| Turoyo | |
|---|---|
| Surayt/Suryoyo | |
| ܛܘܪܝܐTuroyo | |
| Pronunciation | [tˤuˈrɔjɔ] |
| Native to | Turkey,Syria |
| Region | Mardin Province of southeasternTurkey;Al-Hasakah Governorate in northeasternSyria |
| Ethnicity | Assyrians |
Native speakers | 100,000 (2019–2023)[1] |
| Syriac alphabet (West Syriac Serṭo) Latin alphabet (Turoyo alphabet) | |
| Official status | |
Recognised minority language in | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | tru |
| Glottolog | turo1239 |
| ELP | Turoyo |
 Neo-Aramaic languages, including Turoyo (represented in red colour) | |
| This article containsIPA phonetic symbols. Without properrendering support, you may seequestion marks, boxes, or other symbols instead ofUnicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, seeHelp:IPA. | |
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Turoyo (Turoyo:ܛܘܪܝܐ), also referred to asSurayt (Turoyo:ܣܘܪܝܬ), or modernSuryoyo (Turoyo:ܣܘܪܝܝܐ), is aCentral Neo-Aramaic language traditionally spoken by theSyriac Christian community in theTur Abdin region located in southeasternTurkey and in northeasternSyria.[5][6] Turoyo speakers are mostly adherents of theSyriac Orthodox Church.[7] Originally spoken and exclusive to Tur Abdin, it is now majority spoken in the diaspora.[8] It is classified as a vulnerable language.[9][10] Most speakers use theClassical Syriac language for literature and worship.[11] Its closest relatives areMlaḥsô and western varieties ofNortheastern Neo-Aramaic likeSuret.[12] Turoyo is notmutually intelligible withWestern Neo-Aramaic, having been separated for over a thousand years.[13]
TermṬuroyo comes from the wordṭuro, meaning 'mountain', thus designating a specificNeo-Aramaic language of the mountain region ofTur Abdin in southeastern part of modernTurkey (henceTurabdinian Aramaic). Other, more general names for the language areSurayt orSuryoyo.[14][15]
TermSurayt is commonly used by its speakers, as a general designation for their language, modern or historical. It is also used by the recent EU funded programme to revitalize the language, in preference toṬuroyo, since Surayt is a historical name for the language used by its speakers, while Turoyo is a more academic name for the language used to distinguish it from other Neo-Aramaic languages, and Classical Syriac. However, especially in thediaspora, the language is frequently calledSurayt,Suryoyo (orSurayt,Sŭryoyo orSüryoyo depending on dialect), meaning "Syriac" in general. Since it has developed as one of western variants of the Syriac language, Turoyo is sometimes also referred to asWestern Neo-Syriac.[16]
Turoyo has evolved from theEastern Aramaic colloquial varieties that have been spoken inTur Abdin and the surrounding plain for more than a thousand years since the initial introduction ofAramaic to the region. However, it has also been influenced byClassical Syriac, which itself was the variety of theEastern Middle Aramaic spoken farther west, in the city ofEdessa, today known asUrfa. Due to the proximity of Tur Abdin to Edessa, and the closeness of their parent languages, meant that Turoyo bears a greater similarity to Classical Syriac than do Northeastern Neo-Aramaic varieties.
The homeland of Turoyo is theTur Abdin region in southeastern Turkey.[17] This region is a traditional stronghold ofSyriac Orthodox Christians.[18][19] The Turoyo-speaking population prior to theSayfo largely adhered to the Syriac Orthodox Church.[17] In 1970, it was estimated that there were 20,000 Turoyo-speakers still living in the area, however, they gradually migrated toWestern Europe and elsewhere in the world.[17] The Turoyo-speaking diaspora is now estimated at 100,000.[20] In thediaspora communities, Turoyo is usually a second language which is supplemented by more mainstream languages.[8] The language is considered endangered byUNESCO, but efforts are still made by Turoyo-speaking communities to sustain the language through use in homelife, school programs to teach Turoyo on the weekends, and summer day camps.[8][21]
Until recently, Turoyo was a spoken vernacular and was never written down: Kthobonoyo (Classical Syriac) was the written language. In the 1880s, various attempts were made, with the encouragement of western missionaries, to write Turoyo in theSyriac alphabet, in theSerto and inEstrangelo script used for West-Syriac Kthobhonoyo. One of the first comprehensive studies of the language was published in 1881, by orientalistsEugen Prym andAlbert Socin, who classified it as aNeo-Aramaic dialect.[22]
However, with upheaval in their homeland through the twentieth century, many Turoyo speakers have emigrated around the world (particularly toSyria,Lebanon,Sweden andGermany). The Swedish government's education policy, that every child be educated in his or her first language, led to the commissioning of teaching materials in Turoyo. Yusuf Ishaq thus developed an alphabet for Turoyo based on theLatin script. Silas Üzel also created a separate Latin alphabet for Turoyo in Germany.
