Kilit is an extinct

Iranian Iranian () may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Iran ** Iranian diaspora, Iranians living outside Iran ** Iranian architecture, architecture of Iran and parts of the rest of West Asia ** Iranian cuisine, cooking traditions and practic ...

dialect of

Azerbaijan Azerbaijan, officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, is a Boundaries between the continents, transcontinental and landlocked country at the boundary of West Asia and Eastern Europe. It is a part of the South Caucasus region and is bounded by ...

that is closely related to

Talysh Talysh may refer to: *Talysh people, an ethnic group of Iran and Azerbaijan **Talysh language, the West Iranian language of these people ** Talysh, a historical region on the southwestern coast of the Caspian Sea, inhabited by the Talysh people *T ...

. It is probably a dialect of Iranian Tati, otherwise found only in Iran, specifically a subdialect of Harzandi. It was spoken in the villages around Kilit, located 12 kilometers southwest from the city of

Ordubad Ordubad is the second largest city of Azerbaijan's Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic and the capital of an eponymous district. Ordubad is a medieval city of the Caucasus and in its current capacity of a town was founded in the 18th century. The town ...

in a

district A district is a type of administrative division that in some countries is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or county, counties, several municipality, municip ...

with the same name of Nakhchivan in

. It was still used by non-native speakers as a second language in the 1950s.Stilo, D. L. 1994. Phonological systems in contact in Iran and Transcaucasia. In ''Persian studies in North America: Studies in Honor of Mohammad Ali Jazayery'' By Muhammed Ali Jaza'iri, Mehdi Marashi, Mohammad Ali: Festschrift Jazayery, Published by Ibex Publishers, Inc., p. 90. ,

History

The language has been long known to the

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

historians and travelers since the middle of nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries. The historian Chopin, first mentioned it back in 1852. He states the inhabitants of the village as amounting to 104. Zelinsky researched on the language in 1880 afterwards. In the 1950s a few speakers was reported who used the language probably only as a trade lingo or secret language. In 1966, A. G. Gasanov collected a few words and phrases.Sources of kilit language (Источники о килитском языке)
/ref> Although the possibility of a migration cannot be ruled out, however it is more likely, given more data about Tatic languages and proto-Tatic, that this group extended at least as far as the areas in which the remanent languages are spoken today.

Some available materials

The following is a kiliti text reported by Zelinsky:Zelinsky, S. P. 1880. Three Magali: Nakhichevan, Ordubadsky and Daralagezsky. Geografo-statistical and agricultural description. "Collected information about the Caucasus," t. VII, Tiflis. (Зелинский С. П. 1880. Три магала: Нахичеванский, Ордубадский и Даралагезский. Географо-статистическое и сельскохозяйственное описание. "Сборник сведений о Кавказе", т. VII, Тифлис.) Gasanov, A. G. 1966. "O 'tainom' iazyke zhitelei sela Kilit Nakhichevankoi ASSR." In Voprosy Dialektologii Tiurkskix lazykov, Vol. 4, edited by R. I. Avanesov, N. A. Baskakov, et al. Baku: Akademii Nauk Azerbaidzhanskoi SSR.

Transliterated Transliteration is a type of conversion of a text from one writing system, script to another that involves swapping Letter (alphabet), letters (thus ''wikt:trans-#Prefix, trans-'' + ''wikt:littera#Latin, liter-'') in predictable ways, such as ...

from

Cyrillic The Cyrillic script ( ) is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and Iranic-speaking countries in Southeastern Europe, Ea ...

Russian translit converter
/ref> : Comparative list of numbers and some words mentioned by Zelinsky and Gasanov:

The identity

Chopin remarks that the inhabitants of Kilit village were professing

Shiite Shia Islam is the second-largest branch of Islam. It holds that Muhammad designated Ali ibn Abi Talib () as both his political successor (caliph) and as the spiritual leader of the Muslim community (imam). However, his right is understood ...

faith and their language is not similar to any of the other local dialects. However he has been puzzled about their origin. He mentioned that they might be from

Armenian Armenian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia * Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent ** Armenian diaspora, Armenian communities around the ...

origin or more likely Talyshi, Tat, Tajik or

Zoroastrian Zoroastrianism ( ), also called Mazdayasnā () or Beh-dīn (), is an Iranian religion centred on the Avesta and the teachings of Zarathushtra Spitama, who is more commonly referred to by the Greek translation, Zoroaster ( ). Among the wo ...

.Shopen, Ivan, 1852. Istoricheskiĭ pamiatnik sostoianiia Armianskoĭ-oblasti v ėpokhu eia prisoedineniia k Rossiĭskoĭ-Imperii. Published by V tip. Imp. Akademii nauk. P. 539 Zelinsky considered it as a mixture of Kurdish, Persian and Arabic. Gasanov called it with a certain affinity towards Iranian languages. But only Zelinsky's materials are enough to understand that kiliti is not an argot, possesses an independent grammatical structure and have the main base of the root words and all the typical features of the Iranian languages. The existing materials also provide a sufficient basis to determine it as belonging to the northwestern Iranian group of languages. That language had no written tradition. According to Zelinsky, dozens of villages had spoken the language before, but it was just understandable to the villagers afterwards and then the

Azerbaijani language Azerbaijani ( ; , , ) or Azeri ( ), also referred to as Azerbaijani Turkic or Azerbaijani Turkish (, , ), is a Turkic languages, Turkic language from the Oghuz languages, Oghuz sub-branch. It is spoken primarily by the Azerbaijanis, Azerbaij ...

replaced it.

History

Some available materials

The identity

References and notes

Further reading