Mongolian language

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The Mongolian language (in Mongolian script: Şablon:MongolUnicode Şablon:MongolUnicode Şablon:Lang; in Mongolian Cyrillic: Şablon:Lang, Şablon:Lang) is the official language of Mongolia and largest-known member of the Mongolic language family. The number of speakers across all its dialects may be 10 million, including the vast majority of the residents of Mongolia and many of the Mongolian residents of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.<ref name="ReferenceA"> Estimate from Svantesson et al. 2005: 141</ref> In Mongolia, the Khalkha dialect, written in Cyrillic (and at times in Latin for social networking), is predominant, while in Inner Mongolia, the language is dialectally more diverse and is written in the traditional Mongolian script. In the discussion of grammar to follow, the variety of Mongolian treated is Standard Khalkha Mongolian (i.e., the standard written language as formalized in the writing conventions and in the school grammar), but much of what is to be said is also valid for vernacular (spoken) Khalkha and for other Mongolian dialects, especially Chakhar.

Some classify several other Mongolic languages like Buryat and Oirat as dialects of Mongolian, but this classification is not in line with the current international standard.

Mongolian has vowel harmony and a complex syllabic structure for a Mongolic language that allows clusters of up to three consonants syllable-finally. It is a typical agglutinative language that relies on suffix chains in the verbal and nominal domains. While there is a basic word order, subject–object–predicate, ordering among noun phrases is relatively free, so grammatical roles are indicated by a system of about eight grammatical cases. There are five voices. Verbs are marked for voice, aspect, tense, and epistemic modality/evidentiality. In sentence linking, a special role is played by converbs.

Modern Mongolian evolved from Middle Mongol, the language spoken in the Mongol Empire of the 13th and 14th centuries. In the transition, a major shift in the vowel-harmony paradigm occurred, long vowels developed, the case system changed slightly, and the verbal system was restructured. Mongolian is distantly related to the Khitan language. It belongs to the Northern Asian linguistic area, including the Turkic, Mongolic, Tungusic, Korean and Japonic languages. These languages have been grouped under the still-debated Altaic language family and contrasted with the Mainland Southeast Asia linguistic area. Mongolian literature is well attested in written form from the 13th century but has earlier Mongolic precursors in the literature of the Khitan and other Xianbei peoples.

Geographic distribution

Mongolian is the official national language of Mongolia, where it is spoken by nearly 3.6 million people (2014 estimate),<ref name="Mongolian">Şablon:Cite book</ref> and the official provincial language of China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, where there are at least 4.1 million ethnic Mongols.<ref>Şablon:Cite book</ref> Across the whole of China, the language is spoken by roughly half of the country's 5.8 million ethnic Mongols (2005 estimate)<ref name="Mongolian"/> However, the exact number of Mongolian speakers in China is unknown, as there is no data available on the language proficiency of that country's citizens. The use of Mongolian in Inner Mongolia, has witnessed periods of decline and revival over the last few hundred years. The language experienced a decline during the late Qing period, a revival between 1947 and 1965, a second decline between 1966 and 1976, a second revival between 1977 and 1992, and a third decline between 1995 and 2012.<ref>Şablon:Cite book</ref> However, in spite of the decline of the Mongolian language in some of Inner Mongolia's urban areas and educational spheres, the ethnic identity of the urbanized Chinese-speaking Mongols is most likely going to survive due to the presence of urban ethnic communities.<ref>Şablon:Cite book</ref> The multilingual situation in Inner Mongolia does not appear to obstruct efforts by ethnic Mongols to preserve their language.<ref>Şablon:Cite book</ref><ref>Şablon:Cite book</ref> Although an unknown number of Mongols in China, such as the Tumets, may have completely or partially lost the ability to speak their language, they are still registered as ethnic Mongols and continue to identify themselves as ethnic Mongols.<ref name="Mongolian"/><ref>Şablon:Cite book</ref> The children of inter-ethnic Mongol-Chinese marriages also claim to be and are registered as ethnic Mongols.<ref>Şablon:Cite bookŞablon:Cite book</ref>

Classification and dialects

Mongolian belongs to the Mongolic languages. The delimitation of the Mongolian language within Mongolic is a much disputed theoretical problem, one whose resolution is impeded by the fact that existing data for the major varieties is not easily arrangeable according to a common set of linguistic criteria. Such data might account for the historical development of the Mongolian dialect continuum, as well as for its sociolinguistic qualities. Though phonological and lexical studies are comparatively well developed,<ref>See especially Rinčjen 1979, Amaržargal 1988, Coloo 1988 and for a general bibliography on Mongolic phonology Svantesson et al. 2005: 218–229.</ref> the basis has yet to be laid for a comparative morphosyntactic study, for example between such highly diverse varieties as Khalkha and Khorchin.<ref>See Ashimura 2002 for a rare piece of research into dialect morphosyntax that shows significant differences between Khalkha and Khorchin.</ref><ref>Janhunen 2003d: 189.</ref>

The status of certain varieties in the Mongolic group—whether they are languages distinct from Mongolian or just dialects of it—is disputed. There are at least three such varieties: Oirat (including the Kalmyk variety) and Buryat, both of which are spoken in Russia, Mongolia, and China; and Ordos, spoken around Inner Mongolia's Ordos City.<ref>See Janhunen (ed.) 2003 and Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005 for two classificatory schemes.</ref>

