Bube, Bohobé or Bube–Benga (Bobe, Bubi), is a

Bantu language The Bantu languages (English: , Proto-Bantu: *bantʊ̀) are a large family of languages spoken by the Bantu people of Central, Southern, Eastern africa and Southeast Africa. They form the largest branch of the Southern Bantoid languages. T ...

spoken by the Bubi, a

Bantu people The Bantu peoples, or Bantu, are an ethnolinguistic grouping of approximately 400 distinct ethnic groups who speak Bantu languages. They are native to 24 countries spread over a vast area from Central Africa to Southeast Africa and into Southern A ...

native to, and once the primary inhabitants of,

Bioko Island Bioko (; historically Fernando Po; bvb, Ëtulá Ëria) is an island off the west coast of Africa and the northernmost part of Equatorial Guinea. Its population was 335,048 at the 2015 census and it covers an area of . The island is located o ...

in Equatorial Guinea. The language was brought to Bioko from continental Africa more than three thousand years ago when the Bubi began arriving on the island. It has around 50,000 speakers, with three variants: North, South and Central-East. It is noted for its tonal character and the divergence of words by gender. The language is also spoken by Bubi native to

Gabon Gabon (; ; snq, Ngabu), officially the Gabonese Republic (french: République gabonaise), is a country on the west coast of Central Africa. Located on the equator, it is bordered by Equatorial Guinea to the northwest, Cameroon to the north ...

and

Cameroon Cameroon (; french: Cameroun, ff, Kamerun), officially the Republic of Cameroon (french: République du Cameroun, links=no), is a country in west- central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west and north; Chad to the northeast; th ...

. The Bube language is divided into six different dialects that vary in the northern and southern regions of Bioko Island. For example, in the North, people speak ''Rebola'' and its variations: ''Basile'', ''Banapa'' and ''Basupa''. However, in the North-East, ''Bakake'' is spoken. Bube is also spoken in a small area on the mainland closest to the island, where speakers are shifting to

Wumboko Kpwe (Mokpwe) is a Bantu language of Cameroon Cameroon (; french: Cameroun, ff, Kamerun), officially the Republic of Cameroon (french: République du Cameroun, links=no), is a country in west-central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria ...

. This has been reported as "Bube", "Bubia" or "Wovea" (see

Wovea people The Wovea are an ethnic group native to coastal areas of the Fako division of the Southwest Province of Cameroon. The Wovea are one of the ethnic groups that comprise the Sawa, or Cameroonian coastal peoples. History Wovea oral history names a ma ...

). The first works on the Bube language were those of the Baptist missionary John Clarke, published in 1846 and 1848. A later Bube-to-English primer was authored in 1875 by William Barleycorn, a colonial era

Primitive Methodist The Primitive Methodist Church is a Methodist Christian denomination with the holiness movement. It began in England in the early 19th century, with the influence of American evangelist Lorenzo Dow (1777–1834). In the United States, the Primit ...

missionary A missionary is a member of a Religious denomination, religious group which is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Tho ...

of Igbo and Fernandino descent, while he was serving in the Bubi village of Basupu. An official language dictionary and grammar guide was published by the ethnic Bubi scholar Justo Bolekia Boleká.

Other names

Other names and forms of the name include Bubé, eVoové, eBubée, Bhubhi, Bubi, Ibubi, Ibhubhi, Pove and Eviia.

Phonology

Vowels

Bube has 7 vowels that can be either short or long: The

nasal Nasal is an adjective referring to the nose, part of human or animal anatomy. It may also be shorthand for the following uses in combination: * With reference to the human nose: ** Nasal administration, a method of pharmaceutical drug delivery ** ...

vowels are

allophone In phonology, an allophone (; from the Greek , , 'other' and , , 'voice, sound') is a set of multiple possible spoken soundsor ''phones''or signs used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language. For example, in English, (as in '' ...

s of respective oral vowels.

Consonants

Bube has 29 consonants. Some of them are

prenasalized Prenasalized consonants are phonetic sequences of a nasal and an obstruent (or occasionally a non-nasal sonorant such as ) that behave phonologically like single consonants. The primary reason for considering them to be single consonants, rather ...

Numbers

The numbers one through ten in Bube are as follows:C. Junyent, ''Las lenguas del mundo'', p. 66 :

References

Bibliography

* Biddulph, Joseph, Fernandian (1988). ''The Bubi Bantu language of Bioco/Fernando Po''. Pontypridd, Wales: Languages Information Centre, WorldCat no. 17838738. *Bolekia, Justo Bolekia (1991). Curso de lengua bubi. (Coleccion ensayos, 8.) Malabo: Centro Cultural Hispano-Guineano. *Bolekia, Justo (2009). Diccionario español-bubi. Madrid: Ediciones AKAL. 544pp. * Clarke, John (1846)
''Sentences in the Fernandian Tongue''
Dunfermline Press, Bimbia. * Clarke, John (1848)
''Introduction To The Fernandian Tongue'', Part 1.
Berwick-on-Tweed.

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bube language Mbam languages Languages of Equatorial Guinea Languages of Gabon Languages of Cameroon