Editing Mongolic languages

{{Short description|Language family of Eurasia}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2024}}
{{Infobox language family
| name = Mongolic
| ethnicity = [[Mongolic peoples]]
| region = [[Mongolia]], [[Inner Mongolia]] ([[China]]), [[Buryatia]] and [[Kalmykia]] ([[Russia]]), [[Herat Province]] ([[Afghanistan]]) and [[Issyk-Kul Region]] ([[Kyrgyzstan]])
| familycolor = Altaic
| fam1 = [[Serbi–Mongolic languages|Serbi–Mongolic]]?
| protoname = [[Proto-Mongolic language|Proto-Mongolic]]
| child1 = Central Mongolic <small>(including ''[[Mongolian language|Mongolian]]'')</small>
| child2 = Southern Mongolic
| child3 = ''[[Dagur language|Dagur]]''
| child4 = ''[[Moghol language|Moghol]]''{{NoteTag|Presumed extinct.}}
| child5 = [[Rouran language|Rouran]]? {{extinct}}
| iso5 = xgn
| glotto = mong1329
| glottorefname = Mongolic
| map = Linguistic map of the Mongolic languages.png
| mapalt = Topographic map showing Asia as centered on modern-day Mongolia and Kazakhstan. Areas are marked in multiple colors and attributed some of the language names of Mongolic languages. The extent of the colored area is somewhat less than in the previous map.
| mapcaption = Geographic distribution of the Mongolic languages
}}
The '''Mongolic languages''' are a [[language family]] spoken by the [[Mongolic peoples]] in [[Eastern Europe]], [[Central Asia]], [[North Asia]] and [[East Asia]], mostly in [[Mongolia]] and surrounding areas and in [[Kalmykia]] and [[Buryatia]]. The best-known member of this language family, [[Mongolian language|Mongolian]], is the primary language of most of the residents of [[Mongolia]] and the [[Mongols|Mongol]] residents of [[Inner Mongolia]], with an estimated 5.7+ million speakers.<ref>{{harvcoltxt|Svantesson|Tsendina|Karlsson|Franzén|2005|p=141}}</ref>

==History==
[[File:MongolicLanguagesGraph.svg|thumb|right|A timeline-based graphical representation of the Mongolic and [[Para-Mongolic languages]]]]
The possible precursor to Mongolic is the [[Xianbei#Language|Xianbei language]], heavily influenced by the [[Proto-Turkic_language|Proto-Turkic]] (later, the [[Oghuric languages|Lir-Turkic]]) language.

The stages of [[Mongolian language#Linguistic history|historical Mongolic]] are:
* Pre-Proto-Mongolic, from approximately the 4th century AD until the 12th century AD, influenced by [[Turkic languages#Geographical expansion and development|Shaz-Turkic]].<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/9781135796907 |title=The Mongolic Languages |date=2006-01-27 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-135-79690-7 |editor-last=Janhunen |editor-first=Juha |edition=0 |language=en |doi=10.4324/9780203987919 |ref=none}}</ref>{{pn|date=March 2025}}
*[[Proto-Mongolic language|Proto-Mongolic]], from approximately the 13th century, spoken around the time of [[Genghis Khan|Chinggis Khan]]. 
* [[Middle Mongol language|Middle Mongol]], from the 13th century until the early 15th century<ref>{{harvcoltxt|Rybatzki|2003|p=57}}</ref> or late 16th century,<ref>{{harvcoltxt|Poppe|1964|p=1}}</ref> depending on classification spoken. (Given the almost entire lack of written sources for the period in between, an exact cutoff point cannot be established.) Again influenced by [[Turco-Mongol tradition|Turkic]].
*[[Classical Mongolian language|Classical Mongolian]], from approximately 1700 to 1900.
* [[Mongolian language|Standard Mongolian]] The standard Mongolian language has been in official use since 1919, and this form of the language is used in the economic, political, and social fields.

===Pre-Proto-Mongolic===
''Pre-Proto-Mongolic'' is the name for the stage of Mongolic that precedes Proto-Mongolic. Proto-Mongolic can be clearly identified chronologically with the language spoken by the Mongols during [[Genghis Khan]]'s early expansion in the 1200-1210s. Pre-Proto-Mongolic, by contrast, is a continuum that stretches back indefinitely in time. It is divided into Early Pre-Proto-Mongolic and Late Pre-Proto-Mongolic.

