Gumuz languages
| Gumuz | |
|---|---|
| B'aga | |
| Native to | Ethiopia, Sudan |
| Region | Benishangul-Gumuz Region Amhara Region Blue Nile Province |
| Ethnicity | Gumuz |
|
Native speakers
|
180,000 in Ethiopia (2007 census) 40,000 in Sudan (no date) |
|
Nilo-Saharan?
|
|
| Dialects |
|
| Ethiopic, Latin (in Ethiopia) | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | |
| Glottolog | gumu1244 |
Gumuz (also spelled Gumaz) is a dialect cluster spoken along the border of Ethiopia and Sudan. It has been tentatively classified within the Nilo-Saharan family. Most Ethiopian speakers live in Kamashi Zone and Metekel Zone of the Benishangul-Gumuz Region, although a group of 1,000 reportedly live outside the town of Welkite (Unseth 1989). The Sudanese speakers live in the area east of Er Roseires, around Famaka and Fazoglo on the Blue Nile, extending north along the border.
An early record of this language is a wordlist from the Mount Guba area compiled in February 1883 by Juan Maria Schuver.
Varieties are not all mutually intelligible. By that standard, there are two or three Gumuz languages. Grammatical forms are distinct between northern and southern Gumuz.
Daats'iin, discovered in 2013, is clearly a distinct language, though closest to southern Gumuz.
Gumuz has both ejective consonants and implosives. The implosive quality is being lost at the velar point of articulation in some dialects (Unseth 1989). There is a series of palatal consonants, including both ejective and implosive. In some dialects, e.g. Sirba, there is a labialized palatalized bilabial stop, as in the word for 'rat' [bʲʷa] (Unseth 1989).
Tones are high and low, with downstep.
Word order is AVO, with marked nominative case, though there is AOV order in the north, probably from Amharic influence .
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