Semnani (, ) is the main language of the Semnan province of Iran and has several branches. The language belongs to the Northwestern branch of the Western Iranian languages and is spoken in south of the Caspian Sea.
Semnani, similar to other Caspian languages, bears some resemblance to the Old Iranian Median language and was influenced by Parthian in a later process.Habib Borjian: . In: . Nr. 2. Brill, 2009
Classification Glottolog classifies the Semnani language within the Semnani-Biyabuneki subgroup of Northwestern Iranian languages and classifies nearby languages, such as Sangsari, Lasgerdi, Sorkhei and Aftari within another subgroup, the Komisenian subgroup.
Semnani is linguistically closely related to Zaza, spoken in Anatolia and Gurani, spoken by pockets in northeastern Iraq and northwestern Iran. Jost Gippert suggests that "that there is an inter-related connection among (northern) Zāzāki, Semnāni, and Gorāni based on the shared archaic features of the languages".
Phonology Consonants Labial Dental Alveolar Postalveolar Palatal Velar Uvular GlottalNasal () Plosive Affricate Fricative Tap Trill () Approximant (Where symbols appear in pairs, the one to the right represents a voiced consonant. Allophones are in parentheses.)
Grammar
Grammatical gender has been extensively preserved in Semnani, Sangsari, Zaza and various Tati dialects. Semnani along with Zaza and Tati dialects, is distinguished within Western Iranian by marking grammatical gender on verbs, representing a highly idiosyncratic typological feature. These languages preserve the morphological expressions of grammatical gender across direct and oblique cases, singular and plural numbers and the copula.
Syntax Subjects in Semnani must have gender agreement with the verb in their immediate clause.
Notes
Bibliography Pierre Lecoq. 1989. "Les dialectes caspiens et les dialectes du nord-ouest de l'Iran," Compendium Linguarum Iranicarum. Ed. Rüdiger Schmitt. Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag. Pages 296–314.
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