Gumuz (also spelled Gumaz) is a

dialect cluster A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a series of language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but the differences accumulate over distance so that widely separated vari ...

spoken along the border of

Ethiopia Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the Er ...

and Sudan. It has been tentatively classified within the

Nilo-Saharan The Nilo-Saharan languages are a proposed family of African languages spoken by some 50–60 million people, mainly in the upper parts of the Chari and Nile rivers, including historic Nubia, north of where the two tributaries of the Nile meet. ...

family. Most Ethiopian speakers live in Kamashi Zone and

Metekel Zone Metekel Zone is located in Benshangul-Gumuz of Ethiopia. It is bordered on the south and southwest by Kamashi, on the west by Sudan, and on the north and east by the Amhara region. The Abay River defines the Zone's boundaries with Kamashi, wh ...

of the Benishangul-Gumuz Region, although a group of 1,000 reportedly live outside the town of

Welkite Welkite (also transliterated Wolkite) () is a town and separate woreda in south-western Ethiopia. The administrative center of the Gurage Zone of the Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples' Region (SNNPR), this town has a latitude and longi ...

(Unseth 1989). The Sudanese speakers live in the area east of Er Roseires, around Famaka and Fazoglo on the Blue Nile, extending north along the border. Dimmendaal et al. (2019) suspect that the poorly attested varieties spoken along the river constitute a distinct language, Kadallu. Gerrit Dimmendaal, Colleen Ahland & Angelika Jakobi (2019) Linguistic features and typologies in languages commonly referred to as 'Nilo-Saharan', ''Cambridge Handbook of African Linguistics'', p. 6–7 An early record of this language is a wordlist from the

Mount Guba Mount is often used as part of the name of specific mountains, e.g. Mount Everest. Mount or Mounts may also refer to: Places * Mount, Cornwall, a village in Warleggan parish, England * Mount, Perranzabuloe, a hamlet in Perranzabuloe parish, ...

area compiled in February 1883 by Juan Maria Schuver.

Varieties

Varieties are not all mutually intelligible. By that standard, there are two or three Gumuz languages. Grammatical forms are distinct between northern and southern Gumuz. Daats'iin, discovered in 2013, is clearly a distinct language, though closest to southern Gumuz. The poorly attested varieties in Sudan are likely a distinct language as well, Kadallu. (See Bʼaga languages.) ''Ethnologue'' lists Guba, Wenbera, Sirba, Agalo, Yaso, Mandura, Dibate, and Metemma as Gumuz dialects, with Mandura, Dibate, and Metemma forming a dialect cluster. Ahland (2004)Ahland, Colleen Anne. 2004. ''Linguistic Variation Within Gumuz: A Study of the Relationship Between Historical Change and Intelligibility (Ethiopia, Sudan)''. MA thesis, University of Texas at Arlington. provides comparative lexical data for the Guba, Mandura, North Dibat'e, Wenbera, Sirba Abay, Agelo Meti, Yaso, and Metemma dialects.

Phonology

Gumuz has both

ejective consonants In phonetics, ejective consonants are usually voiceless consonants that are pronounced with a glottalic egressive airstream. In the phonology of a particular language, ejectives may contrast with aspirated, voiced and tenuis consonants. Some l ...

and implosives. The implosive quality is being lost at the velar point of articulation in some dialects (Unseth 1989). There is a series of palatal consonants, including both ejective and implosive. In some dialects, e.g. Sirba, there is a labialized palatalized bilabial stop, as in the word for 'rat' (Unseth 1989).

Consonants

* The tap �mainly occurs in morpheme-internal positions, and not in word-initial position. It also occurs as an allophone of /ɗ/ in intervocalic and word-final positions. * A trill may occur from ideophones or as a result of loanwords from Amharic. * A velar implosive �tends to only exist in the Agelo Meti dialect. * A labialized bilabial plosive ʷtends to only exist in the Sirba Abay dialect. * A voiced fricative �may occur when /ɓ/ tends to weaken in word-final position in some dialects.

Both dialects

* The labio dental only occurs in rare distribution, and mainly occurs in intervocalic and word-initial positions. It is also possibly introduced via derivation from ideophones. * The palatal �only occurs word-internally in intervocalic environments, before a palatal consonant, or as an allophone of /n/ before a front vowel. * �ʷonly occurs in rare distribution, or when /ŋ/ occurs before a weakened short rounded vowel. * Other labialized consonants ʷ, ɡʷ, kʼʷ, χʷtend to occur as a result of velar or uvular consonants preceding weakened short rounded vowels that precede another vowel.

Vowels

* Short allophones of /i, e, a, o, u/ can be heard as �, ɛ, ə, ɔ, ʊ * A central close vowel �may occur in various positions after a shortened /u/ when labializing a velar or uvular consonant.

Tone

Tones are high and low, with downstep.Colleen Ahland, 2012. "A Grammar of Northern and Southern Gumuz", Doctoral Dissertation, University of Oregon.

Grammar

Word order is AVO, with marked nominative case, though there is AOV order in the north, probably from Amharic influence . In intransitive clauses, subjects in S–V order are unmarked, whereas those in V–S order are marked for nominative case.

Notes

References

* Ahland, Colleen Anne. A Grammar of Northern and Southern Gumuz. Doctoral dissertation, University of Oregon. * Dimmendaal, Gerrit J., 2000. "Number marking and noun categorization in Nilo- Saharan languages". Anthrolopological Linguistics 42:214-261.

External links

Gumuz basic lexicon at the Global Lexicostatistical Database
{{Languages of Ethiopia Languages of Ethiopia Languages of Sudan Subject–verb–object languages Bʼaga languages