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'Tocharian' or 'Tokharian' is one of the most obscure branches of the group of Indo-European languages. The name of the language is taken from people known to the Greek historians (Ptolemy VI, 11, 6) as the Tocharians (, "Tokharoi"). These are sometimes identified with the Yuezhi and the Kushans, while the term ''Tokharistan'' usually refers to 1st millennium Bactria. A Turkic text refers to the Turfanian language (Tocharian A) as ''twqry''. Interpretation is difficult, but F. W. K. Müller has associated this with the name of the Bactrian ''Tokharoi''. In Tocharian, the language is referred to as ''arish-käna'' and the Tocharians as ''arya''.
Tocharian consisted of two languages; 'Tocharian A' (Turfanian, Arsi, or East Tocharian) and 'Tocharian B' (Kuchean or West Tocharian). These languages were spoken roughly from the sixth to ninth century centuries; before they became extinct, their speakers were absorbed into the expanding Uyghur tribes. Both languages were once spoken in the Tarim Basin in Central Asia, now the Xinjiang Autonomous Region of China.

Contents

Phonemes

Vowels

Consonants

Writing system

Morphology

Cultural significance

Comparison to other Indo-European languages

See also

References

External links

Phonemes

Phonetically, Tocharian is a "centum" Indo-European language, characterized by the merging of palato-velar consonants with plain velars (
★ k,
★ g,
★ gh), which is generally associated with Indo-European languages of the West European area (Italic, Celtic, Germanic, Greek). In that sense, Tocharian seems to have been an isolate in the "Satem" phonetic world of Indo-European-speaking East European and Asian populations.

Vowels

★ (transcribed <ā>) (transcribed <ä>), (transcribed )

★ Diphthongs (Tocharian B only): (transcribed ), (transcribed ), (transcribed ), (transcribed <āu>)

Consonants

★ Stops: (transcribed )

★ Affricates:

★ Fricatives: (transcribed <ś>), (transcribed )

★ Approximants: (transcribed [y])

★ Trills:

★ Nasals: (transcribed word-finally), (transcribed <ñ>)

★ Lateral approximants: (transcribed )
Note that the above consonantal values are largely based on the writing of Sanskrit/Prakrit loanwords. A retroflex value for is particularly suspect as it is derived from palatalized ; it was probably a low-frequency sibilant (like German spelling ), as opposed to the higher-frequency sibilant (like Mandarin Pinyin spelling ).

Writing system

Wooden plate with inscriptions in Tocharian. Kucha, China, 5th-8th century (Tokyo National Museum)

Tocharian is documented in manuscript fragments, mostly from the 8th century (with a few earlier ones) that were written on palm leaves, wooden tablets and Chinese paper, preserved by the extremely dry climate of the Tarim Basin. Samples of the language have been discovered at sites in Kucha and Karasahr, including many mural inscriptions.
Tocharian A and B are not intercomprehensible. Properly speaking, based on the tentative interpretation of ''twqry'' as related to ''Tokharoi'', only Tocharian A may be referred to as ''Tocharian'', while Tocharian B could be called ''Kuchean'' (its native name may have been ''kuśiññe''), but since their grammars are usually treated together in scholarly works, the terms A and B have proven useful. A common Proto-Tocharian language must precede the attested languages by several centuries, probably dating to the 1st millennium BC. Given the small geographical range of and the lack of secular texts in Tocharian A, it might alternatively have been a liturgical language, the relationship between the two being similar to that between Classical Chinese and Mandarin. It must be noted however that the lack of a secular corpus in Tocharian A is by no means definite, due to the fragmentary preservation of Tocharian texts in general.
The alphabet the Tocharians were using is derived from the North Indian Brahmi alphabetic syllabary (abugida) and is referred to as ''slanting Brahmi''. It soon became apparent that a large proportion of the manuscripts were translations of known Buddhist works in Sanskrit and some of them were even bilingual, facilitating decipherment of the new language. Besides the Buddhist and Manichaean religious texts, there were also monastery correspondence and accounts, commercial documents, caravan permits, and medical and magical texts, and one love poem. Many Tocharians embraced Manichaean duality or Buddhism.