There is no disagreement that the Khalkha dialect of the Mongolian state is Mongolian.<ref>For an exact delimitation of Khalkha, see Amaržargal 1988: 24–25.</ref> Beyond this one point, however, agreement ends. For example, the influential classification of Sanžeev (1953) proposed a "Mongolian language" consisting of just the three dialects Khalkha, Chakhar, and Ordos, with Buryat and Oirat judged to be independent languages.<ref>Sanžeev 1953: 27–61, especially 55.</ref> On the other hand, Luvsanvandan (1959) proposed a much broader "Mongolian language" consisting of 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>Quoted from Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 167–168.</ref> Some Western scholars<ref>among them Janhunen 2003</ref> propose that the relatively well researched Ordos variety is an independent language due to its conservative syllable structure and phoneme inventory. While the placement of a variety like Alasha,<ref>Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 265–266.</ref> which is under the cultural influence of Inner Mongolia but historically tied to Oirat, and of other border varieties like Darkhad would very likely remain problematic in any classification,<ref>Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 266 classify Alasha as a variety of Southern Mongolian according to morphological criteria, while Svantesson et al. 2005: 148 classify it as a variety of Oirat according to phonological criteria. For a discussion of opinions on the classification of Darkhad, see Sanžaa and Tujaa 2001: 33–34.</ref> the central problem remains the question of how to classify Chakhar, Khalkha, and Khorchin in relation to each other and in relation to Buryat and Oirat.<ref>Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 166–73, 184–195. See also Janhunen 2003d: 180.</ref> The split of Şablon:IPA into Şablon:IPA before *i and Şablon:IPA before all other reconstructed vowels, which is found in Mongolia but not in Inner Mongolia, is often cited as a fundamental distinction,<ref>E.g., Svantesson et al. 2005: 143, Poppe 1955: 110–115.</ref> for example Proto-Mongolic Şablon:IPA, Khalkha Şablon:IPA, Chakhar Şablon:IPA 'year' versus Proto-Mongolic Şablon:IPA, Khalkha Şablon:IPA, Chakhar Şablon:IPA 'few'.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2006: 159–160; the difference between the [l]s might just be due to the impossibility of reconstructing something as precise as Şablon:IPA for Proto-Mongolic and imprecision or convenience in notation for Chakhar (Chakhar phonemes according to Dobu 1983).</ref> On the other hand, the split between the past tense verbal suffixes -Şablon:IPA in the Central varieties vs. -Şablon:IPA in the Eastern varieties<ref>E.g., bi tegün-i taniǰei I him know -Şablon:Smallcaps 'I knew him' is accepted and ?Bi öčögedür iregsen rejected by an Inner Mongolian grammarian from Khorchin (Chuluu 1998: 140, 165); in Khalkha, by contrast, the first sentence would not appear with the meaning attributed to it, while the second is perfectly acceptable.</ref> is usually seen as a merely stochastic difference.<ref>See, for example, Činggeltei 1959. Notice that this split is blurred by the school grammar, which treats several dialectal varieties as one coherent grammatical system (for example Činggeltei 1999 [1979]). This understanding is in turn reflected in the undecided treatment of -Şablon:IPA in research work like Bayančoγtu 2002: 306.</ref>

In Inner Mongolia, official language policy divides the Mongolian language into three dialects: Southern Mongolian, Oirat, and Barghu-Buryat. Southern Mongolian is said to consist of Chakhar, Ordos, Baarin, Khorchin, Kharchin, and Alasha. The authorities have synthesized a literary standard for Mongolian in whose grammar is said to be based on Southern Mongolian and whose pronunciation is based on the Chakhar dialect as spoken in the Plain Blue Banner.<ref>"Öbür mongγul ayalγu bol dumdadu ulus-un mongγul kelen-ü saγuri ayalγu bolqu büged dumdadu ulus-un mongγul kelen-ü barimǰiy-a abiy-a ni čaqar aman ayalγun-du saγurilaγsan bayidaγ." (Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 85).</ref> Dialectologically, however, western Southern Mongolian dialects are closer to Khalkha than they are to eastern Southern Mongolian dialects: for example, Chakhar is closer to Khalkha than to Khorchin.<ref>Janhunen 2003d.</ref>

Besides Mongolian, or "Central Mongolic", other languages in the Mongolic grouping include Dagur, spoken in eastern Inner Mongolia, Heilongjiang, and in the vicinity of Tacheng in Xinjiang; the Shirongolic subgroup Shira Yugur, Bonan, Dongxiang, Monguor, and Kangjia, spoken in Qinghai and Gansu regions; and the possibly extinct Moghol of Afghanistan.<ref>Janhunen 2006, except that Mongghul and Mangghuer are treated as a sub-branch (Slater 2003) and that Kangjia has been added (Siqinchaoketu 1999). Khamnigan which Janhunen groups as a Central Mongolic language is usually not discussed by other scholars.</ref>

As for the classification of the Mongolic family relative to other languages, the Altaic theory (which is increasingly less well received among linguists<ref>For a history of the Altaic theory, see Georg et al. 1999. Since then, the major pro-Altaistic publication Starostin et al. 2003 has appeared, which got mostly mildly negative to devastating reviews, the most detailed being Vovin 2005.</ref>) proposes that the Mongolic family is a member of a larger Altaic family that would also include the Turkic and Tungusic, and usually Koreanic languages and Japonic languages as well.

Grammar

The following description is based primarily on Khalkha Mongolian. In particular, the phonology section describes the Khalkha dialect as spoken in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia's capital. The phonologies of other varieties such as Ordos, Khorchin, and even Chakhar, differ considerably.<ref>See Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 249–384.</ref> In contrast, most of what is said about morphology and syntax also holds true for Chakhar,<ref>See Sečenbaγatur 2003</ref> while Khorchin is somewhat more diverse.<ref>See Bayančoγtu 2002</ref>

Phonology

Şablon:Listen This section discusses the phonology of Khalkha Mongolian with subsections on Vowels, Consonants, Phonotactics and Stress.

Vowels

The standard language has seven monophthong vowel phonemes. They are aligned into three vowel harmony groups by a parameter called ATR (advanced tongue root); the groups are −ATR, +ATR, and neutral. This alignment seems to have superseded an alignment according to oral backness. However, some scholars still describe Mongolian as being characterized by a distinction between front vowels and back vowels, and the front vowel spellings 'ö' and 'ü' are still often used in the West to indicate two vowels which were historically front. The Mongolian vowel system also has rounding harmony.

Length is phonemic for vowels, and each of the seven phonemes occurs short or long. Phonetically, short Şablon:IPA is highly divergent from long Şablon:IPA, being the central vowel Şablon:IPA.

In the following table, the seven vowel phonemes, with their length variants, are arranged and described phonetically.

