Dear readers, Barev. Today we will learn more about the language spoken by Armenians. That is, about the Armenian language.
So Armenians. One of the oldest languages in the world. It belongs to the so-called ancient written alphabet – the Armenian alphabet created by the Mesrop Mashtot has existed since the 5th century AD.
Monument to the Creator of the Armenian alphabet Mesrop Mashtots
Armenian, like Russian, Swedish or Spanish, belongs to the Indo-European language family. For example, An Armenian word like Duk (you) can be instantly familiar – almost like the German Du (you). Or Amarr (Summer) - Almost English summer.
But in Indo-European languages, Armenians are still different – no one is closer than anyone else. Because it broke away from the ordinary IE family about 4-5 thousand years ago. Although now linguists are trying to establish a special connection between Armenian and Greek. And the Phrygians became extinct by 2,000 years ago.
Armenian is quite peculiar – most of its words can only be found in Armenian. Although there are many things borrowed from Ancient Persian (Pahlavi). In spoken language - from Russian. There are also many words borrowed from the Ural language in Armenian, which disappeared 3,000 years ago – Artsiv, for example.
Yes, Armenians have nothing to do with neighboring Georgians. Although similar to him in speech. In The Georgian language, there are also many things borrowed from the Armenian language.
There is also a unique ancient Armenian language, Grabar. The language of ancient Armenian chronicles and books, the language of prayer of the Armenian Apostolic Church.
Armenians follow linguistic purity. That is, they try to come up with their own language for all objects and phenomena. For example, հեռախոս (errajos) is a telephone (literally a distant speaker). An amazing thing: the Armenians even invented their own coffee word - surch...
There are many dialects of Armenian – about 260! From Arzakh (Karabakh) to Hamshin. But in general, the language can be divided into two variants - Eastern (the language of Armenia, based on the language of the Erivanians) and Western (the language of the Armenian diaspora in the West, based on the dialect of the Armenians of Constantinople).
Today, about 15 million people worldwide speak Armenian. Armenians consider their unique language to be the most beautiful language in the world and worship it so much!