Late Pre-Proto-Mongolic refers to the Mongolic spoken a few centuries before Proto-Mongolic by the Mongols and neighboring tribes like the [[Merkit]]s and [[Kerait]]s. Certain archaic words and features in Written Mongolian go back past Proto-Mongolic to Late Pre-Proto-Mongolic (Janhunen 2006).

===Relationship with Turkic===
{{further|Turco-Mongols}}
Pre-Proto-Mongolic has borrowed various words from [[Turkic languages]].

In the case of Early Pre-Proto-Mongolic, certain loanwords in the Mongolic languages point to early contact with [[Oghur languages|Oghur]] (Pre-Proto-Bulgaric) Turkic, also known as r-Turkic. These loanwords precede [[Common Turkic]] (z-Turkic) loanwords and include:
*Mongolic ''ikere'' (twins) from Pre-Proto-Bulgaric ''ikir'' (versus Common Turkic ''ekiz'')
*Mongolic ''hüker'' (ox) from Pre-Proto-Bulgaric ''hekür'' (Common Turkic ''öküz'')
*Mongolic ''jer'' (weapon) from Pre-Proto-Bulgaric ''jer'' (Common Turkic ''yäz'')
*Mongolic ''biragu'' (calf) versus Common Turkic ''buzagu''
*Mongolic ''siri-'' (to smelt ore) versus Common Turkic ''siz-'' (to melt)

The above words are thought to have been borrowed from Oghur Turkic during the time of the [[Xiongnu]].

Later [[Turkic peoples]] in Mongolia all spoke forms of Common Turkic (z-Turkic) as opposed to [[Oghur languages|Oghur]] (Bulgharic) Turkic, which withdrew to the west in the 4th century. The [[Chuvash language]], spoken by 1 million people in European Russia, is the only living representative of Oghur Turkic which split from Proto Turkic around the 1st century AD.

Words in Mongolic like ''{{lang|mn|dayir}}'' (brown, Common Turkic ''yagiz'') and ''nidurga'' (fist, Common Turkic ''yudruk'') with initial *d and *n versus Common Turkic *y are sufficiently archaic to indicate loans from an earlier stage of Oghur (Pre-Proto-Bulgaric). This is because Chuvash and Common Turkic do not differ in these features despite differing fundamentally in rhotacism-lambdacism (Janhunen 2006). Oghur tribes lived in the Mongolian borderlands before the 5th century, and provided Oghur loanwords to Early Pre-Proto-Mongolic before Common Turkic loanwords.{{sfn|Golden|2011|p=31}}

===Proto-Mongolic===
{{main|Proto-Mongolic language}}

Proto-Mongolic, the ancestor language of the modern Mongolic languages, is very close to Middle Mongol, the language spoken at the time of [[Genghis Khan]] and the [[Mongol Empire]]. Most features of modern Mongolic languages can thus be reconstructed from Middle Mongol. An exception would be the voice suffix like -caga- 'do together', which can be reconstructed from the modern languages but is not attested in Middle Mongol.

The languages of the historical [[Donghu people|Donghu]], [[Wuhuan]], and [[Xianbei]] peoples might have been related to Proto-Mongolic.<ref>{{harvcoltxt|Andrews|1999|p=72}}, "[...] believed that at least some of their constituent tribes spoke a Mongolian language, though there is still some argument that a particular variety of Turkic may have been spoken among them."</ref> For [[Tuoba language|Tabghach]], the language of the founders of the [[Northern Wei]] dynasty, for which the surviving evidence is very sparse, and Khitan, for which evidence exists that is written in the two Khitan scripts ([[Khitan large script|large]] and [[Khitan small script|small]]) which have as yet not been fully deciphered, a direct affiliation to Mongolic can now be taken to be most likely or even demonstrated.<ref>see Vovin 2007 for Tabghach and Janhunen 2012 for Khitan</ref>

