily in Khotan and [[Tumshuq]] (northeast of Kashgar).{{sfn|Bailey|1983}} They largely predate the [[Islamization of Xinjiang]] under the [[Turkic languages|Turkic-speaking]] [[Kara-Khanid Khanate]].{{sfn|Bailey|1983}} Similar documents, the [[Dunhuang manuscripts]], were discovered written in the Khotanese [[Saka language]] and date mostly from the tenth century.<ref>{{cite journal |url=http://history.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/VH%20BAI%20paper%2009.pdf |title=The Tribute Trade with Khotan in Light of Materials Found at the Dunhuang Library Cave |first=Valerie |last=Hansen |journal=Bulletin of the Asia Institute |volume=19 |date=2005 |pages=37–46 |access-date=23 September 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304031701/http://history.yale.edu/sites/default/files/files/VH%20BAI%20paper%2009.pdf |archive-date=4 March 2016 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Attestations of the Saka language show that it was an [[Eastern Iranian language]]. The linguistic heartland of Saka was the [[Kingdom of Khotan]], which had two varieties, corresponding to the major settlements at Khotan (now called [[Hotan]]) and Tumshuq (now titled [[Tumxuk]]).<ref>Sarah Iles Johnston, Religions of the Ancient World: A Guide, Harvard University Press, 2004. pg 197</ref><ref>Edward A Allworth,''Central Asia: A Historical Overview'', Duke University Press, 1994. pp 86.</ref> Tumshuqese and Khotanese varieties of Saka contain many borrowings from the [[Middle Indo-Aryan languages]], but also share features with the modern Eastern Iranian languages [[Wakhi language|Wakhi]] and [[Pashto]].<ref>{{cite conference|book-title=History of civilizations of Central Asia|publisher=Motilal Banarsidass|isbn=8120815408|title=Religions and religious movements|last=Litvinsky|first=Boris Abramovich|author2=Vorobyova-Desyatovskaya, M.I|author-link2=Margarita Vorobyova-Desyatovskaya|pages=421–448|year=1999}}</ref>

The Issyk inscription, a short fragment on a silver cup found in the [[Issyk kurgan]] in [[Kazakhstan]] is believed to be the earliest example of Saka, constituting one of very few autochthonous epigraphic traces of that language.<ref name="CBAUMER">{{cite book |last1=Baumer |first1=Christoph |title=History of Central Asia, The: 4-volume set |date=18 April 2018 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=978-1-83860-868-2 |page=206 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DhiWDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA206 |language=en}}</ref> The inscription is in a variant of [[Kharosthi]]. Harmatta suggests that the inscriptions are a variant of the [[Kharosthi]] language, while Christopher Baumer has said that they closely resemble the [[Old Turkic]] runic alphabet. From Khotanese Saka, Harmatta translates the inscription as: "The vessel should hold wine of grapes, added cooked food, so much, to the mortal, then added cooked fresh butter on".{{sfn|Harmatta|1996|pp=[https://books.google.com/books?id=9U6RlVVjpakC&pg=PA421 420–421]}}

[[Linguistic]] evidence suggest the Wakhi language is descended from Saka languages.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Frye |first1=R.N. |title=The History of Ancient Iran |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofancient0000frye |url-access=registration |date=1984 |page=[https://archive.org/details/historyofancient0000frye/page/192 192]|publisher=C.H.Beck |isbn=9783406093975 |quote=[T]hese western Saka he distinguishes from eastern Saka who moved south through the Kashgar-Tashkurgan-Gilgit-Swat route to the plains of the sub-continent of India. This would account for the existence of the ancient Khotanese-Saka speakers, documents of whom have been found in western Sinkiang, and the modern Wakhi language of Wakhan in Afghanistan, another modern branch of descendants of Saka speakers parallel to the Ossetes in the west.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Bailey |first1=H.W. |title=The culture of the Sakas in ancient Iranian Khotan |date=1982 |publisher=Caravan Books |pages=7–10 |quote=It is noteworthy that the Wakhi language of Wakhan has features, phonetics, and vocabulary the nearest of Iranian dialects to Khotan Saka.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Windfuhr |first1=G. |title=Iranian Languages |date=2013 |publisher=Routeledge |isbn=978-1-135-79704-1 |page=15}} "In addition to the continuation of Middle Persian in New Persian, three small modern languages show significant grammatical and lexical reflexes of other documented Middle Iranian languages: In Iran, Sangesari of the Semnan group shares a distinct set of features with Khwarezmian. In the east, Yaghnobi in Tajikistan continues a dialect of Sogdian, and Wakhi in the Pamirs shows distinct reflexes of Khotanese and Tumshuqese Saka. In fact, Wakhi is an example of the repeated invasions of Saka since antiquity."</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Carpelan |first1=C. |last2=Parpola |first2=A. |last3=Koskikallio |first3=P. |title=Early Contacts Between Uralic and Indo-European: Linguistic and Archaeological Considerations: Papers Presented at an International Symposium Held at the Tvärminne Research Station of the University of Helsinki, 8–10 January, 1999 |journal=Suomalais-Ugrilainen Seura |date=2001 |volume=242 |page=136 |quote=...descendants of these languages survive now only in the Ossete language of the Caucasus and the Wakhi language of the Pamirs, the latter related to the Saka once spoken in Khotan.}}</ref> According to the Indo-Europeanist Martin Kümmel, Wakhi may be classified as a Western Saka dialect; the other attested Saka dialects, Khotanese and Tumshuqese, would then be classified as Eastern Saka.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Novak |first1=L. |title=Question of (Re)classification of Eastern Iranian Languages |journal=Linguistica Brunensia |date=2014 |volume=62 |issue=1 |pages=77–87}}</ref>