Selonian language

Infobox Language
name = Selonian, Selian
nativename =
states = Latvia and Lithuania
region = Europe
extinct = 16th century
iso1 =
iso2 =
iso3 = sxl
familycolor = Indo-European
fam1 = Indo-European
fam2 = Balto-Slavic
fam3 = Baltic
fam4 = Western

Selonian was a language appertaining to the Baltic languages group of the Indo-European languages family. This language was spoken by the Eastern Baltic tribe of Selonians, who lived until the 15th century in Selonia, a territory in South Eastern Latvia and North Eastern Lithuania.

During the 13th-15th centuries the Selonians lost their language being assimilated by Latgalians and partly by Lithuanians.

It is considered that Selonian language kept the proto Baltic phonemes an, en, in, un like the Lithuanian language, but the proto Baltic soft k, g were changed to c, dz like the Latvian language, as well as the proto Baltic š, ž were changed to s, z.

The traces of the Selonian language can be still found in the territories Selonians inhabited, especially in the accent and phonetics of the so-called Selonian dialect of the Latvian language.There are some traces of the Selonian language in the North Eastern sub-dialects of Aukštaitian dialect of Lithuanian language, mostly in the lexicon.

References