Front Central Back
Short Long Short Long Short Long
Close Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
Near-Close Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
Close-Mid Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
Open-mid Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
Open Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA

Khalkha also has four diphthongs: Şablon:IPA.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 22</ref>

ATR harmony. Mongolian divides vowels into three groups in a system of vowel harmony:

+ATR ("front") −ATR ("back") Neutral
Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA

As mentioned, for historical reasons these have traditionally been labeled as "front" vowels and "back" vowels. Indeed, in Romanized transcription of Mongolian, the vowels Şablon:IPA and Şablon:IPA are often conventionally rendered as Şablon:Angle bracket and Şablon:Angle bracket, while the vowels Şablon:IPA and Şablon:IPA are expressed as Şablon:Angle bracket and Şablon:Angle bracket (this is also the case in the nonphonological sections of this article). However, for modern Mongolian phonology, it seems more appropriate to instead characterize the two vowel-harmony groups by the dimension of tongue root position. There is also one neutral vowel, Şablon:IPA, not belonging to either group.

All the vowels in a noncompound word, including all its suffixes, must belong to the same group. If the first vowel is −ATR, then every vowel of the word must be either Şablon:IPA or a −ATR vowel. Likewise, if the first vowel is a +ATR vowel, then every vowel of the word must be either Şablon:IPA or a +ATR vowel. In the case of suffixes, which must change their vowels to conform to different words, two patterns predominate. Some suffixes contain an archiphoneme Şablon:IPA that can be realized as Şablon:IPA. For example:

Other suffixes can occur in Şablon:IPA being realized as Şablon:IPA, in which case all −ATR vowels lead to Şablon:IPA and all +ATR vowels lead to Şablon:IPA. For example:

If the only vowel in the word stem is Şablon:IPA, the suffixes will use the +ATR suffix forms.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 43–50.</ref>

Rounding harmony. Mongolian also has rounding harmony, which does not apply to close vowels. If a stem contains Şablon:IPA (or Şablon:IPA), a suffix that is specified for an open vowel will have Şablon:IPA (or Şablon:IPA, respectively) as well. However, this process is blocked by the presence of Şablon:IPA (or Şablon:IPA) and Şablon:IPA. E.g. Şablon:IPA came in, but Şablon:IPA inserted.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 46–47, 50–51.</ref>

Vowel length. The pronunciation of long and short vowels depends on the syllable's position in the word. In word-initial syllables there is a phonemic contrast in length. A long vowel has about 208% the length of a short vowel. In word-medial and word-final syllables, formerly long vowels are now only 127% as long as short vowels in initial syllables, but they are still distinct from initial-syllable short vowels. Short vowels in noninitial syllables differ from short vowels in initial syllables by being only 71% as long and by being centralized in articulation. As they are nonphonemic, their position is determined according to phonotactic requirements.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 1–7, 22–24, 73–75.</ref>

Consonants

The following table lists the consonants of Khalkha Mongolian. The consonants enclosed in parentheses occur only in loanwords.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 25–30.</ref>

Labial Dental Palatal Velar Uvular
plain pal. plain pal. pal. plain
Nasal Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
Plosive voiceless aspirated (Şablon:IPA) (Şablon:IPA) Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA (Şablon:IPA) (Şablon:IPA)
voiceless Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
voiced Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
Affricate voiceless aspirated Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
voiceless Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
Fricative central (Şablon:IPA) Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
lateral Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
Trill Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA
Approximant Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA Şablon:IPA

Mongolian lacks the voiced lateral approximant, Şablon:IPA; instead, it has a voiced alveolar lateral fricative, Şablon:IPA, which is often realized as voiceless Şablon:IPA.<ref>Karlsson 2005: 17</ref> In word-final position, Şablon:IPA (if not followed by a vowel in historical forms) is realized as Şablon:IPA. The occurrence of palatalized consonant phonemes seems to be restricted to words that contain [−ATR] vowels.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 20–21, where it is actually stated that they are phonemic only in such words; in Svantesson's analysis, [−ATR] corresponds to "pharyngeal" and [+ATR]—to "nonpharyngeal".</ref> Aspirated consonants are preaspirated in medial and word-final contexts, devoicing preceding consonants and vowels. Devoiced short vowels are often deleted.<ref>Şablon:Cite web</ref>

Syllable structure and phonotactics

The maximal syllable is CVVCCC, where the last C is a word-final suffix. A single short vowel rarely appears in syllable-final position. If a word was monosyllabic historically, *CV has become CVV. Şablon:IPA is restricted to codas (else it becomes Şablon:IPA), and Şablon:IPA and Şablon:IPA do not occur in codas for historical reasons. For two-consonant clusters, the following restrictions obtain:

Clusters that do not conform to these restrictions will be broken up by an epenthetic nonphonemic vowel in a syllabification that takes place from right to left. For example, hojor 'two', ažil 'work', and saarmag 'neutral' are, phonemically, Şablon:IPA, Şablon:IPA, and Şablon:IPA respectively. In such cases, an epenthetic vowel is inserted so as to prevent disallowed consonant clusters. Thus, in the examples given above, the words are phonetically Şablon:IPA, Şablon:IPA, and Şablon:IPA. The phonetic form of the epenthetic vowel follows from vowel harmony triggered by the vowel in the preceding syllable. Usually it is a centralized version of the same sound, with the following exceptions: preceding Şablon:IPA produces Şablon:IPA; Şablon:IPA will be ignored if there is a nonneutral vowel earlier in the word; and a postalveolar or palatalized consonant will be followed by an epenthetic Şablon:IPA, as in Şablon:IPA.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 62–72.</ref>

Stress

Stress in Mongolian is nonphonemic (does not distinguish different meanings) and thus is considered to depend entirely on syllable structure. But scholarly opinions on stress placement diverge sharply.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 95–97</ref> Most native linguists, regardless of which dialect they speak, claim that stress falls on the first syllable. Between 1941 and 1975, several Western scholars proposed that the leftmost heavy syllable gets the stress. Yet other positions were taken in works published between 1835 and 1915.

