Austronesian
Basic Vocabulary Database
Kia Ora!
Random Word: waiha simi-na ("to sniff, smell" inRoro)
Welcome to the Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database.
This database contains 349,279 lexical items from2,040 languages spoken throughout the Pacific region. Most of these languages belong to theAustronesian language family, which is the largest family in the world containing around 1,000 and 1,200 languages.
Each language in our database has around 210 words associated with it. These words correspond to basic items of vocabulary, such as simple verbs like'to walk', or'to fly', the names of body parts likehand ormouth, colors likered, numbers (1,2,3,4) and kinship terms such asMother,Father andPerson. The full list ishere.
We have a new paper out inScience:Language Phylogenies Reveal Pulses and Pauses in Pacific Settlement.
More Information:
Warning: Please do not cite or publish anything using this database without the authors' permission.
We would welcome assistance from professional linguists to correct any mistakes, improve the cognacy judgments and to add further languages.
We only have between 170% and 204% of all of the Austronesian languages represented in this database, and would love to expand this number. If you have data for an Austronesian, Trans New Guinea / Papaun / Indo-Pacific or Australian language or dialect that are not here, pleasehelp us out.
To cite this database, please reference the following paper. You should also include the date that you obtained the data, as we are constantly improving and correcting the information contained here.
Greenhill, S.J., Blust. R, & Gray, R.D. (2008).The Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database: From Bioinformatics to Lexomics.Evolutionary Bioinformatics, 4:271-283.
The commercial use of these data is forbidden unless under the express permission of the authors.
Contact us by email with any queries, comments or suggestions:Simon Greenhill
Latest News
AddedWarembori from Donohue (1999). Thanks to Emily Gasser Posted inaustronesian on 2026-01-22 02:40:54 by (1075)
AddedYoke from Christoph Bracks field notes. Thanks to Emily Gasser Posted inaustronesian on 2026-01-22 02:40:42 by (1074)
AddedTamambo from Jauncey 1997. Posted inaustronesian on 2025-06-03 02:06:44 by Simon Greenhill (1073)
AddedMalay (1600) from D. Lombard (1970) le "spraeck end woord-boek" de Frederick de Houtman, première méthode de malais parlé (fin du XVIe s.) présenté par Denys Lombard, avec la collaboration de Mmes Winarsih Arifin et Minnie Wibisono. Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient, Paris, 1970.. Posted inaustronesian on 2025-04-14 05:11:54 by Simon Greenhill (1072)
AddedDalkalaen from Kilu von Prince (2012). Thanks to Simon Greenhill Posted inaustronesian on 2025-02-23 23:56:44 by (1071)
© 2003-2026:Simon J. Greenhill , Robert Blust, &Russell Gray.
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Please cite: Greenhill, S.J., Blust. R, & Gray, R.D. (2008).The Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database: From Bioinformatics to Lexomics. Evolutionary Bioinformatics, 4:271-283.
The Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database byGreenhill et al. is licensed under aCreative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.