Talk:Kartvelian languages

Comment

The speaker population estimates are confusing especially when compared to the ones given in Georgian language. Would someone please give the separate estimates for

• How many people use Georgian (either as a native language or as an official or "everyday business" language) in each country;
• How many people are native speakers of each of the four languages (Georgian, Svan, Laz, Megrelian) in each country.

My understanding from the data given is that the whole population of Georgia uses Georgian (because it is the official language and the only written language) but only about 70% (about 4 million) are native speakers. But that means that about 1.5 million people in Georgia are not native speakers of Georgian. Are they all speakers of the three dialects, or are there other languages (not South Caucasian) spoken in Georgia?
Jorge Stolfi 04:25, 27 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Svans, Lazs, Megrels are ethnic Georgians, ethnographic groups of Georgian people. Svan, Laz and Megrelian are parts of Kartvelian (Georgian) language group of the Iberian-Caucasian language family, dialects of old Georgian language. Native language for all Georgians (all ethnographic groups of Georgian people) is a GEORGIAN LANGUAGE. Dear Jorge Stolfi! Unfortunately, you and othet "Wikipedians" not know outstanding works of famous Georgian scientists Ivane Javakhishvili, Arnold Chikobava, Pavle Ingorokva, Simon Janashia, Varlam Topuria and others. YOU ARE DILETTANT IN THIS FIELD!
Levzur, 30 Apr 2004

From apparently reliable reports that I have seen, the Laz are Muslim, are Turkish citizens, are bilingual Laz/Turkish, use the Turkish alphabet when they have to write their language, and identify their country as Turkey rather than Georgia. So in what sense are they "ethnic Georgians"?
Jorge Stolfi 01:53, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

Dont be funny people ethnic georgian sounds funny where the name georgian means a religious group rather than an ethnic name, almost 2 million muslim south-caucasian speakers live across Turkey, who can undertsand georgian speaking even some identify themselves as Gürcü (georgean), some south caucasian speakers(which tbilisi claims main ethic stock) are from laz ethnicity identify themselves as Laz migrated along other caucasian muslims to the region on 19th century. total south caucasian speakers in turkey may be up to 4 millions settled mostly on northern Turkey. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.100.25.28 (talk) 01:10, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

Some of them are from Georgian stock, but some are certainly not. Subsuming Svan, Laz and Mingrelian under the one language would linguistically - and politically - be like saying that Norwegian, Danish and Swedish are really all just Norwegian dialects. And yes, there are many non-South Caucasian languages spoken in Georgia; Abkhaz (100,000 native speakers), for instance, and small communities of Ossetian and many Northwest Caucasian and Northeast Caucasian languages. The fact that all of Georgia is an ethnic Georgian and a native speaker of Georgian is unfortunately promulgated by some Georgians. I noted that Levzur neglected to mention some of the great Abkhazian linguists, like Zaira Khiba and Tamara Shakryl. thefamouseccles 00:42, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

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I have restored some edits by anonymous user 213.157.209.234:

• The four languages of this family are not mutually intelligible. This is clearly stated by every source I have seen, including Georgian ones. Intentionally omitting this information is misleading to say the least.
• The assertion that the Laz are "ethnnic Georgians" is probably POV. The most detailed reports that I have seen state that the overwhelming majority of the Laz speakers live in Turkey, are Muslim, consider themselves Turkish citizens and speak Turkish as a second language. The few publicationn in Laz language generally use the Turkish alphabet, not the Georgian one. Anyway, this page is about languages, not about ethnic groups (there is a big difference).
• Those same sources say that the number of Laz speakers is not known with precision because it is not counted by census data, but estimates vary from much less than 100,000 to about 500,000. Most other sources are closer to the low end.
• I cannot find any support for statement that there are 2 million Georgian speakers in Turkey.
• Mingrelian is occasionally used in English-language documents about the Megrelian language, so it is useful to list that name here, too.

