The role of the Arabic language in the formation of "Ajam" alphabets and the original writing-literary tradition for the languages of the North Caucasus

Abstract

The events that took place in X-XV in North-eastern Caucasus resulted in the transformation of Islamized society of Dagestan. Arabic became the language of religion. Arabic enabled a newly Muslimized non-Arabic people to become part of common Islamic culture. Arabic became a prestigious language, as the religious language of winners.  Arabic culture and Arabic literature were more widely and more quickly spread than the military-political power of Arabs. 

In XV-XVII centuries after dissemination of the Arabic language by Seljuks, Mongols and Muslim missioners, Arabic became the religious language not only in Dagestan but also almost in the whole territory of Northern Caucasus. 

At the end of XVI the Ottoman Empire gained the influence over the southern-eastern region of Dagestan. Subsequently, the culture of local Dagestani people had undergone significant changes: the Arabic literary tradition, which in the previous few centuries, the played a leading role in literary culture in the history of Dagestan, took second place and in some regions it started to lose its monopolistic nature.

For a certain period (XV-XVI cc) the influence of Turkish and Persian languages strengthened on literary, state-administrative and scientific fields, especially by the end of XVI and at the beginning of XVII century. Up to the 30-s of the XX century Turkish languages used to be the means of communication between the ethnic groups: namely, Kumyk language (a Turkish language from Kipchak subgroup) was used in north-eastern regions as Lingua franca; and Azerbaijani – for South Dagestan and Transcaucasian regions.

By the first quarter of the XVIII century the Caspian region of the North Caucasus and a part of Iran were officially included in the state borders of Russia (in particular, we are talking about a narrow territory of the Caspian region). The leaders of the Ottoman Empire continued efforts to establish on the territory of Chechnya and Ingushetia.

In 1834 the  “Caucasus Imamate” was established by the imams in Dagestan and Chechnya during the early and middle of the 19 th century in the Northern Caucasus, to fight against the Russian Empire during the Caucasian War, where Russia sought to conquer the Caucasus in order to secure communications with its new territories south of the mountains. This events were directly related to the fact that by the end of XVIII century and at the beginning of the XIX century in Northern Caucasus (especially in Dagestan, Chechnya, Ingushetia, Kabarbo and partly Cherkasy) the social positions of the Arabic language became stronger.

It is important to notice that among almost 800 original Arabic-script compositions that are kept in Dagestani Manuscript funds, the majority of work belong to philological sciences. All of them were written within XV-XX centuries. They are mainly, the famous Arabic language textbooks. The number of those textbooks exceeds to the number of texts created on and about Koran.

The role of the Arabic language and literature in the process of formation of literary traditions was great in Dagestan due to the fact that the local North Caucasian (Dagestan) so called “Ajam” alphabet was originated from the Arabic script. Since the VIII-X century the Arabic graphic was disseminated in the North Caucasus and gradually it merged with the sound system of the local languages. 

Since the XV century onwards until the 20-s of the XX century there was an ongoing process of copying the original literature with the help of “Ajam” script. The process became intensive at the eve of XVIII-XIX centuries after the “Ajam” alphabet was re-analyzed once again, however literary bilingualism in Dagetsan lasted for a longer time. It is noteworthy that the same period could be considered to be somehow the “renaissance” of local Dagestani literature written in Arabic scripts. The role of the Arabic language, its literary traditions and possibilities could be considered to be the determining factor of the renaissance.