Walker (1997)<ref>elaborating on Bosson 1964 and Poppe 1970.</ref> proposes that stress falls on the rightmost heavy syllable unless this syllable is word-final:

HˈHLL Şablon:IPA to be organized
LHˈHL Şablon:IPA separating (adverbial)
LHHˈHL Şablon:IPA the residents of Ulaanbaatar
HˈHH Şablon:IPA angrily
ˈHLH Şablon:IPA sad

A "heavy syllable" is here defined as one that is at least the length of a full vowel; short word-initial syllables are thereby excluded. If a word is bisyllabic and the only heavy syllable is word-final, it gets stressed anyway. In cases where there is only one phonemic short word-initial syllable, even this syllable can get the stress:<ref>Walker's evidence is collected from one native informant, examples from Poppe 1970, and consultation with James Bosson. She defines stress in terms of pitch, duration and intensity. The analysis pertains to the Khalkha dialect. The phonemic analysis in the examples is adjusted to Svantesson et al. 2005.</ref>

LˈH Şablon:IPA goose
ˈLL Şablon:IPA having read

More recently, the most extensive collection of phonetic data so far in Mongolian studies has been applied to a partial account of stress placement in the closely related Chakhar dialect.<ref>Harnud [Köke] 2003.</ref><ref>Harnud 2003 was reviewed by J. Brown in Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 2006 Dec, 36(2): 205–207.</ref> The conclusion is drawn that di- and trisyllabic words with a short first syllable are stressed on the second syllable. But if their first syllable is long, then the data for different acoustic parameters seems to support conflicting conclusions: intensity data often seems to indicate that the first syllable is stressed, while F0 seems to indicate that it is the second syllable that is stressed.<ref>Harnud [Köke] 2003: 44–54, 94–100.</ref>

Morphology

Modern Mongolian is an agglutinative, almost exclusively suffixing language, the only exception being reduplication.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 58–59.</ref> Most of the suffixes consist of a single morpheme. There are many derivational morphemes.<ref>Sečen 2004.</ref> For example, the word bajguullagynh consists of the root baj- 'to be', an epenthetic -g-, the causative -uul- (hence 'to found'), the derivative suffix -laga that forms nouns created by the action (like -ation in 'organisation') and the complex suffix –ynh denoting something that belongs to the modified word (-yn would be genitive).

Nominal compounds are quite frequent. Some derivational verbal suffixes are rather productive, e.g. jar'- 'to speak', jarilts- 'to speak with each other'. Formally, the independent words derived using verbal suffixes can roughly be divided into three classes: final verbs, which can only be used sentence-finally, i.e. -na (mainly future or generic statements) or –ø (second person imperative);<ref>Luvsanvandan (ed.) 1987: 151–153, 161–163.</ref> participles (often called "verbal nouns"), which can be used clause-finally or attributively, i.e. -san (perfect-past)<ref>Hashimoto 1993.</ref> or -maar ('want to'); and converbs, which can link clauses or function adverbially, i.e. -ž (qualifies for any adverbial function or neutrally connects two sentences) or -tal (the action of the main clause takes place until the action expressed by the suffixed verb begins).<ref>Luvsanvandan (ed.) 1987: 103–104, 124–125, 130–131.</ref>

Roughly speaking, Mongolian has eight cases: nominative (unmarked), genitive, dative, accusative, ablative, instrumental, comitative and directional.<ref>Tsedendamba and Möömöö 1997: 222–232.</ref> If a direct object is definite, it must take the accusative, while it must take the nominative if it is unspecific.<ref>Guntsetseg 2008: 61. The exact conditions of use for indefinite specific direct objects have not yet been specified in detail, but they appear to be related to animacy and textual context.</ref> In addition to case, a number of postpositions exist that usually govern genitive, ablative, or comitative case or a form of the nominative that has sometimes -Vn either for lexical historical reasons or analogy (thus maybe becoming an attributive case suffix).<ref>Sečenbaγatur 2003: 32–46.</ref> Nouns can take reflexive-possessive clitics indicating that the marked noun is possessed by the subject of the sentence: bi najz(-)aa avarsan I friend-Şablon:Smallcaps save-Şablon:Smallcaps 'I saved my friend'.<ref>Tsedendamba and Möömöö 1997: 234–241.</ref> However, there are also somewhat noun-like adjectives to which case suffixes seemingly cannot be attached directly unless there is ellipsis.<ref>For a pioneering approach to this problem, see Sajto 1999.</ref> Plurality may be left unmarked, but there are overt plurality markers, some of which are restricted to humans. A noun that is modified by a numeral usually does not take any plural affix.<ref>Tsedendamba and Möömöö 1997: 210–219, Sečenbaγatur 2003: 23–29.</ref>

Personal pronouns exist for the first and second person, while the old demonstrative pronouns have come to form third person (proximal and distal) pronouns. Other word (sub-)classes include interrogative pronouns, conjunctions (which take participles), spatials, and particles, the last being rather numerous.<ref>This is a simplified treatment of word classes. For a more precise treatment within the descriptive framework common in Inner Mongolia, see Sečenbaγatur 2003.</ref>

Negation is mostly expressed by -güj after participles and by the negation particle biš after nouns and adjectives; negation particles preceding the verb (for example in converbal constructions) exist, but tend to be replaced by analytical constructions.<ref>For the historic background of negation, see Yu 1991. For a phenomenology, see Bjambasan 2001.</ref>

Syntax

Phrase structure

The noun phrase has the order: demonstrative pronoun/numeral, adjective, noun.<ref>Guntsetseg 2008: 55.</ref> Attributive sentences precede the whole NP. Titles or occupations of people, low numerals indicating groups, and focus clitics are put behind the head noun.<ref>Tserenpil and Kullmann 2005: 237, 347.</ref> Possessive pronouns (in different forms) may either precede or follow the NP.<ref>Svantesson 2003: 164–165.</ref> Examples:

bid-nij uulz-san ter sajhan zaluu-gaas č
we-Şablon:Smallcaps meet-Şablon:Smallcaps that beautiful young.man-Şablon:Smallcaps Şablon:Smallcaps
'even from that beautiful young man that we have met'
Dorž bagš maan'
Dorj teacher our
'our teacher Dorj'

The verbal phrase consists of the predicate in the center, preceded by its complements and by the adverbials modifying it and followed (mainly if the predicate is sentence-final) by modal particles,<ref>See Mönh-Amgalan 1998.</ref> as in the following example with predicate bičsen:

ter hel-eh-güj-geer üün-ijg bič-sen šüü
s/he without:saying it-Şablon:Smallcaps write-Şablon:Smallcaps Şablon:Smallcaps
's/he wrote it without saying [so] [i.e. without saying that s/he would do so, or that s/he had done so], I can assure you.'

