Lower Fly River

Timothy Usher, Santa Fe Institute

The Lower Fly River family is comprised of four or five languages spoken along the south bank of the Fly River, just west of its delta, in Papua New Guinea's Western Province (Jore and Alemán 2002, q.v. p. 10.) The Fly River delta is one of the most linguistically complicated regions on earth, with five very different families and two isolated languages spoken in a small area and many words exchanged between them. Lower Fly River was separated from its nearest relatives, Inland Gulf to the northeast and Lake Murray to the northwest, by the expansions of Kiwai and Suki respectively.

The internal classification of Lower Fly River is as follows:

Lower Fly River

Baramu

Bitur

Giribam-Makayam

Giribam

Makayam

Were

This is the same as the subclassification given in Jore and Alemán (2002,) except that Abom is excluded. Baramu shows the highest degree of lexical independence. Further subclassification may be possible, but the influence of loans from neighboring families (below) warrants caution. There are also elements of a chain, with Baramu at the eastern end and Were at the western end, hence the order of presentation above. Abom is sharply distinct from all of these, and despite its location and a number of shared terms (below) is not a member of Lower Fly River or of Fly River.

Jore and Aleman (2002: 14) provide lexical similarity figures between eight Lower Fly River villages alongside Abom as follows:

[under construction]

Chalmers (1897: 139-144) 93 terms for Tagota (Makayam) (unobtained)

Ray (1907: 391-412) … comparative terms for Pisirami (Makayam) after Riley (n.d.) and Tagota after Chalmers (1897)

Ray (1923) …

Riley (1931-1932: 172-189) 415 comparative terms for Tirio (Baramu)

Williams (1936: 30-31) 7 comparative terms for Arama (Were) and Anima (Makayam)

Jore (2002) 190 comparative terms for Bituri of Upiara, Bisuaka and Tewara villages

Jore (2002) 190 comparative terms for Were of Dewala village

Jore (2002) 190 comparative terms for Makayam of Lewada and Aduru villages and Baramu of Tirio #2

Jore (2002) 190 comparative terms for Abom and Giribam of Janor village

Jore and Alemán (2002: 43-48) 162 comparative terms for Bituri of Upiara, Bisuaka and Tewara villages, Giribam of Janor, Makayam of Lewada and Aduru, Were of Dewala, Baramu of Tiro #2 and Abom

[under construction]

Ray (1923: 336) placed Makayam (Tagota and Pisirami) and Baramu (Tirio) in two separate families, called the Tagota group and the Tirio group respectively

Wurm (1970) …

Greenberg'(1971: 825-829) places the Tirio group, including both Baramu and Makayam, alongside his Marind (including Yaqay and Boazi,) Ok, Awju and Kukukuku (Kratke Range) groups in a Southwestern subgroup of Indo-Pacific

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Ross …

[under construction]

Proto-Lower Fly River had 13 consonants and 5 vowels as follows:

Velar non-stop /*ɣ/ reflects two different Fly River phonemes, initial / and medial /*k/     Any consonant can occur initially, medially or finally. Consonant clusters occur only accross morpheme boundaries.

Any vowel can occur initially, medially or finally, but the cooccurance of different vowels is restricted by vowel height harmony such that a high vowel /*i *u/ and a mid vowel /*e *o/ cannot appear in the same root. Low central vowel /*a/ is harmonically neutral, and can cooccur with any other vowel.

In addition to the five full vowels /*i *u *e *o *a/ given above, a final destressed archiphonemic vowel is found which is represented here as schwa /*ə/ [ɐ]. This is needed to explain the differences between the dispositions of final consonants (below.)

…

Initial and medial consonants correspond as follows:

Subfinal and final consonants correspond as follows:

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Vowels and vowel sequences correspond as follows:

These correspondences are exemplified as follows, with attestations drawn from Jore and Alemán (2002: 43-48, ibid.) unless otherwise indicated. Baramu (Tirio) forms drawn from Riley (1931-1932: 172-189) are designated by [er], as are Pisirami (Makayam) forms from Riley (n.d.) as excerpted in Ray (1907: 391-412, 1923: ….) Tagota (Makayam) forms from Chalmers as excerpted in Ray are designated by [jc]. All of these trasncriptions are phonetic, not phonemic.

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Bilabial nasal /*m/ is generally retained as such in all descendants:

Apical nasal /*n/ is retained as such in all descendants:

Bilabial voiceless stop /*p/ is preserved as such in all descendants:

Apical voiceless stop /*t/ is retained as such in all descendants:

Laminal voiceless /*s/ …:

…:

One exception may indicate a loan into Giribam and Makayam:

…:

Velar voiceless stop /*k/ …:

Voiced stops /*b *d *g/ are merged with the reflexes of voiceless stops /*p *t *k/ in Giribam and Makayam.

