Karluk languages

The Karluk or Qarluq languages are a sub-branch of the Turkic language family that developed from the varieties once spoken by Karluks.^[1]

Karluk
Qarluq, Southeastern Turkic, Turkestan Turkic
Geographic distribution	Central Asia
Linguistic classification	Turkic Common Turkic Karluk
Early forms	Middle Turkic Karakhanid Khorezmian Turkic Chagatai
Subdivisions	Western Karluk (Uzbek) Eastern Karluk (Uyghur)
Language codes
Glottolog	uygh1241
Uzbek     Uyghur     Ili

Many Middle Turkic works were written in these languages. The language of the Kara-Khanid Khanate was known as Turki, Ferghani, Kashgari or Khaqani. The language of the Chagatai Khanate was the Chagatai language.

Karluk Turkic was once spoken in the Kara-Khanid Khanate, Chagatai Khanate, Timurid Empire, Mughal Empire, Yarkent Khanate and the Uzbek-speaking Khanate of Bukhara, Emirate of Bukhara, Kokand Khanate, Khiva Khanate, Maimana Khanate.^[2]

Classification

Languages

• Uzbek – spoken by the Uzbeks; approximately 44 million speakers ^[3]
• Uyghur – spoken by the Uyghurs; approximately 8–11 million speakers ^[4]
• Ili Turki – moribund language spoken by Ili Turks, who are legally recognized as a subgroup of Uzbeks; 120 speakers and decreasing (1980)
• Chagatai – extinct language which was once widely spoken in Central Asia and remained the shared literary language there until the early 20th century.
• Karakhanid – literary language of the Kara-Khanid Khanate that is considered a standard form of Middle Turkic.^[5]
• Khorezmian Turkic – literary language of the Golden Horde that is considered a preliminary stage of the Chagatai language.

Proto-Turkic	Common Turkic	Karluk	Western	Uzbek
			Eastern	Uyghur Ili Turki Äynu
			Old	Chagatai † Khorezmian Turkic † Karakhanid †

Glottolog v.5.0 refers to the Karluk languages as "Turkistan Turkic" and classifies them as follows:^[6]

Turkistan	Chagatai Modern Turkistan Uyghuric Ainu (China) Ili Turki Uighur Uzbek Northern Uzbek Southern Uzbek

References

1. Austin, Peter (2008). One Thousand Languages: Living, Endangered, and Lost. University of California Press. p. 145. ISBN 978-0-520-25560-9.
2. McChesney, R. D. (14 July 2014). Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480-1889. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-1-4008-6196-5.
3. Uzbek at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required) Northern at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required) Southern at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
4. "Uyghur". Ethnologue. Retrieved 7 December 2022.
5. Glottlog 5.0 places this with Old Turkic.
6. Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Karluk languages". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.