HUN - Language

Language

The subject of the Hunnic language is met with much controversy. So far, there is no general consensus on the exact origin or classification of Hunnic. A group of authors suppose that it may have been a member of, or related to, the Turkic language family. Having said that, the literary sources of Priscus and Jordanes preserve only a few names, and three words, of the language of the Huns, which have been studied for more than a century and a half. The sources themselves do not give the meaning of any of the names, only of the three words. These words (medos, kamos, strava) do not seem to be Turkic, but probably a satem Indo-European language similar to Slavic and Dacian.

Traditionally notable studies include that of Pritsak 1982, "The Hunnic Language of the Attila Clan.", who concluded, "It was not a Turkic language, but one between Turkic and Mongolian, probably closer to the former than the latter. The language had strong ties to Old Bulgarian and to modern Chuvash, but also had some important connections, especially lexical and morphological, to Ottoman and Yakut... The Turkic situation has no validity for Hunnic, which belonged to a separate Altaic group." On the basis of the existing name records, a number of scholars suggest that the Huns spoke a Turkic language of the Oghur branch, which also includes Bulgar, Avar, Khazar and Chuvash languages. English scholar Peter Heather called the Huns "the first group of Turkic, as opposed to Iranian, nomads to have intruded into Europe". Maenchen-Helfen held that many of the tribal names among the Huns were Turkic. However, the evidence is scant (a few names and three non-Turkic words), thus scholars currently conclude that the Hunnic language cannot presently be classified, and attempts to classify it as Turkic and Mongolic are speculative.

A variety of languages were spoken within the Hun pax. Roman sources, e.g. Priscus, recorded that Latin, Gothic, "Hun" and other local 'Scythian" languages were spoken. Based on some etymological interpretation of the words strava and medos, and subsequent historical appearance, the latter has been taken to include a form of pre-Slavic language.