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To 213.157.193.*: apparently the facts (esp. numbers of speakers) which you have repeatedly placed on this page are in disagreement with the sources originally found by the authors of this article. Please either state here your sources and/or your rationale for continually placing these facts here or cease continued altering of this page. -- Grunt 01:40, 2004 Jun 14 (UTC)

This is a waste of time since the user in question has been refusing all dialogue. I see no way to stop this war, except perhaps by getting someone in Georgia to intervene. I will see what I can do...
Jorge Stolfi 02:03, 14 Jun 2004 (UTC)

At this point, I feel fairly secure in offering to temp-ban this guy's proxies whenever he starts reverting these articles. That should be better than protecting them, since at least other people can get a chance to continue working, and tide us over until Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/ChrisO and Levzur reaches a conclusion. Bryan 05:23, 14 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I had already banned his proxies, but unfortunately someone saw fit to change the period of one of the bans from one month to one day (!). Guanaco extended the ban to 3 days, which is little better, but I've extended it to 1 month to match the other bans. They expire on 11 July. As Jdforrester puts it, "General practice for anonymous 'nuisance' editors is to block them until they go away." -- ChrisO 07:59, 14 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Levzur appears to have made his usual edits again, and I banned him for 48 hours while I try to figure out whether Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/ChrisO and Levzur has reached a conclusion yet. Anyone know what the status of arbitration is? Bryan 23:55, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

only 50 000 in turkey...so i have already met half of them cos my home town is home to roughly 25 000 muslim georgians, (in at least 30 villages) but the main body of georgian speakers here in turkey is in the north east and probably much more than 1 million in numbers( including laz) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.107.77.206 (talk) 21:45, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

article/category name mismatch suggest renaming

It's bad that the main names: South Caucasian languages and Category:Kartvelian languages do not match, although they have just the same meaning. (In the present situation, for an article on one of the languges to look not misleading, one needs to relate the two names as synonyms.) One of them should be renamed.--Imz 20:46, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

"Gruzinit"

I didn't make the change because my knowledge about these languages is limited. However, I believe that there is a mistake: "gruzinit" is the name in Hebrew, not Russian. I speak both Hebrew and Russian, and "gruzinit" is the name of Georgian in Hebrew; also, the "-it" ending is characteristic of Hebrew grammar. In Russian, one would say "gruzinskiy". However, before I make any changes, I'd like a confirmation, possibly by the original author of the paragraph in question.--EngineeringCat 07:14, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

True. Gruzinit it's Hebrew name. In Russian it's called "еврейско-грузинский, evrejsko-gruzinskij", not just "gruzinskiy" (=Georgian). But Gruzinic is not at all the language, it's just a sort of trade jargon. --Koryakov Yuri 09:49, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Two points-- (1)Gruzinit is the Hebrew term for "Georgian"...not Judaeo-Georgian. (2) What evidence is there of a language called Judaeo-Georgian...if you refer to the sparse sprinkling of Hebrew and Aramaic words, then Brooklynese-Jewish ought to at least be a dialect. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.107.163.197 (talk) 04:46, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Im removing that term Gruzinic, there is no such thing as Gruzinic anywhere in scholarly materials about South Caucasian or Kartvelian languages. I searched for it for a while now. Its definitely an original research and misleading info. Iberieli (talk) 04:00, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

However, Judeo-Georgian (although not called "Gruzinic" or "Gruzinit") is mentioned on Ethnologue, here. But the comment section itself claims "May not be a separate language from Georgian, but a dialect using various Hebrew loanwords." — N-true (talk) 14:45, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for finding some reference but in most of the sources on South Caucasian language group, mingrelian and svan are considered as dialects and not separate languages. This whole page does not really comply with common accepted categorization of this language family group by most scholars. That is why, this page is lacking sources and references. Thanks. Iberieli (talk) 00:28, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

I am my self Georgian jew. In the begining of my way in the Hebrew wikipedia I see the article about the language and said "there is not such a language" but after I checked I find that tha reserch find that the Georgian jew speaks abit different kind of Georgian. I find (in the net) a great article of Gershon Ben Oren and Wolf Moskovich about the "Georgian jew spoken language characteristic" (part I part II) in Hebrew. basicly it's Georgian and have more words that came from 1. old Georgian words that the non-jew are not using more. 2. words from Hebrew or Aramaic from the religion jewish books. The language divided to sub language grups acording to the distribution in Georgia.