===Middle Mongol===
{{main|Middle Mongol}}
The changes from Proto-Mongolic to Middle Mongol are described below.
====Changes in phonology====
=====Consonants=====
Research into reconstruction of the consonants of Middle Mongol has engendered several controversies. Middle Mongol had two series of plosives, but there is disagreement as to which phonological dimension they lie on, whether aspiration<ref>Svantesson ''et al.'' (2005)</ref> or voicing.<ref>Tömörtogoo (1992)</ref> The early scripts have distinct letters for velar plosives and uvular plosives, but as these are in complementary distribution according to vowel harmony class, only two back plosive phonemes, *''/k/'', *''{{IPA|/kʰ/}}'' (~ *''[k]'', *''{{IPA|[qʰ]}}'') are to be reconstructed.<ref>Svantesson ''et al.'' (2005): 118–120.</ref> One prominent, long-running disagreement concerns certain correspondences of word medial consonants among the four major scripts (''UM'', ''SM'', ''AM'', and ''Ph'', which were discussed in the preceding section). Word-medial ''/k/'' of Uyghur Mongolian (UM) has not one, but two correspondences with the three other scripts: either /k/ or zero. Traditional scholarship has reconstructed *''/k/'' for both correspondences, arguing that *''/k/'' was lost in some instances, which raises the question of what the conditioning factors of those instances were.<ref>Poppe (1955)</ref> More recently, the other possibility has been assumed; namely, that the correspondence between UM ''/k/'' and zero in the other scripts points to a distinct phoneme, ''/h/'', which would correspond to the word-initial phoneme ''/h/'' that is present in those other scripts.<ref>Svantesson ''et al.'' (2005): 118–124.</ref> ''/h/'' (also called ''/x/'') is sometimes assumed to derive from *''{{IPA|/pʰ/}}'', which would also explain zero in ''SM'', ''AM'', ''Ph'' in some instances where ''UM'' indicates /p/; e.g. ''[[Deel (clothing)|debel]]'' > Khalkha ''deel''.<ref>Janhunen (2003c): 6</ref>

The palatal affricates *''č'', *''čʰ'' were fronted in Northern Modern Mongolian dialects such as Khalkha. {{IPA|*''kʰ''}} was [[spirantization|spirantized]] to {{IPA|/x/}} in Ulaanbaatar Khalkha and the Mongolian dialects south of it, e.g. Preclassical Mongolian ''kündü'', reconstructed as ''{{IPA|*kʰynty}}'' 'heavy', became Modern Mongolian {{IPA|/xunt/}}<ref>Svantesson ''et al.'' (2005): 133, 167.</ref> (but in the vicinity of [[Bayankhongor]] and [[Baruun-Urt]], many speakers will say {{IPA|[kʰunt]}}).<ref>Rinchen (ed.) (1979): 210.</ref> Originally word-final *''n'' turned into /ŋ/; if *''{{IPA|n}}'' was originally followed by a vowel that later dropped, it remained unchanged, e.g. ''{{IPA|*kʰen}}'' became {{IPA|/xiŋ/}}, but ''{{IPA|*kʰoina}}'' became {{IPA|/xɔin/}}. After i-breaking, {{IPA|*[ʃ]}} became phonemic. Consonants in words containing back vowels that were followed by ''{{IPA|*i}}'' in Proto-Mongolian became [[Palatalization (phonetics)|palatalized]] in Modern Mongolian. In some words, word-final ''{{IPA|*n}}'' was dropped with most case forms, but still appears with the ablative, dative and genitive.<ref>Svantesson ''et al.'' (2005): 124, 165–166, 205.</ref>

Only foreign origin words start with the letter ''L'' and none start with the letter ''R''.<ref name="Ramsey1987">{{cite book|author=S. Robert Ramsey|title=The Languages of China|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2E_5nR0SoXoC&pg=PA206|year=1987|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=0-691-01468-X|pages=206–}}</ref>

=====Vowels=====
The standard view is that Proto-Mongolic had ''{{IPA|*i, *e, *y, *ø, *u, *o, *a}}''. According to this view, ''{{IPA|*o}}'' and ''{{IPA|*u}}'' were [[pharyngealization|pharyngealized]] to {{IPA|/ɔ/}} and {{IPA|/ʊ/}}, then ''{{IPA|*y}}'' and ''{{IPA|*ø}}'' were [[velarization|velarized]] to {{IPA|/u/}} and {{IPA|/o/}}. Thus, the vowel harmony shifted from a velar to a pharyngeal paradigm. ''{{IPA|*i}}'' in the first syllable of back-vocalic words was [[Assimilation (linguistics)|assimilated]] to the following vowel; in word-initial position it became {{IPA|/ja/}}. ''{{IPA|*e}}'' was rounded to {{IPA|*ø}} when followed by ''{{IPA|*y}}''. VhV and VjV sequences where the second vowel was any vowel but ''{{IPA|*i}}'' were monophthongized. In noninitial syllables, short vowels were deleted from the phonetic representation of the word and long vowels became short;<ref>Svantesson ''et al.'' (2005): 181, 184, 186–187, 190–195.</ref> e.g. ''{{IPA|*imahan}}'' (''{{IPA|*i}}'' becomes {{IPA|/ja/}}, ''{{IPA|*h}}'' disappears) > ''{{IPA|*jamaːn}}'' (unstable ''n'' drops; vowel reduction) > /jama(n)/ 'goat', and ''{{IPA|*emys-}}'' (regressive rounding assimilation) > ''{{IPA|*ømys-}}'' (vowel velarization) > ''{{IPA|*omus-}}'' (vowel reduction) > /oms-/ 'to wear'

