The Paniai Lakes languages, also known as the Wissel Lakes or Wissel Lakes – Kemandoga River, are a small family of closely related

Trans–New Guinea languages Trans–New Guinea (TNG) is an extensive Language family, family of Papuan languages spoken on the island of New Guinea and neighboring islands, a region corresponding to the country Papua New Guinea as well as Western New Guinea, parts of Indone ...

spoken in the

Paniai Lakes The Paniai Lakes, originally known as the Wissel Lakes, are the three large, freshwater lakes in Central Papua, Indonesia: Paniai, Tigi, and Tage. Lakes Paniai and Tage are located in the Paniai Regency, while Lake Tigi is located in Deiyai Regen ...

region of the highlands of

Western New Guinea Western New Guinea, also known as Papua, Indonesian New Guinea, and Indonesian Papua, is the western half of the island of New Guinea, formerly Dutch and granted to Indonesia in 1962. Given the island is alternatively named Papua, the region ...

in the

region of Papua. Foley (2003) considers their Trans–New Guinea status to be established.

Languages

The languages are:NewGuineaWorld
/ref> * Paniai Lakes languages **

Moni Moni or Mone ( Kamkata-vari: ''Mone''/''Mune''), also known as Mandi (from Prasun) was, after Imra, the second-most important god in the pre-Islamic pantheon of the Nuristani people. With his breath, Imra created Moni and Gish. Moni was believed ...

**Central *** Wolani (Wodani) *** Ekari (Ekari) *** Auye (incl. Dao) They are most closely related to the

Dani languages The Dani or Baliem Valley languages are a family of clearly related Trans–New Guinea languages spoken by the Dani and related peoples in the Baliem Valley in the Highland Papua Highland Papua () is a provinces of Indonesia, province of In ...

, Amung and Dem.

Pronouns

Independent pronouns and possessive prefixes are: :

Vocabulary comparison

The following basic vocabulary words are from Larson & Larson (1972) and Voorhoeve (1975), as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database. The words cited constitute translation equivalents, whether they are cognate (e.g. ''homa'', ''huma'' for “stone”) or not (e.g. ''bodiya'', ''usa'' for “fire”). :

Evolution

Paniai Lakes reflexes of proto-Trans-New Guinea (pTNG) etyma are:

Ekari language Ekari (also ''Ekagi'', ''Kapauku'', ''Mee'') is a Trans–New Guinea language spoken by about 100,000 people in the Paniai lakes region of the Indonesian province of Central Papua, including the villages of Enarotali, Mapia and Moanemani. T ...

: * ‘breast’ < * ‘arm’ < * ‘belly’ < * ‘breast’ < * ‘skin’ < * ‘louse’ < * ‘come’ < * ‘father’ < * ‘speech, talk’ < ‘instructions’ * ‘sun’ <

Moni language Moni, as given by Ekari people, or Migani/Megani, as given by locals, also known as ''Djonggunu'', ''Jonggunu'', is a Papuan language spoken by about 20,000 people (1991) in the Paniai lakes region of the Indonesian province of Central Papua Ce ...

: * ‘breast’ < * ‘heart’ < ‘internal organs, belly’ * ‘skin’ < * ‘woman’ < * ‘night’ < * ‘stone’ < * ‘tree’ < * ‘come’ <

References

{{Papuan languages Languages of Western New Guinea West Papuan Highlands languages