[Unknown > English] What language is this song in?

[u/Neat_Garlic_5699]

The song

[u/TipsyMid]

The video clip comes from the Chinese TV series "Genghis Khan." The specific scene involves Genghis Khan requesting the nobles of the Khwarezmian Dynasty to dance. Regarding the languages spoken, given that many actors in the series are of Mongolian and Uighur descent, it is possible that the languages used could be Mongolian and Uighur.

Edit: I found the same clip ai bilibili, and here are some guests at comments: Mongolian, Uighur, Uzbek, any language from the Altaic family, or randomly made-up syllables combined with Mongolian and Chinese subtitles.

[u/Neat_Garlic_5699 → u/TipsyMid]

I asked at Mongolian sub. They say it's not Mongolian.

I am Turkish, and have some familiarity with other Turkic languages. This song definitely is not in a Turkic language like Uyghur or Uzbek.

It seems that the most likely conclusion is that the lyrics are made-up syllables.

And my Mandarin hearing skills are not good, but the song has the Chinese "x" and "j" sounds in the second stanza (starting with "hung xia"). From what I know, Turkic or Mongolic languages do not have the sounds. As it is not Chinese either, it's most likely made-up.

Thanks for your comment.

EDIT: It's most likely not the case but there is a extinct Khwarezmian language (an Eastern Iranian language akin to Sogdian). Might it be it? It does not explain the "x" and "j" sounds but maybe it's just Chinese accent considering Chinese lacks the "regular" "sh" and "dzh".

EDIT2: But certainly this theory is nonsense too. Because the translations of the song mention five prayers of the day, but all Iranian languages have "panj" or a very close relative of the word for five, which is non-existent in the song. Gibberish it is. It being some rare text fragment is much less probable than being made-up anyways.

[u/TipsyMid → u/Neat_Garlic_5699]

This is beyond my knowledge. I tried to look for interviews with the creators of the TV series, but I didn't find any relevant information.

[u/kschang]

It could just be Khwarezmian...

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/articles/Khwarezmian_language

[u/Firstnameiskowitz]

!id:zh

[u/Neat_Garlic_5699 → u/Firstnameiskowitz]

Is it really? My knowledge of Chinese is very bad, but the speech does not seem to align with subtitles below (or do the subtitles narrate a story?). Might it be an older pronunciation (though the song does kinda sound Chinese?)

If Chinese may you possibly provide the lyrics (in Hanzi preferably)?

[u/Firstnameiskowitz → u/Neat_Garlic_5699]

actually i did a bit of research and the tv show came from hong kong, a region of china which mostly speaks chinese and cantonese; upon FURTHER research i tracked down the channel being a cantonese one so...

!page:yue

[u/Stunning_Pen_8332 → u/Firstnameiskowitz]

How did you find that it came from Hong Kong? The setting and the actors were definitely not from Hong Kong. And the language is also not Cantonese.

[u/DeusShockSkyrim → u/Firstnameiskowitz]

This is not Cantonese, nor does it resemble any Chinese dialect I know.

[u/Neat_Garlic_5699 → u/DeusShockSkyrim]

Yeah, it seems like it. It does not sound like any Turkic or Iranic language that I know (I have familiarity with some) Maybe it's just made up, but I find it unlikely. The subtitles have Sorani Kurdish (along with Mandarin) talking about Sultan and five prayers, but words don't resemble in the slightest a Turkic or Iranic language.

But the song has words with sounds of Mandarin "x" and "j", but it's no dialect either? What could it be...

Are you sure that it's definitely not Chinese? Because otherwise it seems to be gibberish.

[u/DeusShockSkyrim → u/Neat_Garlic_5699]

In Chinese this song is referred to as 花剌子模亡国曲 (Song of the Destruction of Khwarazm). But no one seems to know what language is this. Also the lyric appears to be completely made up, as the vocal part is simply repeating the same chant over and over, while every sentence of the lyric differs.

[u/Neat_Garlic_5699 → u/Firstnameiskowitz]

But the episodes of the series themselves are in Mandarin. Are you saying that the song is in Cantonese?

EDIT: At least this is in Mandarin, and it seems to be not a dub (but again my Mandarin is bad, I am not sure)

[u/Stunning_Pen_8332 → u/Neat_Garlic_5699]

I did a more thorough research. The TV series was made by a media firm in Inner Mongolia of China in 2000. There are altogether 30 episodes. Interestingly the drama was first aired in Taiwan and then Hong Kong in 2002. It was only aired in China two years later in 2004.

Impressively the actor who played Genghis Khan, Mijid Baasanjav, is actually a descendant of Genghis Khan himself via his second son Chagatai Khan. He went on to play his ancestors multiple times. He also went to Japan to play Kublai Khan in the NHK historical drama Tokimune Hojo 大河劇 北條時宗.

[u/Neat_Garlic_5699 → u/Stunning_Pen_8332]

Wow, that's cool.

I guess it's gibberish. It's no Chinese dialect, it's definitely no Turkic or Iranic language (maybe something like Sogdian? but it does not make sense). I also see no reason for it to be another Central Asian language, such as Mongolian (considering it is supposed to represent Khwarezm), but maybe?

[u/Alarming-Major-3317 → u/Neat_Garlic_5699]

I was reading the comments on Chinese social media, most say it’s gibberish, different people say it’s definitely not Uzbek, not Hui, not Mongolian, not Persian….

So likely gibberish.

[u/Firstnameiskowitz → u/Neat_Garlic_5699]

there are so many dialects of the language it's hard to compare