This reconstruction has recently{{When|date=November 2016}} been opposed, arguing that vowel developments across the Mongolic languages can be more economically explained starting from basically the same vowel system as Khalkha, only with ''{{IPA|*[ə]}}'' instead of ''*[e]''. Moreover, the sound changes involved in this alternative scenario are more likely from an [[Articulatory phonetics|articulatory]] point of view and early Middle Mongol loans into [[Korean language|Korean]].<ref>Ko (2011)</ref>

====Changes in morphology====

=====Nominal system=====
[[File:Secret history.jpg|thumb|right|upright=1.13|alt=white page with several lines of black Chinese characters running top-down and separated into small groups by spaces. To the left of some of the characters there are small characters such as 舌　and 中. To the right of each line, groups of characters are indicated as such by a "<nowiki>]]</nowiki>"-shaped bracket, and to the right of each such bracket, there are other medium-sized characters|''[[The Secret History of the Mongols]]'' which goes back to a lost Mongolian script original is the only document that allows the reconstruction of agreement in social gender in Middle Mongol.<ref>Tümenčečeg 1990.</ref>]]

In the ensuing discourse, as noted earlier, the term "Middle Mongol" is employed broadly to encompass texts scripted in either Uighur Mongolian (UM), Chinese (SM), or Arabic (AM).

The case system of Middle Mongol has remained mostly intact down to the present, although important changes occurred with the comitative and the dative and most other case suffixes did undergo slight changes in form, i.e., were shortened.<ref>Rybatzki (2003b): 67, Svantesson (2003): 162.</ref> The Middle Mongol comitative -''luɣ-a'' could not be used attributively, but it was replaced by the suffix -''taj'' that originally derived adjectives denoting possession from nouns, e.g. ''mori-tai'' 'having a horse' became ''mor<nowiki>'</nowiki>toj'' 'having a horse/with a horse'. As this adjective functioned parallel to ''ügej'' 'not having', it has been suggested that a "privative case" ('without') has been introduced into Mongolian.<ref>Janhunen (2003c): 27.</ref> There have been three different case suffixes in the dative-locative-directive domain that are grouped in different ways: -''a'' as locative and -''dur'', -''da'' as dative<ref>Rybatzki (2003b): 68.</ref> or -''da'' and -''a'' as dative and -''dur'' as locative,<ref>Garudi (2002): 101–107.</ref> in both cases with some functional overlapping. As -''dur'' seems to be grammaticalized from ''dotur-a'' 'within', thus indicating a span of time,<ref>Toɣtambayar (2006): 18–35.</ref> the second account seems to be more likely. Of these, -''da'' was lost, -''dur'' was first reduced to -''du'' and then to -''d''<ref>Toɣtambayar (2006): 33–34.</ref> and -''a'' only survived in a few frozen environments.<ref>Norčin ''et al.'' (ed.) 1999: 2217.</ref> Finally, the directive of modern Mongolian, -''ruu'', has been innovated from ''uruɣu'' 'downwards'.<ref>Sečenbaɣatur ''et al.'' (2005): 228, 386.</ref> Social gender agreement was abandoned.<ref>Rybatzki 2003b: 73, Svantesson (2003): 166.</ref>

=====Verbal system=====
Middle Mongol had a slightly larger set of declarative finite verb suffix forms<ref>Weiers (1969): Morphologie, §B.II; Svantesson (2003): 166.</ref> and a smaller number of participles, which were less likely to be used as finite predicates.<ref>Weiers (1969): Morphologie, §B.III; Luvsanvandan (1987): 86–104.</ref> The linking converb -''n'' became confined to stable verb combinations,<ref>Luvsanvandan (ed.) (1987): 126, Činggeltei (1999): 251–252.</ref> while the number of converbs increased.<ref>Rybatzki (2003b): 77, Luvsanvandan (ed.) (1987): 126–137</ref> The distinction between male, female and plural subjects exhibited by some finite verbal suffixes was lost.<ref>The reconstruction of a social gender distinction is fairly commonplace, see e.g. Rybatzki (2003b): 75. A strong argument for the number distinction between -''ba'' and -''bai'' is made in Tümenčečeg (1990): 103–108, also see Street (2008) where it is also argued that this has been the case for other suffixes.</ref>

====Changes in syntax====
Neutral word order in clauses with pronominal subject changed from object–predicate–subject to subject–object–predicate; e.g.

