Bruny Island language

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Bruny Island
Nuenonne
Region Bruny Island, Tasmania
Ethnicity Buny tribe of Tasmanians
Extinct 19th century
Eastern Tasmanian
  • Bruny (Southeastern)
    • Bruny Island
Language codes
ISO 639-3 None (mis)
Linguist list
 0h9 (includes SE Tasmanian)
AIATSIS[1] T5 (includes SE Tasmanian)

Bruny Island Tasmanian, or Nuenonne ("Nyunoni"), a name shared with Southeast Tasmanian, is an aboriginal language or pair of languages of Tasmania in the reconstruction of Claire Bowern.[2] It was spoken on Bruny Island off the southeastern coast of the island by the Bruny tribe.

Bruny Island Tasmanian is attested in a list of 986 words collected by Joseph Milligan (published 1857 & 1859); in 515 words collected by George Augustus Robinson; in 273 words from Charles Sterling; and in 111 words from R.A. Roberts (published 1828). The Milligan vocabulary is divergent, and falls out as a distinct language when the lists are compared at p < 0.15, though it falls together with the rest of the island at a looser criterion of p < 0.20.[3]

Sample text

The following is recorded as a prayer collected on Bruny Island in Robinson's diaries.[4] The first line is the Robinson's transcription, followed by a reconstruction of what Robinson may have heard, and finally an English gloss.

MOTTI NYRAE PARLERDI MOTTI NOVILLY RAEGEWROPPER PARLERDI NYRAE PARLERDI
moti nairi palati moti nowili retji-ropa palati nairi palati
one good God one bad devil God good God
MAGGERER WARRANGELLY RAEGEWROPPER MAGGERER TOOGENNER UENEE NYRAE PARLERVAR LOGERNER
makara waran-ngali retji-ropa makara tökana wini nairi palawa lookana
stop sky devil stop below fire good native dead
TAGGERER TEENNY LAWWAY WARRANGELLY PARLERDI NYRAE RAEGE (etc.) NOVILLY
takara tini lawey waran-ngali palati nairi retji nowili
goes road up sky God good white man bad
PARLERVAR LOGERNER TAGGERER TEENNY TOOGUNNER RAEGEWROPPER UENEE MAGGERER UENEE
palawa lookana takara tini tökana retji-ropa wini makara wini
native dead go road below devil fire stop fire

References

  1. ↑ (includes SE Tasmanian) at the Australian Indigenous Languages Database, Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies
  2. ↑ Claire Bowern, September 2012, "The riddle of Tasmanian languages", Proc. R. Soc. B, 279, 4590–4595, doi: 10.1098/rspb.2012.1842
  3. ↑ Bowern (2012), supplement
  4. ↑ J.E. Calder, 1874. "Native Tribes of Tasmania", Journal of the Anthropological Institute, 3:28
Aboriginal anthropology in Tasmania
Aboriginal Tasmanians
Tasmanian tribes
Aboriginal history
Tasmanian languages
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