In this clause the adverbial, helehgüjgeer 'without saying [so]' must precede the predicate's complement, üünijg 'it-Şablon:Smallcaps' in order to avoid syntactic ambiguity, since helehgüjgeer is itself derived from a verb and hence an üünijg preceding it could be construed as its complement. If the adverbial was an adjective such as hurdan 'fast', it could optionally immediately precede the predicate. There are also cases in which the adverb must immediately precede the predicate.<ref>Sečenbaγatur 2003: 167.</ref>

For Khalkha, the most complete treatment of the verbal forms is Luvsanvandan (ed.) 1987. However, the analysis of predication presented here, while valid for Khalkha, is adapted from the description of Khorchin by Matsuoka 2007.

Most often, of course, the predicate consists of a verb. However, there are several types of nominal predicative constructions, with or without a copula.<ref>Hashimoto 2004</ref> Auxiliaries that express direction and aktionsart (among other meanings) can with the assistance of a linking converb occupy the immediate postverbal position, e.g. uuž orhison drink-Şablon:Smallcaps leave-Şablon:Smallcaps 'drank up'. The next position is filled by converb suffixes in connection with the auxiliary, baj- 'to be', e.g. ter güjž bajna s/he run-Şablon:Smallcaps be-Şablon:Smallcaps 'she is running'. Suffixes occupying this position express grammatical aspect, e.g., progressive and resultative. In the next position, participles followed by baj- may follow, e.g., ter irsen bajna s/he come-Şablon:Smallcaps be-Şablon:Smallcaps 'he has come'. Here, an explicit perfect and habituality can be marked, which is aspectual in meaning as well. This position may be occupied by multiple suffixes in a single predication, and it can still be followed by a converbal Progressive. The last position is occupied by suffixes that express tense, evidentiality, modality, and aspect.

Clauses

Unmarked phrase order is subjectobject–predicate.<ref>Guntsetseg 2008: 54.</ref> While the predicate generally has to remain in clause-final position, the other phrases are free to change order or to wholly disappear.<ref>Tserenpil and Kullmann 2005: 88, 363–364.</ref> The topic tends to be placed clause-initially, new information rather at the end of the clause.<ref>Apatoczky 2005.</ref> Topic can be overtly marked with bol, which can also mark contrastive focus,<ref>Hammar 1983: 45–80.</ref> overt additive focus ('even, also') can be marked with the clitic č,<ref>Kang 2000.</ref> and overt restrictive focus with the clitic l ('only').<ref>Tserenpil and Kullmann 2005: 348–349.</ref>

The inventory of voices in Mongolian consists of passive, causative, reciprocal, plurative, and cooperative. In a passive sentence, the verb takes the suffix -gd- and the agent takes either dative or instrumental case, the first of which is more common. In the causative, the verb takes the suffix -uul-, the causee (the person caused to do something) in a transitive action (e.g., 'raise') takes dative or instrumental case, and the causee in an intransitive action (e.g., 'rise') takes accusative case. Causative morphology is also used in some passive contexts:

Bi tüün-d huurt-san
I that.one-Şablon:Smallcaps fool-Şablon:Smallcaps
'I was fooled by her/him'.

The semantic attribute of animacy is syntactically important: thus the sentence, 'the bread was eaten by me', which is acceptable in English, would not be acceptable in Mongolian. The reciprocal voice is marked by -ld-, the plurative by -tsgaa-, and the cooperative by -lts-.<ref>Sečenbaγatur 2003: 116–123.</ref>

Mongolian allows for adjectival depictives that relate to either the subject or the direct object, e.g. Ljena nücgen untdag 'Lena sleeps naked', while adjectival resultatives are marginal.<ref>Brosig 2009.</ref>

Complex sentences

One way to conjoin clauses is to have the first clause end in a converb, as in the following example using the converb -bol:

bid üün-ijg ol-bol čam-d ög-nö
we it-Şablon:Smallcaps find-Şablon:Smallcaps you.Şablon:Smallcaps-Şablon:Smallcaps give-Şablon:Smallcaps
'if we find it we'll give it to you'

Some verbal nouns in the dative (or less often in the instrumental) function very similar to converbs:<ref>Svantesson 2003: 172.</ref> e.g., replacing olbol in the preceding sentence with olohod find-Şablon:Smallcaps yields 'when we find it we'll give it to you'. Quite often, postpositions govern complete clauses. In contrast, conjunctions take verbal nouns without case:<ref>See Sečenbaγatur 2003: 176–182 (who uses the term "postposition" for both and the term "conjunction" for junctors).</ref>

jadar-san učraas unt-laa
become.tired-Şablon:Smallcaps because sleep-Şablon:Smallcaps<ref>Note on notation: the semicolon in the interlinear gloss, Şablon:Smallcaps indicates that multiple semantic features are simultaneously expressed by a single, unanalyzable affix.</ref>
'I slept because I was tired'

Finally, there is a class of particles, usually clause-initial, that are distinct from conjunctions but that also relate clauses: bi olson, harin čamd ögöhgüj I find-Şablon:Smallcaps but you-Şablon:Smallcaps give-Şablon:Smallcaps 'I've found it, but I won't give it to you'.

Mongolian has a complementizer auxiliary verb ge- very similar to Japanese to iu. ge- literally means 'to say' and in converbal form gež precedes either a psych verb or a verb of saying. As a verbal noun like gedeg (with n' or case) it can form a subset of complement clauses. As gene it may function as an evidentialis marker.<ref>Sečenbaγatur 2003: 152–153.</ref>

Mongolian clauses tend to be combined paratactically, which sometimes gives rise to sentence structures which are subordinative despite resembling coordinative structures in European languages:<ref>Johanson 1995.</ref>

ter ir-eed namajg üns-sen
that.one come-Şablon:Smallcaps I.Şablon:Smallcaps kiss-Şablon:Smallcaps
'S/he came and kissed me.'

