Orya

Timothy Usher, Santa Fe Institute

Orya (Uria,) also known as Warpu (Wairpu,) is spoken by approximatelly 1,600 people (1991) living in the Unurum-Guay, Bonggo and Lereh districts of Indonesia's Papua province. Orya properly refers to only one village, but is used by native speakers to designate the language because this is the village from which the people are thought to originate. Speakers also call themselves Yap Zi “interior people” and their language Yap Zi Ol. The term Uria is used in government records (Fields 1991: 29-30.) Barr and Walker (1978: 6) call the language Warpu (Wairpu) but do not explain the significance of this term. Orya has borrowed a number of basic terms from the Sause language to the southwest.

Galis (1955) 27 comparative terms for Saweh

Voorhoeve (1975: 110) 40 comparative terms for Uria after Anceaux (n.d.)

Barr and Walker (1978: 11-14) 109 comparative terms for Warpu of Taja and Witi villages

Stokhof ed. (1983: 115-131) comparative vocabulary of Sawé after Jelkemp (?Jellemp)

Smits and Voorhoeve eds. (1994: 18-266) comparative vocabularies of Uria/Orya of Guay village after Maware and of Sigi and an unspecified variety after Anceaux, all collected in Guay

Fields (1991) phonology of Orya of Guay

Fields (1997) nominalization in Orya

Clouse (1997: 165-230) 261 comparative terms for Orya of Guay after Fields

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Fields (1991: 36, ibid.) gives 16 consonants and 7 vowels for Orya of Guay as follows:

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Orya has borrowed a number of basic terms from Sause immediately to the southwest. As a member of the Mamberamo River family to the west, Sause is related to Orya at a greater distance than is Tor. The Sause word for “moon,” for example, regularly corresponds with the Tor River word, but the Orya word shows the Sause correspondence rather than the expected Orya reflex (in brackets below):