The Nimboran languages are a small
family
Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...
of
Papuan languages
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 geographical grouping, and does not imply ...
, spoken in the
Grime River and
Nawa River
The Nawa River is a river in Western New Guinea. It is the major northern tributary of the Taritatu River, which it forms where it merges with the Sobger River.
See also
*List of drainage basins of Indonesia
*List of rivers of Western New Guinea ...
watershed in
Jayapura Regency
Jayapura Regency is one of the regencies (''kabupaten'') in Papua Province of Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Paci ...
, that had been part of
Stephen Wurm
Stephen Adolphe Wurm (, ; 19 August 1922 – 24 October 2001) was a Hungarian-born Australian linguist.
Early life
Wurm was born in Budapest, the second child to the German-speaking Adolphe Wurm and the Hungarian-speaking Anna Novroczky. ...
's
Trans–New Guinea proposal. However, when proto-Nimboran pronouns are reconstructed ''(*genam'' "I" and ''kom'' or ''komot'' "thou"), they have little resemblance to the proto-TNG pronouns ''*na'' and ''*ga.'' Usher places them in a
North Papuan stock that resembles Cowan's proposal.
[
Foley (2018) classifies the Nimboran languages separately as an independent language family.]
Classification
The languages are:[
*Nimboran (Grime River)
**East
*** Mekwei (Moi)
***Gresi–Kemtuik
**** Kemtuik
**** Gresi
**West
*** Mlap (Kuangsu)
*** Namblong (Nimboran)
]
Proto-language
Pronouns
The pronouns Ross (2005) reconstructs for proto-Nimboran are,
:
Below are pronouns in the Nimboran languages as given by Foley (2018):Nimboran language
Nimboran (Nambrong, Namblong, Namlong) is a Papuan language of Nimboran District, Jayapura Regency, Indonesia spoken by mostly older adults. Younger generations have shifted to Papuan Malay
Papuan Malay or Irian Malay is a Malay-based creole, ...
.
Basic vocabulary
Some lexical reconstructions by Usher (2020) are:[Grime River]
New Guinea World.
:
Vocabulary comparison
The following basic vocabulary words are from Voorhoeve (1975), as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database.
References
External links
Nimboran word lists from Voorhoeve (1975)
(TransNewGuinea.org)
Grime River
New Guinea World.
{{Tor–Kwerba languages
Foja Range languages