In the subordinate clause the subject, if different from the subject of main clause, sometimes has to take accusative or genitive case.<ref>Mizuno 1995.</ref> There is marginal occurrence of subjects taking ablative case as well.<ref>Pürev-Očir 1997: 131.</ref> Subjects of attributive clauses in which the head has a function (as is the case for all English relative clauses) usually require that if the subject is not the head, then it take the genitive,<ref>Sečenbaγatur 2003: 36.</ref> e.g. tüünij idsen hool that.one-Şablon:Smallcaps eat-Şablon:Smallcaps meal 'the meal that s/he had eaten'.

Loanwords and coined words

In distant times Mongolian adopted loanwords from Old Turkic, Sanskrit (these often through Uighur), Persian, Arabic, Tibetan,<ref>Temürčereng 2004: 86–99.</ref> Tungusic, and Chinese.<ref>Svantesson 2003: 127.</ref> Recent loanwords come from Russian, English,<ref>Temürčereng 2004: 99–102.</ref> and Chinese (mainly in Inner Mongolia).<ref>Öbür mongγul-un yeke surγaγuli 2005: 792–793.</ref> Language commissions of the Mongolian state have been busy translating new terminology into Mongolian,<ref>Şablon:Cite web</ref> so that the Mongolian vocabulary now has jerönhijlögč 'president' ("generalizer") and šar ajrag 'beer' ("yellow kumys"). There are quite a few loan translations, e.g., galt tereg 'train' ('fire-having cart') from Chinese huǒchē (火车, fire cart) 'train'.<ref>Öbür mongγul-un yeke surγaγuli 2005: 828.</ref> Other loan translations include mun chanar (essence) from Chinese shízhì (实质, true quality), khün am (population) from Chinese rénkǒu (人口, person mouth), erdene shish (corn, maize) from Chinese yùmǐ (玉米, jade rice) and bügd nairamdakh uls (republic) from Chinese gònghéguó (共和国, public collaboration nation).

Examples of Sanskrit loanwords used in contemporary Khalkha Mongolian include shashin (शशन sasana, religion), sansar (सँसार sansāra, space), avyas (अभ्यास abhyasa, talent), buyan (पुण्य punya, good deeds), agshin (क्षण kšana, instant), tiv (द्वीप dvipa, continent), garig (ग्रह graha, planet), tsadig (जातक jātaka, tales, stories), shuleg (श्लोक šloka, poems, verses), badag (पदक padaka, strophe), arshan (रसायन rašayana, mineral water, nectar), shastir (शास्त्र shastra, chronicle), bud (बुध budh, Mercury), sugar (शुक्र shukra, Venus), barhasvadi (वृहस्पति vrihaspati, Jupiter) and sanchir (शनि shani, Saturn).

Examples of Persian loanwords used in contemporary Khalkha Mongolian include anar (anar, amethyst), baishin (pishiwan, building), bars (fars, tiger), bers (farzin, chess queen/female tiger), bold (pulad, steel), bolor (bulur, crystal), gunjid (kunjut, sesame), gindan (zindan, prison), dari (daru, powder/gunpowder), duran (dur, telescope), duranbai (durbin, telescope/microscope), devter (daftar, notebook), nom (nameh, book) and hurmast (ahuramazda, high god).

Examples of Chinese loanwords used in contemporary Khalkha Mongolian include banz (板子 bǎnzi, board), laa (蜡 là, candle), luuvan (萝卜 lúobo, radish), khuluu (葫芦 húlu, gourd), denluu (灯路 dēnglù, lamp), chiiden (汽灯 qìdēng, electric lamp), biir (笔儿 bǐ'er, paintbrush), gambanz (斩板子 zhǎnbǎnzi, cutting board), chinjuu (青椒 qīngjiāo, pepper), juutsai (韭菜 jiǔcài, leek), moog (蘑菇 mógu, mushroom), tsuu (醋 cù, vinegar, soy sauce), baitsaa (白菜 báicài, cabbage), mantuu (馒头 mántou, steamed bun), shiigua (西瓜 xīguā, watermelon), naimaa/maimaa (买卖 mǎimài, trade), goimon (挂面 gùamiàn, noodles), dan (单 dān, single), gan (钢 gāng, steel), lantuu (榔头 lángtou, sledgehammer), tsonkh (窗户 chūanghu, window), buuz (包子 bāozi, dumplings), khuushuur (火烧儿 hǔoshāo'er, fried dumpling), zutan (乳脂汤 rǔzhītāng, cream soup), bantan (粉汤 fěntāng, flour soup), jan (酱 jiàng, soy), van (王 wáng, king), gunj (公主 gōngzhǔ, princess), gun (公 gōng, duke), janjin (将军 jiāngjūn, general), taigan (太监 tàijiàn, eunuch), pyanz (片子 piànzi, recorded disk), guanz (馆子 guǎnzi, restaurant), lianhua (莲花 liánhuā, lotus), khuar (花儿 huā'er, flower, used in names), toor (桃儿 táo'er, peach), intoor (樱桃儿 yīngtáo'er, cherry), zeel (借 jie, borrow, lend, with Mongolian denominal verb suffix -l-), vandui (豌豆 wāndòu, pea), yanz (样子 yàngzi, manner, appearance), shinj (性质 xìngzhì, characteristic), sampin (算盘 suànpán, abacus), liir (梨儿 lí'er, pear), bai (牌 páizi, target), jin (斤 jīn, weight), bin (饼 bǐng, pancake), khuanli (皇历 huángli, calendar), shaazan (烧瓷 shāocí, porcelain), khantaaz (砍兜肚 kǎndōudu, sleeveless vest), puntuuz (粉条子 fěntiáozi, potato noodles) and tsai (茶 chá, tea).

