From WikiLang
 Mari pages
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| Introduction · Pronouns · Verbs |
| Finno-Ugric Languages | |
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| Baltic-Finnic |  Estonian ·  Finnish ·  Ingrian ·  Karelian ·  Livonian ·  Veps ·  Votic ·  Võro
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| Permic |  Komi ·  Udmurt
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| Ugric |  Hungarian ·  Khanty ·  Mansi
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| N/A |  Erzya · Mari · Moksha
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An Introduction to the Language
The Mari language, spoken by more than 600,000 people, belongs to the Uralic language family. It is spoken primarily in the Mari Republic (Mari: Марий Эл, Marii El, i.e., 'Mari land') of the Russian Federation as well as in the area along the Vyatka river basin and eastwards to the Urals. Mari speakers, known as the Mari are found also in the Tatarstan, Udmurtia, and Perm regions.
Mari today has a unified standard form with two variants (Hill and Meadow aka Western and Eastern, with the Eastern variant prevailing in everyday usage), using a modified version of the Cyrillic alphabet, and is the titular and official language of its republic, alongside Russian. The use of two "variants", as opposed to two "languages", has been hotly debated: Maris recognize the unity of the ethnic group, and the two forms are very close, but distinct enough to cause some problems with communication.
The variant of Mari described in the wikilang pages, is the Eastern/Meadow Mari.
Family
Uralic
- Mari
Spoken in
Spoken in Marij El in Russia by over 600,000 people.
