Finisterre languages
Language family of Papua New Guinea
The Finisterre languages are a language family, spoken in the Finisterre Range of Papua New Guinea, classified within the original Trans, New Guinea (TNG) proposal, and William A. Foley considers their TNG identity to be established. They share with the Huon languages a small closed class of verbs taking pronominal object prefixes some of which are cognate across both families (Suter 2012), strong morphological evidence that they are related.
The most populous Finisterre languages are Wantoat, Rawa, and Yopno, with about 10,000 speakers apiece, and Iyo, with about half that number.
01Internal structure
Huon and Finisterre, and then the connection between them, were identified by Kenneth McElhanon (1967, 1970). They are clearly valid language families. Finisterre contains six clear branches. Beyond that, classification is based on lexicostatistics, which does not provide precise classification results. The outline below follows McElhanon and Carter et al. (2012).
- Finisterre family
- Erap branch
- Gusap-Mot branch
- Uruwa branch: Sakam (Kutong), Som, Nukna (Komutu), Yau, ?Weliki
- Wantoat branch: Awara, Wantoat (Yagawak, Bam), Tuma-Irumu
- Warup branch: Asaro'o (Morafa), Molet, Bulgebi, Degenan, Tandɨ (Yagomi), Forak, Guya (Guiarak), Gwahatike (Dahating), Muratayak (Asat)
- Yupna branch: Domung, Ma (Mebu), Nankina, Bonkiman, Yopno (Kewieng, Wandabong, Nokopo, Isan), ?Yout Wam
02Vocabulary comparison
The following basic vocabulary words are from McElhanon & Voorhoeve (1970) and Retsema et al. (2009), as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database:
Erap branch Gusap-Mot branch Uruwa branch Wantoat branch Warup branch Yupna branch gloss Mungkip Uri
(Sintogoro dialect)Iyo Yau
(Mup dialect)Tuma-Irumu
(Irumu dialect)Degenan Yopno
(Nokopo dialect)head kʰige dimin kemba kuwit kʌyi tʌnam busuŋʌ hair sɨsa; sɪsa sɨsɑ hu dzioŋ pundzi gɔt daŋwai ear maget; magitnɛ mɑgi ɔsumbi ɔndɔm sukun nʌm kɔsim eye dae; da·ge de tɔŋi dan dapur dabəl daƀʌl nose miminɛ; mimiŋge kininiʔ umi tanma inami tomoni tooth ma miti man men mɛn gɛn tongue mabɛm; mabim mɨmbɛm mipi motbin mɛmber mɛlɛ mel leg kada kʌjoŋ louse mi; mīŋ tumuŋ imi imon imʌn iməŋ iat dog sap kuɣɔŋ isa sap aŋ umʌt noŋkwak pig kare bird jāŋ jɑŋ nũ egg qiliq blood we·q ʌmɑ bone kwadi; kwadzi kʌti: wimbi kurat konzar doruk; ʌtʌt kataar skin girim fugu kowi gib gup; kʌndʌp meᵲ- gʌp; kandap breast nom nʌm susu mum nonoŋ mum naŋ tree bɛm fɨɾi man mɛ ʌmi amna ama amen woman tam tɑmin pare ɔƀi sun maim; male mɑjɛm okisa sep kɔmi ɔm doran moon jaʁip mɑjɛp water ime; imɛ ɑmɑ sono yamo ome ɩm kʌlap fire kuduk; kugup kudip te ibdi kʌndʌp ɛřap kandap stone qawade gʷunʌgʌm road, path tɛlɛ; tɛrɛpmēŋ kʌdʌpʌŋ ore amsap kandet mar̃ʌn kosit name buŋām; wow wɔp owe man wop maŋgi mai eat nʌna ne na na na na one kubugaŋ kubinik two lifɛt fʌmɑʔ
Sources and credits
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