Kalasha language

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Kalasha
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Native toPakistan (Chitral District)
RegionKalasha Valleys
EthnicityKalash
Native speakers
7,500[1] (2023)[2]
Dialects
Arabic script, Latin script
Language codes
ISO 639-3kls
Glottologkala1372
ELPTemplate:Endangered Languages Project
LinguasphereTemplate:Infobox language/lingualist
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Kalasha (Script error: No such module "IPA"., locally: Script error: No such module "Lang".) is an Dardic Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Kalash people, in the Chitral District of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. There are an estimated 7,466 speakers of Kalasha according to the 2023 Census of Pakistan.[1] It is an endangered language and there is an ongoing language shift to Khowar.[3]

Kalasha should not be confused with the nearby Nuristani Kalasha (known as "Kalasha-ala" or "Waigali"), which is a Nuristani language. According to Badshah Munir Bukhari, a researcher on the Kalash, "Kalasha" is also the ethnic name for the Nuristani inhabitants of a region southwest of the Kalasha Valleys, in the Waygal and middle Pech Valleys of Afghanistan's Nuristan Province. The name "Kalasha" seems to have been adopted for the Kalash people by the Kalasha speakers of Chitral from the Nuristanis of Waygal, who for a time expanded up to southern Chitral several centuries ago.[4] However, there is no close connection between the Indo-Aryan language Kalasha-mun (Kalasha) and the Nuristani language Kalasha-ala (Waigali), which descend from different branches of the Indo-Iranian languages.

Kalasha, alongside Khowar, retain some archaic features of the Indo-Aryan languages, such as archaic Vedic Sanskrit vocabulary, sibilants, and several types of consonant clusters long lost in others.

History

Early scholars to have done work on Kalasha include the 19th-century orientalist Gottlieb Wilhelm Leitner and the 20th-century linguist Georg Morgenstierne. More recently, studies have been undertaken by Elena Bashir and several others. The development of practical literacy materials has been associated with the Kalasha linguist Taj Khan Kalash. The Southern Kalash or Urtsun Kalash shifted to a Khowar-influenced dialect of Kalasha-mun in the 20th century called Urtsuniwar.

Classification

Of all the languages in Pakistan, Kalasha is likely the most conservative, along with the nearby language Khowar.[5] In a few cases, Kalasha is even more conservative than Khowar, e.g. in retaining voiced aspirate consonants, which have disappeared from most other Dardic languages.

Some of the typical retentions of sounds and clusters (and meanings) are seen in the following list. However, note some common New Indo-Aryan and Dardic features as well.[6]

Phonology

The Kalasha language is phonologically atypical because it contrasts plain, long, nasal and retroflex vowels as well as combinations of these.Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'Module:Footnotes/anchor_id_list' not found. Set out below is the phonology of Kalasha:Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'Module:Footnotes/anchor_id_list' not found.[3]

Vowels

Front Central Back
Close i ĩ i˞ ĩ˞ u ũ u˞ ũ˞
Mid e ẽ e˞ ẽ˞ o õ o˞ õ˞
Open a ã a˞ ã˞

Consonants

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Labial Alveolar Retroflex Postalveolar/
Palatal 		Velar Uvular Glottal
Nasal m n (ɳ) (ɲ) (ŋ)
Stop voiceless p t ʈ k (q)
voiced b d ɖ ɡ
aspirated pʰ tʰ ʈʰ kʰ
breathy voiced bʱ dʱ ɖʱ ɡʱ
Affricate voiceless ts tʂ tɕ
voiced dz dʐ dʑ
aspirated tsʰ tʂʰ tɕʰ
breathy voiced dʑʱ
Fricative voiceless s ʂ ɕ (x) h
voiced z ʐ ʑ (ɣ)
Approximant l ɫ j w
Rhotic r (ɽ)

The phonemes /x ɣ q/ are found in loanwords.

Vocabulary comparison

The following table compares Kalash words to their cognates in other Indo-Aryan languages.Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'Module:Footnotes/anchor_id_list' not found.

