Kho-Bwa languages

The Kho-Bwa languages, also known as Kamengic, are a small family of languages, or pair of families, spoken in Arunachal Pradesh, northeast India. The name Kho-Bwa was originally proposed by George van Driem (2001). It is based on the reconstructed words *kho ("water") and *bwa ("fire"). Blench (2011) suggests the name Kamengic, from the Kameng area of Arunachal Pradesh. Alternatively, Anderson (2014)^[1] refers to Kho-Bwa as Northeast Kamengic.

Kho-Bwa
Kamengic Bugunish
Geographic distribution	Arunachal Pradesh
Linguistic classification	Sino-Tibetan? Kho-Bwa
Subdivisions	Sherdukpen Sartang Chug (Duhumbi) Lish (Khispi) ? Puroik ? Bugun
Language codes
Glottolog	khob1235

Both Van Driem and Blench group the Sherdukpen (or Mey), Lishpa (or Khispi), Chug (Duhumbi) and Sartang languages together. These form a language cluster and are clearly related. The pair of Sulung (or Puroik) and Khowa (or Bugun) languages are included in the family by Van Driem (2001) but provisionally treated as a second family by Blench (2024).^[2]

These languages have traditionally been placed in the Tibeto-Burman group by the Linguistic Survey of India, but the justification of this is open to question.^{[citation needed]} The languages have certainly been strongly influenced by the neighboring Sino-Tibetan languages, but this does not necessarily imply genetic unity and may possibly be a purely areal effect.^[3]

The entire language family has about 15,000 speakers (including Puroik) or about 10,000 speakers (excluding Puroik), according to estimates made during the 2000s.

Word lists and sociolinguistic surveys of Kho-Bwa languages have also been conducted by Abraham, et al. (2018).

Classification

The internal structure of the Kho-Bwa group of languages is as follows.^[2] The similarities between Puroik–Bugun and Sherdukpen/Mey are sporadic and may be due to contact. Lieberherr (2015) considers Puroik to be a Tibeto-Burman language, which would imply that at least Bugun is as well.

Blench & Post (2024)^[2]

• Puroik–Bugun
  • Puroik (Sulung)
  • Bugun (Khowa)

• Mey (Mö) [dialect cluster]
  • Sherdukpen [2 languages]
    • Shergaon
    • Rupa (Mö)
  • Sartang (But Monpa) [2 languages]
    • Rahung
    • Jergaon
  • Chug–Lish [1 language]
    • Khispi (Lish)
    • Gompatse
    • Duhumbi (Chug)

Lieberherr & Bodt (2017)

Lieberherr & Bodt (2017)^[4] consider Puroik to be a Kho-Bwa language, and classify the Kho-Bwa languages as follows.

• Kho-Bwa
  • Puroik
  • Bugun
  • Western Kho-Bwa
    • Sherdukpen, Sartang
    • Chug (Duhumbi), Lish (Khispi)

Tresoldi et al. (2022)

Based on computational phylogenetic analyses from Tresoldi et al. (2022), the phylogenetic tree of Kho-Bwa is roughly as follows:^[5]

• Kho-Bwa
  • Western
    • Duhumbi–Khispi (Chug–Lish): Duhumbi (Chug), Khispi (Lish)
    • Mey–Sartang: Shergaon, Rupa, Jerigaon, Khoina, Rahung, Khoitam
  • Bugun
    • A
      • Bulu, Rawa, Kojo Rojo
      • Sario Saria, Lasumpatte, Chayangtajo
    • B
      • Namphri, Kaspi
      • Wangho, Dikhyang
      • Singchaung, Bichom

Vocabulary

The following table of Kho-Bwa basic vocabulary items is from Blench (2015).^[6]

