Lezgian

Lezgian, also spelled Lezgin, is a Northeast Caucasian language spoken by the Lezgin people in southern Dagestan (Russia) and northeastern Azerbaijan. It is the most widely spoken language of the Lezgic subgroup. Estimates place several hundred thousand native speakers, with communities in urban and rural areas and a diaspora in other parts of the Caucasus and beyond.

It belongs to the Lezgic branch of the Northeast Caucasian language family, closely related to Tabasaran and other Lezgic languages. Lezgian has historically been written in multiple scripts, including Cyrillic in Russia and Latin in other contexts; no single standard orthography is universally used.

Phonology and morphology: Lezgian has a rich consonant inventory that includes ejective and other non-Plosive sounds, alongside a five-vowel system. The language is highly agglutinative, with extensive verbal morphology and a system of noun cases. Its syntax is predominantly subject–object–verb (SOV), but word order can be flexible due to the rich inflection and agreement markers. Verbs encode tense, aspect, mood, evidentiality, and person agreement with both subject and object nouns.

Status and use: Lezgian is a living language in its traditional homeland of Dagestan and Azerbaijan, used in daily communication, education, media, and literature at regional levels. It faces typical minority-language challenges, with varying levels of intergenerational transmission and official support across the two countries.