Changes in the Vocabulary of Khalaj in Half a Century
Mina Dolati DarabadiAlthough compilations of the Turkic language of Khalaj had been made before Doerfer, Doerfer was the first to determine the importance of this language, after which he sent his students to Iran in 1968 to do fieldwork. Thus, a comprehensive study of Khalaj was carried out during this period. The collected materials were examined in Doerfer’s book Khalaj Materials in 1971. The book’s third chapter contains materials from the dialects of Talxab, Mansurabad, and Xaltabad. These materials are given in word lists. The longest most comprehensive list contains 319 words compiled from Talxab village. The Mansurabad and Xaltabad word lists have 111 words in common with the Talxab list. This study was carried out to determine the changes in the vocabulary of Khalaj as published by Doerfer. In order to achieve this aim, the Persian words in the Talxab list in the fifth chapter of Khalaj Materials were presented to people native to the specific areas, who were then asked for their Khalaj equivalents. Due to the lists in Khalaj Materials being the first comprehensive study compiled on the Turkic language of Khalaj, this book was chosen as the primary source in this research. In addition, the words are even more important, as they were compiled by a team of Turcologists. Thus, the similarities and differences were revealed by comparing the words compiled from the Xarrab (currently Baharistan) region in January 2022 with those the Doerfer team had compiled in 1968. The results reveal how much the Khalaj Turkish vocabulary has changed under the influence of other languages over half a century.
Yarım Asırda Halaç Türkçesi Söz Varlığındaki Değişimler
Mina Dolati DarabadiDoerfer’den önce Halaç Türkçesi ile ilgili derlemeler yapılsa da bu dilin önemi ilk olarak Doerfer tarafından tespit edilmiştir. Doerfer daha sonra saha çalışması yapmak üzere 1968 yılında öğrencilerini İran’a göndermiştir. Böylece, Halaç Türkçesinde ilk kapsamlı çalışma bu dönemde gerçekleştirilmiştir. Derlenen malzemeler 1971 yılında Khalaj Materials adlı kitapta incelenmiştir. Kitabın üçüncü bölümünde Talxab, Mansur âbad ve Xalt âbad lehçelerinin materyalleri yer almaktadır. Bu materyaller kelime listeleri şeklinde verilmiştir. En kapsamlı ve uzun kelime listesi 319 kelimeyle Talxab köyünden derlenmiştir. Mansur âbad ve Xalt âbad kelime listesinde Talxab listesiyle ortak olarak 111 kelime yer almaktadır. Bu çalışma, Halaç Türkçesinin Doerfer tarafından ortaya konulan söz varlığının uğradığı değişiklikleri tespit etmek amacıyla yapılmıştır. Bu amaca ulaşmak için Khalaj Materials kitabının beşinci bölümünde yer alan Talxab listesindeki Farsça kelimeler aynı şekilde kaynak kişilere verilmiş ve onlardan günümüzde Halaç Türkçesi karşılıkları istenilmiştir. Bu liste Halaçlardan derlenen ilk kapsamlı çalışma olduğu için bu araştırmada ana kaynak olarak seçilmiştir. Ayrıca kelimeler bir Türkolog ekibi tarafından derlendiği için daha çok önem arz etmektedirler. Böylece, 2022 yılının Ocak ayında, Xarrab (Günümüzdeki Baharistan) bölgesinden derlenen kelimeler ile Doerfer ekibinin 1968 yılında derlediği kelimeler karşılaştırılarak benzerlik ve farlılıkları ortaya konulmuştur. Sonuç olarak aklaşık yarım asırlık dönemde Halaç Türkçesi söz varlığının diğer dillerin etkisinde ne kadar kalıp değiştiği tespit edilmiştir.
The first materials under the name of Khalaj Turkish were compiled and published by the Eastern linguist Minorsky in 1940. The second compilation of Khalaj belongs to Mohammad Mogaddam, who performed field studies in the areas of Tafraş and Aştiyan and compiled four different dialects of the Turkic language of Khalaj spoken there.
However, Doerfer was the first to determine the importance of Khalaj. Based on the deficiencies in previous studies, Doerfer considered conducting field studies in the region to be necessary. He sent his students to Iran in 1968 to identify the villages where Khalaj was spoken and to compile materials in order to verify Moghaddam’s materials. Mogaddam’s materials were given to volunteers in Persian in three different areas, and they were asked about the words’ equivalency in Khalaj.
The collected materials were examined in Doerfer’s (1971) book Khalaj Materials in 1971. The book’s third chapter contains materials from the dialects of Talxab, Mansurabad, and Xaltabad that are given in word lists. The longest most comprehensive list contains 319 words compiled from the Talxab village. The word lists from Mansurabad and Xaltabad have 111 words in common with the Talxab list.
Afterward, a second fieldwork study was conducted in the Khalaj region in 1969. Doerfer personally participated in this study. Thus, a comprehensive study of the Khalaj was carried out during this period, and the published studies are still currently the source on Khalaj.
The first and only Khalaj dictionary was conducted in these field studies. The Wörterbuch des Chaladsch dictionary contains Talxab dialectal words that Doerfer and Tezcan published in 1980. The second critical study based on these materials is Lexik und Sprachgeographie des Chaladsch and contains two volumes. The words are arranged thematically, and each word’s Khalaj meaning is given alongside their German headwords.
The issues that increase the importance of this book are how it shows the dialectal differences between words and how it provides etymological information about the words. Doerfer’s (1988) Grammatik des Chaladsch discusses the phonology and morphology of Khalaj. Also, Tezcan and Doerfer’s (1994) Folklore Texte der Chaladsch, provides text samples of Khalaj. The samples are sorted into four chapters. Chapter 1 provides samples from the first field study, Chapter 2 provides samples from the second field study, and Chapters 3 and 4 address the field samples obtained by Müseyyeb Arabgol. Based on these studies, quite a volume of scientific research was carried out on Khalaj.
The importance of Khalaj was realized through the work of Doerfer and his team, thanks to which they identified the archaic phonetic features and vocabulary of Khalaj and put forth new classifications on the Turkic language. Khalaj is positioned as an independent branch in the classification of Turkic languages due to it having the linguistic features of Old Turkic.
This study is presented in order to determine the changes that have occurred to words in Khalaj as published by Doerfer (1968). Therefore, the words in the fifth chapter of Khalaj Materials were given to the people native to the three areas. The words were given in Persian, and the people were asked for the Khalaj equivalents. The similarities and differences were revealed by comparing the words compiled from the Xarrab (now known as Baharistan) region in January 2022 with those compiled by the Doerfer team in 1968. The article then determined how much the Khalaj vocabulary had changed under the influence of other languages over the past half a century. According to the studies, there was a 15%-word difference in Khalaj Turkish this half-century. Today, Persian words are used about 7% more frequently than Khalaj words. Meanwhile, only two words Doerfer had recorded as Persian in his compilations were found to be recorded as Khalaj in this study.
The facts that the Khalaj people have been in Persian neighborhoods, that Persian is the official language of the country, and Persian being used as a prestigious language among newer generations has led to Khalaj being used less over time. In addition, while comparing the two reviews, approximately 8% of different Turkish-origin words are seen to have been used . The differences between the Khalaj dialects and the acceptance and giving of words from other Turkish languages such as Azerbaijan Turkish could have led to this. In addition, different words have been determined to be used for concepts in the language, and this can lead to the detection of different words in the same language while both are actively used in conversations.
