Batuley (Gwatle lir) is a language spoken on the

Aru Islands The Aru Islands Regency ( id, Kabupaten Kepulauan Aru) is a group of about 95 low-lying islands in the Maluku Islands of eastern Indonesia. It also forms a regency of Maluku Province, with a land area of . At the 2011 Census the Regency had a ...

of eastern Indonesia. It is close to Mariri; Hughes (1987) estimates that around 80% of lexical items are shared. The language's name comes from the Gwatle island (Batuley in Indonesian), which the Batuley consider their homeland (Daigle (2015)).

Geographical distribution

Batuley is spoken in eastern Indonesia across seven villages that Daigle (2015) lists in his thesis. Some of them are Kabalsiang on Aduar Island, Kumul in the identically-named island, and Gwaria (Waria) in the Island of

Gwari Gbagyi or Gbari (plural - Agbagyi/Agbari) is the name and the language of Gbagyi/Gbari ethnic group who are predominantly found in Central Nigeria, with a population of about 1 million people. Members of the ethnic group speak two dialects. While ...

Phonology

Vowels

Batuley has a simple five-vowel system with no vowel length distinction (Daigle 2015). *i *e *u *o *a is an allophone of and (in different environments). is an allophone of when it does not receive the primary stress. Furthermore, and may both be reduced to a schwa in fast speech in certain conditions.

Consonants

Daigle (2015)

Lexicon

Daigle (2015) * : water, fresh water * : island * : sister; branch * : big house * : wood, tree * : chest, breast * : breast milk (: breast, : its water) * : scorpion * : small fresh-water turtle * : cloud * : dance (n) * : month * : shoe (borrowing) * : diesel fuel (borrowing) * : zero (borrowing) * : think (borrowing) * : cat (borrowing) * : teacher (borrowing) * : paper (borrowing) * : crack, split (borrowing) * : hat (borrowing) * : older sibling (borrowing) * : year (borrowing) * : book (borrowing)

Geographical distribution

Phonology

Vowels

Consonants

Lexicon

References

Further reading