{{interlinear|indent=3|abbreviations=NFUT:nonfuture
|Kökseü sabraq ügü.le-run ayyi yeke uge ugu.le-d ta ... kee-jüü.y
|Kökseü sabraq speak-CVB alas big word speak-PAST you ... say-NFUT
|"Kökseü sabraq spoke saying, 'Alas! You speak a great boast....' "<ref>Street (1957): 14, ''Secret History'' 190.13v.</ref>}}

The syntax of verb negation shifted from negation particles preceding final verbs to a negation particle following participles; thus, as final verbs could no longer be negated, their paradigm of negation was filled by particles.<ref>Yu (1991)</ref> For example, Preclassical Mongolian ''ese irebe'' 'did not come' v. modern spoken Khalkha Mongolian ''ireegüi'' or ''irsengüi''.

==Classification==
{{see also|Para-Mongolic languages|Altaic languages}}

The Mongolic languages have no convincingly established living relatives. The closest relatives of the Mongolic languages appear to be the [[para-Mongolic languages]], which include the extinct [[Khitan language|Khitan]],<ref name=Janhunen>{{cite book|author=Juha Janhunen|title=The Mongolic Languages|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DuCRAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA364|date=2006|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-135-79690-7|page=393}}</ref> [[Tuyuhun language|Tuyuhun]], and possibly also [[Tuoba language|Tuoba]] languages.<ref name="Shimunek2017">{{cite book|last=Shimunek|first=Andrew|title=Languages of Ancient Southern Mongolia and North China: a Historical-Comparative Study of the Serbi or Xianbei Branch of the Serbi-Mongolic Language Family, with an Analysis of Northeastern Frontier Chinese and Old Tibetan Phonology|publisher=Harrassowitz Verlag|publication-place=Wiesbaden|year=2017|isbn=978-3-447-10855-3|oclc=993110372}}</ref>

[[Alexander Vovin]] (2007) identifies the extinct Tabɣač or [[Tuoba language]] as a Mongolic language.<ref>Vovin, Alexander. 2007. ‘Once again on the Tabɣač language.’ Mongolian Studies XXIX: 191-206.</ref> However, Chen (2005)<ref>Chen, Sanping 2005. Turkic or Proto-Mongolian? A Note on the Tuoba Language. Central Asiatic Journal 49.2: 161–73.</ref> argues that Tuoba (Tabɣač) was a [[Turkic language]]. Vovin (2018) suggests that the [[Rouran language]] of the [[Rouran Khaganate]] was a Mongolic language, close but not identical to Middle Mongolian.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Vovin |first=Alexander |title = A Sketch of the Earliest Mongolic Language: the Brāhmī Bugut and Khüis Tolgoi Inscriptions |url = https://www.academia.edu/39716045|journal = International Journal of Eurasian Linguistics |year=2019 |language=en |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=162–197 |doi = 10.1163/25898833-12340008 |s2cid=198833565 |issn=2589-8825 }}</ref>

===Altaic===
A few linguists have grouped Mongolic with [[Turkic languages|Turkic]], [[Tungusic languages|Tungusic]] and possibly [[Koreanic languages|Koreanic]] or [[Japonic languages|Japonic]] as part of the controversial [[Altaic languages|Altaic family]].<ref>e.g. {{harvcoltxt|Starostin|Dybo|Mudrak|2003}}; contra e.g. {{harvcoltxt|Vovin|2005}}</ref>

