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Urum Урум
Pronunciation:	IPA: uˈrum
Spoken in:	Ukraine, Greece
Total speakers:	45,000[1]
Language family:	Altaic[2] (controversial)  Turkic   Kypchak, Oghuz    Urum
Writing system:	Cyrillic alphabet, Greek alphabet
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	none
ISO 639-2:	—
ISO 639-3:	uum
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. See IPA chart for English for an English-​based pronunciation key.

Urum is a Turkic language spoken by several thousand people who inhabit a few villages in the Southeastern Ukraine and in diaspora communities world wide.

The name Urum is derived from the medieval Greek word for Rome designating Constantinople and Greece in general. The Ottoman Empire used it to describe non-Muslims within the empire. The initial vowel in Urum is prosthetic: originally Turkic languages did not have r- in word-initial position, and in borrowed words used to add a vowel before it. The common use of the term Urum appears to have led to some confusion, as most Turkish-speaking Greeks were called Urum. The Turkish-speaking population in Georgia is often confused with the distinct community in the Ukraine.^[3][4] (see: Urums)

Contents 1 Sounds 1.1 Consonants 2 Writing System 3 Publications 4 References

Consonant phonemes

	Labial		Dental		Alveolar		Postalveolar		Palatal		Velar		Glottal
Plosive	p	b	t			d			c	ɟ	k	ɡ
Affricate					ʦ ¹		ʧ	ʤ
Fricative	f	v	θ	ð ²	s	z	ʃ	ʒ			x	ɣ	h
Nasal	m		n								ŋ
Flap/Tap			ɾ
Lateral			l
Approximant									j

(1) /ʦ/ is found only in loanwords.

(2) /θ/ and /ð/ are found only in loanwords from Greek.

A few manuscripts are known to be written in Urum using Greek characters.^[5] During the period between 1927 and 1937,the Urum language was written in reformed Latin characters, the so called New Turkic Alphabet, and used in local schools; at least one primer is known to have been printed. In 1937 the use of written Urum stopped. Alexander Garkavets uses the following alphabet:^[6]

А а	Б б	В в	Г г	Ғ ғ	Д д	(Δ δ)	Д′ д′
(Ђ ђ)	Е е	Ж ж	Җ җ	З з	И и	Й й	К к
Л л	М м	Н н	Ң ң	О о	Ӧ ӧ	П п	Р р
С с	Т т	Т′ т′	(Ћ ћ)	У у	Ӱ ӱ	Υ υ	Ф ф
Х х	Һ һ	Ц ц	Ч ч	Ш ш	Щ щ	Ъ ъ	Ы ы
Ь ь	Э э	Ю ю	Я я	Θ θ

Very little has been published on the Urum language. There exists a very small lexicon^[7], and a small description of the language^[8].

1. ^ Garkavets, Alexander. North Azovian Urums - Greeks Speaking Turkic Language.
2. ^ "[1] Ethnologue"
3. ^ Казаков, Алексей (12 2000). Понтийские греки (Russian).
4. ^ Gordon, Raymond G. (ed.) (2005). Ethnologue Report for Urum. Ethnologue: Languages of the World. SIL International.
5. ^ Urum. Language Museum.
6. ^ Гаркавець, Олександр (2000). Урумський словник (pdf, html) (in Ukrainian, Urum), 632. 
7. ^ Podolsky, Baruch (1985). A Tatar - English Glossary. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. ISBN 3-447-00299-9. 
8. ^ Podolsky, Baruch (1986). "Notes on the Urum Language". Mediterranean Language Review 2: 99–112. 

v • d • e Altaic languages
Turkic languages • Mongolic languages • Tungusic languages • Buyeo languages* Notes: *A hypothetical language family that includes Korean and the Japonic languages.

v • d • e Turkic languages
Bulgar	Bulgar*† | Chuvash | Hunnic*† | Khazar†
Uyghur	Old Turkic† | Aini²| Chagatay† | Ili Turki | Lop | Uyghur | Uzbek
Kypchak	Baraba | Bashkir | Crimean Tatar¹ | Cuman† | Karachay-Balkar | Karaim | Karakalpak | Kazakh | Kipchak† | Krymchak | Kumyk | Nogai | Tatar | Urum¹ | Altay | Kyrgyz
Oghuz	Afshar | Azerbaijani | Crimean Tatar¹ | Gagauz | Khorasani Turkish | Ottoman Turkish† | Pecheneg† | Qashqai | Salar | Turkish | Turkmen | Urum¹
Khalaj	Khalaj
Northeastern	Chulym | Dolgan | Fuyü Gïrgïs | Khakas | Northern Altay | Shor | Tofa | Tuvan | Western Yugur | Sakha / Yakut
Notes: ¹Listed in more than one group, ²Mixed language, *Disputed, †Extinct