A series of reading books and workbooks that introduce Ishaq's alphabet are calledToxu Qorena!, or "Come, Let's Read!" This project has also produced aSwedish-Turoyo dictionary of 4500 entries: theSvensk-turabdinskt Lexikon: Leksiqon Swedoyo-Suryoyo. Another old teacher, writer and translator of Turoyo is Yuhanun Üzel (1934-2023) who in 2009 finished the translation of thePeshitta Bible in Turoyo, with Benjamin Bar Shabo and Yakup Bilgic, inSerto (West-Syriac) and Latin script, a foundation for the "Aramaic-Syriac language". A team of AI researchers completed the first translation model for Turoyo in 2023.[23]
Turoyo has borrowed some words fromArabic,[24]Kurdish,Armenian, andOttoman Turkish. The main dialect of Turoyo is that ofMidyat (Mëḏyoyo), in the east of Turkey'sMardin Province. Every village have distinctive dialects (Midwoyo, Kfarzoyo, `Iwarnoyo, Nihloyo, and Izloyo, respectively).[citation needed] All Turoyo dialects are mutually intelligible with each other. There is a dialectal split between the town of Midyat and the villages, with only slight differences between the individual villages.[17] A closely related language or dialect,Mlaḥsô, spoken in two villages inDiyarbakır, is now deemed extinct.[17]
Turoyo is written both in Latin andSyriac (Serto) characters. The orthography below was the outcome of the International Surayt Conference held at the University of Cambridge (27–30 August 2015).[15][25]
| Latin letter | ' | B b | V v | G g | Ġ ġ | J j | D d | Ḏ ḏ | H h | W w | Z z | Ž ž | Ḥ ḥ | Ṭ ṭ | Ḍ ḍ | Y y |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Syriac letter | ܐ | ܒ | ܒ݂ | ܓ | ܓ݂ | ܔ | ܕ | ܕ݂ | ܗ | ܘ | ܙ | ܙ݅ | ܚ | ܛ | ܜ | ܝ |
| Pronunciation | [ʔ], ∅ | [b] | [v] | [g] | [ɣ] | [dʒ] | [d] | [ð] | [h] | [w] | [z] | [ʒ] | [ħ] | [tˤ] | [dˤ] | [j] |
| Latin letter | K k | X x | L l | M m | N n | S s | C c | P p | F f | Ṣ ṣ | Q q | R r | Š š | Č č | T t | Ṯ ṯ |
| Syriac letter | ܟ | ܟ݂ | ܠ | ܡ | ܢ | ܣ | ܥ | ܦ | ܦ݂ | ܨ | ܩ | ܪ | ܫ | ܫ݂ | ܬ | ܬ݂ |
| Pronunciation | [k] | [x] | [l] | [m] | [n] | [s] | [ʕ] | [p] | [f] | [sˤ] | [q] | [r] | [ʃ] | [tʃ] | [t] | [θ] |
| Latin letter | A a | Ä ä | E e | Ë ë | O o | Y/I y/i | W/U w/u | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Syriac vowel mark (ormater lectionis) | ܰ | ܱ | ܶ | ܷ | ܳ | ܝ | ܘ | |
| Pronunciation | [a] | [ă] | [e] | [ə] | [o] | [j]/[i] | [w]/[u] |
Attempts to write down Turoyo have begun since the 16th century, with Jewish Neo-Aramaic adaptions and translations of Biblical texts, commentaries, as well as hagiographic stories, books, and folktales in Christian dialects. The East Syriac Bishop Mar Yohannan working with American missionary Rev. Justin Perkins also tried to write the vernacular version of religious texts, culminating in the production of school-cards in 1836.[26]
In 1970s Germany, members of the Aramean evangelical movement (Aramäische Freie Christengemeinde) used Turoyo to write short texts and songs.[27] The Syriac evangelical movement has also published over 300 Turoyo hymns in a compedium namedKole Ruhonoye in 2012, as well as translating the four gospels with Mark and John being published so far.[27]
The alphabet as used in a forthcoming translation ofNew Peshitta in Turoyo by Yuhanun Bar Shabo,Sfar mele surtoṯoyo – Picture dictionary and Benjamin Bar Shabo'sAlice's Adventures in Wonderland.