In the 20th century there are numerous daily life words loaned from Russia: doktor (doctor), ostol (table), shokolad (chocolate), vagon (train wagon), kalendar (calendar), sistem, podvoolk (from futbolka T-shirt), yavlaga (apple), galavsaa (sausage), galstuk (red scarf) and mashin (car). In recent times due to fast-phased social and cultural transformations, the Mongolian language loaned numerous words from English; some have gradually evolved as official terms: menejment, computer, fail (file), marketing, kredit, onlain (online), mesej (message). Most of these are confined to the Mongolian state.

Despite having a diverse pool of loanwords Mongolian uses more native vocabulary than languages like Japanese or Korean where words of Chinese origin take up to 60% of vocabulary. Volker Rybatzki points out the relative lexical purity of Mongolian in The Mongolic Languages (2003)<ref>Juha Janhunen (2003). The Mongolic Languages. London. Chapter 18, Intra-Mongolic Taxonomy, Volker Rybatzki, Pages 385-387.</ref>

Şablon:Quote

Writing systems

Şablon:Main

Dosya:Nova N 176 folio 9.jpg
Nova N 176 found in Kyrgyzstan. The manuscript (dating to the 12th century Western Liao) is written in the Mongolic Khitan language using cursive Khitan large script. It has 127 leaves and 15,000 characters.

Mongolian has been written in a variety of alphabets, making it a language with one of the largest number of scripts used historically. The earliest stages of Mongolian (Xianbei, Wuhuan languages) may have used an indigenous runic script as indicated by Chinese sources. The Khitan large script adopted in 920 CE is an early Mongol (or according to some, para-Mongolic) script.

The traditional Mongolian script was adapted from Uyghur script probably at the very beginning of the 13th century and from that time underwent some minor disambiguations and supplementations. Between 1930 and 1932, a short-lived attempt was made to introduce the Latin script in the Mongolian state, and after a preparatory phase, the Mongolian Cyrillic script was declared mandatory by government decree. It has been argued that the 1941 introduction of the Cyrillic script, with its smaller discrepancy between written and spoken form, contributed to the success of the large-scale government literacy campaign, which increased the literacy rate from 17.3% to 73.5% between 1941 and 1950.<ref name=unesco>Batchuluun Yembuu, Khulan Munkh-Erdene. 2005. Literacy country study: Mongolia. Background paper prepared for the Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2006. Literacy for Life. P.7-8]</ref> Earlier government campaigns to eradicate illiteracy, employing the traditional script, had only managed to raise literacy from 3.0% to 17.3% between 1921 and 1940.<ref name=unesco/> From 1991 to 1994, an attempt at reintroducing the traditional alphabet failed in the face of popular resistance.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 34, 40–41.</ref> In informal contexts of electronic text production, the use of the Latin alphabet is common.<ref name=MHK>Şablon:Cite web</ref>

In the People's Republic of China, Mongolian is a co-official language with Mandarin Chinese in some regions, notably the entire Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. The traditional alphabet has always been used there, although Cyrillic was considered briefly before the Sino-Soviet split.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 34, 40.</ref> There are two types of written Mongolian used in China: the traditional Mongolian script, which is official among Mongols nationwide, and the Clear script, used predominantly among Oirats in Xinjiang.<ref>Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 398.</ref>

Linguistic history

Dosya:Phagspa imperial edict dragon year.jpg
Edict of Yesün Temür Khan, Emperor Taiding of Yuan (1328). Only the 'Phags-pa script retains the complete Middle Mongol vowel system.<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 111.</ref>

The earliest surviving Mongolian text may be the Şablon:İll, a report on sports composed in Mongolian script on stone, which is most often dated at 1224 or 1225.<ref>E.g. Garudi 2002: 7. But see Rachewiltz 1976)</ref> The Mongolian-Armenian wordlist of 55 words compiled by Kirakos of Gandzak (13th century) is the first written record of Mongolian words.<ref>Djahukyan 1991: 2368</ref> From the 13th to the 15th centuries, Mongolian language texts were written in four scripts (not counting some vocabulary written in Western scripts): Uyghur Mongolian (UM) script (an adaptation of the Uyghur alphabet), 'Phags-pa script (Ph) (used in decrees), Chinese (SM) (The Secret History of the Mongols), and Arabic (AM) (used in dictionaries).<ref>Rybatzki 2003: 58</ref> While they are the earliest texts available, these texts have come to be called "Middle Mongol" in scholarly practice.<ref>See Rachewiltz 1999 for a critical review of the terminology used in periodizations of Mongolic; Svantesson et al. 2005: 98–99 attempt a revision of this terminology for the early period.</ref> The documents in UM script show some distinct linguistic characteristics and are therefore often distinguished by terming their language "Preclassical Mongolian".<ref>Rybatzki 2003: 57"</ref>

The Yuan dynasty referred to the Mongolian language in Chinese as "Guoyu" (Şablon:Zh), which means "National language", a term also used by other non-Han dynasties to refer to their languages such as the Manchu language during the Qing dynasty, the Jurchen language during the Jin dynasty (1115–1234), the Khitan language during the Liao dynasty, and the Xianbei language during the Northern Wei.

The next distinct period is Classical Mongolian, which is dated from the 17th to the 19th century. This is a written language with a high degree of standardization in orthography and syntax that sets it quite apart from the subsequent Modern Mongolian. The most notable documents in this language are the Mongolian Kangyur and Tengyur<ref>Janhunen 2003a: 32.</ref> as well as several chronicles.<ref>Okada 1984.</ref> In 1686, the Soyombo alphabet (Buddhist texts) was created, giving distinctive evidence on early classical Mongolian phonological peculiarities.<ref>Nadmid 1967: 98–102.</ref> Şablon:Clear

Changes in phonology

Consonants

The research into the 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>e.g. Svantesson et al. 2005</ref> or voicing.<ref>e.g. 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/, *Şablon:IPA (~ *[k], *Şablon:IPA) 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/ got lost in some instances, which raises the question of what the conditioning factors of those instances were.<ref>e.g. Poppe 1955</ref> More recently, the other obvious 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/ (sometimes also called /x/) is sometimes assumed to derive from *Şablon:IPA, which would also explain zero in SM, AM, Ph in some instances where UM indicates /p/, e.g. debel > Khalkha deel.<ref>Janhunen 2003c: 6</ref>

