Mator language

Mator or Motor is an extinct Uralic language belonging to the group of Samoyedic languages, extinct since around 1839. It was spoken in the northern region of the Sayan Mountains in Siberia, close to the Mongolian north border. The speakers of Mator, Template:Ill, lived in a wide area from the eastern parts of the Minusinsk District (okrug) along the Yenisei River to the region of Lake Baikal. Three dialects of Mator were recorded: Mator proper as well as Taygi and Karagas (occasionally portrayed as separate languages, but their differences are few). Mator was influenced by Mongolic, Tungusic and Turkic languages before it went extinct, and may have even been possibly influenced by the Iranic languages.Template:Sfn It went extinct as a result of the Mator people shifting linguistically to the related Kamas language or nearby Altaic-sprachbund languages, like Buryat, Soyot, Khakas, Evenki and Tatar.

File:Peoples Siberia XVI.jpg

A map of Siberian peoples in the 16th century with the Mators in

  orange

, near the bottom-center of the map.

Today the term "Mator people" is simply a name of a seok of the Koibal, one of the five territorial sub-division groups of the Khakas. (Note that the name "Koibal" likewise derives from the related Samoyedic Koibal language).

Mator has been frequently grouped together with Selkup and Kamassian as "South Samoyedic". This is however a grouping by geographical area, and not considered to constitute an actual sub-branch of the Samoyedic languages.

Phonology

Consonants

Mator consonantsTemplate:Sfn

		Bilabial	Dental/ Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	voiceless	(Template:IPAlink)	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink
	voiced	Template:IPAlink	(Template:IPAlink)	(Template:IPAlink)	(Template:IPAlink)
Fricative	voiceless		Template:IPAlink	(Template:IPA link)	Template:IPAlink
	voiced		(Template:IPAlink)	(Template:IPAlink)
Nasal		Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink
Rhotic			Template:IPAlink
Approximant	central			Template:IPAlink
	lateral		Template:IPAlink

Vowels

Mator vowelsTemplate:Sfn

		Front		Central	Back
		unrounded	rounded
Close	short	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink	(Template:IPAlink)	Template:IPAlink
	long	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink	(Template:IPAlink)?	Template:IPAlink
Mid	short	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPA link	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink
	long	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPA link?	Template:IPAlink	Template:IPAlink
Open	short			Template:IPAlink
	long			Template:IPAlink
Reduced		Template:IPA link

Lexicon

Below are some Mator words from Helimski 1997.Template:Sfn

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External links

• Mator–English glossary
• Mator grammar and dictionary