Be the first in the room — members see you arrive.
Join the room“οὕτω δημόσιον κακὸν ἔρχεται οἴκαδ᾿ ἑκάστῳ.”
“πολλάκι δ᾿ ἐξ ὀλίγης ὀδύνης μέγα γίγνεται ἄλγος.”
“φύλασσε τρόπου καλοκαγαθίαν ὅρκου πιστοτέραν.”
“idem aiebat si in unum locum cuncti mala sua contulissent, futurum ut propria deportare domum quam ex communi miseriarum acervo portionem suam ferre mallent.”
“Ἕλλησιν [. . .] πρός τε τἆλλα μετρίως ἔχειν ἔδωκεν ὁ θεός, καὶ σοφίας τινὸς ἀθαρσοῦς ὡς ἔοικε καὶ δημοτικῆς, οὐ βασιλικῆς οὐδὲ λαμπρᾶς, ὑπὸ μετριότητος ἡμῖν μέτεστιν, ἣ τύχαις ὁρῶσα παντοδαπαῖς χρώμενον ἀεὶ τὸν βίον, οὐκ ἐᾷ τοῖς παροῦσιν ἀγαθοῖς μέγα φρονεῖν οὐδὲ θαυμάζειν ἀνδρὸς εὐτυχίαν μεταβολῆς χρόνον ἔχουσαν.”
“ἀλλ᾿ οὐδεὶς ἂν μωρὸς σιωπᾶν ἐν συμποσίῳ δύναιτο.”
Quotes via Wikiquote (CC BY-SA), each with its original source.
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Solon is a language or dialect descended from Tungusic that was spoken by the Solons in China. Solon is a Manchurian Evenki dialect that was created when Solons were relocated from the Upper and Middle Amur basin to Hulunbuir during the 17th century. The Solon language is mainly concentrated in the Ewenki Autonomous Banner in Inner Mongolia, which was previously named the Solon Banner until 1958.
Not who you're looking for? Others named Solon: Athenian legislator · city in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, United States · human settlement in Johnson County, Iowa, United States of A · town in Maine, United States
Solon is a language or dialect descended from Tungusic that was spoken by the Solons in China. Solon is a Manchurian Evenki dialect that was created when Solons were relocated from the Upper and Middle Amur basin to Hulunbuir during the 17th century. The Solon language is mainly concentrated in the Ewenki Autonomous Banner in Inner Mongolia, which was previously named the Solon Banner until 1958.
The term "Solon" is believed to have come from the Evenki word sologon, which means 'upstream inhabitant', with solo- defined as 'to go upstream'. Solon was originally used for Evenki and Dagur speakers from the Amur valley and was probably used when the Solons were formed as distinct from the Evenki. After migrations in the 16th-17th century from multiple ethnic groups, the name Solon was used for modern Solon, Dagur and Oroqen speakers. After being moved to Hulunbuir in 1732, the modern Solons and Solon dialect were designated and distinguished from other ethnic groups.
Solons were also called Ongkors, which has been changed to designate Solons from Xinjiang and their dialect. The Chinese name for the Solon language is the 海拉尔, Hǎilā'ěr (Hailar) dialect of Evenki.
The Solons call themselves the "Ewenke", which is the term also used by China for the entire Ewenke minority groups that include the Khamnigan Evenki and the Aoluguya Evenki. When conversing with Nargil, Solons state that Ewenke refers to Solon, and the other Ewenke minority groups should have a modifier for their names to disgtinguish those groups from Solon.
Glottolog states that the dialects of Solon are Amur, Hulun Buir (Huihe), Morigele, Nonni (Nenjiang) and Ongkor Solon. Piispanen states the Solon dialects are Huihe, Hailar/Bouthka, Orončo, Manegir, Onkor/Xinjian and Turkestan Solon, with the latter 2 most likely being an identical dialect.
There is also a different grouping for the Solon's dialects that are made up of 3 different dialect groups, Hailar, Nonni and Ongkor Solon. The Hailar dialect has been significantly influenced by Mongolic, while the Nonni dialect has been significantly influenced by Chinese and Dagur. The Nonni dialect is considered to be more endangered due to its worse preservation.
The Ongkor Solon dialect has been extinct since the 1990s.
According to Juha Janhunen's research, the numerous dialects of the Ewenki language can be divided into two major groups: those of the Solons (which he labels "Solon Ewenki") and those of the Ewenki of Siberia (as well as the Oroqen and the "Manchurian Reindeer Tungus" of China), which he calls "Siberian Evenki". Solon is mutually unintelligable with the other Evenki dialects. The Ewenki dialects of the bilingual Khamnigan show features characteristic of both "Manchurian" and "Siberian" groups, as well as peculiar Khamnigan innovations.
