Thakali is a

Sino-Tibetan Sino-Tibetan (also referred to as Trans-Himalayan) is a family of more than 400 languages, second only to Indo-European in number of native speakers. Around 1.4 billion people speak a Sino-Tibetan language. The vast majority of these are the 1.3 ...

language of

Nepal Nepal, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mainly situated in the Himalayas, but also includes parts of the Indo-Gangetic Plain. It borders the Tibet Autonomous Region of China Ch ...

spoken by the

Thakali people The Thakali ( ) are an ethnolinguistic Tibeto-Burman ethnic group of Nepal. They are often regarded as the "richest caste" of Nepal. The traditional area of the Thakali community is called ''Thak-sat-se'' or the Thak Khola region and lies in the ...

, mainly in the

Myagdi Myagdi District ( ), a part of Gandaki Province, is one of the List of districts of Nepal, seventy-seven districts of Nepal. The district, with Beni, Dhawalagiri, Beni as its district headquarters, covers an area of , had a population of 114,447 ...

and

Mustang District Mustang District ( ) (from the Standard Tibetan, Tibetan ''möntang'' (), "fertile plain") is one of the eleven districts of Gandaki Province and one of List of districts of Nepal, seventy-seven districts of Nepal which was a Kingdom of Lo-Mant ...

s. Its dialects have limited

mutual intelligibility In linguistics, mutual intelligibility is a relationship between different but related language varieties in which speakers of the different varieties can readily understand each other without prior familiarity or special effort. Mutual intelli ...

. Seke (Serke, Tangbe, Tetang, Chuksang) is sometimes considered a separate language. Other names and dialect names are Barhagaule, Marpha, Panchgaunle, Puntan Thakali, Syang, Tamhang Thakali, Thaksaatsaye, Thaksatsae, Thaksya, Tukuche, Yhulkasom. Seke (Serke) is spoken in the villages of Tangbe, Tetang, Chuksang, Chaile, and Gyakar in

, northern Nepal. Martine Mazaudon has documented the Tangbe dialect of Seke as spoken by an expatriate speaker in Paris. Honda (2002) also documented two other dialects of Seke, Tetang and Chuksang.

Geographical distribution

Thakali is spoken in the middle of the Kali Gandaki River valley and in the upper part of the

Kali Gandaki Gorge The Kali Gandaki Gorge or Andha Galchi is the gorge of the Kali Gandaki (or Gandaki River) in the Himalayas in Nepal. By some sources, it may be one of the deepest gorges in the world. The upper part of the gorge is also called Thak Khola after ...

(also known as Thak Khola), in

Gandaki Province Gandaki Province ( ) ), is one of the seven federal provinces established by the current constitution of Nepal which was promulgated on 20 September 2015. Pokhara is the province's capital city. It borders the Tibet Autonomous Region in Southw ...

. The Thakali area is bounded by

Annapurna Annapurna (; ) is a mountain situated in the Annapurna mountain range of Gandaki Province, north-central Nepal. It is the 10th highest mountain in the world at above sea level and is well known for the difficulty and danger involved in its as ...

Himal on one side and Dhawalagiri Himal on the other, with Tatopani village in the south and Jomsom in the north (''

Ethnologue ''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'' is an annual reference publication in print and online that provides statistics and other information on the living languages of the world. It is the world's most comprehensive catalogue of languages. It w ...

''). The Tukuche dialect is spoken from Tukuche to Thaksatsae, in 13 villages: Tukuche, Khanti, Kobang, Larjung, Dampu, Naurikot, Bhurjungkot, Nakung, Tithi, Kunjo, Taglung, Lete, Ghansa. Many live outside the area. Seke is spoken by Gurung of Chuksang, Tsaile, Tangbe, Tetang, and Gyakar villages of

Dhawalagiri Zone Dhaulagiri ( ) was one of the fourteen zones which Nepal was divided into for administrative purposes, prior to the September 10, 2015 adoption of a new Constitution, which divided the nation instead into 7 provinces. It is in the Western Devel ...

. There are only 700 native speakers of this language, 100 of whom live in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. Reportedly, half of the New York City speakers live in the same apartment building.

Dialects

'' lists the following dialects of Thakali. *Tukuche (Tamhang Thakali, Thaksaatsaye, Thaksatsae) *Marpha (Puntan Thakali) *Syang (Yhulkasom) Seke has the following dialects. *Tangbe *Tetang *Chuksang

References

External links

* * Tamangic languages Languages of Nepal Languages written in Tibetan script Languages written in Devanagari {{st-lang-stub