Following [[Sergei Starostin]], [[Martine Robbeets]] suggested that Mongolic languages belong to a "[[Transeurasian]]" superfamily also comprising [[Japonic languages]], [[Korean language|Korean]], [[Tungusic languages]] and [[Turkic languages]],<ref>Robbeets, Martine et al. 2021 Triangulation supports agricultural spread of the Transeurasian languages, Nature 599, 616–621</ref> but this view has been severely criticized.<ref name="Tian 2022">{{citation |url=https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.06.09.495471v1 |last1=Tian |first1=Zheng |last2=Tao |first2=Yuxin |last3=Zhu |first3=Kongyang |last4=Jacques |first4=Guillaume |author4-link=Guillaume Jacques|last5=Ryder |first5=Robin J. |last6=de la Fuente |first6=José Andrés Alonso |last7=Antonov |first7=Anton |last8=Xia |first8=Ziyang |last9=Zhang |first9=Yuxuan |last10=Ji |first10=Xiaoyan |last11=Ren |first11=Xiaoying |last12=He |first12=Guanglin |last13=Guo |first13=Jianxin |last14=Wang |first14=Rui |last15=Yang |first15=Xiaomin |last16=Zhao |first16=Jing |last17=Xu |first17=Dan |last18=Gray |first18=Russell D. |author18-link=Russell Gray|last19=Zhang |first19=Menghan |last20=Wen |first20=Shaoqing |last21=Wang |first21=Chuan-Chao |last22=Pellard |first22=Thomas |title=Triangulation fails when neither linguistic, genetic, nor archaeological data support the Transeurasian narrative |publisher=Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory |date=2022-06-12 |doi=10.1101/2022.06.09.495471|s2cid=249649524 }}</ref> {{Better source needed|reason=Source is a preprint and the publisher is not a linguistic journal but appears to be a biology journal.|date=November 2024}}

=== Languages ===
{{Main list|List of Mongolic languages}}

Contemporary Mongolic languages are as follows. The classification and numbers of speakers follow Janhunen (2006),<ref>{{harvcoltxt|Janhunen|2006|pp=232–233}}</ref> except for Southern Mongolic, which follows Nugteren (2011).<ref>{{harvcoltxt|Nugteren|2011}}</ref>

{{tree list}}
* '''Mongolic'''
** [[Dagur language|Dagur]] (96,000 speakers)
** Central Mongolic
*** [[Khamnigan Mongol]] (2,000 speakers)
*** [[Buryat language|Buryat]] (330,000 speakers)
*** [[Mongolian language|Mongolian proper]] (5.2 million speakers)
*** [[Mongolian language in Inner Mongolia|Peripheral Mongolian]] (as [[Ordos Mongolian|Ordos]])
*** [[Kalmyk Oirat|Kalmyk]]–[[Oirat language|Oirat]] (360,000 speakers)
** Southern Mongolic (part of a Gansu–Qinghai [[Sprachbund]])
*** [[Eastern Yugur language|Shira Yugur]] (4,000 speakers)
*** [[Shirongol languages|Shirongol]]
**** [[Monguor language|Monguor]] (150,000 speakers)
***** Mongghul/Huzhu Monguor
***** Mangghuer/Minhe Monguor
**** Baoanic
***** [[Bonan language|Bonan]] (6,000 speakers)
***** [[Santa language|Santa]] (Dongxiang) (200,000 speakers)
***** [[Kangjia language|Kangjia]] (1,000 speakers)
** [[Moghol language|Moghol]] (extinct)<ref>{{Cite web |title=Glottolog 4.7 – Mogholi |url=https://glottolog.org/resource/languoid/id/mogh1245 |access-date=2022-12-27 |website=glottolog.org}}</ref>
{{tree list/end}}

In another classificational approach,<ref>e.g. Sečenbaɣatur et al. (2005:193–194)</ref> there is a tendency to call Central Mongolian a language consisting of Mongolian proper, Oirat and Buryat, while Ordos (and implicitly also Khamnigan) is seen as a variety of Mongolian proper. Within Mongolian proper, they then draw a distinction between Khalkha on the one hand and the [[Mongolian language in Inner Mongolia]] (containing everything else) on the other hand. A less common subdivision of Central Mongolic is to divide it into a Central dialect (Khalkha, Chakhar, Ordos), an Eastern dialect (Kharchin, Khorchin), a Western dialect (Oirat, Kalmyk), and a Northern dialect (consisting of two Buryat varieties).<ref>{{harvcoltxt|Luvsanvandan|1959}} quoted from Sečenbaɣatur et al. (2005:167–168)</ref>

The broader delimitation of Mongolian may be based on [[mutual intelligibility]], but an analysis based on a [[Phylogenetic tree#Limitations of phylogenetic analysis|tree diagram]] such as the one above faces other problems because of the close contacts between, for example, Buryat and Khalkha Mongols during history, thus creating or preserving a [[dialect continuum]]. Another problem lies in the sheer comparability of terminology, as Western linguists use ''language'' and ''dialect'', while Mongolian linguists use the [[Brothers Grimm|Grimmian]] trichotomy ''language'' (kele), ''dialect'' (nutuɣ-un ayalɣu) and ''Mundart'' (aman ayalɣu).

