Akhvakh (Ашwалlи мицlи)

Akhvakh is a North East Caucasian language spoken by about 6,500 people mainly in the southwest of the Republic of Dagestan of the Russian Federation, especially in the mountains between the Andi-Koisu and Avar-Koisu rivers.

There are two main Akhvakh dialects: Northern Akhvakh and Southern Akhvakh, and due to the limited mutually intelligibility between them, Avar, a closely related language is used as a lingua franca between speakers of the dialects.

There are between one to two thousand people in Akhvakh-Dere, a village in the Zaqatala district of Azerbaijan, who speak a form of Akhvakh similar to the northern dialect.

Akhvakh has no standard written form and is not taught in schools. It is used mainly in homes, while Avar and Russian and used elsewhere.

Since the 1940s a number of linguistics studies of Akhvakh have been undertaken, and a few texts in Akhvakh have been published including a collection of stories in 1949.