Arta is a highly endangered Negrito language of the northern

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

Distribution

Lawrence Reid's 1990 fieldwork revealed only 12 speakers in Villa Santiago, Aglipay,

Quirino Quirino, officially the Province of Quirino ( ilo, Probinsia ti Quirino; tl, Lalawigan ng Quirino), is a landlocked province in the Philippines located in the Cagayan Valley region in Luzon. Its capital is Cabarroguis. It is named after Elp ...

Province, and in 1992 it was spoken by only three families. It is not closely related to other languages. There are still small groups of Arta speakers in

Maddela Maddela, officially the Municipality of Maddela ( ilo, Ili ti Maddela; tl, Bayan ng Maddela), is a 1st class municipality of the Philippines, municipality in the Philippine Province, province of Quirino, Philippines. According to the 2020 census ...

and

Nagtipunan Nagtipunan, officially the Municipality of Nagtipunan ( ilo, Ili ti Nagtipunan; tl, Bayan ng Nagtipunan), is a 1st class municipality in the province of Quirino, Philippines. According to the 2020 census, it has a population of 25,399 people. Na ...

towns of Quirino Province (Lobel 2013:88).Lobel, Jason William. 2013
''Philippine and North Bornean languages: issues in description, subgrouping, and reconstruction''
Ph.D. dissertation. Manoa: University of Hawai'i at Manoa. Kimoto (2017)Kimoto, Yukinori / 木本幸憲. 2017
''A Grammar of Arta: A Philippine Negrito Langage''
/ フィリピンネグリート言語、アルタ語の文法. Ph.D dissertation, Kyoto University. reports that Arta has 10 native speakers and 35–45 second-language speakers living primarily in Pulang Lupa, Kalbo, and in Disimungal, Nagtipunan. The Arta are found in the following places within

Municipality.Kimoto, Yukinori
A preliminary report on the grammar of Agta
*Nagtipunan Municipality **Disimungal Barangay ***Purok Kalbo ***Pulang Lupa ***Tilitilan **San Ramos Barangay **Pongo Barangay **Sangbay Barangay Arta is in contact with Casiguran Agta,

Nagtipunan Agta Nagtipunan Agta is a Northeastern Luzon language. It is one of the Aeta languages The Aeta (Ayta ), Agta, or Dumagat, are collective terms for several Filipino indigenous peoples who live in various parts of the island of Luzon in the P ...

, Yogad, Ilokano, and Tagalog.

Phonology

Arta is notable for having

vowel length In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, ...

distinction, an unusual typological feature in the Philippines.

Sound changes

Kimoto (2017: 56–67) lists the following sound changes from

Proto-Malayo-Polynesian Proto-Malayo-Polynesian (PMP) is the reconstructed ancestor of the Malayo-Polynesian languages, which is by far the largest branch (by current speakers) of the Austronesian language family. Proto-Malayo-Polynesian is ancestral to all Austronesi ...

(PMP) to Arta. Long vowels in Arta are derived from PMP diphthongs.

Lexical innovations

Kimoto (2017: 4) lists the following Arta lexical innovations (highlighted in bold). Lexical innovations in Casiguran Agta are also highlighted in bold. Reid (1994)Reid, Lawrence A. 1994.
Possible Non-Austronesian Lexical Elements in Philippine Negrito Languages
" In ''Oceanic Linguistics'', Vol. 33, No. 1 (Jun. 1994), pp. 37-72. lists the following reconstructed forms as possible non-Austronesian lexical elements found exclusively in Arta. Forms from Kimoto (2018)Kimoto, Yukinori. 2018
''Arta vocabulary''
have also been included. Note the use of orthographic è �and ng � Reid (1994) lists the following reconstructed forms as possible non-Austronesian lexical elements found in both Arta and "North Agta" (i.e., various

Northeastern Luzon languages The Northeastern Luzon languages is a primary subgroup of the Northern Luzon languages, proposed by Robinson & Lobel (2013) based on historical phonology, functors, and lexicon. Classification Robinson & Lobel (2013:148) propose the following in ...

spoken mostly in

Cagayan Cagayan ( ), officially the Province of Cagayan ( ilo, Probinsia ti Cagayan; ibg, Provinsiya na Cagayan; itv, Provinsiya ya Cagayan; fil, Lalawigan ng Cagayan), is a province in the Philippines located in the Cagayan Valley region, covering ...

Province). Forms from Kimoto (2018) have also been included. The forms *səlub 'fragrant' and *Rəbi 'pity, kindness' are found in both Arta and Alta.

References

*Kimoto, Yukinori. 2017.
A Grammar of Arta: A Philippine Negrito Language
'. Ph.D dissertation, Kyoto University.

External links

ELAR documentation and description of Arta language
{{Austronesian languages Aeta languages Endangered Austronesian languages Languages of Quirino Northern Luzon languages