Languages of Peoples of Russia: Moscow students come to Yugra to save an ancient language of Khanty and Mansi

Moscow students have arrived to Yugra to save an ancient language of endangered indigenous peoples of the North - Khanty and Mansi. This is the second time students and graduates of Moscow State University undergo practical training in the village of Tegi, Berezovski District.

Students are talking to the local peoples who are trying to remember nearly lost words and expressions of Khanty language. "I recall words, expressions used by my mom, dad, grandparents when I was a child. As for now these words are forgotten. We speak our native language poorly", said the villager Antonina Chuprova.

Besides oral practice, students are going to put down the language – study it and record its present-day state.

Linguists classify the languages of Khanty and Mansi in the Ugric languages group that also incorporates the Hungarian language. It is believed that once there existed a community of people who spoke this parent language. Despite the unclear nature and discrepancy of the origin of Khanty and Mansi, researchers are unanimous in the opinion of their two-component culture, that included traditions of local taiga tribes and Ugric peoples who came from the south. Linguists accept the possibility of ancient connections between Uralic language family and Indo-European and Turkic families, there exist parallels with the Yukaghic, Chukotko-Kamchatkan, and Eskimo-Aleut languages, discovered are connections with ancient Iranian languages.