I agree that Gruzinic have to delete and the correct name is Q'ibruli (ყიბრული-עיבּרוּלי), that means "the language of the jews". I make one article in the Hebrew wikipedia that the origin of it from Q'ibruli. קבלולי (კაბალული) it is a wadding dance of the Georgian jew and the origin of the word is from the word "קבלה" - "reception" and the dance id reception dance. Geagea (talk) 01:02, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Dear Geagea, amazing work and truly amazing find, can you please (if you have time) include this info into the article? It would be very helpful. Thank you very much fore your help. Iberieli (talk) 21:48, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Fact mismatch

South Caucasian languages are said to be also called "Ibero-Caucasian languages" while the article with that name says that "Ibero-Caucasian languages" is a proposed family tree including South Caucasian languages. That fact mismatch needs to be resolved, although I have not competence enough to do it. ... said: Rursus (bork²) 08:13, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Mingrelian or Laz words?

The table with sample words has a single column for both Mingrelian and Laz. Are the words taken from Mingrelian or Laz (when not the same)? --JorisvS (talk) 14:23, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Comparative Grammar section

I just moved the Proto-Kartvelian consonants to where it belongs, on Proto-Kartvelian language. I think we should consider what we want to do with the entire Comparative Grammar section, because as it stands now it pretty much dwarfs the rest of the article. Also, could it be that there is more content there that would be more correctly placed on the Proto-Kartvelian language page? I'd like your input. --JorisvS (talk) 19:22, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I appreciate your efforts. Thank you very much for the relevant corrections. As for the fate of the Comparative Grammar section, I think it should be extended more, as well as the rest of the article. I am going to do that step by step. --Benfaremo (talk) 01:55, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, more to tell, let's tell. It's just that I'm in doubt about a) whether this is the best place for it, and b) if there's anything that could be done to remedy the imbalance between the Comparative Grammar section and the rest of the article. If both so, then everything's fine... --JorisvS (talk) 21:25, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Suggested move

It is my belief that the page South Caucasian languages must be moved to page Kartvelian languages. Term South Caucasian languages, while not incorrect, can mislead readers who are not very experienced in linguistics. Namely, one can mistakenly think that South Caucasian languages include all of the languages of the geographic so-called South Caucasus while this is not the case; this has happened in my experience a couple of times. If one reads the article and does the research, they will be able to understand what South Caucasian languages are but when there is a less ambiguous term in existence, I do not see why one should choose the more ambiguous one for the title. --ComtesseDeMingrélie 18:36, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Closed with the result: move. Seems like a fairly solid consensus. ·Maunus·ƛ· 19:20, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

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South Caucasian languages → Kartvelian languages — Per WP:NCON articles should be named in accordance with common English usage. "Kartvelian" is becoming the most common name in linguistic academic circles for this group of languages. --Taivo (talk) 18:40, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Support. As proposer. --Taivo (talk) 18:43, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Support. --ComtesseDeMingrélie 18:47, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Oppose for now. If the term "South Caucasian" can confuse people, so can "North(east/west) Caucasian". I would like to know what "is becoming the most common name" is supposed to mean precisely? Strong oppose to the nominator's (Comtesse) behavior surrounding the move. --JorisvS (talk) 19:18, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, the term North Caucasian Languages is also confusing considering that many languages in the N. Caucasus have nothing in common. The fact that the legitimacy of the N. Caucasus classification is "widely disputed" is already noted on the North Caucasian languages article in case you have not read it. Nevertheless, this should be part of this discussion. --ComtesseDeMingrélie 21:55, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Wierd. The article is, at present, located at Kartvelian languages, but the talk page is still here at Talk:South Caucasian languages. That needs to be fixed. In answer to JorisvS's question about "becoming most common name", I refer him/her to the bibliography on this very article, where the majority of references are to "Kartvelian". The volume name for Volume 1 of The Indigenous Languages of the Caucasus is "Kartvelian Languages". Ruhlen and the other "lumpers" also generally use "Kartvelian" rather than "South Caucasian". At least among linguists, "Kartvelian" is the current term. I don't subscribe to ComtesseDeMingrelie's methods or reasons at all. I only propose this since "Kartvelian" is becoming a much more common name in linguistic academia than "South Caucasian". --Taivo (talk) 23:05, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Ethnologue also uses "Kartvelian" now, as well. --Taivo (talk) 01:39, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't really have much against using the term "Kartvelian" per se. I would like a thought on the Northeast and Northwest C languages, as these were named such in opposition to a South C family and only make sense in opposition to one another. --JorisvS (talk) 10:45, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

