Pεrε or Mbre is a

moribund language An endangered language or moribund language is a language that is at risk of disappearing as its speakers die out or shift to speaking other languages. Language loss occurs when the language has no more native speakers and becomes a " dead langua ...

of the

Ivory Coast Ivory Coast, also known as Côte d'Ivoire and officially the Republic of Côte d'Ivoire, is a country on the southern coast of West Africa. Its capital city of Yamoussoukro is located in the centre of the country, while its largest List of ci ...

. It is known as ''Pεrε'' lso rendered ''Prε''by its speakers and as ''Bεrε'' lso rendered ''Brε''by the locally dominant Koro people. Pεrε was first described in an unpublished manuscript by Denis Creissels. A grammar, dictionary and texts have been published by Jeffrey Heath and Brahima Tioté.

Sociolinguistic situation

Pεrε is spoken in the village of Bondosso – and marginally in Niantibo – not far from the city of

Bouaké Bouaké (or Bwake, N'Ko script, N’ko: ߓߐ߰ߞߍ߫ ''Bɔ̀ɔkɛ́'') is the second-largest list of cities in Ivory Coast, city in Ivory Coast, with a population of 740,000 (2021 census). It is the seat of three levels of subdivisions of Ivory ...

. Until recently it was also spoken in the village of Kouakoudougou. The speakers are a '' numu'' (blacksmith) caste among the Mande. It had 30 active speakers in 2019 out of an ethnic population that was 700 in the year 2000. Speakers are shifting to the neighbouring Manding language Koro, and the language has large numbers of Manding

loanword A loanword (also a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing. Borrowing is a metaphorical term t ...

Classification

Pεrε does not appear to belong to any of the traditional branches of the Niger–Congo language family. It does not have the verb extensions or noun classes characteristic of the Atlantic–Congo languages.

Roger Blench Roger Marsh Blench (born August 1, 1953) is a British linguist, ethnomusicologist and development anthropologist. He has an M.A. and a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge and is based in Cambridge, England. He researches, publishes, and work ...

suspects it may form its own branch, though perhaps not far from the

Kwa languages The Kwa languages, often specified as New Kwa, are a proposed but as-yet-undemonstrated family of languages spoken in the south-eastern part of Ivory Coast, across southern Ghana, and in central Togo. The Kwa family belongs to the Niger-Congo ...

Phonology

The phonology section below is sourced from Heath & Tioté (2019). There are two tones, a /H/ and /L/, but phonetically /L/ may be realized as mid tone when followed by another /L/. Grammatical use of tone includes the distinction between perfective and imperfective aspect. There are seven vowel qualities, with an

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distinction in the mid vowels, but no vowel harmony. All seven may be long or short, nasal or oral. /CVɾV/ tends to be realized as əɾVfor any short vowel. The consonant inventory is also typical for the area, with marginal /h/ and /ʔ/. Additionally, there are the phonemes /l/, /ɾ/, /w/, /j/. /CjV/ and /CwV/ sequences occur.

Grammar

Nouns have "absolute" suffix /a/ that appears at the end of a noun phrase and in citation form. Word order is SVOX. There are

phrasal verb In the traditional grammar of Modern English, a phrasal verb typically constitutes a single semantic unit consisting of a verb followed by a particle (e.g., ''turn down'', ''run into,'' or ''sit up''), sometimes collocated with a preposition (e. ...

s with

postposition Adpositions are a class of words used to express spatial or temporal relations (''in, under, towards, behind, ago'', etc.) or mark various semantic roles (''of, for''). The most common adpositions are prepositions (which precede their complemen ...

Sociolinguistic situation

Classification

Phonology

Grammar

References

Further reading