The Tangkhulic and Tangkhul languages are a group of

Sino-Tibetan languages Sino-Tibetan, also cited as Trans-Himalayan in a few sources, is a family of more than 400 languages, second only to Indo-European in number of native speakers. The vast majority of these are the 1.3 billion native speakers of Chinese languages. ...

spoken mostly in northeastern

Manipur Manipur () ( mni, Kangleipak) is a States and territories of India, state in Northeast India, with the city of Imphal as its capital. It is bounded by the Indian states of Nagaland to the north, Mizoram to the south and Assam to the west. It ...

India India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...

. Conventionally classified as "Naga," they are not clearly related to other

Naga languages The Naga languages are a geographic and ethnic grouping of languages under the Kuki-Chin-Naga languages, spoken mostly by Naga peoples. Northern Naga languages do not fall within the group, in spite of being spoken by Naga groups; instead, th ...

, and (with Maringic) are conservatively classified as an independent Tangkhul–Maring branch of Tibeto-Burman, pending further research. The Maringic languages appear to be closely related to the Tangkhulic family, but not part of it.

Languages

Tangkhulic languages include: * Tangkhul (Indian Tangkhul) * Somra (Burmese Tangkhul) * Akyaung Ari * Kachai * Huishu * Tusom * Suansu The Tangkhulic languages are not particularly close to each other. Brown's "Southern Tangkhul" (= Southern Luhupa?) is a

Kuki-Chin The Kuki-Chin languages (also called Kuki-Chin-Mizo, Kukish or South-Central Tibeto-Burman languages) are a branch of 50 or so Sino-Tibetan languages spoken in northeastern India, western Myanmar and southeastern Bangladesh. Most speakers of the ...

rather than Tangkhulic language. It has strong links with the recently discovered

Sorbung language Sorbung is a recently discovered Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Manipur, northeastern India. Although the speakers are ethnically Tangkhul, it appears to be a non-Tangkhulic Kuki-Chin language, as it shows strong links with what was called 'Sou ...

, which is also not Tangkhulic despite being spoken by ethnic Tangkhul. some northern villages (

Chingjaroi Chingjaroi, originally known Asinei or Asewnei alternatively called Zingchui/Zingjui by the tangkhul, Shomai by the Poumai and khatchomi by the Chakhesangs is a large village located in northern Ukhrul district, Manipur state, India and bordered ...

, Jessami, Soraphung Razai) in Tangkhul area have language more closely related to the Angami-pochuri language group. Koki, Long Phuri, Makuri, and

Para Para, or PARA, may refer to: Businesses and organizations * Paramount Global, traded as PARA on the Nasdaq stock exchange * Para Group, the former name of CT Corp * Para Rubber, now Skellerup, a New Zealand manufacturer * Para USA, formerly ...

are "Naga" languages spoken in and around

Leshi Township Leshi Township or Layshi Township ( my, လေရှီးမြို့နယ်) is a mountainous

, Myanmar. These four languages could possibly classify as Tangkhulic languages or

Ao languages The Ao or Central Naga languages are a small family of Sino-Tibetan languages spoken by various Naga peoples of Nagaland in northeast India. Conventionally classified as "Naga", they are not clearly related to other Naga languages, and are con ...

.Barkman, Tiffany. 2014
''A descriptive grammar of Jejara (Para Naga)''
MA thesis, Chiang Mai: Payap University.

Classification

Mortensen (2003:5) classifies the Tangkhulic languages as follows. ;Tangkhulic *Northern: Huishu *North-Central:

Champhung Champhung is a village located extreme west in Ukhrul district, Manipur. The village is connected by an inter village road Via Makuikong and is about 30 kilometers from the district headquarter and 4 Kilometers from Lungchong Maiphei - L.M Bloc ...

*East-Central **Eastern *** Kachai *** Phadāng **Central ***Standard Tangkhul ***

Ukhrul Ukhrul/Hunphun ( Meitei pronunciation:/ˈuːkˌɹəl or ˈuːkˌɹʊl/) is a town in the state of Manipur, India. Ukhrul is the home of the Tangkhul Nagas. It is the administrative headquarter of the Ukhrul district. There are also four sub- ...

*Southern **Brown's 'Central Tangkhul' **South-Central *** Khangoi ***Brown's 'Northern Tangkhul'

Reconstruction

Proto-Tangkhulic, the reconstructed ancestral

proto-language In the tree model of historical linguistics, a proto-language is a postulated ancestral language from which a number of attested languages are believed to have descended by evolution, forming a language family. Proto-languages are usually unatte ...

of the Tangkhulic languages, has been reconstructed by Mortensen (2012).Mortensen, David R. 2012
''Database of Tangkhulic Languages''
(unpublished ms. contributed to STEDT). Mortensen (2003:5-7)Mortensen, David R. (2003). �
Comparative Tangkhul
” Unpublished Qualifying Paper, UC Berkeley. lists the following phonological innovations ( sound changes) from

Proto-Tibeto-Burman Proto-Tibeto-Burman (commonly abbreviated PTB) is the reconstructed ancestor of the Tibeto-Burman languages, that is, the Sino-Tibetan languages, except for Chinese. An initial reconstruction was produced by Paul K. Benedict and since refined by ...

(PTB) to Proto-Tangkhulic. * PTB *s- > *''th''-; PTB *ts-, *sy- > *''s''- *PTB *dz-, *dzy-, *tsy- > *''ts''- *PTB *ky-, *gy- > *''ʃ''- *PTB *kr-, *tsy- > *''c''- *Neutralization of vowel length distinctions in non-low vowels *Dissimilation of aspiration in prefixes Proto-Tangkhulic also has the nominalizing prefix *''kV''-. Proto-Tangkhulic lexical innovations are: * *war ‘mushroom’ (found exclusively in Tangkhulic) * *kɔ.phuŋ ‘mountain’ (found exclusively in Tangkhulic) * *kɔ.mi ‘to give’ (found exclusively in Tangkhulic) * *khaj ‘fish’ (also found in some Zeme and Angami languages) * *pan ‘hand’ (also found in some Zeme languages) * *pej ‘foot’ (also found in some Zeme and Angami languages)

References

*George van Driem (2001) ''Languages of the Himalayas: An Ethnolinguistic Handbook of the Greater Himalayan Region.'' Brill. *Mortensen, David R. and James A. Miller (2013). �
A reconstruction of Proto-Tangkhulic rhymes
” Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area 36(1): 1-32. *Mortensen, David R. (2012)
''Database of Tangkhulic Languages''
(unpublished ms. contributed to STEDT). *Mortensen, David R. and James A. Miller (2009). �

” International Conference on Sino-Tibetan Languages and Linguistics 42, Chiangmai, November 4. *Mortensen, David R. (2003). �
Comparative Tangkhul
” Unpublished Qualifying Paper, UC Berkeley. *Mortensen, David. 2014
The Tangkhulic Tongues - How I Started Working on Endangered Languages
{{Languages of Northeast India Languages of India