Engan languages
| Engan | |
|---|---|
| Enga – Southern Highlands | |
| Geographic distribution | New Guinea |
| Linguistic classification | Northeast New Guinea?
|
| Subdivisions |
|
| Glottolog | enga1254[1] |
 Map: The Engan languages of New Guinea
The Engan languages
Trans–New Guinea languages
Other Papuan languages
Austronesian languages
Uninhabited | |
The Engan languages are a small family of Papuan languages of the highlands of Papua New Guinea. The two branches of the family are rather distantly related, but were connected by Franklin and Voorhoeve (1973).
Contents
Name[edit]
The name "Engan" is sometimes restricted to the northern branch of the family, to those languages transparently related to Enga, sometimes to the family as a whole.
Languages[edit]
The languages fall into three quite distinct branches: Engan proper, Huli, and Southern Highlands:
- North Engan (Engan proper): Enga–Kyaka–Lembena, Ipili, Bisorio (Nete, Iniai)
- South Engan (Kewa–Huli)
Classification[edit]
The Engan family constitutes a branch of the Trans–New Guinea languages in the classification of Malcolm Ross, but the evidence for this is weak.
There are a considerable number of resemblances with Wiru. Borrowing has not been ruled out as the reason for this, though the pronouns are similar as well.
Reconstruction[edit]
Pronouns are easy to reconstruct for the northern and southern branches, but much more difficult for Engan as a whole. Ross (2005) has the following for the singular,, Wiru has been added for comparison:
pEngan N Engan S Engan Wiru 1 **nə *na-ba *ní no (gen. anu) 2 **ne-ke *ne-ba *ne-ke ne (gen. ne-ke) 3 ? *ba *[n]i-bu one
External links[edit]
Footnotes[edit]
- ^ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Enga–Kewa–Huli". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
References[edit]
- Ross, Malcolm (2005). "Pronouns as a preliminary diagnostic for grouping Papuan languages". In Andrew Pawley; Robert Attenborough; Robin Hide; Jack Golson. Papuan pasts: cultural, linguistic and biological histories of Papuan-speaking peoples. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. pp. 15–66. ISBN 0858835622. OCLC 67292782.
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| Other Papuan languages |
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