Mush dialect (Armenian: Մշոյ բարբառ, Mšo barbař) is a Western Armenian dialect formerly spoken in the city of Mush (Muş) and the historic region of Taron, in present-day eastern Turkey. As a result of the extermination of the native Armenian population during the genocide of 1915, the dialect is almost completely extinct today with only several thousand native speakers in a number of villages in Armenia and three Armenian-populated villages in the Samtskhe-Javakheti province of Georgia.
During the Russo-Turkish War of (1877–78), Armenians from Mush and Alashkert established villages in the Erivan Governorate: in Aparan and south of Novo-Bayazit (present-day Gavar). According to Adjarian there were 21 Armenian villages in the Erivan Governorate where the Mush dialect was spoken. Another group of Armenians from Khnus settled near Akhalkalaki, particularly in three villages: Heshtia, Toria and Ujmana.[2][3]
According to a 1955 article the Mush dialect was spoken in villages located in the following districts (raion) of Soviet Armenia: Talin, Aparan, Artik, Aghin, Ejmiatsin, and Martuni.[4]
One notable village in Armenia where the dialect is still spoken is Kamo in the northwestern Shirak Province.[5][6]
^"Կամո [Kamo]". shirak.mtaes.am (in Armenian). Ministry of Territorial Administration and Emergency Situations of Republic of Armenia. Archived from the original on 2015-10-25. Բնակչությունը հիմնականում հայեր են և խոսում են մշո բարբառով:
^Hacikyan, Agop Jack (2005). The Heritage of Armenian Literature: From The Eighteenth Century To Modern Times. Detroit: Wayne State University Press. p. 566. ISBN9780814332214.
^YouTube video of William Saroyan's visit to Soviet Armenia in the 1970s. He clearly speaks the Mush dialect.
Baghdasarian-Tapaltsian, S. H. (1958). Msho barbare [The Dialect of Mush] (in Armenian). Yerevan: Armenian National Academy of Sciences. — a wide study on the dialect, includes 15 stories, 710 proverbs, sayings, blessings
