Georgian (ქართული) is a non-indoeuropean language, the main member of the Kartvelian language branch. It’s spoken mainly in Georgia and it’s the official language of the Republic of Georgia. Other languages belonging to this family are Mingrelian (მეგრული), Svan (სვანური) and Laz (ლაზური). Needless to say, it has *nothing* to do with Russian.
During its long history, Georgian has been written using three different scripts. Asomtavruli, Nuskhuri and Mkhedruli (the last one is used for everyday matters, while the first two are only used by the Georgian Orthodox Church).
The Mkhedruli script (meaning “military”) is composed of 33 characters, with a strict grapheme-phoneme correspondence. It has 28 consonants and 5 vowels, and it’s unicameral (no uppercase-lowercase differences). It’s written from left to right.
Notable characteristics of Georgian are the lack of gender, a case-system grammar and an inordinate love for overwhelming consonant clusters.
It’s surely a challenge, but one I am willing to take.
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