Mruic languages

Mruic or Mru–Hkongso is a small group of Sino-Tibetan languages consisting of two poorly attested languages, Mru and Anu-Hkongso. Their relationship within Sino-Tibetan is unclear.

Mruic
Mru–Hkongso
Geographic
distribution		Burma, Bangladesh
Linguistic classificationSino-Tibetan
  • Mruic
Subdivisions
Glottologmrui1235[1]

Peterson & Wright (2009)[2] proposed the name Mru–Hkongso.

Classification

Matisoff (2015)[3][4] classifies Mru as part of the Northeast Indian areal group, a linkage[5] that includes Tani, Deng (Digaro), "Kuki-Chin–Naga", Meithei, Mikir, and Sal.

On the other hand, Bradley (1997) classifies Mru as part of Lolo-Burmese, based on Löffler's (1966) observations that Mru shares many phonological and lexical resemblances with Lolo-Burmese.[6][7]

The Mru-Hkongso group was first proposed by Peterson & Wright (2009),[2] who do not consider it to be a subgroup of Lolo-Burmese.

Peterson (2017:205)[8] notes that Mru and Hkongso do not have any features characteristic of Kuki-Chin languages that have been identified by VanBik (2009),[9] including lack of the sound change Proto-Tibeto-Burman *s > tʰ, lack of Kuki-Chin-type verb stem alternation, and lack of the singular first person pronoun (1.SG) *kaj which is present in most Kuki-Chin languages.

Peterson (2009)[10] considers Mru-Hkongso to be a separate Tibeto-Burman branch, and notes the following similarities between Mru-Hkongso and Bodo–Garo languages.

  • Bodo–Garo *=kho 'accusative'; Mru =k(öj) 'accusative' (Hkongso locative =ko)
  • Bodo–Garo *=ba ‘also’; Mru-Hkongso =pö ‘also’
  • Bodo–Garo *–ram 'locative nominalizer'; Mru –ram 'locative nominalizer'
  • Bodo–Garo *=gVn 'future marker'; Mru –köm ~ kön 'irrealis marker' (Hkongso ham)
  • Bodo–Garo *–(k)ha 'past marker'; Mru –khaj ~ -hö 'past marker' (Hkongso kö ?)
  • Bodo–Garo *–dV 'imperative marker'; Mru –diö 'imperative marker' (Hkongso de)

Peterson (2009)[10] considers the similarities with Bodo–Garo to be due to the possible early split of Mruic from a Tibeto-Burman branch that included Bodo–Garo (see also Central Tibeto-Burman languages and Sal languages).

Grammar

Both Mru and Hkongso display SVO (subject-verb-object) order instead of the SOV word order typical of most Tibeto-Burman languages.[10][11][12] Bai, Sinitic, and Karenic are the only other Sino-Tibetan language branches with primarily verb-medial (SVO) word order.

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References
  1. Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Mruic". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  2. Peterson, David A. and Jonathan Wright. 2009. Mru-Hkongso: a new Tibeto-Burman grouping. Paper presented at The 42nd International Conference on Sino-Tibetan Languages and Linguistics (ICSTLL 42), Chiang Mai.
  3. Matisoff, James A. 2015. The Sino-Tibetan Etymological Dictionary and Thesaurus. Berkeley: University of California. (PDF)
  4. Matisoff, James A. (2003). Handbook of Proto-Tibeto-Burman: System and Philosophy of Sino-Tibetan Reconstruction. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-520-09843-5.
  5. DeLancey, Scott (2015). "Morphological Evidence for a Central Branch of Trans-Himalayan (Sino-Tibetan)". Cahiers de Linguistique Asie Orientale. 44 (2): 122–149. doi:10.1163/19606028-00442p02.
  6. Löffler, Lorenz G. (1966). "The contribution of Mru to Sino-Tibetan linguistics". Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft. 116 (1): 118–159. JSTOR 43369896.
  7. Bradley, David (1997). "Tibeto-Burman languages and classification" (PDF). Tibeto-Burman languages of the Himalayas, Papers in South East Asian linguistics. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics. pp. 1–71.
  8. Peterson, David. 2017. "On Kuki-Chin subgrouping." In Picus Sizhi Ding and Jamin Pelkey, eds. Sociohistorical linguistics in Southeast Asia: New horizons for Tibeto-Burman studies in honor of David Bradley, 189-209. Leiden: Brill.
  9. VanBik, Kenneth. 2009. Proto-Kuki-Chin: A Reconstructed Ancestor of the Kuki-Chin Languages. STEDT Monograph 8. ISBN 0-944613-47-0.
  10. Peterson, David A. 2009. "Where does Mru fit into Tibeto-Burman?" Paper presented at The 42nd International Conference on Sino-Tibetan Languages and Linguistics (ICSTLL 42), November 2009, Payap University, Chiangmai, Thailand.
  11. Ebersole, Harold. 1996. The Mru Language: A preliminary grammatical sketch. Ms.
  12. Jonathan Michael Wright. 2009. Hkongso Grammar Sketch. MA thesis, Graduate Institute of Applied Linguistics.
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