# Azerbaijani dialects

Azerbaijani dialects reflect relatively minor language differences and are mutually intelligible. The Azerbaijani language has two distinct sublanguages: Northern and Southern.
Southern Azerbaijani contains many Arabic and Persian words that are not familiar to northern speakers. This began to increase in 1828.

## History

In his Seyahatnâme (travelogue), 17th-century Ottoman traveler Evliya Çelebi provided a detailed account of the Ajem-Turkic (or Azerbaijani) dialects in continuum with the Turkish dialects of the Armenian highlands: Diyarbekir, Bitlis, and few samples of Erzurum, Van, Hamadan, Mosul, and Tabriz. Evliya Çelebi specified the Tabrizi dialect as the speech of the Turkomans, Afshars, and "Gök-dolaq", while he sometimes referred to those of Diyarbekir and Bitlis as "Kurdish" dialects. Apart from formal samples, these dialects were further exemplified by his dialogue with the Safavid governors of Urmia, Tabriz, Shamakhi, and Yerevan.

## Dialect groups

The main dialect groups are Eastern (Derbent, Baku, Shamakhi, Mugan and Lankaran dialects), Western (Qazakh, Karabakh, Ganja and Ayrum dialects), Northern (Nukha, Zaqatala - Qakh dialects) and Southern (Yerevan, Nakhchivan, Ordubad and Tabriz dialects). The dialects are mutually intelligible but differ with regard to accent, syntax, and vocabulary. Eastern and northern groups of dialects were influenced by the Kypchak language.
According to Encyclopedia Iranica:
   We may distinguish the following Azeri dialects: (1) eastern group: Derbent (Darband), Kuba, Shemakha (Šamāḵī), Baku, Salyani (Salyānī), and Lenkoran (Lankarān), (2) western group: Kazakh (not to be confounded with the Kipchak-Turkic language of the same name), the dialect of the Ayrïm (Āyrom) tribe (which, however, resembles Turkish), and the dialect spoken in the region of the Borchala river; (3) northern group: Zakataly, Nukha, and Kutkashen; (4) southern group: Yerevan (Īravān), Nakhichevan (Naḵjavān), and Ordubad (Ordūbād); (5) central group: Ganja (Kirovabad) and Shusha; (6) North Iraqi dialects; (7) Northwest Iranian dialects: Tabrīz, Reżāʾīya (Urmia), etc., extended east to about Qazvīn; (8) Southeast Caspian dialect (Galūgāh). Optionally, we may adjoin as Azeri (or “Azeroid”) dialects: (9) East Anatolian, (10) Qašqāʾī, (11) Aynallū, (12) Sonqorī, (13) dialects south of Qom, (14) Kabul Afšārī.
According to Ethnologue, North Azerbaijani has the following regional dialects, each of which is slightly different from the other: "Quba, Derbend, Baku, Shamakhi, Salyan, Lenkaran, Qazakh, Airym, Borcala, Terekeme, Qyzylbash, Nukha, Zaqatala (Mugaly), Qabala, Nakhchivan, Ordubad, Ganja, Shusha (Karabakh), Karapapak, Kutkashen, Kuba". While South Azerbaijani has the following dialects: "Aynallu (Inallu, Inanlu), Karapapakh, Tabriz, Afshari (Afsar, Afshar), Shahsavani (Shahseven), Moqaddam, Baharlu (Kamesh), Nafar, Qaragozlu, Pishagchi, Bayat, Qajar".
According to the second edition of the Encyclopaedia of Islam, there are four main dialects of Azeri: 1) Baku-Shirvan, 2) Ganja-Karabakh, 3) Tabriz, and 4) Urmia.

## Dialectal features

According to "A grammar of Iranian Azari" by Yavar Dehghani, dialects of South Azerbaijani in Iran are as follows: 1) Urmia, 2) Tabriz, 3) Ardabil, and 4) Zanjan. Each one of these has a set of unique features that distinguishes it.

### Urmia dialect

The Urmia dialect stands out primarily by means of the fact that it, unlike the other dialects, does not have labial harmony applied to any suffix. As a result, every suffix has only two forms, one harmonized for back vowels and one for front vowels.
| Suffix type | Urmia dialect | Urmia dialect | Standard Azerbaijani | Standard Azerbaijani | Standard Azerbaijani | Standard Azerbaijani |
| Suffix type | back | front | back rounded | back unrounded | front rounded | front unrounded |
| Suffix forming abstract nouns from adjectives or nouns | | | | | | |
| Suffix forming adjectives from nouns | | | | | | |
| Privative suffix | | | | | | |
| Suffix forming third-person singular imperative | | | | | | |

### Tabriz dialect

The Tabriz dialect is the most-spoken dialect of Azerbaijani in Iran. A feature distinguishing it from standard Azerbaijani is the further fronting of palatal stops and postalveolar affricates. The voiceless postalveolar affricate and voiced postalveolar affricate are fronted to the voiceless alveolar affricate and voiced alveolar affricate, while the voiceless palatal plosive and voiced palatal plosive are fronted to the voiceless postalveolar affricate and voiced postalveolar affricate.
| Standard Azerbaijani | Tabriz dialect |
Another one of the ways it differs from standard Azerbaijani is the only partial observance of vowel harmony. One aspect of this is that the final vowel of a word does not need to harmonize with the preceding syllables in regards to either roundness or backness.
* Meaning
* 'flock'
* 'fox'
* 'true'
* 'lamb'
Additionally, various suffixes simply ignore harmony altogether, always having a back vowel. Among others, the standard Azerbaijani infinitive suffix is always, the future suffix is always, the first person plural imperative suffix is always, the comparative suffix is always, the participle-deriving suffix is always, and the abstract noun deriving suffix is always. This lack of vowel harmony is similar to that of Uzbek.

### Ardabil dialect

The Ardabil dialect generally applies both labial and backness harmony to suffixes, but has a few exceptions to them as well, particularly the suffixes for the past tense, possessive aspect, and continuous aspect. While the possessive aspect and past tense suffixes have no labial harmonization, the continuous aspect suffix (equivalent to standard Azerbaijani) has no harmonization of any kind. Suffixes following it ignore it and harmonize with the stem.
* Meaning
* 'I throw'
* 'I arrange'
* 'I come'
* 'I wait'

### Zanjan dialect

In the Zanjan dialect, the second person singular suffix is (as opposed to standard Azerbaijani) and the second person plural suffix is (as opposed to standard Azerbaijani).
| Meaning | Zanjan dialect | Standard Azerbaijani |
| 'You (singular) see' | | |
| 'You (plural) see' | | |

## Publications

The first comparative analysis of the Turkic (Azerbaijani) dialects was carried out by Mirza Kazimbey in his 1839 book The General Grammar of the Turkish – Tatar Language.
During 1924 - 1930, Soviet researchers collected some 60 thousand dialect words. The program was prepared to compile a comprehensive dictionary. N.I. Ashari led this program. The Academy of Sciences of the Azerbaijan SSR published a one-volume dictionary named Dialectological Dictionary of the Azerbaijani Language in 1964, which covered more than six thousand words.
At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century, the Dictionary of the Dialects of the Azerbaijani language was published. The dictionary contained samples from Zangibasar, Sharur, Yardimli, Tebriz, Gubadli, Lachin, Kalbacar, Balakan, Qakh and Zagatala.