Morphology

Tocharian has completely re-worked the nominal declension system of Proto-Indo-European. The only cases inherited from the proto-language are nominative, genitive, and accusative; in Tocharian the old accusative is known as the ''oblique'' case. In addition to these three cases, however, each Tocharian language has six cases formed by the addition of an invariant suffix to the oblique case. For example, the Tocharian A word '' "teacher" is declined as follows:

Case	Suffix	Singular	Plural
Nominative
Genitive
Oblique
Instrumental	-yo
Perlative	-ā
Comitative	-aśśäl
Allative	-ac
Ablative
Locative

Cultural significance

"Tocharian donors", with light hair and light eye color, dressed in Sassanian style, 6th century CE fresco, Qizil, Tarim Basin. These frescoes are associated with annotations in Tocharian and Sanskrit made by their painters.

The existence of the Tocharian languages and alphabet was not even guessed at, until chance discoveries in the early 20th century brought to light fragments of manuscripts in a then-unknown alphabetic syllabary (abugida) that turned out to belong to a hitherto unknown branch of the Indo-European family of languages, which has been named 'Tocharian'.
Tocharian has upset some theories about the relations of Indo-European languages and is revitalizing linguistic studies. The Tocharian languages are a major geographic exception to the usual pattern of Indo-European branches, being the only one that spread directly east from the theoretical Indo-European starting point in the Pontic steppe.
Tocharian probably died out after 840, when the Uyghurs were expelled from Mongolia by the Kyrgyz, retreating to the Tarim Basin. This theory is supported by the discovery of translations of Tocharian texts into Uyghur. During Uyghur rule, the peoples mixed with the Uyghurs to produce much of the modern population of what is now Xinjiang.

Comparison to other Indo-European languages

'Tocharian vocabulary (sample)'
Modern English	Tocharian A	Tocharian B	Irish	Latin	Ancient Greek	Vedic Sanskrit	Proto-Indo-European
one	sas	e	aon	ūnus	heis	aika	★ oynos, ★ sems
two	wu	wi	dó	duo	duo	dváu	★ d(u)woh1
three	tre	trai	trí	trēs	treis	tri	★ treyes
four	śtwar	śtwer	ceathair	quattuor	téssares	catvāras	★ kwetwores
five	päñ	piś	cúig	quīnque	pente	pañka	★ penkwe
six	äk	kas	sé	sex	héx		★ (s)weḱs
seven	pät	ukt	seacht	septem	heptá	saptá	★ septm
eight	okät	okt	hocht	octō	októ		★ oḱtoh3
nine	ñu	ñu	naoi	novem	ennéa	náva	★ newn
ten	śäk	śak	deich	decem	deka	dáśa	★ deḱm
hundred	känt	kante	cead	centum	hekatón	śatám	★ ḱmtom
father	pācar	pācer	athair	pater	patēr	pitár-	★ ph2tēr
mother	mācar	mācer	máthair	mater	mētér	mātar-	★ meh2tēr
brother	pracar	procer	bráthair	frāter	phrátēr¹	bhrātar-	★ bhreh2tēr
sister	ar	er	siúr	soror	éor¹	svas-	★ swesor
(horse)³	yuk	yakwe	each	equus	híppos	áśva-	★ eḱwo-
cow	ko	keu	bó	bos²	boûs	gáus	★ gwow-
(voice)²	vak	vek	focal¹	vōx	épos¹	vāk	★ wekw-
name	ñom	ñem	ainm	nōmen	ónoma	nāman-	★ nomn
to milk	malk	mälk	bligh	mulgēre	amélgein	marjati¹	★ melg-

¹ = Cognate, with shifted meaning

² = Borrowed cognate, not native.

³ = English meaning, unrelated word

See also

★ Language families and languages

★ Tocharians

References

★ "Tokharian Pratimoksa Fragment Sylvain Levi". ''The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland''. 1913, pp. 109-120.

★ Mallory, J.P. and Victor H. Mair. ''The Tarim Mummies''. London: Thames & Hudson, 2000. (ISBN 0-500-05101-1)

★ Schmalsteig, William R. "Tokharian and Baltic." ''Lituanus''. v. 20, no. 3, 1974.

★ Krause, Wolfgang and Werner Thomas. ''Tocharisches Elemantarbuch''. Heidelberg: Carl Winter Universitätsverlag, 1960.

★ Malzahn, Melanie (Ed.). ''Instrumenta Tocharica''. Heidelberg: Carl Winter Universitätsverlag, 2007. (ISBN 978-3-8253-5299-8)

External links

★ Conjugation tables for Tocharian A and B

★ Tocharian alphabet (from Omniglot)

★ TITUS: Tocharian alphabets& Manuscripts from the Berlin Turfan Collection

★ Mark Dickens, 'Everything you always wanted to know about Tocharian'

★ A Tocharian-to-English dictionary with nearly 200 words

★ Tocharian Online from the University of Texas at Austin