I moved the Talk page to go with the article. If this discussion results in an oppose to move, then it can be moved back when the article is moved back. --Taivo (talk) 23:07, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I am disturbed by the fact that my "behavior" is brought up on this discussion after JorisvS indiscriminately reverted all of my edits without justification. The problem was not the move after being warned, the problem was removal of legitimate edits within the article. As for the name itself, it does not appear that we are challenging an existing consensus, we are merely changing what someone before us preferred(There's no better word considering that the two terms are synonymous). Just because the name was in place when we checked the page does not mean that it had been put in place for good reasons. If there is a pre-existing consensus that I am not aware of, please point me to it and the reasons behind it.--ComtesseDeMingrélie 23:20, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Comment. Well that's a fine old mess that has been created. I've reverted User:ComtesseDeMingrelie's copy and pastes moves as a clear contrevention of WP:CWW. Copying and pasting like this without attribution breaks our copyright rules and could, although very unlikely, lead to legal problems for Wikipedia. As such any reversion to the copy-paste versions is likely to be seen as disruptive and could lead to a block. The correct way to move the page is by moving it. As this request in contreversial (as seen by both the support and oppose votes above) a requested move discussion is the correct way to go. While this discussion takes place the article should stay at it's stable name (i.e. South Caucasian languages). I've also moved the talk page back (which was moved correctly) so as it once again matches the article title. I have no comment on the merits of either name and my comments here should not be seen as supporting one name or the other, I've just sorted out the mess that was created. Dpmuk (talk) 23:32, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

P.S. I've looked at most of the edits made by User:ComtesseDeMingrelie while at the other title, with a view to reintroducing them, and most of them consist of changing South Caucasian to Kartvelian. However a) while the page is at this title it makes more sense to keep them as South Caucasian and b) the changes have been opposed on the user's talk page and per WP:BRD they should now be discussed here. Additionally anyone else redoing those edits would make attribution more difficult and so also possibly cause copyright problems so it would be easiest if User:ComtesseDeMingrelie did them again in this version once a consensus has been reached. Dpmuk (talk) 23:42, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Please be ware that I did try to move the pages through the regular "move" option but it did not let me. It said the destination page already existed and I did not see another way but to copy/paste.--ComtesseDeMingrélie 00:47, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

I thought that was probably the case but as you'd already reverted several times I worded the above reasonably strongly so that, hopefully, you did not do so again - I certainly wasn't trying to imply you'd been delibrately disruptive or anything. At least you'll know for next time - WP:MOVE should explain most of what you need to know although WP:RM may also be helpful reading. Dpmuk (talk) 00:57, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Dpmuk. Comtesse, that was the point I was trying to make. --JorisvS (talk) 10:45, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Support. Agreed. For now, the name Kartvelian languages is much more common. References provided in the article show that. –BruTe ^Talk 07:18, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

• Support "South Caucasian" harkens back to the obsolete idea of a Caucasian language family. When "Caucasian" is used these days, it means North Caucasian languages. (The are also sometimes called E Cauc & W Cauc if that helps matters any, but that's a separate discussion.) — kwami (talk) 19:08, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The name "Kartvelian" not true

The name "Kartvelian" is not true. The Laz people are not used to "Kartvelian". The Svan people are not used to "Kartvelian". The true name of the page is "South Caucasian". The name "South Caucasian" is used by Laz people and Svan people. But, the name "Kartvelian" is used by Georgian people. --Kmoksy (talk) 12:21, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

There are some Georgian nationalist editors in English wikipedia. They are changing articles according to their nationalist ideas and they are threating people with ban who oppose to them. I'm a Laz, and i don't describe myself as a Georgian, other Lazs too but somebody wants to change this situation as well as they are using wikipedia for this aim. Argun (talk) 12:43, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Argun, please refrain from making personal attacks on the other users or you might be given the warning, I'm afraid. I don't think PA would help to improve the quality of an article or its name. Kmoksy, I suggest you familiarize with Kartvelian people's articles. –BruTe ^Talk 13:32, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Brute, your edit is not true. Because, Mingrelian language is a language spoken in Abkhazia. --Kmoksy (talk) 13:51, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

