The Mailuan or Cloudy Bay languages are a small family of

Trans–New Guinea languages Trans–New Guinea (TNG) is an extensive family of Papuan languages spoken on the island of New Guinea and neighboring islands, a region corresponding to the country Papua New Guinea as well as parts of Indonesia. Trans–New Guinea is perhaps ...

spoken around

Cloudy Bay Te Koko-o-Kupe / Cloudy Bay is located at the northeast of New Zealand's South Island, to the south of the Marlborough Sounds and north of Clifford Bay, New Zealand, Clifford Bay. In August 2014, the name Cloudy Bay, given by Captain Cook in 177 ...

in the "

Bird's Tail The Papuan Peninsula, also known as the Bird's Tail Peninsula, is a large peninsula in Papua New Guinea, southeast of the city of Lae, that makes up the southeastern portion of the island of New Guinea. The peninsula is the easternmost extent of ...

" (southeastern peninsula) of New Guinea. They are classified within the Southeast Papuan branch of Trans–New Guinea.

Languages

The languages, which all share about half of their vocabulary, are, *

Domu is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Katsuhiro Otomo. Similar to his work '' Akira'', the story centers on an old man and a child possessing extrasensory powers. It was serialized weekly between 1980 and 1981 in Futabasha's ...

, Binahari–Binahari-Ma, Morawa, Mailu (Magi), Laua Bauwaki–O'oku is closely related to the Mailuan languages.

Classification

Dutton (1971) said Bauwaki was a link to the

Yareban languages The Yareban or Musa River languages are a small family of Trans–New Guinea languages spoken near the Musa River in the "Bird's Tail" (southeastern peninsula) of New Guinea. They are classified within the Southeast Papuan branch of Trans&nd ...

. It has greater lexical similarity with Aneme Wake (Yareban) than the closest Mailuan language, Domu. Usher (2020) classifies Mailuan, Bauwaki and Yareban together. Magi shows evidence of

language shift Language shift, also known as language transfer, language replacement or language assimilation, is the process whereby a speech community shifts to a different language, usually over an extended period of time. Often, languages that are perceived ...

from an Oceanic language in many Oceanic words.

Pronouns

Usher (2020) reconstructs the proto-Mailuan–Yareban pronouns as:New Guinea World, Owen Stanley Range
/ref> : Ross (1995) reconstructs the Mailuan pronouns as: :

Vocabulary comparison

The following basic vocabulary words are from Thomson (1975) and various SIL field notes, as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database. The words cited constitute translation equivalents, whether they are cognate (e.g. ''kuma'', ''uma'', ''tuma'' for “louse”) or not (e.g. ''baka'', ''ulim'', ''muruu'' for “egg”). Additional word lists can be found in Ray (1938).Ray, Sidney H. 1938. The languages of the Eastern and South-Eastern Division of Papua. ''Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland'' 68: 153–208.

Evolution

Mailuan reflexes of proto-Trans-New Guinea (pTNG) etyma are:

Mailu language Mailu, or Magi (Magɨ), is a Papuan language of Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offsho ...

: *''ama'' ‘breast’ < *amu *''maa'' ‘mouth’ < *maŋgat *''kisa'' ‘bone’ < *kondaC *''tupa'' ‘short’ < *tu(p,mb)a(C) *''guia'' ‘

cassowary Cassowaries (; Biak: ''man suar'' ; ; Papuan: ''kasu weri'' ) are flightless birds of the genus ''Casuarius'', in the order Casuariiformes. They are classified as ratites, flightless birds without a keel on their sternum bones. Cassowaries a ...

’ < *ku(y)a

Bauwaki language Bauwaki (Bawaki) is a Papuan language The Papuan languages are the non-Austronesian languages spoken on the western Pacific island of New Guinea, as well as neighbouring islands in Indonesia, Solomon Islands, and East Timor. It is a strictly ge ...

: *''baba'' ‘father’ < *mbapa *''idi'' ‘hair’ < *iti *''(ine) ibi'' ‘name’ < *imbi *''iini''- ‘sleep’ < *kin(i,u)-

References

Bibliography

Notes

{{Papuan languages Mailu–Yareban languages Languages of Central Province (Papua New Guinea)