Sokna language

{{Redirect|Sawkna language|the town Sawkna|Sokna, Libya}}

{{Short description|Extinct Eastern Berber language of Libya}}

{{Infobox language

|name=Sokna

|nativename=Tasuknit

|states=Libya

|region=Fezzan

|extinct=?

|ref=e17

|familycolor=Afro-Asiatic

|fam2=Berber

|fam3=Eastern

|fam4=Awjila–Sokna

|iso3=swn

|glotto=sawk1238

|glottorefname=Sawknah-Fogaha

|dia1=Sokna

|dia2=Fezzan (Foqaha, Tmessa)

}}

Sokna (also Sawknah, Sukna; native name: Tasuknit){{cite web |url=http://salvadorjafer.net/linguasfera/1Afroasiatic/10Tamazic/lingtamazic.htm |title=Linguasfera: Tamazic (Berber) |lang=ca |website=Llengües, Literatures i Cultures del Món, [LLCM] |access-date=2015-10-27}} is a presumably extinct Eastern Berber language which was spoken in the town of Sokna (Isuknan) and the village of Fuqaha in northeastern Fezzan in Libya. According to Václav Blažek (1999), Sokna was also spoken in the oasis of Tmassa.{{cite book |author-link=Václav Blažek |first=Václav |last=Blažek |title=Numerals: Comparative-etymological Analyses of Numeral Systems and Their Implications : Saharan, Nubian, Egyptian, Berber, Kartvelian, Uralic, Altaic and Indo-European Languages |series=Spisy Masarykovy univerzity v Brně, Filozofická fakulta |date=1999 |volume=322 |isbn=9788021020702}}

The most extensive and recent materials on it are Sarnelli (1924){{cite journal |last=Sarnelli |first=Tommaso |year=1924–1925 |title=Il dialetto berbero di Sokna: Materiali lessicali, testi manoscritti in caratteri arabi, con trascrizione e traduzione |journal=Supplemento All'Africa Italiana |lang=it}} for Sokna and Paradisi (1963){{cite journal |last=Paradisi |first=Umberto |year=1963 |title=Il linguaggio berbero di El-Fogaha (Fezzan) |journal=Istituto Orientale di Napoli |volume=XIII |pages=93–126}} for El-Fogaha. Both articles report that the language was spoken only by a handful of old people at the time, so it is generally presumed to be extinct.

Aikhenvald & Militarev (1984) and Blench (2006) consider Sokna and Fezzan to be separate languages. Blench lists Tmessa and Al-Foqaha as dialects of Fezzan.