Mordvin (people)

The Mordvins (Mordva) are a people who speak languages of the Finno-Permic branch of the Finno-Ugric language family.

Less than one third of Mordvins live in the autonomous republic of Mordovia, Russian Federation, in the basin of the Volga River. The rest are scattered over the Russian oblasts of Samara, Penza, Orenburg and Nizhni Novgorod, as well as Tatarstan, Central Asia and Siberia.

The Mordvins consist of two groups: Erzya Mordvins, who speak Erzya, and Moksha Mordvins, who speak Moksha. Both prefer to call themselves Erzä and Moksha respectively, usually don't recognize the Mordva term, and consider themselves different peoples.

The Qaratay Mordvin ethnic group live in Kama Tamağı District of Tatarstan, and speak Tatar, but with a large proportion of Mordvin vocabulary. Another Mordva group (Teryukhan), living in Nizhni Novgorod Oblast of Russia speak pure Russian since 19th century. Both of these groups recognize the term Mordva for themselves.

Since 1950s their numbers, their presence in Mordovia, and their knowledge of their mother tongues has decreased. In 2003 there were around 1,054,000 Mordvins.

• List of Mordvins

External link

• Library of Congress: Mordvins, the initial text is based on this reference