Khitan: deciphering China’s forgotten Para-Mongolic language

A steppe empire’s undeciphered glyphs are at the verge of recovery. Meet the Khitan language! Subscribe for more: Become my patron: ~ Briefly ~ This animation tells the linguistic story of a script that was invented over a thousand years ago and lasted for three centuries. Despite everything written about them in Chinese history and the written evidence in their language, their scripts remain somewhat of a mystery. We’ll get an understanding of the difference between the two scripts, the attempts at decipherment so far, and what we do know about them. We’ll end comparing identifiable Khitan vocabulary to other languages to see where it fits into North Asia’s linguistic scene. ~ Credits ~ Art, narration and animation by Josh from NativLang. A bit of the music, too. Most of the music is by Kevin MacLeod (), with one piece by Darren Curtis. Please see my sources document below for full names and