“THINK TAT, SPEAK TAT, WRITE IN TAT!”

Dear Editors,
In recent years, much has been written about the national minorities living in Azerbaijan. Only your newspaper had several extensive articles about Talishes, Tats and other nations. I would like to know whether the Tats have their own language. Because in the Soviet army, my father had a friend-Тat, very good soldier who knew and spoke only in Azerbaijani language.

Vigen Manoukyan
tanker

We asked orientalist, Associate Professor Vardan Voskanyan to reply to the soldier’s letter.

Tat or Caucasian Persian language in historical Shirvan during the Islamic Middle Ages to the early 20th century was the primary language of the territory, as evidenced also by so-called father of Azerbaijani historiography Abbas Ghuli Agha Bakikhanov. In subsequent years, as a result of the introduction of Turkism and an active policy of assimilation of indigenous peoples, it was expelled from the areas of expansion.

Recently, in the Azerbaijani Republic by the activists and intellectuals of Tat nationality “Tat language revival movement” was formed, its main slogan is: “Think Tat, speak Tat, write in Tat!”

By the way, the Tat language is one of the Iranian languages, which is studied in the academic circles of Armenia.