Nyishi (also known as Nishi, Nisi, Nishang, Nissi, Nyising, Leil, Aya, Akang, Bangni-Bangru, Solung) is a

Sino-Tibetan language Sino-Tibetan, also cited as Trans-Himalayan in a few sources, is a family of more than 400 languages, second only to Indo-European in number of native speakers. The vast majority of these are the 1.3 billion native speakers of Chinese languages. ...

of the Tani branch spoken in

Papum Pare Papum Pare district (Pron:/ˌpæpəm ˈpæɹɪ or ˈpɑ:ɹeɪ/) is an administrative district in the state of Arunachal Pradesh in India. As of 2011, it is the most populous district of Arunachal Pradesh (out of 20). History The district was ...

Lower Subansiri Lower Subansiri district (Pron:/su:bənˈsɪɹi/) is one of the 25 administrative districts of the state of Arunachal Pradesh in northeastern India. History The district was formed when Subansiri district was bifurcated into Upper and Lower Sub ...

, Kurung Kumey, Kra Daadi,

East Kameng East Kameng district is one of districts of Arunachal Pradesh state in northeastern, India. It shares an international border with China in the north and district borders with West Kameng district to the west, Pakke-Kessang district to the sou ...

, Pakke Kesang, Kamle districts of

Arunachal Pradesh Arunachal Pradesh (, ) is a state in Northeastern India. It was formed from the erstwhile North-East Frontier Agency (NEFA) region, and became a state on 20 February 1987. It borders the states of Assam and Nagaland to the south. It shares ...

and

Darrang District Darrang () is an administrative district in the state of Assam in India. The district headquarters are located at Mangaldoi. The district occupies an area of 1585 km2. History No definitive records about Darrang are available for the pre-med ...

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. According to the 2011 census of India, the population of the Nishi speakers is approximately 300,000. Though there are plenty of variations across regions, the dialects of Nishi, such as Akang, Aya, Nyishi (raga), Mishing, Tagin are easily mutually intelligible, with the exception of the rather small in population Bangni-Bangru and Solung Dialects being very different from the former. 'Nisi' is sometimes used as a cover term for western Tani languages. Nishi is a subject–object–verb language.

Origin

The main origin of this language has been pointed out by George Abraham Grierson as ‘Dafla’. He included different varieties under a common name which is known as North Assam group. The varieties are Dafla, Miri and Abor according to him. Daflas used to denote them as ‘Nyi-Shi’. these tribes inhabited between the Assam Valley and Tibet. Then they started to spread in Lakhimpur, Sibsagar and Darrang Districts of

. Mr. William Robinson in his notes mentioned that Daflas were spread over a region from 92°50’ to 94° north latitude. The word ''nyishi'' itself means "upland man", and is a

compound Compound may refer to: Architecture and built environments * Compound (enclosure), a cluster of buildings having a shared purpose, usually inside a fence or wall ** Compound (fortification), a version of the above fortified with defensive struc ...

of ''nyi'' ("man") and ''shi'' ("highland"). They are probably descendants of peoples who separated from Khasi 4,200 years ago.

Phonology

Nishi is a

tonal language Tone is the use of pitch in language to distinguish lexical or grammatical meaning – that is, to distinguish or to inflect words. All verbal languages use pitch to express emotional and other paralinguistic information and to convey emph ...

that utilizes three tones: rising, neutral, and falling. These can be applied to all of its

vowel A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (leng ...

s, and often can change the word's meaning: : ''bénam'' – "to hold" : ''benam'' – "to deliver" : ''bènam'' – "to vomit" These are the consonants of Nyishi. Where the orthography differs from the IPA, the orthography is bolded.

Grammar

Nyishi distinguishes between

number A number is a mathematical object used to count, measure, and label. The original examples are the natural numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and so forth. Numbers can be represented in language with number words. More universally, individual numbers c ...

person A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of prope ...

, and case. It does not have a gender system, but special affixes can be added to nouns to denote gender.

Origin

Phonology

Grammar

Pronouns

Vocabulary

Numerals

References

Further reading