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Mailuan languages

The MailuanorCloudy Bay languages are a small family of Trans–New Guinea languages spoken around Cloudy Bay in the "Bird's Tail" (southeastern peninsula) of New Guinea. They are classified within the Southeast Papuan branch of Trans–New Guinea.

Languages[edit]

The languages, which all share about half of their vocabulary, are,

• Domu, Binahari–Binahari-Ma, Morawa, Mailu (Magi), Laua

Bauwaki–O'oku is closely related to the Mailuan languages.

Classification[edit]

Dutton (1971) said Bauwaki was a link to the Yareban languages. It has greater lexical similarity with Aneme Wake (Yareban) than the closest Mailuan language, Domu. Usher (2020) classifies Mailuan, Bauwaki and Yareban together.^[1]

Magi shows evidence of language shift from an Oceanic language in many Oceanic words.

Pronouns[edit]

Usher (2020) reconstructs the proto-Mailuan–Yareban pronouns as:^[1]

	sg	du	pl
1excl	*na		*ge
1incl		*gu	*i
2	*ga		*ja
3	*e		*ema

Ross (1995) reconstructs the Mailuan pronouns as:

	sg	du	pl
1	*i	*gu-	*ge
2	*ga	*[j]a	*[j]a, *mee
3		*emu

Vocabulary comparison[edit]

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The following basic vocabulary words are from Thomson (1975)^[2] and various SIL field notes, as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database:^[3]

Additional word lists can be found in Ray (1938).^[5]

Evolution[edit]

Mailuan reflexes of proto-Trans-New Guinea (pTNG) etyma are:^[6]

Mailu language:

• ama ‘breast’ < *amu
• maa ‘mouth’ < *maŋgat[a]
• kisa ‘bone’ < *kondaC
• tupa ‘short’ < *tu(p,mb)a(C)
• guia ‘cassowary’ < *ku(y)a

Bauwaki language:

• baba ‘father’ < *mbapa
• idi ‘hair’ < *iti[C]
• (ine) ibi ‘name’ < *imbi
• iini- ‘sleep’ < *kin(i,u)-

References[edit]

• Ross, Malcolm (2005). "Pronouns as a preliminary diagnostic for grouping Papuan languages". In Andrew Pawley; Robert Attenborough; Robin Hide; Jack Golson (eds.). Papuan pasts: cultural, linguistic and biological histories of Papuan-speaking peoples. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. pp. 15–66. ISBN 0858835622. OCLC 67292782.