Jie (张昌圣. "《晋书·佛图澄传》之羯语探源". 四川大学学报: 哲学社会科学版 3 (1995): 48-56.) is a poorly attested extinct language formerly spoken in northeast China during the Later Zhao dynasty by the Jie people, who were formerly part of the Xiongnu confederation. It has been considered to be of either Turkic or Yeniseian affiliation.
Attestation Only one phrase in the native language of the Jie is known. The source for this phrase was the Kuchean Buddhist monk and missionary Fotudeng. It was recorded in the Book of Jin as and said to have a connection to Shi Le's fight against Liu Yao in 328. The phrase was glossed with a Chinese translation: Text Middle Chinese Gloss "army" "go out" Liu Yao's barbarian title "capture"
Analysis
Turkic This phrase has been analyzed in a number of publications. Shiratori (1900),Shiratori, Kurakichi, Uber die Sprache des Hiung-nu Stammes und der Tung-hu-Stdmme, Tokyo, 1900 Ramstedt (1922),Ramstedt G.J., "Zur Frage nach der Stellung des Tschuwassischen" (On the question of the position of the Chuvash), Journal de la Société finno-ougrienne 38, 1922, pp. 1–34 Bazin (1948), von Gabain (1950), Shervashidze (1986),Shervashidze I.N. "Verb forms in the language of the Turkic runiform inscriptions", Tbilisi, 1986, pp. 3–9 and Shimunek (2015) recognized Turkic lexicon, and gave their versions of the transcription and translation: Ramstedt Bazin von Gabain Shervashidze Shimunek Sükä talıqınbügüg tutun! Süg tägti ıdqaŋboquγıγ tutqaŋ! Särig tılıtqanbuγuγ kötürkän Sükâ tol'iqtinbuγuγ qodigo(d)tin su-Ø kete-r erkanboklug-gu tukta-ŋ Go with a war[and] capture bügü! Send the army to attack,capture the commander! You'd put forth the army,you'd take the deer You came to the armyDeposed buγuγ When/as the army goes out,capture the Boklug!
Yeniseian Edwin G. Pulleyblank (1963) argued that the Turkic interpretations cannot be considered very successful because they conflict with the phonetic values of the Chinese text and with the Chinese translation. Instead, he suggested a connection with the Yeniseian languages, as well as remarking on the Yeniseian verb ending -ŋ, particularly common in Kott. In contrast, second-person plural imperatives in Old Turkic also end in -ŋ (e.g. in military commands).
Alexander Vovin (2000) gave the following translation based on Yeniseian, corroborating Pulleyblank's findings. Vovin (2000) suggests a connection with the Southern Yeniseian branch.
The verbal ending -ŋ can be seen in Jie, which is a common verb ending in Yeniseian languages, particularly Kott. The cognate form of the Jie words 'they will catch' in Ket is , showing the characteristic of Pumpokol where the sound corresponds the Ket sound ; thus Jie is thought to be closely related to Pumpokol. The Arin word 'fight' partly coincides in the second syllable of 'army', however the connection is dubious and Vovin suggested it to be a loanword, because if Pumpokolic speakers became part of Xiongnu, the word for army would have likely been loaned.
Vovin et al. (2016) revise the above translation, as well as mapping the verbs over a Ket verb template and criticizing Shimunek et al.'s interpretation of the couplet.
Savelyev and Jeong (2020) criticize Vovin's Yeniseian reading of the couplet, noting that out of the four words of the couplet, only two may tentatively be read based on Pumpokol data, with both words including lexical and grammatical morphemes that are not actually attested in Pumpokol. The other two do not have any hypothetical parallel in Yeniseian; thus, Vovin et al. (2016) had to assume a loan from an unidentified source into the supposedly Pumpokolic language of the Xiongnu, thus making the reading quite doubtful.
Notes
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