מוקשה

Moksha (мокшень кяль mokshen kjal') is one of two Mordvinic Uralic languages alongside Erzya, with ~250K speakers. Both are co-official with Russian in the Republic of Mordovia (capital Saransk), but they are not mutually intelligible despite shared ancestry — they diverged before the medieval period and are now separate written languages. Moksha has more western/southern distribution than Erzya, while Erzya is more east/north. Notable for an unusual reduced-vowel /ə/ phoneme (written ъ in Cyrillic, distinct from Russian usage), 13 grammatical cases, definite/indefinite/possessive declensions, an uvular consonant series, and SOV word order. Cyrillic-based orthography with extra letters since 1922 (with a brief Latin Yañalif phase 1928-37). Literary tradition since 1920s national-revival period. UNESCO classifies as definitely endangered due to ongoing Russification.