Latvian Latvieu valoda
Spoken in	Latvia
Typology	SVO
Classification by family
- Indo-European - Balto-Slavic languages - Baltic languages - East Baltic languages - Latvian
Official status
Official language of	Latvia
Language codes
ISO 639-1	lv
ISO 639-2	lav
ISO 639-3	lav
IETF	lv
Sample
Article I of the Declaration of Human Rights ( see text in French ) 1. Pants Visi cilvki piedzimst brive a vienldzgi sava pacie a tiesbs. Vini ir ar apveltti saprtu a sirdsapziu a viiem jizturas Citam ready citu brlbas Gara.
change

Latvian (or Latvian, Latvian: is a language which belongs to the Baltic East family Indo-European.

Summary 1 History 2 Dialects 3 Geographical distribution 4 Writing 5 Phonetics 6 Grammar 7 Vocabulary 8 Notes and references 9 See also 9.1 Related articles 9.2 External link

/ / History

Closely related to Lithuanian , Latvian formed until the ^sixteenth century a branch called the Latgalian. This branch also included the Curonian the smigalien and Selonians now extinct. The oldest written texts in Latvian hymns were translated by Nicholas Ramm, a German pastor in Riga, a collection which dates from 1530.

He later took over its history the influence of German , but also live , in the Estonian and Russian. As countries, Latvia had long historical ties with Germany , the Polish , the Swedish and Russian. Both during the era of the czars , when Latvia was part of the Russian empire , and during the occupation the Soviet in the second half of the ^twentieth century , Russians have immigrated into the country without learning Latvian. The Russian dominated in virtually all spheres of society, and Latvian became increasingly marginalized in the country. However, Latvian does not lose its official status. Today, Latvian is the language of about 60% of the population and less than 50% in major cities. In the process for independence in the early 1990s , Latvia, like the Estonia , proposed legislation to prevent the extinction of the language.

Dialects

The Latvian has three main dialects: the Livonian top Latvian (Latgalian) and Latvian Western literary form that represents the current.

Geographic distribution

Latvian is the mother tongue of 1.4 million people in Latvia which is the official language and about 500 000 people abroad.

Latvia	1,394,000 in 1995
United States	100 000
Russia	60 000
Australia	36 000
Canada	24 000
Germany	9 000
Lithuania	4 400
Ukraine	7 000
Estonia	3 000
Belarus	2 300
Sweden	4 000
Brazil	7 000
New Zealand	500
United Kingdom	9 000
Venezuela	500

Writing

Although it was written in Gothic script before the ^twentieth century , it now uses the Latin alphabet enriched signs diacritics ( macron , hacek , cedilla ). 34 letters of the alphabet does not contain q, w, x or y (except in foreign words), but adds the letters diacrites A, C, E, G, I, K, L, N, R, S, U and. The phoneme having amu noted by r, the letter is nowadays generally ignored, at least in Latvia own publications. The digraph ch Phonetics

Each phoneme is denoted by a letter clean, except for dz and dz, the two letters written by the sounds e and E (open and closed), and oral vowel o (long or short) foreign words is not distinguished graphically the proper diphthong o Latvian - which can be recorded in books teaching uo. It is easy to guess the pronunciation of a word while reading. The pitch accent is not mobile as in Lithuania , but takes on the first syllable , with few exceptions.

Describe the Latvian alphabet without including digraphs (dz, dz and c. now abandoned, and diphthongs) shows the great confusion in the literature and minds. Except sometimes I - we can find comes after i and i - the diphthongs are not distinguished in alphabetical lists. So are found in the purely Latin alphabet.

Grammar

• Typological point of view, is a Latvian language inflectional.
• The names are as in French between two types : male or female, each characterized by specific terminations. The number duel appears in rare cases.
• The names are divided into six or seven groups of declination , as grammarians and appreciation exceptions - few, in a complex but regular.
• The system of declination are seven cases: nominative , genitive , accusative , dative , instrumental , rental , vocative. However, the instrumental is - almost always - identical in the singular to the accusative , in the plural dative , grammarians - heedless of rigor - have evacuated their works.
• There is no article.
• For adjectives - varying in gender and number - there is a definite form and shape indefinitely, each according to his declination.
• The verbal system has three time simple: present , imperfect and future , and three compound tenses: past tense , past perfect , future perfect. There are five modes : the indicative , the imperative , the conditional , the connective (used to express doubt about the truth of a statement) and the flow.

Vocabulary

Word	Translation	Report from Latin etymological
earth	zeme	humus
sky	Debes	nimbus
water	Uden	unda
fire	uguns	ignis
man	vrietis	vir
Women	sieviete
Dining	is	eder
drink	dzert	vorare
great	liel
small	mazs	magnus (reverse)
night	nakts	nox
day	diena	dies
hello	labdien

References

See also