Lhao Vo language

Lhaovo (the Burmese name: လော်ဝေါ်), also known as Maru (မရူ) and Langsu (the Chinese name: 浪速), is a Burmish language spoken in Burma and by a few thousand speakers in China.

Lhao Vo
Maru
Native to	Myanmar, China
Native speakers	(100,000 cited 1997)[1]
Language family	Sino-Tibetan (Tibeto-Burman) Lolo–Burmese Burmish Maruic Lhao Vo
Writing system	Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-3	mhx
Glottolog	maru1249

Distribution

Dai Qingxia (2005:3) reports 5,600 Langsu speakers in China. Many thousands more are dispersed across the eastern edge of Kachin State, Myanmar.

• Luxi City: Yingpan Township (ယင်းဖန်မြို့နယ်, 营盘乡)
• Lianghe County: Mengyang Township (မယ်ညန့်နယ်, 养乡)
• Longchuan County: Bangwai Township (ဖန်ဝိုင်မြို့နယ်, 邦外乡) and Jingkan Township (ကျင်ခန်မြို့နယ်, 景坎乡)

The Langsu people call themselves lɔ̃³¹vɔ³¹ (Chinese: Lang'e 浪峨)^[2][3]

Varieties

The standard Lhaovo dialect is that of the Dago’ (tăkoʔ) hill area, on the east side of N'Mai River valley in Kachin State.^[4]

Sawada (2017) lists the following patois (subvarieties) of Lhaovo.^[4]

• Gyanno’ (autonym: kjɛn35 noʔ21): spoken in the west side of the N'Mai River in Sawlaw Township.
• Tho’lhang (autonym: tʰaʔ21 lo̰22): spoken in Htawlang and a few other villages in northern Sawlaw Township.
• Lakin (autonym: lăkɛ̰22): spoken in Lakin village, northern Sawlaw Township.
• Lhangsu (autonym: la̰ŋ53 su53; not the same as Langsu 浪速 of Yunnan): spoken in the area between Hkrang Hka and Sanin Hka, which are two tributaries of the Mali Hka. It is spoken in Sumprabum Township, including in the villages of Hting Tsa, N-gawk Hkyet, and Ma Awng.

Langsong

The Langsong (浪宋) are found in Zaoyang (早阳)^[5] in Yunlong County (in the Chinese province of Yunnan) as well as in Baocun (表村),^[6] Laomo (老末), and Sancha (三岔).^[7][8] They reportedly speak a highly endangered language that may be possibly related to Langsu.

Phonology

Consonants

Lhao Vo has the following consonant sounds:^[9]

		Labial		Dental/ Alveolar	Post- alveolar	Palatal	Velar		Glottal
		plain	pal.				plain	pal.
Plosive	voiceless	p	pʲ	t			k	kʲ	(ʔ)
	aspirated	pʰ	pʰʲ	tʰ			kʰ	kʰʲ
Affricate	voiceless			t͡s̪	t͡ʃ
	aspirated			t͡s̪ʰ	t͡ʃʰ
Fricative	voiceless	f		s̪	ʃ		x
	voiced	v					ɣ		ɦ
Nasal		m	mʲ	n		ɲ	ŋ
Tap				ɾ
Approximant				l		j

• Sounds /p, t, k, ʔ, m, n, ŋ, j/ can all be heard in final position.
• /ʔ/ is only written in final position.

Vowels

There is a distinction among creaky vowel sounds:^[9]

	Front				Central		Back
	plain		creaky		plain	creaky	plain	creaky
Close	i		ḭ				u	ṵ
Mid	e	ø	ḛ	ø̰			o	o̰
Open					a	a̰
Diphthong					au	a̰ṵ

• /i, ḭ/ can also range to [ɪ, ɪ̰].
• Vowels /e, o/ when preceding a word-final /-ŋ/ can also be heard as nasalized [ẽ, õ].