Rybatzki (2003: 388–389)<ref>Rybatzki, Volker. 2003. "Intra-Mongolic taxonomy." In Janhunen, Juha (ed). ''The Mongolic Languages'', 364–390. Routledge Language Family Series 5. London: Routledge.</ref> recognizes the following 6 areal subgroups of Mongolic.
* Northeastern Mongolic (NE) = [[Dagur language|Dagur]]
* Northern Mongolic (N) = [[Khamnigan Mongol]]–[[Buryat language|Buryat]]
* Central Mongolic (C) = [[Mongolian language|Mongol proper]]–[[Ordos Mongolian|Ordos]]–[[Oirat language|Oirat]]
* South-Central Mongolic (SC) = [[Eastern Yugur language|Shira Yughur]]
* Southeastern Mongolic (SE) = [[Monguor language|Mongghul]]–[[Monguor language|Mangghuer]]–[[Bonan language|Bonan]]–[[Santa language|Santa]] – [[Kangjia language|Kangjia]]
* Southwestern Mongolic (SW) = [[Moghol language|Moghol]]

Additionally, the [[Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology]] refers to Central Mongolic as "Eastern Mongolic" and classifies the group as follows, using data from Rybatzki (2003) as the basis:<ref>{{Cite journal |url=https://glottolog.org/resource/languoid/id/oira1260 |title=Glottolog 4.8 - Eastern Mongolic |date=2023-07-10 |access-date=2024-01-17 |website=[[Glottolog]] |last1=Hammarström |first1=Harald |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240117134205/https://glottolog.org/resource/languoid/id/oira1260 |archive-date=2024-01-17 |url-status=live |publisher=[[Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology]] |author-link=Harald Hammarström |last2=Forkel |first2=Robert |publication-place=[[Leipzig]] |doi=10.5281/zenodo.7398962 |last3=Haspelmath |first3=Martin |author-link3=Martin Haspelmath |last4=Bank |first4=Sebastian |doi-access=free}}</ref>

{{Tree list}}
* Eastern Mongolic
** Khalkha–Buriat
*** [[Buryat language|Buriat]]
**** China Buriat
**** Mongolia Buriat
**** Russia Buriat
*** [[Mongolian language|Mongolian]]
**** [[Khalkha Mongolian|Halh Mongolian]]
**** [[Oirat language|Oirad–Kalmyk–Darkhat]]
**** [[Mongolian language in Inner Mongolia|Peripheral Mongolian]]
** [[Khamnigan Mongol|Khamnigan]]
{{Tree list/end}}

=== Mixed languages ===
The following are [[mixed languages|mixed]] [[Varieties of Chinese|Sinitic]]–Mongolic languages.
* [[Tangwang language|Tangwang]] (mixed [[Mandarin Chinese|Mandarin]]–[[Santa language|Santa]])
* [[Wutun language|Wutun]] (mixed [[Mandarin Chinese|Mandarin]]–[[Bonan language|Bonan]])

==Writing systems==
{{see also|Mongolian script}}
* The traditional [[Mongolian script]] (based on the [[Old Uyghur alphabet]]) was first developed for Proto-Mongolic, possibly as early as the 7th century.
* In 1931, the [[Mongolian People's Republic]] adopted a [[Mongolian Latin alphabet|Mongolian version of the Latin alphabet]] as the official script for Mongolian.
* Under [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] influence, in 1941 Mongolia switched to a version of the Russian alphabet called [[Mongolian Cyrillic]].
* In March 2020, the Mongolian government announced plans to use both Cyrillic and the traditional Mongolian script in official documents by 2025.<ref>[https://www.montsame.mn/en/read/219358 Official documents to be recorded in both scripts from 2025], Montsame, 18 March 2020.</ref>

== See also ==
* [[Inscription of Hüis Tolgoi]]

