Nyawaygi language
The Nyawaygi language, also spelt Nyawaygi, Nywaigi, or Nawagi, is an extinct Australian Aboriginal language that was spoken by the Nyawaygi people in North Queensland, on the east coast of Australia. The Nyawaygi language region includes the landscape within the Hinchinbrook Regional Council, Halifax Bay, and Rollingstone.[3]
| Nyawaygi | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Australia |
| Region | Queensland |
| Ethnicity | Nyawaygi |
| Extinct | 2009, with the death of Willie Seaton[1] |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | nyt |
| Glottolog | nyaw1247 |
| AIATSIS[2] | Y129 |
| ELP | Nyawaygi |
Nyawaygi had the smallest number of consonants, 12, of any Australian language. It had 7 conjugations, 3 open and 4 closed, the latter including monosyllabic roots, and, in this regard, conserved a feature of proto-Pama–Nyungan lost from contiguous languages.[4]
Vocabulary
Some words from the Nyawaygi language, as spelt and written by Nyawaygi authors include:[3]
- Alu: head
- Angal: boomerang
- Balgan: stone
- Buramu: butterfly
- Gabagan: aunt
- Touca tula: good day
- Wadi: laugh
- Yunggul: one
Notes
- Dixon, R. M. W. (10 December 2010). I Am a Linguist: With a Foreword by Peter Matthews. ISBN 978-9004192355.
- Y129 Nyawaygi at the Australian Indigenous Languages Database, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies
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This Wikipedia article incorporates text from Nyawaygi published by the State Library of Queensland under CC BY licence, accessed on 30 May 2022.
- Dixon, R. M. W. (1983). "Nyawagyi". In Dixon, Robert M. W.; Blake, Barry J. (eds.). Handbook of Australian Languages. Vol. 3. John Benjamins Publishing. pp. 431–523. ISBN 978-9-027-27353-6.
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