| Bats batsba motjiti |
||
|---|---|---|
| Spoken in: | Georgia | |
| Region: | Zemo-Alvani in Kakheti | |
| Total speakers: | 3,420 (2000 WCD) | |
| Language family: | Caucasian North Caucasian (disputed) North Central Batsbi Bats |
|
| Language codes | ||
| ISO 639-1: | none | |
| ISO 639-2: | cau | |
| ISO 639-3: | bbl | |
| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. | ||
Bats (also Batsi, Batsbi, Batsb, Batsaw, Tsova-Tush) is the language of the Bats people, a Caucasian minority group, and is part of the Nakh family of Caucasian languages. It had 2,500 to 3,000 speakers in 1975. There is only one dialect. It exists only as a spoken language, as the Bats people use Georgian as their written language. The language is not mutually intelligible with either Chechen or Ingush, the other two members of the Nakh family. The Bats are Georgian Orthodox Christians. Ethnographically they are Tushetians, an ethnographical group of Georgians, living in the north-east of Georgia. Tushetia is divided into 4 clans, and one of them is Tsovata clan, the clan of Bats. Tsovata clan was in the Tsova Gorge, but now all members of it, all Tsova-Tushs live in the village of Zemo-Alvani.
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History
Until the middle of the 19th century, the Bats lived in Tushetia, the mountain region of Northeast Georgia. The Tsova Gorge in Tushetia was inhabited by four Bats communities: the Sagirta, Otelta, Mozarta and Indurta. Later they settled on the Kakhetia Plain, in the village of Zemo-Alvani, where they still live. Administratively they are part of the Akhmeta district of Georgia. There are some families of Bats in Tbilisi and other bigger towns in Georgia.
Classification
Bats belongs to the Nakh family of Caucasian languages.
Geographic distribution
Most speakers of Bats live in the village of Zemo-Alvani, on the Kakhetia Plain, in the Akhmeta district of Georgia. There are some families of Bats in Tbilisi and other bigger towns in Georgia.
Sounds
Grammar
The first grammar of Bats – Über die Thusch-Sprache – was compiled by the German orientalist Anton Schiefner (1817-1879) making it into the first grammar of any indigenous Caucasian languages based on sound scientific principles.[1] Bats has eight noun classes, the highest number among the Caucasian languages. Bats also has explicit inflections for agentivity of a verb; it makes a distinction between as woʒe I fell down (sc. through no fault of my own) and so woʒe I fell down (sc. and it was my own fault).
References
- ^ Kevin Tuite (2007). The rise and fall and revival of the Ibero-Caucasian hypothesis, pp. 7-8. Historiographia Linguistica, 35 #1.
