Edkhyam Tenishev and the Lopnur dialect

Abstract

In this research, E.R. Tenishev's contributions to Turcology and Lobnor dialect studies were examined. E. R. Tenishev who was of Tatar origin, is one of the leading names in Turkology. He was the teacher and mentor of many people who conduct research into the world of Turkic languages and cultures nowadays. A leading representative of the Russian Turkology school and an expert in the fields of historical-comparative grammar, history of the Turkic languages, ancient Turkic inscriptions and contemporary Turkic dialects, Tenişev devoted his 83 years of life to Turkology. He possessed a wide knowledge of the ancient history and psychology of the Kazan Tatars and their relationships with other ethnic groups. As a prominent Turkologist in the field of Turkic philological methods, Tenishev conducted research about the ethnic situation and history of the Tatars, and the problems they experienced, in parallel with his own studies.  

All the studies that Tenishev made in the field of historical-comparative grammar show that he was an extraordinary scholar in the world of science, and that his place and role in Turkology will never be filled by anyone else. Tenishev, who had a very important scientific method and conducted monographic studies, was one of the original Turkologists. The works that he wrote on this subject in particular made great contributions not only to Turkology, but also to the development of general theories of linguistics.

The studies made by Tenishev, who was also editor of the Sovetskaya Türkologiya journal between the years 1987-1999, are of great importance for the field of dialectology in contemporary Turkology, and especially for the dialects of New Uyghur Turkic. Among these dialects, the research studies he conducted on the Lop Nur dialect, and the evaluations he wrote on the subject, illuminated the debates about whether the Lop Nur dialect is a dialect of Uyghur Turkic or of Kyrgyz Turkic.

This dialect, which is included among the Uyghur dialects, is a mixture of Kipchak and Karluk Turkic. In Tenişev’s view, the Lop Nur dialect, which he regarded as a reflection of a very early period of Kyrgyz Turkic, is a dialect that shows affinity with Kyrgyz Turkic and the dialects of Mountain Altai. 

In this paper, the studies conducted on the dialect, the views of scholars who have carried out serious research on the subject, and the ideas of Tenishev related to the subject are focused on, and, moreover, the linguistic characteristics of the Lop Nur dialect are presented.