A Review of Mela Mahmoudi Bazidi’s Tuhfetu’l-Khullan fi Zimani Kurdan

Abstract

This work deals with the manuscript work of Tuhfetu’l-Khullan fi Zimani Kurdan in terms of identity, physical structure, and content. There is no doubt that this essay belongs to Mela Mahmoudi Bazidi and that was written by him. Bazidi says that Alexandre Jaba was interested in Kurdish and he requested him to compose such a work. Thereupon, he says that he wrote this book as a gift for his friend (i.e. for Jaba) who has been called by Bazidi as a Fellow. As an independent work, the manuscript is currently located in Alexandre Jaba’s collection in the Russian Academy of Sciences Library in St. Petersburg in a solid case. The 143-page work presents the grammar of Kurmanji dialect of Kurdish language. The work is important in many respects. The manuscript, one of the oldest and rare works on the Kurdish language, is an original work and does not have a second copy. Besides offering Kurdish grammar, the work is an invaluable treasure trove in terms of syntax, morphology, phonology, spelling rules, alphabet, punctuation, language features, influence of the other languages, and the cultural items. The work, basically tackles the following topics: definitions and parts of verb, definition and parts of nouns, letters, times, pronouns, noun phrase, gerunds and infinitives, adjective, adverbs of space and time, prepositions, suffixes, conjunctions.