The palatal affricates *č, *čʰ were fronted in Northern Modern Mongolian dialects such as Khalkha. Şablon:IPA was spirantized to Şablon:IPA in Ulaanbaatar Khalkha and the Mongolian dialects south of it, e.g. Preclassical Mongolian kündü, reconstructed as Şablon:IPA 'heavy', became Modern Mongolian Şablon:IPA<ref>Svantesson et al. 2005: 133, 167.</ref> (but in the vicinity of Bayankhongor and Baruun-Urt, many speakers will say Şablon:IPA).<ref>Rinchen (ed.) (1979): 210.</ref> Originally word-final *n turned into /ŋ/; if *Şablon:IPA was originally followed by a vowel that later dropped, it remained unchanged, e.g. Şablon:IPA became Şablon:IPA, but Şablon:IPA became Şablon:IPA. After i-breaking, Şablon:IPA became phonemic. Consonants in words containing back vowels that were followed by Şablon:IPA in Proto-Mongolian became palatalized in Modern Mongolian. In some words, word-final Şablon:IPA 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">Şablon:Cite book</ref>

Vowels

The standard view is that Proto-Mongolic had Şablon:IPA. According to this view, Şablon:IPA and Şablon:IPA were pharyngealized to Şablon:IPA and Şablon:IPA, then Şablon:IPA and Şablon:IPA were velarized to Şablon:IPA and Şablon:IPA. Thus, the vowel harmony shifted from a velar to a pharyngeal paradigm. Şablon:IPA in the first syllable of back-vocalic words was assimilated to the following vowel; in word-initial position it became Şablon:IPA. Şablon:IPA was rounded to Şablon:IPA when followed by Şablon:IPA. VhV and VjV sequences where the second vowel was any vowel but Şablon:IPA were monophthongized. In noninitial syllables, short vowels were deleted from the phonetic representation of the word and long vowels became short.<ref>Svantesson 2005: 181, 184, 186–187, 190–195.</ref>

E.g. Şablon:IPA (Şablon:IPA becomes Şablon:IPA, Şablon:IPA disappears) > Şablon:IPA (unstable n drops; vowel reduction) > /jama(n)/ 'goat'

and Şablon:IPA (regressive rounding assimilation) > Şablon:IPA (vowel velarization) > Şablon:IPA (vowel reduction) > /oms-/ 'to wear'

This reconstruction has recentlyŞablon:When 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 Şablon:IPA instead of *[e]. Moreover, the sound changes involved in this alternative scenario are more likely from an articulatory point of view and early Middle Mongol loans into Korean.<ref>Ko 2011</ref>

Changes in morphology

Nominal system

Dosya:Secret history.jpg
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 following discussion, in accordance with a preceding observation, the term "Middle Mongol" is used merely as a cover term for texts written in any of three scripts, Uighur Mongolian script (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 2003: 67, Svantesson 2003: 162.</ref> The Middle Mongol comitative -luγ-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'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 2003: 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>Toγtambayar 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>Toγtambayar 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 uruγu 'downwards'.<ref>Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 228, 386.</ref> Social gender agreement was abandoned.<ref>Rybatzki 2003: 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 2003: 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 2003: 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.,

Kökseü sabraq ügü.le-run ayyi yeke uge ugu.le-d ta ... kee-jüü.y
K. s. speak-Şablon:Smallcaps alas big word speak-Şablon:Smallcaps you ... say-Şablon:Smallcaps
"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' vs. modern spoken Khalkha Mongolian ireegüj or irsengüj.

See also

Şablon:Portal

References

Şablon:Reflist

Bibliography

For some Mongolian authors, the Mongolian version of their name is also given in square brackets, e.g., "Harnud [Köke]". Köke is the author's native name. It is a practice common among Mongolian scholars, for purposes of publishing and being cited abroad, to adopt a surname based on one's patronymic, in this example "Harnud"; compare Mongolian name.
Some library catalogs write Chinese language titles with each syllable separate, even syllables belonging to a single word.

List of abbreviations used. TULIP is in official use by some librarians; the remainder have been contrived for this listing.
Journals

  • KULIP Kyūshū daigaku gengogaku ronshū [Kyushu University linguistics papers]
  • MKDKH Muroran kōgyō daigaku kenkyū hōkoku [Memoirs of the Muroran Institute of Technology]
  • TULIP Tōkyō daigaku gengogaku ronshū [Tokyo University linguistics papers]

Publishers

Şablon:Refbegin

  • Şablon:Mn icon Amaržargal, B. 1988. BNMAU dah' Mongol helnij nutgijn ajalguuny tol' bichig: halh ajalguu. Ulaanbaatar: ŠUA.
  • Apatóczky, Ákos Bertalan. 2005. On the problem of the subject markers of the Mongolian language. In Wú Xīnyīng, Chén Gānglóng (eds.), Miànxiàng xīn shìjìde ménggǔxué [The Mongolian studies in the new century : review and prospect]. Běijīng: Mínzú Chūbǎnshè. 334–343. ISBN 7-105-07208-3.
  • Şablon:Jp icon Ashimura, Takashi. 2002. Mongorugo jarōto gengo no Şablon:IPA no yōhō ni tsuite. TULIP, 21: 147–200.
  • Şablon:Mn icon Bajansan, Ž. and Š. Odontör. 1995. Hel šinžlelijn ner tom"joony züjlčilsen tajlbar toli. Ulaanbaatar.
  • Şablon:Mn icon Bayančoγtu. 2002. Qorčin aman ayalγun-u sudulul. Kökeqota: ÖMYSKQ. ISBN 7-81074-391-0.
  • Şablon:Mn icon Bjambasan, P. 2001. Mongol helnij ügüjsgeh har'caa ilerhijleh hereglüürüüd. Mongol hel, sojolijn surguul: Erdem šinžilgeenij bičig, 18: 9–20.
  • Bosson, James E. 1964. Modern Mongolian; a primer and reader. Uralic and Altaic series; 38. Bloomington: Indiana University.
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Şablon:Refend

Further reading

  • Janhunen, Juha A. 2012: Mongolian. (London Oriental and African Language Library, 19.) Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Şablon:ISSN. ISBN 978-90-272-3820-7

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