The term "Kartvelian" is English. The fact that the Laz don't use a cognate of it is irrelevant. That's a bit like saying we need to move the Georgia article to Sakartvelo because the Georgians do not call it "Georgia". Doesn't matter: that's what we call it in English. — kwami (talk) 13:53, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

The Neutral point of view --Kmoksy (talk) 14:01, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Using South Caucasian would not be more neutral. The only neutral thing to do is to use the most common English usage.·Maunus·ƛ· 14:07, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Using Kartvelian not neutral. --Kmoksy (talk) 14:11, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

It doesn't have to be "neutral", it just have to be the most common English usage. It's policy.·Maunus·ƛ· 14:13, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

It is a politic term of Georgians to unity people of Georgia under one flag, not a neutral term. At history Lazs didn't use this term to describe themselves, always they known as Laz (or Chan) by other neighbour people too. An encyclopedia can't support politic terms of countries. Argun (talk) 14:17, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

This is not the Georgian or the Laz encyclopedia. And the term Kartvelian in English has nothing to do with Georgia as a nation, but always includes the Zan and Svan languages. Georgian nationalist politics do not matter here. I am symptahtetic to the ethnic sentiments of Laz, and Svan people who don't want to be classified as part of a Georgian national identity, but this is simple policy here, that is not going to be changed.·Maunus·ƛ· 14:27, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Nearly 70 years later, "Kartvelian languages" term will be "Kartvelian language" term in English. And the mission will complete ;) Argun (talk) 15:01, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

If it is of any comofort I can assure that most English speakers do not associate the word Kartvelian with the country or language of Georgia, or its nationalist ideology at all. I don't think there is any risk that Enlgish speakers would begin to refer to a Georgian as "the Kartvelian language".·Maunus·ƛ· 15:05, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

My God! We need to find a new name for Germanic languages fast, or English will be replaced by German! And Italic languages—quick, before French, Spanish, and Portuguese go extinct! — kwami (talk) 15:07, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I hope you are aware how terrible, and insensitive, that analogy is. There is a fundamental differnece between the political status of Laz and Svan and their relation to the Georgian nation state and between the relation of English to Germanic or Spanish to Italic. There is certainly a legitimate reason for Laz and Svan people to be weary of attempts to subsume them into a larger Georgian group - this is just the wrong place to take that political fight, since wikipedia has quite simple policies about naming that have to be followed.·Maunus·ƛ· 15:22, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

My point is that it's simply a name. It no more means that Laz is Georgian than it does English is German. — kwami (talk) 15:24, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

But that is a point that ignores a long history of oppression of minority groups through manipulation of names - there is nothing simple about names.·Maunus·ƛ· 15:29, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, anon IP, this is the wrong place to take that political fight. Wikipedia has a simple naming policy to follow: WP:NCON--the most common English name. That applies perfectly here since "Kartvelian" is the most common English name for the group of languages that includes Georgian, Svan, Laz, Mingrelian, etc. So we leave the politics elsewhere and use the most common English name per simple Wikipedia policy. --Taivo (talk) 15:19, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, Of course this decision makes happy people like "Brute" who want to erase Laz, Svan and Mingrelian name from history. Be happy with your "neutral" wikipedia and also "neutral" Georgian editors. Argun (talk) 15:27, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

While certain users may have been motivated by nationalist sentiments - I can assure that the general consensus, and my closure of the discussion was motivated by WP policy not by Georgian politics.·Maunus·ƛ· 15:32, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

It is unbelievable how I, a mingrelian with almost every single member of my family mingrelian, am being lectured that Mingrelians are not a subethnic group of Georgians. Of all people, I should know what I am and what not. Same about the Svans and their language.--ComtesseDeMingrélie 18:50, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

This is a topic you a bringing in from a different talkpage where I am not in fact lecturing you - I noticed some discrepancies in the sources. But I admit that on closer inspection it seems to be right that Mingrelians consider themselves part of the Georgian group even though the Mingrelian language is closer to Laz. (who obviously do not selfidentify as a subgroup of Georgians)·Maunus·ƛ· 19:04, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Mingrelian language is closer to Laz because they were part of the same kingdom, Colchis. Present-day eastern Georgia was by itself and the unification/creation of a single national identity did not occur until Christianization. Kartvelian itself derives from the region of Kartli, not because it is better than mingrelia or any other region, but because it was a leading region of the kingdom;Kingdom which did include much of present day lazistan for centuries. That is what bugs some users here, that the term Kartvelian goes back before the Turkish identity of these people and is thus interpreted as a nationalist provocation. And yes, assertions here that the Lazs do not identify themselves or their language as Kartvelian is correct. They have been under Ottomans/Turks for centuries and at this point they are Turkish. There is no doubt, however, that this is the case as a result of assimilation than anything else. There is no need to modify the linguistic groupings simply to accommodate to the fact that today Turkey exists when once upon a time it did not.--ComtesseDeMingrélie 20:24, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

