Uyghur (ئۇيغۇرچە, Uyghurche; formerly known as Eastern Turkish) is a Turkic language with 8 to 11 million speakers, spoken primarily by the Uyghur people in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of Western China. There are several writing systems used to write Uyghur. While Uyghurs usually use the Uyghur alphabet, an alphabet based on the Arabic alphabet, there are also two Latin and one Cyrillic alphabet that can be used to write Uyghur.
Uyghur language
Designations and delimitation
In Turkological research in Turkey, the language is called "Uyghur Turkish" (Uygur Türkçesi). In the 19th century and early 20th century, the language was referred to as "Turkish" (Turki), and in German Turkology also as "East Turkic" until well into the 20th century. The forerunner is "Chagatai".
The language of the medieval Uyghurs and the so-called Uyghur texts named after them, which have been found in large numbers at various sites in Xinjiang from the 9th to the 17th century, must be distinguished from the Uyghur language discussed here. The language of these texts and that of the medieval Uyghurs is attributed to Old Turkic. The descendants of the medieval Uyghurs are the Yugur, as far as they did not adopt Islam and merged into the Islamic and Turkic-speaking population of Xinjiang, which today is called Uyghur.
Classification
Together with the Uzbek language, the Uyghur language belongs to the Karluk languages, a subcategory of the Turkic languages. Other Uyghur languages are Yugur, Ainu and Ili Turki.