The Prepositions In Kumuk Turkish

Kumuk Turkish is one of the modern representatives of historical Kipchak Turkish with Tatar, Kazak, Kırgız, Başkurt, Karakalpak, Nogay, Karaçay-Balkar, Kırım-Tatar and Karay Turkish. Kumuk Turkish is spoken by Kumuk Turks living in Dagestan Autonomous Republic in Russian Federation and Chechen and Ossetia Republics. Kumuk Turks is included to north or Kıpçak Turks; and Kumuk Turkish to Kipchak dialect group. The Kumuk Turk’s written language which has a rich folk literature was first under the influence of Kırım Turkish. After the Soviet period, current local dialect has become the written language. Kumuk Turks had used Arabic alphabet until 1928. Next decade, they used Latin alphabet. With the decision made in 1938 by Soviet goverment, they were forced to use Cyrill alphabet with Nogay, Kırım, Altay and Şor Turks. Kumuks, the most populous Turkish group in Caucasia after Azerbaijan Turkish, mostly live in Dagestan Autonomous Republic in Russian Federation (250.000 people, according to the estimates in 1992), the rest (around 50.000) in Chechen and Ossetia Republics. Also there are some Kumuks immigrated to villages in Tokat, Sivas, Çanakkale in Turkey, after the Russian invasion of North Caucasia. In this study, we will examine prepositions in Kumuk Turkish. Structure, use and funtions of every preposition will be introduced with examples. Examples are taken from eight sources, literary works, dictionaries, grammer and academic works written with standart Karay Turkish. We will give Turkey Turkish synonyms for each preposition in quotation marks.

Keywords

Kumuk Turkish, Kipchak Turkish, preposition, structure, use, function.