Kurtöp language
Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Bhutan
title: "Kurtöp language" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["languages-of-bhutan", "east-bodish-languages", "languages-written-in-tibetan-script"] description: "Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Bhutan" topic_path: "linguistics" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurtöp_language" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0
::summary Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Bhutan ::
::data[format=table title="Infobox language"]
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| name | Kurtöp |
| nativename | Kurtöpkha, Zhâke |
| states | Bhutan |
| familycolor | Sino-Tibetan |
| speakers | 15,000 |
| date | 2011 |
| ref | e18 |
| fam2 | Tibeto-Burman |
| fam3 | Tibeto-Kanauri (?) |
| fam4 | Bodish |
| fam5 | East Bodish |
| script | Tibetan script |
| iso3 | xkz |
| glotto | kurt1248 |
| glottorefname | Kurtokha |
| :: |
|name=Kurtöp |nativename=Kurtöpkha, Zhâke |states= Bhutan |familycolor=Sino-Tibetan |speakers=15,000 |date=2011 |ref=e18 |fam2=Tibeto-Burman |fam3=Tibeto-Kanauri (?) |fam4=Bodish |fam5=East Bodish |script=Tibetan script |iso3=xkz |glotto=kurt1248 |glottorefname=Kurtokha ::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c9/Pema_speaking_Kurtöp.webm" caption="Pema speaking Kurtöp"] ::
The Kurtöp language (Dzongkha: ཀུར་ཏོ་པ་ཁ་; Wylie: Kur-to-pa kha; Kurtöpkha, also called Kurtö and Zhâke) is an East Bodish language spoken in Kurtoe Gewog, Lhuntse District, Bhutan. In 1993, there were about 10,000 speakers of Kurtöp.
Related languages
Historically, Kurtöp and its speakers have had close contact with speakers of Bumthang, Nupbi and Kheng languages, nearby languages of central and eastern Bhutan to the extent that they may be considered part of a wider collection of "Bumthang languages".
References
References
- van Driem, George L.. (1993). "Language Policy in Bhutan". [[School of Oriental and African Studies.
- Schicklgruber, Christian. (1998). "Bhutan: Mountain Fortress of the Gods". Shambhala.
- van Driem, George. (2007). "Encyclopedia of the World's Endangered Languages". [[Routledge]].
- van Driem, George. (2007). "Language diversity endangered". Walter de Gruyter.
::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::