Khalaj, Turkic

The Khalaj are a small Turkic people of central Iran whose language is one of the most remarkable in the Turkic family. Khalaj is not an Oghuz language like its Azerbaijani and Turkmen neighbours but the last survivor of a separate branch, descended from Arghu, a Turkic language described by Mahmud al-Kashgari in the 11th century. The German Turkologist Gerhard Doerfer identified it in 1968 and showed that it preserves features lost everywhere else, such as word-initial h- and Proto-Turkic vowel length.

Medieval geographers placed the Khalaj between India and Sistan, around Ghazni and Zabul in today's Afghanistan, where most were later absorbed into the Pashtuns (some trace the Ghilzai to them). Khalaj adventurers founded the Khalji dynasty of Bengal (1204-27) and the Khalji sultanate of Delhi (1290-1320). One branch moved west with the Seljuks and settled near Saveh before Timur's time; their descendants live in the villages of 'Khalajestan' between Qom, Tafresh and Ashtian. Centuries of contact and 20th-century assimilation have Persianised them: most Khalaj speak Persian, many identify as Persian, and only about 19,000 still speak Khalaj.

The Khalaj are village farmers and herders of a dry upland, growing wheat, barley and orchard fruit with qanat irrigation and keeping sheep and goats; some were semi-nomadic within living memory. Their villages, such as Talkhab in Tafresh County and the villages of Khalajestan district around Dastjerd in Qom Province, keep Khalaj folk poetry, proverbs and Muharram dirges (nowheh) in the language, and local writers have produced Khalaj dictionaries and poetry. Researcher Ali Asghar Jamrasi of Talkhab has documented the language. Family life follows the patterns of rural central Iran, with strong kinship ties and village endogamy.

The Khalaj are Twelver Shia of Qizilbash heritage, living close to Qom, Iran's centre of Shia learning, and their religious life follows the rhythm of central Iranian villages: Muharram mourning, ta'zieh, vows and votive meals, and pilgrimage to Qom and Mashhad. Some Muharram laments are still chanted in Khalaj.

There is no Scripture, JESUS film or known audio recording in Khalaj. Almost all Khalaj speak Persian fluently, so Persian Bibles, film and media are accessible to them. No church or known believer exists among them.