Sarikoli

Introduction

The Sarikoli language is a member of the Pamir subgroup of the Southeastern Iranian languages spoken by Tajiks in China. It is officially referred to in China as the "Tajik language", although it is different from the related Iranian language spoken in Tajikistan, which is considered a dialect of Persian.

The Sarikoli Verb

In Sarikoli, each verb has three finite stems, non-past, past, and perfect, as well as an infinitive stem. There are some regular verbs in which the formation of these verb stems is somewhat predictable, although the infinitive is not predictable. In these regular verbs, the past stem is formed by adding a –t or –d ending to the present stem (depending on the voice of the segment it attaches to), and the perfect stem is sometimes formed by changing those endings to –tʃ or –dʒ. Sometimes the infinitive stem is identical to the past stem, but this is not always the case.

	Non-Past	Past	Perfect	Infinitive
‘say’	lɛv	lɛvd	lɛvdʒ	lɛvd
‘gather’	wix	wixt	wixtʃ	wixt
‘use’	rafon	rafond	rafondʒ	rafond
‘celebrate’	narzamb	narzambd	narzambdʒ	narzambd
‘give’	ðo	ðud	ðudʒ	ðod
‘sit’	niθ	nalɯst	nalɯstʃ	nalist
‘get up’	indiz	indəwd	indəwdʒ	indejd
Irregular
‘do’	ka	tʃəwg	tʃəwɣ	tʃejg
‘become’	so	sɯt	sɛðdʒ	sjɛt
‘come’	joð	jot	iθ	jɛt
‘play’ (instrument)	χej	χid	χɛð	χid
‘turn around’	ʁirs	ʁejrd	ʁejr	ʁejrd
‘sweep’	zdor	zdɯg	zduɣ	zdig
‘sew’	insov	insɯvd	insivd	insivd
‘stand’	warofs	waruvd	warɯvd	warvid