Classical Azerbaijani

Classical Azerbaijani (uncountable)

1. The register of the Azerbaijani language, characterized by extensive lexical and grammatical borrowing from Persian, which was used for literary purposes during the classical period of Azerbaijani literature, approximately from 16th to early 20th century.

   • 1985, Tadeusz Swietochowski, “A century of Russian rule”, in Russian Azerbaijan, 1905-1920: The Shaping of a National Identity in a Muslim Community‎, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 26:

     The literary revival in the native language stemmed from the need to communicate the ideas of the enlightenment to as wide a public as possible. Akhundzadä, who throughout most of his life composed lyric poetry in Persian, when writing works that carried a message of social importance used a language comprehensible to all his countrymen, which he called Türki. The renaissance of a native literature, a by-product of the movement, was thus its first and most tangible accomplishment. The hold of Persian as the chief literary language in Azerbaijan was broken, followed by the rejection of classical Azerbaijani, an artificial, heavily Iranized idiom that had long been in use along with Persian, though in a secondary position.

     1992, Walter Feldman, “Interpreting the Poetry of Mäkhtumquli”, in Jo-Ann Gross, editor, Muslims in Central Asia: Expressions of Identity and Change‎, Durkham and London: Durkham University Press, →ISBN, pages 167-89:

     Mäkhtumquli avoids the altered syntax so typical of the Chagatay ghazal and in particular the Persian syntactic constructions. The relation of his language to classical Azerbaijani has been noted (Benzing 1964:39), and this is probably a result of the influence of poetic models in that language, seen also in the work of Andalib.

     2014, Jamil Hasanli, “Attempts of Party Bodies to Strengthen Control in Ideology”, in Khrushchev's Thaw and National Identity in Soviet Azerbaijan, 1954–1959‎, London: Lexington Books, →ISBN, page 325:

     Then the following reports were made: “World-wide significance of Fizuli's Poetry” (prof.H. Arasly), “Questions of mastership in Fizuli's creativity” (prof. Mir Jalal), “Fizuli and the Azerbaijani music” (A. Badabayli), “Fizuli as the founder of the Classical Azerbaijani literary language” (prof. A. Demirchizadeh) [...]