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Which languages belong to the South Caucasian or Kartvelian family?
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The South Caucasian, or Kartvelian, language family consists of four distinct languages:
- Georgian: The only language in the family with an ancient literary tradition, dating back to the 5th century CE.123
- Mingrelian (also known as Megrelian): Some scholars classify this and Laz as dialects of a single language rather than independent entities.13
- Laz (also known as Chan): A nonliterate language closely related to Mingrelian.13
- Svan: Linguists believe this language separated from the other three at an early stage, as it retains several archaic structural features.13
These languages are spoken south of the main Caucasus range and are believed to have descended from a common protolanguage, as evidenced by their shared grammatical characteristics and vocabulary.3