The Khorchin (MongolianᠬᠣᠷᠴᠢᠨQorčin, Chinese 科尔沁 Kē'ěrqìn) dialect is a variety of Mongolian spoken in the east of Inner Mongolia, namely in Hinggan League, in the north, north-east and east of Hinggan and in all but the south of the Tongliao region.[1] There were 2.08 million Khorchin Mongols in China in 2000,[2] so the Khorchin dialect may well have more than one million speakers, making it the largest dialect of Inner Mongolia.
Historical /t͡ʃʰ/ has become modern /ʃ/, and in some varieties, /s/ is replaced by /tʰ/.[4] Then, *u (<*ʊ<*u) has regressively assimilatedto/ɑ/ before *p, e.g. *putaha (Written Mongolian budaγ-a) > pata ‘rice’.[5] However, less systematic changes that pertain only to a number of words are far more notable, e.g. *t͡ʃʰital 'capacity'> Khorchin /xɛtl/.[6] This last example also illustrates that Khorchin allows for the consonant nuclei/l/ and /n/ (cp. [ɔln] 'many').[7]
The large vowel system developed through the depalatalization of consonants that phonemicized formerly allomorphic vowels, hence /œ/ and /ɛ/. On the other hand, *ö is absent, e.g. Proto-Mongolic*ɵŋke > Kalmyk/ɵŋ/, Khalkha /oŋk/ 'colour',[9] but Khorchin /uŋ/, thus merging with /u/.[10]/y/ is absent in the native words of some varieties and /ɚ/ is completely restricted to loanwords from Chinese,[11] but as these make up a very substantial part of Khorchin vocabulary, it is not feasible to postulate a separate loanword phonology. This also resulted in a vowel harmony system that is rather different from Chakhar and Khalkha: /u/ may appear in non-initial syllables of words without regard for vowel harmony, as may /ɛ/ (e.g. /ɑtu/ 'horses' and /untʰɛ/ 'expensive';[12] Khalkha would have /ɑtʊ/ 'horses' and /untʰe/). On the other hand, /u/ still determines a word as front-vocalic when appearing in the first syllable, which doesn't hold for /ɛ/ and /i/.[13] In some subdialects, /ɛ/ and /œ/ which originated from palatalized /a/ and /ɔ/, have changed vowel harmony class according to their acoustic properties and become front vowels in the system, and the same holds for their long counterparts. E.g. *mori-bar 'by horse' > Khorchin [mœːrœr] vs. Jalaid subdialect [mœːrər].[14]
Khorchin uses the old comitative/-lɛ/ to delimit an action within a certain time. A similar function is fulfilled by the suffix/-ɑri/ that is, however, restricted to environments in the past stratum.[15] In contrast to other Mongolian varieties, in Khorchin Chinese verbs can be directly borrowed; other varieties have to borrow Chinese verbs as Mongolian nouns and then derive these to verbs. Compare the new loan /t͡ʃɑŋlu-/ 'to ask for money' < zhāngluó (张罗) with the older loan /t͡ʃəːl-/ 'to borrow' < jiè (借)[16] that is present in all Mongolian varieties and contains the derivational suffix /-l-/.
^Bayančoγtu also assumes a phoneme /ё/ (~ [ɤ]), but following the analysis of Svantesson et al. 2005 that claims that Mongolian (except for Ordos) only distinguishes phonemic and non-phonemic vowels in non-initial syllables, we arrive at an analysis where [ɤ] and [ə] are in complementary distribution, thus constituting a single phoneme. We thus arrive at the similar phoneme system as that of Sečenbaγatur et al. 2005: 317 who, however, don't mention the vowel /ɚ/ that is restricted to loanwords and doesn't play a role in the vowel harmony system of Khorchin.
Qai yan (2003): Qorčin aman ayalγu ba aru qorčin aman ayalγun-u abiyan-u ǰarim neyitelig ončaliγ. In: Öbür mongγul-un ündüsüten-ü yeke surγaγuli 2005/3: 91-94.
