Azer or Azayr is a mostly or entirely extinct dialect of the

Soninke language The Soninke language (Soninke: ''Sooninkanxanne'', ), also known as Serakhulle or Azer or Maraka, is a Mande languages, Mande language spoken by the Soninke people of West Africa. The language has an estimated 2.3 million speakers, primarily lo ...

, heavily mixed with

Berber Berber or Berbers may refer to: Ethnic group * Berbers, an ethnic group native to Northern Africa * Berber languages, a family of Afro-Asiatic languages Places * Berber, Sudan, a town on the Nile People with the surname * Ady Berber (1913–196 ...

and

Hassaniya Arabic Hassaniya Arabic (; also known as , , , , and Maure) is a variety of Maghrebi Arabic spoken by Mauritanian Arabs, Malian Arabs and the Sahrawis. It was spoken by the Beni Ḥassān Bedouin tribes of Yemeni origin who extended their authority o ...

, formerly spoken in

Mauritania Mauritania, officially the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, is a sovereign country in Maghreb, Northwest Africa. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Western Sahara to Mauritania–Western Sahara border, the north and northwest, ...

and northern

Mali Mali, officially the Republic of Mali, is a landlocked country in West Africa. It is the List of African countries by area, eighth-largest country in Africa, with an area of over . The country is bordered to the north by Algeria, to the east b ...

History and distribution

Azer arose as a lingua franca for trade across the Sahel, a mixture between Soninke and Berber, widely spoken in the salt-trading centres of

Ouadane Ouadane or Wādān () is a small town in the desert region of central Mauritania, situated on the southern edge of the Adrar Plateau, northeast of Chinguetti. The town was a staging post in the trans-Saharan trade and for caravans transporti ...

, Tinigi,

Chinguetti Chinguetti ( ; ) is a ksar and a medieval trading center in northern Mauritania, located on the Adrar Plateau east of Atar. Chinguetti had a population of 4,800 as of 2013. Founded in the 13th century as the center of several trans-Saharan trad ...

, Tichit,

Oualata Oualata or Walāta () (also Biru in 17th century chronicles) is a small oasis town in southeast Mauritania, located at the eastern end of the Aoukar basin. Oualata was important as a caravan city in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries as th ...

, and

Aoudaghost Aoudaghost also transliterated as Awadaghust, Awdughast, Awdaghusht, Awdaghost, and Awdhaghurst () is a former Berber town in Hodh El Gharbi, Mauritania. It was an important oasis town at the southern end of a trans-Saharan caravan route that i ...

. The name is supposedly derived from the Berber term 'El Answar', their name for the Guiriganke or related Soninke group who founded these oasis towns. Azer's usage progressively declined beginning in the 16th century as it was replaced by Berber and Hassaniya. Elements of the language were collected and studied by Heinrich Barth in the 19th century, Diego Brosset in 1930–1931 and Théodore Monod in 1934. Some Berber and Nemadi communities in the

Adrar Plateau The Adrar (, Berber languages, Berber for "mountain") is a highland natural region, natural and historical region of the Sahara, Sahara Desert in northern Mauritania. The Adrar Region, an administrative division of Mauritania, is named after th ...

Araouane Araouane or Arawan is a small village in the Malian part of the Sahara Desert, lying north of Timbuktu on the caravan route to the salt-mining centre of Taoudenni. The village once served as an entrepôt in the trans-Saharan trade. History Be ...

Néma Néma () is a town in southeastern Mauritania, close to the border with Mali. It is located at around at the eastern end of the Aoukar. It is the capital of Hodh Ech Chargui Region and of the Néma (department), Néma Department. While the u ...

and

Taoudenni Taoudenni (also Taoudeni, Taoudénit, Taudeni, , ) is a remote salt mining center in the desert region of northern Mali, north of Timbuktu. It is the capital of Taoudénit Region. The salt is dug by hand from the bed of an ancient salt lake, c ...

spoke Azer well into the 20th century. The language survives today mostly in place names such as

, which means 'spring of horses'.

Notes

Sources

* * * * {{Authority control Languages of Mali Languages of Mauritania Languages of Senegal Mande languages Sahel