The Solon being closely associated with the Dagur, many (around half of them, according to Janhunen's field research in the 1990s) Solon people are bilingual in the Dagur. During the Qing Empire, many Solon (as well as members of many other native groups of Manchuria) were able to speak Manchu, while in modern China Mandarin Chinese is universally taught.
Solon has also been classified as a separate language as it is archaic, atypical and has had a strong influence from neighbouring languages like Manchu and Dagur. Juha Janhunen classifies Solon as a part of the Ewenic languages.
Malcolm Ross proposed the term "lect" in 2001 to not distinguish between Solon being a dialect or language due to the difficulty of its classification.
Solon is considered the most vital Tungusic language. According to UNESCO's Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger, Solon is classified as a language definitely endangered. Juha Janhunen and Toshiro Tsumagari classified Solon as endangered, with the language being nearly extinct locally.
Solon is considered the most vital Tungusic language. Solons generally also have a positive attitude towards their languages and culture, with the language being used in everyday activities.
Solons access to education in Mongolian or Mandarin as well as TV and social media has resulted in many Solons being bilingual or even trilingual. Solons also potentially due to their close interactions, have some levels of proficiency with Dagur, Khamnigan Evenki and Oroqen, although this is rarer for the younger generations. Some Solon speakers also have learnt English, Japanese and Russian, although these are even rarer and are considered foreign languages.
Currently, urbanisation has resulted in challenges with the language being maintained as Solon speakers leaving rural areas have their language become socially disadvantaged. However, in general, a majority of Solons only speak Solon commonly, which is different between older and younger generations that have only 45.9% of younger Solons only speak Solon commonly.
In rural Solon areas, Solon children are able to speak Solon fluently, Han Chinese and Mongols living in these Solon rural regions learn basic sentences of Solon to talk to Solons.
According to Juha Janhunen and Toshiro Tsumagari, the language currently has approximately 15,000 speakers. In 2010, Christopher Moseley stated that there were 10,000 speakers.
However, Nargil states that in the 2020 census, there are 20,000 Solon speakers, which are up from 8,700 speakers in 1964 and 17,500 speakers in 1982. From the 20,000 speakers in 2020, 10,000 come from the Ewenki Autonomous Banner, 4,900 speakers from the Morin Dawa Daur Autonomous Banner, 2,200 speakers from the Arun Banner, 2,200 speakers from the Oroqen Autonomous Banner, 2,000 speakers from Hailar and 1,200 speakers from Zalantun. In the Ewenki Autonomous Banner, the Solon account for 7% of the population, which is lower in urban areas where Mandarin and Mongolian are more commonly used.
The Ewenke Autonomous Banner's government holds events that promote Solon identity and language that include festivals and school activities. There were various policies and organisations created for the protection of Solon, that includes the Ewenke Study Association, the Ewenke Language Centre and the Ewenke Language Tutorial that introduced a Latin script, have adopted weekly education programs including an curriculum for schools and televised an animated series and an TV program in Solon.
Tsumagari states there are 17 consonant phonemes in the Solon language, which are p, t, k, b, d, g, m, n, c, tʃ, j, dʒ, s, x, l, r, w, y and [j]. The /h/ phoneme is also sometimes considered a separate phoneme, but is also interpreted as an allophone of s. However, Kazama states there are 19 consonant phonemes, that are p, t, č, k, b, d, ǰ, g, m, n, ň, ŋ, s, š, x, w, j, r and l. Baek also states that there are 17 consonants, which are m, n, ŋ, b, d, j, g, p, t, c, k, s, x, w, y, l and r. The following table shows all of the consonants Solon uses.
Kazama states there are 12 vowel phonemes in the Solon language, which are H, i, ə, ɵ, u, S, ι, a, o, u, e and ee. However, Baek states there are 9 vowels, that are u, i, ʊ, ɪ, ɵ, e, o, iě and a. The following table shows all of the vowels Solon uses.
The syllable structure of Solon is shown as (C)V(V)(C).
Solon's morphological process has agglutinative suffixes, which is shown in the xaxraa-sül-nii-s (of your chickens). Regressive assimilation has also occurred in Solon, resulting in alterations in the stem's final consonant, which is shown in is-ca being used for has reached over it-caa.
Solon has 13 different cases that includes an established genitive and a unmarked nominative form that serves as a stem of oblique cases. Some case-endings in Solon also include allomorphs which include the stem-final phonemic structure (-V♯/-C♯). The following list includes the Solon words beye (man) and morin (horse) that comes from Toshiro Tsumagari.
