The Mao languages are a branch of the
Omotic languages
The Omotic languages are a group of languages spoken in southwestern Ethiopia, in the Omo River region. The Ge'ez script is used to write some of the Omotic languages, the Latin script for some others. They are fairly agglutinative and have co ...
spoken in
Ethiopia
Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the ...
. The group had the following categories:
*
Bambasi, spoken in the
Bambasi woreda
Districts of Ethiopia, also called woredas ( am, ወረዳ; ''woreda''), are the third level of the administrative divisions of Ethiopia – after ''zones'' and the '' regional states''.
These districts are further subdivided into a number of ...
of
Benishangul-Gumuz Region
Benishangul-Gumuz ( am, ቤንሻንጉል ጉሙዝ, Benšangul Gumuz) is a regional state in northwestern Ethiopia to the border of Sudan. It was previously known as Region 6. The region's capital is Assosa. Following the adoption of the 1 ...
,
*
Hozo and
Seze (often described together as 'Begi Mao'), spoken around
Begi in the
Mirab (West) Welega Zone of the
Oromia Region
Oromia (Amharic: ) ( om, Oromiyaa) is a regional state in Ethiopia and the homeland of the Oromo people. The capital of Oromia is Addis Ababa.
It is bordered by the Somali Region to the east; the Amhara Region, the Afar Region and the ...
, and
*
Ganza, which is spoken south of
Bambasi in the
Asosa Zone of Benishangul-Gumuz Region and west of the Hozo and Seze languages.
It is estimated that there are 5,000 speakers of Bambasi, 3,000 speakers each of Hozo and Seze and a few hundred Ganza speakers (Bender, 2000). During recent political upheavals, a few thousand Bambassi speakers established themselves in the valley of the
Didessa River and
Belo Jegonfoy woreda
Districts of Ethiopia, also called woredas ( am, ወረዳ; ''woreda''), are the third level of the administrative divisions of Ethiopia – after ''zones'' and the '' regional states''.
These districts are further subdivided into a number of ...
. Much of the Mirab Welega Zone was once the home of Mao languages, but they have lost speakers because of the increasing influence of
Oromo.
Contact
Mao languages are in close contact with
Koman languages. Some Koman-speaking groups in Ethiopia consider themselves to be ethnically Mao.
Numerals
Comparison of numerals in individual languages:
See also
*
Mao word lists (Wiktionary)
Further reading
*
References
{{Omotic languages
Languages of Ethiopia
Language families
Omotic languages