In the 1970s, educator Yusuf Ishaq attempted to systematically incorporate the Turoyo language into a Latin orthography, which resulted in a series of reading books, entitled [toxu qorena].[8] Although this system is not used outside of Sweden, other Turoyo speakers have developed their own non-standardized Latin script to use the language on digital platforms.
The Swedish government's "mother-tongue education" project treated Turoyo as an immigrant language, like Arabic, Turkish, Kurdish, and began to teach the language in schools.[27] The staff of the National Swedish Institute for Teaching Material produced a Latin letter-based alphabet, grammar, dictionary, school books, and instructional material. Due to religious and political objections, the project was halted.[27]
There are other efforts to translate famous works of literature, including The Aramaic Students Association's translation ofThe Little Prince, the Nisbin Foundation's translation ofCinderella andLittle Red Riding Hood.[27]
Phonetically, Turoyo is very similar to Classical Syriac. The additionalphonemes/d͡ʒ/ (as injudge),/t͡ʃ/ (as inchurch)/ʒ/ (as inazure) and a few instances of/ðˤ/ (the Arabicẓāʾ) mostly only appear in loanwords from other languages.
The most distinctive feature of Turoyo phonology is its use ofreduced vowels inclosed syllables. The phonetic value of such reduced vowels differs depending both on the value of original vowel and the dialect spoken. The Miḏyoyo dialect also reduces vowels in pre-stress open syllables. That has the effect of producing a syllabicschwa in most dialects (in Classical Syriac, the schwa is not syllabic).
| Labial | Dental/Alveolar | Palato- alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Pharyn- geal | Glottal | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| plain | emphatic | |||||||||||||||||||
| Nasal | m | n | (nˤ) | |||||||||||||||||
| Plosive | p | b | t | d | tˤ | dˤ | k | ɡ | q | ʔ | ||||||||||
| Affricate | tʃ | dʒ | ||||||||||||||||||
| Fricative | f | v | θ | ð | s | z | sˤ | ðˤ | ʃ | ʒ | x | ɣ | ħ | ʕ | h | |||||
| Approximant | w | l | (lˤ) | j | ||||||||||||||||
| Trill | r | (rˤ) | ||||||||||||||||||
Turoyo has the following set of vowels:[28]
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | u | |
| Mid | e | o | |
| Open | a |
| Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|
| Close | ŭ | |
| Mid | ə | |
| Open | ă |
The verbal system of Turoyo is similar to that used in otherNeo-Aramaic languages. In Classical Syriac, the ancientperfect andimperfect tenses had started to becomepreterite andfuture tenses respectively, and other tenses were formed by using theparticiples withpronominalclitics or shortened forms of the verbhwā ('to become'). Most modern Aramaic languages have completely abandoned the old tenses and form all tenses from stems based around the old participles. The classical clitics have become incorporated fully into the verb form, and can be considered more like inflections.
Turoyo has also developed the use of thedemonstrative pronouns much more than any other Aramaic language. In Turoyo, they have becomedefinite articles:
The other Central Neo-Aramaic dialect, ofMlahsô and Ansha villages inDiyarbakır Province is somewhat different from Turoyo. It is virtually extinct; its last few speakers live inQamishli in northeasternSyria and in the diaspora.[28]
Turoyo has three sets of particles that take the place of thecopula innominal clauses: enclitic copula, independent copula, and emphatic independent copula. In Turoyo, the non-enclitic copula (or the existential particle) is articulated with the use of two sets of particles:kal andkit.[26]
Ethno-linguistic group(s) indigenous to theMiddle East; also known as Syriac-Arameans or Chaldeans | |||||||||
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