== Notes ==
{{NoteFoot}}

== References ==
=== Citations ===
{{Reflist}}

=== Sources ===
{{refbegin}}
* {{cite book |last=Andrews |first=Peter A. |year=1999 |title=Felt tents and pavilions: the nomadic tradition and its interaction with princely tentage |volume=1 |publisher=Melisende |isbn=978-1-901764-03-1 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AD1SAAAAMAAJ&q=Hsien-pei+yellow+beard}}
* {{cite book |last=Golden |first=Peter B. |author-link=Peter Benjamin Golden |year=2011 |title=Studies on the Peoples and Cultures of the Eurasian Steppes |url=https://www.academia.edu/9609971 |editor-last=Hriban |editor-first=Cătălin |publisher=Editura Academiei Române |location=Bucharest |isbn=978-973-27-2152-0}}
* {{cite book |last=Janhunen |first=Juha |year=2006 |chapter=Mongolic languages |editor-last=Brown |editor-first=K. |title=The encyclopedia of language & linguistics |location=Amsterdam |publisher=Elsevier |pages=231–234}}
* {{cite journal |last=Janhunen |first=Juha |year=2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140319005120/http://scripta.kr/scripta2010/en/scripta_archives/06%20Janhunen.pdf |archive-date=2014-03-19 |url=http://scripta.kr/scripta2010/en/scripta_archives/06%20Janhunen.pdf |title=Khitan – Understanding the language behind the scripts |journal=Scripta |volume=4 |pages=107–132}}
* {{cite journal |last=Luvsanvandan |first=Š. |year=1959 |title=Mongol hel ajalguuny učir |journal=Mongolyn Sudlal |volume=1}}
* {{cite thesis |last=Nugteren |first=Hans |year=2011 |title=Mongolic Phonology and the Qinghai-Gansu Languages |type=PhD dissertation |institution=Netherlands Graduate School of Linguistics |url=https://www.lotpublications.nl/Documents/289_fulltext.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170808133110/http://www.lotpublications.nl/Documents/289_fulltext.pdf |archive-date=2017-08-08 |isbn=978-94-6093-070-6}}
* {{cite book |last=Poppe |first=Nicholas |year=1964 |orig-year=1954 |title=Grammar of Written Mongolian |location=Wiesbaden |publisher=Harrassowitz}}
* {{cite book |last=Rybatzki |first=Volker |chapter=Middle Mongol |pages=47–82 |editor-last=Janhunen |editor-first=Juha |editor-link=Juha Janhunen |year=2003 |title=The Mongolic languages |url=https://archive.org/details/mongoliclanguage00janh |url-access=limited |series=Routledge Language Family Series |location = London |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-0-7007-1133-8}}
* {{cite book |last=Sechenbaatar |first=Borjigin |year=2003 |title=The Chakhar dialect of Mongol – A morphological description |location=Helsinki |publisher=[[Finno-Ugrian Society]] |series=Mémoires de la Société Finno-Ougrienne |volume=243 |isbn=952-5150-68-2}}
* [Sechenbaatar] Sečenbaɣatur, Qasgerel, Tuyaɣ-a, B. ǰirannige, U Ying ǰe. (2005). ''Mongɣul kelen-ü nutuɣ-un ayalɣun-u sinǰilel-ün uduridqal''. Kökeqota: ÖMAKQ.
* {{cite book |last1=Starostin |first1=Sergei A. |last2=Dybo |first2=Anna V. |last3=Mudrak |first3=Oleg A. |year=2003 |title=Etymological Dictionary of the Altaic Languages |location=Leiden |publisher=Brill}}
* {{cite book |last1=Svantesson |first1=Jan-Olof |first2=Anna |last2=Tsendina |first3=Anastasia |last3=Karlsson |first4=Vivan |last4=Franzén |year=2005 |title=The Phonology of Mongolian |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780199260171}}
* {{cite journal |last=Vovin |first=Alexander |year=2005 |title=The End of the Altaic Controversy: In Memory of Gerhard Doerfer |journal=Central Asiatic Journal |volume=49 |issue=1 |pages=71–132 |jstor=41928378}} (review of Starostin et al. 2003)
* {{cite journal |last=Vovin |first=Alexander |year=2007 |title=Once again on the Tabgač language |journal=Mongolian Studies |volume=29 |pages=191–206 |jstor=43193441}}
{{refend}}

==External links==
* [http://www.chriskaplonski.com/images/ethnicmap_med.jpg Ethnic map of Mongolia]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110716142555/http://altaica.narod.ru/Engl.htm Monumenta Altaica] grammars, texts, dictionaries and bibliographies of Mongolian and other Altaic languages

{{Mongolic languages}}
{{Mongol Yastan}}
{{Altaic languages}}
{{Language families}}
{{Eurasian languages}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mongolic Languages}}
[[Category:Mongolic languages| ]]
[[Category:Mongolic–Khitan languages]]
[[Category:Languages of Mongolia]]
[[Category:Languages of China]]
[[Category:Languages of Russia]]
[[Category:Languages of Afghanistan]]
[[Category:Languages of Kyrgyzstan]]