The following list includes the nominative form and other case forms in Solon with endings that indicate the person and their number, which comes from Toshiro Tsumagari.
Plurality in Solon is represented by the suffix -sal, which is attached to humans, animals and innaminate objects such as omolƐƐ -sal (grandsons), xolƐƐ -sal/＜xolƐƐn (snakes) and jolo-sol (stones). Unmarked forms are also used for referring to plural entities, which is more common when there is a quantitative adjective or it is preceded by a numeral such as ilan iite (three sons) and baraan xonin (many sheep). The suffix -sƐƐn is also added in Solon to place names or personal names and will mean "those who live somewhere" and "someoneʼs family, someone and others", which is shown by imin-sƐƐn (those who live in Imin) and ülji-sƐƐn (the Uljis). The noun ulur or possibly olor (people, fellow) has also been used in Solon for human nouns such as sawi ulur (students).
Most of the personal pronouns in Solon are infected with alternative stems given in square brackets. The case-endings are similar to the noun case-endings, with the restructuring of actual occurrence for case-endings. For 3rd person pronouns, demonstrative pronouns such as eri/tari (this/that), usually employs plural forms ersel/tarsal～taccil (these/those) and elür/talur (＜eri/tari ulur) (these/those people). The original 3rd person pronoun nugan, with a plural form of nugan-sal, is rarely used and expresses politeness to the referent. This is shown in the following table, that comes from Toshiro Tsumagari.
The word meeni (oneself) is used for both numbers and has the stem meen-, a case-ending and a singular reflexive-ending. The word meeni has a dative case of meen-dü-wi, a instrumental case of meen-ji-wi and a accusative case of meen-bi, with the accusative case not having and any case-markings.
The words eri (this) and tari (that) are used attributively and independently, with some case forms having both having reduced stems and derivative forms. The case forms with reduced stems are the dative case of e-dü/ta-du and the locative case of e-lee/ta-laa, while the derivative forms are eyye/tayya (this/that with a contemptuous tone), ennegen/tannagan (like this/that which is attributive) and ettü/tattu (in this/that way).
The following table includes interrogative pronouns from Toshiro Tsumagari:
The following table also includes interrogative pronouns from Toshiro Tsumagari which have some case forms and derivative forms serve as interrogative adverbs.
Adjectives in Solon are converted into nouns instead of having inflections and take number, case and personal markings, as shown by nisüxün-sel-we-ni (the small ones). Conversion or adding instrumental case-endings could also change the adjectives function to be an adverb, as shown by sii ayaxan/ayaxan-ji aasin-caa-si-gii? (Did you sleep well?).
In Solon, there is an adjective suffix -si, which means having/with, could and sometimes has a semantic change. The following table includes Solon's words with the suffix -si and in both Solon and English from Toshiro Tsumagari.
The addition of different suffixes could change the semantic differences of words such as aya (good), which can be changed into aya-xan (rather good, healthy), aya-xaya (almost good) and aya-kkan (very good).
A partial reduplication is employed in Solon for an emphatic expression, almost exactly the way it is expressed in Mongolic and Turkic, while also being similar to Chinese Tungusic, but not Russian Tungusic. This is shown with ab aya (very good), xob xonnorin (coal-black) and nem nemikkün (very thin).
Adjectives for colours also include another type of reduplication that combines with suffixation. This is shown in siŋarin (yellow), siŋa siŋa-ljaxun (deep yellow), ularin (red), ula ulari-ljaxun (deep red).
The following table includes the Solon's words for numerals from Toshiro Tsumagari and Shinjiro Kazama.
The numerals 20, 30, 40, 90, 1,000 and 10,000 (orin, gotin, dexi, yereen, miŋgan and tümün) are shown to be borrowed from Manchu (orin, γusin, dexi, and tumen) and Mongolian (χorin, γucin, yiren, miŋgan, tümen).
Ordinal numerals have the suffix -si/-ci added to them, such as ila-si. Manchu supplementive forms are also adopted for first "üjü" (＜Ma. uju ʻid.＜head) and second "jai" (＜Ma.jai ʻid.＜next).
The following is derivational suffixes of Solon from Toshiro Tsumagari.
Derivational suffixes are used in verb stems in Solon to change the primary stem's meaning, which includes its voice. The following table includes Solon's suffix's used as verb stems in Solon words with the English translation from Toshiro Tsumagari.
