Lamzira KOBAIDZE

Mtiulian dialect is one of the distinguished ones out of highland dialects of the Eastern Georgia. It is linked to the mountain speech by the features characterized for ancient Georgian while it is close to Kartlian and Kakhetian by new features. It is known from the scientific literature, that Mtiulians were resettled in different places with support of the Soviet Government. Currently, they live in Dusheti, Tianeti, Kaspi, Tetritskaro (Manglisi), Leningori, Tsiteltskaro (Kvemo Kedi), Aspindza and Samgori districts. Close relationship with different dialects has changed their speech. In December 1944 the population were resettled from Mtiuleti to the villages of Aspindza district, such as Idumala, Oshora, Sakudabeli, Orgora, Ghobieti, Akhalsheni, Khertvisi, Rustavi, Ota... Some of the villages listed above are abandoned nowadays. It is natural, that local Meskhetian population met to those who were resettled there. As a result of living together of Mtiulian and Meskhetian population of many years both dialects have experienced some changes. The peculiarities of the case category are more interesting for us which demonstrates interesting and diversified picture of both dialects. The article refers to the case category and the changes related to it in both dialects.  The discussion is based on the dialect material taken from the field demonstrating the character of both dialects clearly.

The idea of ​​this paper is to present concisely and clearly the specific linguistic aspects of the two dialects in phonetics, morphology and syntax. We are going to provide a detailed analysis in the monograph.

Key words: Dialect, Mtiulian dialect, Meskhetian (Samtskhe-Javakheti) dialect, phoneme, V-vocal, C-consonant, emphatic vowel.