Amto–Musan is a
language family
A language family is a group of languages related through descent from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family. The term ''family'' is a metaphor borrowed from biology, with the tree model used in historical linguistics ...
of two closely related but mutually unintelligible
Papuan languages
The Papuan languages are the non- Austronesian languages spoken on the western Pacific island of New Guinea, as well as neighbouring islands in Indonesia, Solomon Islands, and East Timor. It is a strictly geographical grouping, and does not imply ...
,
Amto and
Siawi, spoken along the
Samaia River of
Sandaun Province
Sandaun Province (formerly West Sepik Province) is the northwesternmost mainland Provinces of Papua New Guinea, province of Papua New Guinea (also known as home of the sunset). It covers an area of 35,920 km2 (13868 m2) and has a population ...
of
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offshore islands in Melanesia, a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean n ...
.
Languages
Foley (2018) and Usher (2020) agree that the family consists of two languages.
;Amto–Musan / Samaia River family
*
Amto (Ki)
*
Musan (Musian, Siawi)
External relationships
Amto–Musan was left unclassified by Ross (2005) (see
Papuan languages#Ross (2005)) due to lack of data; Wurm (1975) had posited it as an independent family. The family has
typological similarities with the
Busa language isolate
A language isolate is a language that has no demonstrable genetic relationship with any other languages. Basque in Europe, Ainu and Burushaski in Asia, Sandawe in Africa, Haida and Zuni in North America, Kanoê in South America, and Tiwi ...
, but these do not appear to demonstrate a genetic relationship.
Timothy Usher links the Amto–Musan languages to their neighbors, the
Arai languages
The Left May or Arai languages are a small language family of half a dozen closely related but not mutually intelligible languages in the centre of New Guinea, in the watershed of the Left May River. There are only about 2,000 speakers in all. Wi ...
and the
Pyu language in as Arai–Samaia stock.
Foley (2018) classifies them separately as an independent language family.
Foley also notes that due to heavy contact and trade with
Left May languages, Amto–Musan languages have borrowed much cultural vocabulary from Left May.
Cognates
Amto-Musan family cognates listed by
Foley (2018):
:
Possible cognates between the Amto-Musan and
Left May families:
:
Possible loanwords reflecting the close trade relationship between Amto-Musan and Left May speakers:
*‘arrow’
Amto ''lamu'',
Musan ''namu'',
Ama ''lamu''
*‘stone’:
Amto ''tabeki'',
Musan ''tipeki'', Bo ''təpəki'',
Ama ''tomoki''
Vocabulary comparison
The following basic vocabulary words are from Conrad & Dye (1975), as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database:
The words cited constitute translation equivalents, whether they are cognate (e.g. ''tipeki'', ''ʌbɛki'' for “stone”) or not (e.g. ''twæ'', ''nani'' for “head”).
:
References
External links
Amto-Musan languages database at TransNewGuinea.org
{{DEFAULTSORT:Amto-Musan languages
Arai–Samaia languages
Languages of Sandaun Province