English Kalasha Sanskrit other Indo-Aryan languages
bone Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx 'the ribs'
urine Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx; Template:Langx
village Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx; Template:Langx
rope Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx; Template:Langx
smoke Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx; Template:Langx
meat Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx
dog Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx
ant Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx; Template:Langx
son Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx; Template:Langx
long Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx; Template:Langx
eight Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx; Template:Langx
broken Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx 'to snatch'
kill Script error: No such module "Lang". Script error: No such module "Lang". Template:Langx 'destroy'

Conservative traits

Examples of conservative features in Kalasha and Khowar are (note, NIA = New Indo-Aryan, MIA = Middle Indo-Aryan, OIA = Old Indo-Aryan):[3]

  • Preservation of intervocalic /m/ (reduced to a nasalized /w/ or /v/ in late MIA elsewhere), e.g. Kal. grom, Kho. gram "village" < OIA grāma
  • Non-deletion of intervocalic /t/, preserved as /l/ or /w/ in Kalasha, /r/ in Khowar (deleted in middle MIA elsewhere), e.g. Kho. brār "brother" < OIA bhrātṛ; Kal. ʃau < *ʃal, Kho. ʃor "hundred" < OIA śata
  • Preservation of the distinction between all three OIA sibilants (dental /s/, palatal /ś/, retroflex /ṣ/); in most of the subcontinent, these three had already merged before 200 BC (early MIA)
  • Preservation of sibilant + consonant, stop + /r/ clusters (lost by early MIA in most other places):
    • Kal. aṣṭ, Kho. oṣṭ "eight" < OIA aṣṭā; Kal. hast, Kho. host "hand" < OIA hasta; Kal. istam "bunch" < OIA stamba; Kho. istōr "pack horse" < OIA sthōra; Kho. isnār "bathed" < OIA snāta; Kal. Kho. iskow "peg" < OIA *Script error: No such module "Lang". (< skambha); Kho. iśper "white" < OIA śvēta; Kal. isprɛs, Kho. iśpreṣi "mother-in-law" < OIA śvaśru; Kal. piṣṭ "back" < OIA pṛṣṭha; Kho. aśrū "tear" < OIA aśru.
    • Kho. kren- "buy" < OIA krīṇ-; Kal. grom, Kho. grom "village" < OIA grāma; Kal. gŕä "neck" < OIA grīva; Kho. griṣp "summer" < OIA grīṣma
  • Preservation of /ts/ in Kalasha (reinterpreted as a single phoneme)
  • Direct preservation of many OIA case endings as so-called "layer 1" case endings (as opposed to newer "layer 2" case endings, typically tacked onto a layer-1 oblique case):
    • Nominative
    • Oblique (Animate): Pl. Kal. -an, Kho. -an < OIA -ān
    • Genitive: Kal. -as (sg.), -an (pl.); Kho. -o (sg.), -an, -ān (pl.) < OIA -asya (sg.), āṇām (pl.)
    • Dative: Kal. -a, Kho. -a < OIA dative -āya, elsewhere lost already in late OIA
    • Instrumental: Kal. -an, Kho. -en < OIA -ēna
    • Ablative: Kal. -au, Kho. -ār < OIA -āt
    • Locative: Kal. -ai, Kho. -i < OIA -ai
  • Preservation of more than one verbal conjugation (e.g. Kho. mār-īm "I kill" vs. bri-um "I die")
  • Preservation of OIA distinction between "primary" (non-past) and "secondary" (past) endings and of a past-tense "augment" in a-, both lost entirely elsewhere: Kal. pim "I drink", apis "I drank"; kārim "I do", akāris "I did"
  • Preservation of a verbal preterite tense (see examples above), with normal nominative/accusative marking and normal verbal agreement, as opposed to the ergative-type past tenses with nominal-type agreement elsewhere in NIA (originally based on a participial passive construction)

References

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  1. ^ a b Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Pakistan Bureau of Statistics – Data, Statistics, Decisions" (PDF). www.pbs.gov.pk. Retrieved 15 November 2025.
  2. ^ Kalasha at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  3. ^ a b c Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'Module:Footnotes/anchor_id_list' not found.
  4. ^ Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css has no content."Richard Strand's Nuristân Site: The Kalasha of Kalashüm". Archived from the original on 1 November 2001. Retrieved 1 November 2001., http://nuristan.info/Nuristani/Kalasha/kalasha.html
  5. ^ Georg Morgenstierne. Indo-Iranian Frontier Languages, Vol. IV: The Kalasha Language & Notes on Kalasha. Oslo 1973, p. 184, details pp. 195-237
  6. ^ Gérard Fussman: 1972 Atlas linguistique des parlers dardes et kafirs. Publications de l'École Française d'Extrême-Orient

Bibliography

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Further reading

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