language spoken in Kabardino-Balkaria republic, in southwestern Russia, in the northern Caucasus. It is related to the Abkhaz, Abaza, Adyghian, and Ubykh languages, which constitute the Abkhazo-Adyghian, or Northwest Caucasian, language group. These languages are noted for the great number of consonant distinctions and the small number of vowel distinctions in their sound systems. Since the October Revolution of 1917, Kabardian has been a written language. The Roman alphabet was the first system used, but from 1936 the language was written in Cyrillic.