When preceding a final glide /-j/, each vowel has the following allophones:

Phoneme	Allophones
/aj/	[aɪ̆], [ɛ]
/auj/	[auɪ̆], [ɔɪ̆]
/uj/	[uɪ̆], [ʉ], [ʉɪ̆]
/ej/	[əɪ̆]

Tones

Lhao Vo has three lexical tones: high, low and falling. Low tone may be a different analysis of creaky vowels. In Latin script, falling tone is unmarked, e.g. ⟨lo⟩ etc.; low tone is ⟨lo꞉⟩ etc., and high tone is ⟨loˮ⟩ etc. (or ⟨lobʼ⟩ etc. with a final b, d, g). Final glottal stop is written ⟨lo,⟩ etc. in falling tone, ⟨lo;⟩ etc. in low tone, and ⟨loʼ⟩ in high tone.^[10]

References

1. Lhao Vo at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
2. Dai (2005), p. 3.
3. Dai (2010), p. 10.
4. Sawada, Hideo (2017). Two Undescribed Dialects of Northern Burmish Sub-branch: Gyannoʔ and Thoʔlhang. Presented at ICSTLL 50, Beijing, China.
5. "Yúnlóng Xiàn Miáowěi Lìsùzú Xiāng Zǎoyáng" 云龙县苗尾傈僳族乡早阳 [Zaoyang, Miaowei Lisu Ethnic Township, Yunlong County]. ynszxc.gov.cn (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 2018-05-04.
6. "Yúnlóng Xiàn Miáowěi Lìsùzú Xiāng Biǎocūn Biǎocūn" 云龙县苗尾傈僳族乡表村表村 [Baocun, Baocun, Miaowei Lisu Township, Yunlong County]. ynszxc.gov.cn (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 2016-10-10.
7. "Yúnlóng Xiàn Miáowěi Lìsùzú Xiāng Biǎocūn Sānchà" 云龙县苗尾傈僳族乡表村三岔 [Sancha, Baocun, Miaowei Lisu Township, Yunlong County]. ynszxc.gov.cn (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 2018-05-04.
8. Zhongguo shao shu minzu shehui lishi diaocha ziliao congkan xiuding bianji weiyuanhui 中国少数民族社会历史调查资料丛刊修订编辑委员会 (2009). Jǐngpǒzú shèhuì lìshǐ diàochá 景颇族社会历史调查 (in Chinese). Beijing: Minzu chubanshe. p. 57.
9. Hideo, Sawada (1999). Outline of Phonology of Lhaovo (Maru) of Kachin State. In Linguistic & Anthropological Study of the Shan Culture Area, report of research project, Grant-in-Aid for International Scientific Research (Field Research): Tokyo: Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. pp. 97–147.
10. "Lhaovo". Kachin Portal Site.

Further reading

• Dai, Qingxia 戴慶廈 (2005). Làngsùyǔ yánjiū 浪速语研究 [Study of the Maru Language] (in Chinese). Beijing: Minzu chubanshe. ISBN 9787105068159.
• Dai, Qingxia 戴庆厦 (2010). Piànmǎ Cháshānrén jí qí yǔyán 片马茶山人及其语言 [The Chashan People of Pianma and Their Language] (in Chinese). Beijing: Shangwu yinshuguan.
• Hill, Nathan; Cooper, Douglas (2020). "A Machine Readable Collection of Lexical Data on the Burmish Languages" (Data Set). Zenodo. doi:10.5281/zenodo.3759030.
• Yabu Shirō 藪司郎 (1988). "A Preliminary Report on the Study of the Maru, Lashi and Atsi Languages of Burma". In Yoshiaki Ishizawa (ed.). Historical and Cultural Studies in Burma. Tokyo: Institute of Asian Studies, Sophia University. pp. 65–132.

External links

• Consonant Ear Training and Tones
• Maru fieldwork of John Okell from 1969
• Lhaovo language site