The Sarmi-Jayapura Bay languages consist of half a dozen languages spoken on the northern coast of
Papua province of
Indonesia:
:
Sobei,
Bonggo,
Tarpia (Sarmi),
Kayupulau,
Ormu,
Tobati (Jayapura Bay)
Ross (1988) had considered Sarmi and Jayapura Bay (Kayapulau, Orma and Tobati) to be separate but related groups. Ross (1988) listed several additional Sarmi languages:
:
Anus (Korur) and
Podena,
Liki and
Wakde
Wakde is an island group in Sarmi Regency, Papua, Indonesia, between the districts of Pantai Timur and Tor Atas. It comprises two islands, Insumuar (the larger) and Insumanai (much smaller).
History
Occupied by Japanese forces in April 1942, th ...
(close to Sobei),
Masimasi,
Kaptiau, and
Yamna Yamna may refer to:
* Yamna culture
The Yamnaya culture or the Yamna culture (russian: Ямная культура, ua, Ямна культура lit. 'culture of pits'), also known as the Pit Grave culture or Ochre Grave culture, was a late ...
.
The inclusion of a supposed ''Yarsun'' language appears to be due to confusion of language names with island names. No such language is attested; the island is located between that of the
Anus
The anus (Latin, 'ring' or 'circle') is an opening at the opposite end of an animal's digestive tract from the mouth. Its function is to control the expulsion of feces, the residual semi-solid waste that remains after food digestion, which, d ...
and
Podena languages, and all three islands are reported to speak dialects of a single language according to the first source to mention it.
[Hammarström (2015) Ethnologue 16/17/18th editions: a comprehensive review: online appendices]
With the exception of certain
Micronesian languages, the Sarmi-Jayapura languages have the westernmost distribution out of all Oceanic languages.
Sound correspondences
Grace (1971:34-37) published a table of sound correspondences for the Sarmi languages, from which the following forms are gleaned. The languages are arranged from west to east.
References
* Grace, George W. (1971). Notes on the phonological history of the Austronesian languages of the Sarmi Coast. ''Oceanic Linguistics'' 10:11-37.
* Ross, Malcolm (1988). ''
Proto Oceanic and the
Austronesian languages of western Melanesia.'' Canberra: Pacific Linguistics.
Proto Oceanic basic vocabulary database
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sarmi-Jayapura languages
Western Oceanic languages
Languages of western New Guinea
Jayapura
Papua (province) culture