Gloss	Mey (Shergaon)	Mey (Rupa)	Sartang (Jergaon)	Sartang (Rahung)	Lish (Khispi)	Chug (Duhumbi)
one	hǎn	han	hèn	hân	hin	hin
two	ɲǐt	ɲik	nìk	ně	ɲes	niʃ
three	ùŋ	uŋ	ùŋ	ùún	ʔum	om
four	pʰʃì	bsi	sì	psì	pʰəhi	psi
five	kʰù	kʰu	kʰù	kʰu	kʰa	kʰa
six	ʧùk	kit	ʧìk	ʨěy	ʧʰuʔ	ʧyk
seven	ʃìt	sit	sìk	sǐ, sě	ʃis	his
eight	sàʤát	sarʤat	sàrgè	sàrʤɛ́	saɾgeʔ	saɾgeʔ
nine	tʰkʰí	dʰikʰi	tʰkʰì	tɛ̀kʰɯ́	ṱʰikʰu	ṱʰikʰu
ten	sɔ̀ ̃	sõ	sã̀	sɔ	ʃan	ʃan
head	kʰruk	kʰruk	kʰrǔk	kʰruʔ	kʰoloʔ	kʰloʔ
nose	nupʰuŋ	nəfuŋ	nfùŋ	apʰuŋ	hempoŋ	heŋpʰoŋ
eye	khibi	kivi	kábì	kʰaʔby	kʰumu	kʰum
ear	kʰtùŋ	gtʰiŋ	gtʰìŋ	ktèíŋ	kʰutʰuŋ	kʰutʰuŋ
tongue	laphõ	lapon	?	le	loi	loi
tooth	nuthuŋ	tokʧe	mísìŋ	nitʰiŋ	ʃiŋtuŋ	hintuŋ
arm	ik	ik	ìk	ik	hu	hut
leg	là	lapon	lɛ̌	lɛ̌	lei	lai
belly	ʃrìŋ	sliŋ	srìŋ	sriŋ	hiɲiŋ	hiliŋ
bone	skìk	skik	àhík	skik	ʃukuʃ	ʃukuʃ
blood	hà	ha(a)	hɛ̀	ha	hoi	hoi
face	dòŋpù	bo	mi	zə̀í	doʔ	doŋpa
tooth	ntùŋ	tokʧe	mísìŋ	ptə̀íŋ	ʃiŋtuŋ	hintuŋ
stomach	àlà	karbu	ʧàk	phriŋ	hiɲiŋ	hiliŋ
mouth	ʧàw	nəʧaw	so	ʨʨǒ	hoʧok	kʰoʧu
rain	ʧuuma	nimi	nʧʰù	ʧuʧuba	namu	namu

See also

• Kho-Bwa comparative vocabulary lists (Wiktionary)

Further reading

• Ismail Lieberherr and Timotheus Adrianus Bodt. (2017) Sub-grouping Kho-Bwa based on shared core vocabulary. Himalayan Linguistics 16(2). 26–63. Paper (CLDF Dataset on Zenodo doi:10.5281/zenodo.2553234)
• Binny Abraham, Kara Sako, Elina Kinny, Isapdaile Zeliang (2018). Sociolinguistic Research among Selected Groups in Western Arunachal Pradesh: Highlighting Monpa. SIL Electronic Survey Reports 2018–009. (CLDF Dataset on Zenodo. doi:10.5281/zenodo.3537601)
• Bodt, T. and J.-M. List (2019). Testing the predictive strength of the comparative method: An ongoing experiment on unattested words in Western Kho-Bwa languages. Papers in Historical Phonology 4.1. 22–44. doi:10.2218/pihph.4.2019.3037 (CLDF Dataset on Zenodo doi:10.5281/zenodo.3537604)
• Bodt, Timotheus A.; List, Johann-Mattis (2021). "Reflex prediction: A case study of Western Kho-Bwa". Diachronica. doi:10.1075/dia.20009.bod.

References

1. Anderson, Gregory D.S. 2014. On the classification of the Hruso (Aka) language. Paper presented at the 20th Himalayan Languages Symposium, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
2. Roger Blench & Mark Post (ms, 2024) (De)Classifying Arunachal Languages: Reconsidering the Evidence, p. 4–8.
3. Blench (2011): "Certainly, the phonology and morphology of Arunachali languages looks superficially like Tibeto-Burman, which explains their placing in the Linguistic Survey of India. Unfortunately, this is rather where matters have remained [... this paper] proposes we should take seriously the underlying presumption probably implied in Konow's statement in Linguistic Survey of India. Volume III, 1, Tibeto-Burman family, Calcutta (1909:572)], that these languages may not be Sino-Tibetan but simply have been influenced by it; that they are language isolates."
4. Lieberherr, Ismael; Bodt, Timotheus Adrianus. 2017. Sub-grouping Kho-Bwa based on shared core vocabulary. In Himalayan Linguistics, 16(2).
5. Tiago Tresoldi; Christoph Rzymski; Robert Forkel; Simon J. Greenhill; Johann-Mattis List; Russell D. Gray (2022). "Managing Historical Linguistic Data for Computational Phylogenetics and Computer-Assisted Language Comparison". The Open Handbook of Linguistic Data Management. The MIT Press. pp. 345–354. doi:10.7551/mitpress/12200.003.0033. ISBN 978-0-262-36607-6.
6. Blench, Roger. 2015. The Mey languages and their classification. Presentation given at the University of Sydney, 21 August 2015.

• George van Driem (2001) Languages of the Himalayas: An Ethnolinguistic Handbook of the Greater Himalayan Region. Brill.
• Blench, Roger. 2011. (De)classifying Arunachal languages: Reconsidering the evidence
• Lieberherr, Ismael; Bodt, Timotheus Adrianus. 2017. Sub-grouping Kho-Bwa based on shared core vocabulary. In Himalayan Linguistics, 16(2).
• Abraham, Binny, Kara Sako, Elina Kinny, Isapdaile Zeliang. 2018. Sociolinguistic Research among Selected Groups in Western Arunachal Pradesh: Highlighting Monpa. SIL Electronic Survey Reports 2018–009.