There is no doubt too that today most of Mingrelians assimilated hardly by Georgians like you ;). Argun (talk) 21:39, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

You seem not to understand that "Georgian" is a modern ethnic group that was formed over centuries not only from people in two eastern Georgian regions, but also places like Imereti, Guria,Mingrelia, etc. The only reason the language from the East is called Georgian(in other words it has a national title) is that the dominance of the east in political matters, finance, culture etc - the capital has been in the east for hundreds of years - ensured its establishment as a national language. If the center of political power was in another region, lets say Svaneti, chances are today everyone would be able to speak Svan as a national language. But that is not how it happened. This is not unique to Georgia, this has happened in many countries in Europe. Believe it or not, most nations were formed by a mix of something, there were not there since the beginning of times.

So to answer your question, I am a Georgian of the Mingrelian stock. The only time I would not be considered Georgian is if we lived millenia ago in Colchis...or any other time frame that predates the concept of "Georgianess".

PS: It will be nice for you to consult some historical sources on Bulgaria because there are quite a few similarities. The Bulgarians as a nation are derived from people of many different stocks who were unitied after Tsar Boris I adopted Christianity. In Georgia, spread of Christianity in the first millennium had a very similar effect.--ComtesseDeMingrélie 23:10, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I wondered why the Mingrelian refugees from Abxazia were called "Georgian". Now I know. — kwami (talk) 00:08, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

ComtesseDeMingrelie, i couldn't tell these with my bad english, thanks for telling truths about why you call yourself as a "Georgian". I want to say one thing; Lazs always stayed far from this national structuring and this is the answer today why they don't call themselves as "Georgian". Argun (talk) 08:54, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

About using "Kartvelian" name; Today most of Georgian linguists call Laz, Svan and Mingrelian languages as "dialect" of gorgeous Georgian language. So they are using "Kartveluri enebi (Kartvelian languages; comes from "Kartli" tribe of real Georgians)" name for this language group. English speakers learned it from Georgians and they are using this name much more than "South Caucasian languages", but also some linguists don't agree with this "Kartvelian" name because of reasons i told.

I got angry because these BRUTE, ComtesseDeMingrélie users are deleting "South Caucasian languages" name from articles about "Mingrelian, Svan and Laz languages" and i don't think that they are acting "neutral" when they delete it. Argun (talk) 09:16, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

If you can demonstrate that "Kartvelian" has racist overtones in English, fine; otherwise, all this is irrelevant. Anyway, I doubt English speakers learned it from Georgians. It's very common to name a language family after a large, central, or simply familiar language in that family: Germanic, Japonic, Munda, Algonquian, Mande, Khoe, Tungusic, etc etc etc. There's nothing unusual about "Kartvelian"; it's a typical English name for a language family.

It's also normal to use the name the family is located at when mentioning it in other articles. We don't say "Russian is a Slavic, also known as a Slavonic, language", despite "Slavonic" being a common synonym; we just say "Russia is a Slavic language". Same for the Kartvelian or any other languages. — kwami (talk) 09:42, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

I think these wikipedist Georgians are well-organized in english wikipedia to spread their neutral(!) ideas. Look how they are messaging each other and efforting to change page's title, same for other pages too, for example; they are full efforting to add "The Laz people (ლაზი)" as subethnic group of Georgians (Kartveli) in here. Is "Kartveli (Georgian)" a common usage in English to describe "Lazs, Mingrelians, Svans and Georgians?. Otherwise; Bravo friends! You are good in your job. I don't want to discuss anymore and i won't do any contribution in english wikipedia. Good bye! Argun (talk) 14:28, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Kartvelian languages

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Kartvelian languages's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "Britannica":