In Solon, various verb-endings are added to inflect the verbs. This is divided into four functions, which are imperative endings, final endings, particle endings and converb endings.
Solon's imperative forms include 1st, 2nd and 3rd person forms, while also having a tense distinction between present and future forms, with future forms also having a postponed realization. The following table by Toshiro Tsumagari depicts this.
In Solon, final forms that have their verb-terms end with n, modifications that include an a～e link-vowel is added. The following table contains the final forms by Toshiro Tsumagari that includes the words jawa- (to hold) and aasin- (to sleep).
Particle forms in Solon have three syntactically different functions, which are attributes of nouns, a verbal-noun that could potentially take a case-ending and a predicate for both future and past tense. Ending could also take personal markers, which is the same as the nominal possessive marker, but doesn't have a 3rd person marking. The following table contains the particle forms by Toshiro Tsumagari.
Converbs in Solon are modifiers of main verbs in complex sentences. Converbs could require personal marking of the doer, while other converbs have no personal ending. The following table contains the different types of converb in Solon with their suffixes by Toshiro Tsumagari.
There is also a converb form of bi- (to be) or oo- (to become, to do) that some Solon particles originate from. In conjunctiveparticle, subordinative converbs for each verbs are employed, as shown with exin oocci axin (elder sister and elder brother) and imin doo-nii müü-nin aruxxun bicci antasi (The water of Imin river is clear and sweet). The conditional converb of bi- also has a topic particle bikki(wi) (as for) originate from it with a reflexive marker as shown by tari doo-nii gebbi-nin bikkiwi imin doo gün-en (The name of the river is called Imin river).
Auxiliaries are employed in Solon verbs are used to analytically express aspectual, modal and other meanings after conjugational forms for verbs. An example would be the verb bi with past forms such as bi-see (remote past) and üli-cee bi-see ((He) has already gone), the future form of ga-jiguu bi-see (I might have taken) and the coordinative converb of aasi-mi bi-see ((He) was (still) sleeping). Auxiliaries also are employed in the verbs oo- with the coordinative converb ebbesi-mi oo-dan (ʻ(It is) possible/permitted/expected to swim), nee- (ʻto lay, keep) with subordinative converbs xorii-cci nee-see ((They) have arrested (him)) and ommo-cci nee-süü (ʻI have forgotten), büü- (to give) with the coordinative converb irda-mi büü-xe (Comb my hair for me!) and isi- (to see) with the coordinative converb ji-mi isi-xe (Try to eat!).
Historically, Solon has never had a literary form. In the 1980s, standardisation of the language had started, which included the creation of a script system based off of the Mongolian script. In 2005, the Ewenke Study Association started to use Latin as a script for researchers and Solons, but this has not been adopted by Solon community. Currently Solon can be recording using the Latin, Manchu, or the Mongolian script, although it still remains virtually unwritten as it lacks a commonly accepted orthography. Tsumagari also states that the Manchu script is no longer used, while Solons, when applying a script, usually employ an Mongolian or an Chinese script.
Both Solon and Dagur have strongly influenced each other linguistically due to both ethnic groups living near each other. Solons speak Dagur as a second language and approximately 100 words in Solon could be directly attributed to Solon. There are hundreds of Dagur loanwords in Solon, which include xaxraa (chicken) and düsee (wall).
As in Dagur, Solon has the Mongolic consonants b, g, d and s be replaced by the consonant r. The following table shows words from Solon, Dagur and other Mongolic languages that depict this consonant replacement.
As in Dagur, Solon has changes in the vowels ö and o, which is changed into ü and u for both languages. The following table shows words from Solon, Dagur and other Mongolic languages that depict this vowel change.
Solon borrows some numerals and months are borrowed from Manchu along with other words. The following table provided Toshiro Tsumagari and Jerry Norman lists some words in Solon, English, Manchu and Proto-Tungusic.
Solon uses many Chinese loanwords, which include soŋko (window), xooco (train), dεεnsi (television), gaŋbii (pen) and liibεε (week). Solon loanwords from Chinese also include adverbs (maaſan - promptly), interjections (wei - hi, hello) and grammatical particles (si - a subject/topic marker, baa - an sentence-final marker). Chinese words in Solon use verb-formative suffixes to create verbs, such as gaŋbii-da (to use a pen,to write with a pen).
Solon's lexical influence from Chinese has also been used for compounds and phrases. The following table from Toshiro Tsumagari includes words from Solon and Chinese with their literal transations into English.
The following are Solon words of Russian origin with their English translation from Toshiro Tsumagari.
The following list of Solon words comes from Shinjiro Kazama also in English.