Bilabial voiced stop /*b/ …:

Exceptions can only be loans into Giribam-Makayam, /*b₂aigə/ for example being a loan from Aramia River /*boiga/ “back” (below,) and /*ab₂eɾ/ and /b₂aɾab/ most likely loans from Were or Bituri:

Apical voiced stop /*d/ …:

Velar voiced stop /*g/ … (Shafer 1965: 116):

…:

Bilabial non-stop /*w/ is retained as such in all descendants. It is not occluded as it is in other Fly River subfamilies:

Apical non-stop /*ɾ/ is retained as such in all descendants. It is much less common initially than medially or finally:

Palatal non-stop /*j/ …:

…:

…:

…:

Velar non-stop /*ɣ/ is retained only Were, where it is heard as uvular or velar voiced stop [ɢ g] or as voiceless [k kʰ]:

In one example, /*ɣ/ is lost also in Were when the root /*moɣom/ “seed” (above) is used as a suffix:

…:

Historically, /*ɣ/ represents two different Fly River phonemes, initial prenasalized velar stop /*ŋg/ and medial voiceless /*k/.

Subfinal and final consonants are presented here together by segment, as they are sometimes difficult to distinguish from one another. The term subfinal refers to the consonants of final segments with destressed schwa /*ə/, which have different reflexes than final consonants, but these reflexes overlap and the retention of /*ə/ is sporadic and not entirely predictable.

… /*mə/ …:

…:

… /*m/ …:

… /*nə/ …:

… /*n/ …:

… /*pə/ …:

… /*p/ …:

… /*t/ …:

… /*t/ …:

… /*k/ …:

… /*k/ …:

… /*b/ …:

…

… /*d/ …:

…:

…:

…:

One example doesn't fit cleanly into either of these patterns:

… /*wə/ …:

… /*w/ …:

… /*ɾə/ …:

… /*ɾ/ …:

… /*jə/ …:

Lower Fly River vowels /*i *u *o *e *a/ conform to vowel harmony restrictions such that a high vowel /*i *u/ and a mid vowel /*e *o/ do not cooccur in the same root. Low central vowel /*a/ is neutral, and can cooccur with any vowel. These are generally retained as such in all descendants, with only a few exceptions. In order to illustrate the constraints upon vowel cooccurences imposed by vowel harmony, roots including only high vowels /*i *u/ are presented first, followed by those including only mid vowels /*e *o/, followed by those containing only low vowel /*a/ and then roots containing /*a/ and any other vowel(s).

High front vowel /*i// has been found in monosylables, in disyllables with like vowel /*i/, preceding high back /*u/ or low central /*a/ in a following syllable and preceded by /*u/ or /*a/ in a previous syllable.

High front vowel /*i/ in simple environments is retained as such in all descendants:

High back vowel /*u/ in simple environments is retained as such in all descendants:

High vowels /*i *u/ cannot cooccur with mid vowels /*e *o/ in the same root, but can cooccur with one another.

… /*iCu/ …:

The pattern /*uCi/ is found in only one word:

… /*u/ …:

Mid front vowel /*e/ in simple environments is retained as such in all descendats:

Mid back vowel /*o/ in simple environments is retained as such in all descendants:

Mid vowels /*e *o/ cannot cooccur with high vowels /*i *u/ in the same root, but can cooccur with one another.

The pattern /*eCo/ is found in only one word which might be a regionwide loan:

The pattern /*oCe/ is better established, and is retained as such in all descendants:

… /*eCea/ …:

/*o/ …:

Low central vowel /*a/ …:

… /*aCi/ …:

… /*aCu/ …:

… /*aCe/ …:

… /*aCo/ …:

… /*iCa/ …:

… /*uCa/ …:

… /*eCa/ …:

… /*oCa/ …:

…vowel sequences ….

…

…

…

…

…

…

…

…unstressed final vowel ….

…suffix on adjectives ….

… This suffix is likely comparable to Upper Mbian Marind /-agV/ which appears on some adjectives, including “new” and “old”, where the quality of /V/ is determined by gender ablaut in agreement with qualified nominals (q.v. Drabbe 1954: 128-142):

… including color terms …

[under construction]

…, with all attestations drawn from Jore (2002, Jore and Alemán 2002):

….

Lower Fly River nominative pronouns are reconstructed as follows, with all attestations drawn from Jore and Alemán (2002: 48):

It is possible that, in addition to these, there is a third person singular pronouns as there is in other Fly River subfamilies, which is simply not represented in the limited dataset available to us, as the standard survey forms of Jore (2002) do not contain sentances with feminine referents.

No information is available about the verbal morphology of any Lower Fly River language.

[under construction]

The languages of the the Lower Fly River have have interacted extensively with their neighbors, as evidenced by loanwords from, and probably to, five neighboring families, Pahoturi River, Aramia River, Kiwai, Tabo, and Wipi of the East Trans Fly family, as well as the distantly related Abom.

Abom …:

…:

Besides Abom, loans into Lower Fly River languages came from Aramia River (Gogodalan) across the Fly River to the north, Pahoturi River to the south, and Kiwai in the delta to the east.

Loans from Aramia River are least frequent in Bituri, due to its location south of the Fly. Several are only attested for Baramu (q.v. Riley 1931-1932: 172-189):

Additionally, some words have been loaned from Lower Fly River into Aramia River languages, with Aramia attestations drawn from Riley (1930-1931: 172-189):

Loans from the Pahoturi River are most common in Were:

Loans from Kiwai are most common in Baramu (q.v. Shafer 1965: 316,) which is immediately adjacent to South Kiwai. Many are only attested for Baramu (q.v. Riley 1931-1932: 172-189, 175-194):

One high-profile shared with Kiwai is almost certainly a loan from Lower Fly River or a near relative thereof into Kiwai:

… Tabo …:

… Wipi of the East Trans Fly family …:

…