• From Proto-Kartvelian language: Britannica
• From European Union: "European Union". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 1 July 2009. international organisation comprising 27 European countries and governing common economic, social, and security policies....
• From Iran: Encyclopædia Britannica 23 January 2008

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 05:14, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

geographic distribution

So far as I am aware, Turkey is a nation which exists on two continents, but Anatolia is a geographic term. I think we need consensus before we start referring to Turkey as a geographic region. μηδείς (talk) 03:01, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Then I will put "northeast" back. Alba Illyrian (talk) 03:08, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

It would still have to be Anatolia. I made an alternate suggestion on your talk page. μηδείς (talk) 03:16, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Why would it "still have to be Anatolia." Alba Illyrian (talk) 03:47, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

The template for the article specifies geographical location, not countries in which the language(s) are spoken. The article for Anatolia says "Anatolia ... is a geographic and historical term denoting the westernmost protrusion of Asia" and the article for Turkey says "Turkey ... is a Eurasian country that stretches across the Anatolian peninsula in western Asia and Thrace in the Balkan region of southeastern Europe." Turkey is a country, Anatolia is a geographic term. Like I said, feel free to change "Georgia" to "Western Trans-Caucasus". μηδείς (talk) 04:10, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Although Alba's been banned as a sockpuppet I am going to institute the change in any case. μηδείς (talk) 16:25, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Canik and Lazistan

map: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Johnston,_Alexander_Keith_(1804-1871)._Turkey_in_Asia,_Transcaucasia._1861_(EA).jpg FACT: the South Caucasian people were living there (before the Ancient Greeks came)... Böri (talk) 13:15, 21 February 2013 (UTC)

Grammar section

It would be useful to me to link the declension terms like ergative and lative, which don't (as far as I know) appear in IE languages. --Richardson mcphillips (talk) 14:24, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

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"Dialect continuum"

I checked up available sources including Boeder, Gamkrelidze, and Klimov and found only vaguely worded mentions of partial intelligibility of the languages. Only two of them (Mingrelian and Laz) could be considered dialects of same language (Zan), which is explained in the corresponding articles, but even this doesn't make them a dialect continuum because they are not contiguous. Needless to say there are no transitional dialects between Georgian and Svan, Georgian and Mingrelian, Svan and Mingrelian. I deleted the statement about a dialect continuum with its numerous—but empty—references. — 2dk (talk) 18:56, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Better sourcing ought to be searched for...and/or, the matter should be looked into a bit more. I grant that the cited references did not support the claim; however, from your analysis, I don't think you have a full understanding of what a dialect continuum is (understandably so: it is an obscure concept). basically, it is like this: dialect continuums can exist across vast distances. The various standard languages that are represented along a continuum are NOT mutually intelligible with one another; NOR are you likely to find any documented transitional dialects between said languages. What you have, is small dialectical changes from one village to the next, and so on, so that each spot along the continuum has mutual intelligibility with their neighbouring villages, but distance places along the continuum are not mutually ineligible with one another.

For example: there is, allegedly, two different dialect continuums starting from the same place in Porgugal: one along the coastal lowlands to the Northeast, ending in Belgium; and the other following the coastal lowlands to the Southeast ending in Italy. cheers Firejuggler86 (talk) 21:17, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

BTW, just to be clear: I have NO OPINION on whether or not the dialect continuum claim is true in this case or not! Nor do I know enough about this region to find out the answer to that. Only giving an explanation of what dialect continuum does and does not mean :) Firejuggler86 (talk) 22:06, 4 January 2021 (UTC)

Higher-level connections

In the section "Higher-level connections", the article presently says:

Note however that both the concept of a Nostratic family and Kartvelian's relation to it are not considered likely by other linguists.

I'm inclined to think most linguists would say there's no plausible evidence of a relationship, but I think they would refrain from saying whether a relationship is likely or not. Thus, Id' propose something like:

Note however that most linguists find the concept of a Nostratic family and Kartvelian's relation to it to be purely speculative.

Am I right? Nø (talk) 10:08, 13 January 2023 (UTC)

Possible relationship with Hattic

Kartvelian languages are mentioned in Hattic language § Classification. I wonder if the claim of possible connection is notable enough to be included in Kartvelian languages § Classification? Daask (talk) 13:21, 12 June 2023 (UTC)