| Nihali | |
|---|---|
| निहाली | |
| Native to | India |
| Region | Jalgaon Jamod,Buldhana district,Maharashtra (on the border withMadhya Pradesh) |
| Ethnicity | 5,000 Nihali |
Native speakers | 2,500 (2016)[1] |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | nll |
| Glottolog | niha1238 |
| ELP | Nihali |
 Historically Nihali-speaking area spanning the border betweenMaharashtra to the south andMadhya Pradesh to the north | |
 Nihali is classified as Critically Endangered by theUNESCOAtlas of the World's Languages in Danger | |
Nihali, also known asNahali, is anendangeredlanguage isolate that is spoken in west-centralIndia by approximately 2,500 people as of 2016.[2] The name of the language derives fromnahal, meaning "tiger".[3]
Nihali has not been definitively proven to be related to any other surroundinglanguage families ofSouth Asia, such asMunda,Indo-Aryan, andDravidian languages, nor to other language isolates likeBurushaski andKusunda.
The Nihali tribal area is just south of theTapti River spanning the border betweenMaharashtra andMadhya Pradesh aroundBuldhana district andBurhanpur district. However, only the villages in the Buldhana district - Jamod, Sonbardi, Kuvardev, Chalthana, Ambavara, Wasali, and Cicari - still use the Nihali language today. There aredialectal differences between the Jamod-Sonbardi and the Kuvardev-Chalthana varieties.[4] Historically, Nihali was spoken around the village of Tembi in Burhanpur district as well.[5]
Today there are no longer any monolingual speakers of the language, as Nihali speakers are likely to speak varieties of Korku, Marathi, or Hindi among others.[6] There is no established writing system for the language.[7]
The early history of Nihali is unclear, as there are no direct attestations of the Nihali language prior to the modern era. One theory suggests that the Nihali people might trace back to the ancient community ofNahalka, an offshoot of theNishada tribe mentioned in theMahabharata and thePadma Purana.[8]
Franciscus Kuiper was the first to suggest that Nihali may be unrelated to any other Indian language, with the non-Korku, non-Dravidian core vocabulary being the remnant of an earlier population in India. However, he did not rule out that it may be aMunda language, like Korku. Kuiper suggested that Nihali may differ from neighbouring languages, such as Korku, mostly in its function as ananti-language.[5] Kuiper's assertions stem, in part, from the fact that many oppressed groups within India have usedsecret languages to prevent outsiders from understanding them.[9]
For centuries, most Nihalis have often worked as agricultural labourers, for speakers of languages other than their own. In particular, Nihali labourers have often worked for members of theKorku people, and are often bilingual in theKorku language. Because of this history, Nihali is sometimes used only to prevent non-Nihali speaking outsiders from understanding them.[10] Some commonalities between Nihali andGondi vocabulary also suggest that the Nihali people may have historically lived with theGondi people or anotherDravidian-speaking peoples in the area, before reaching the present settlements.[11]
The Nihali live similarly to the Kalto people. That and the fact that theKalto language has often been calledNahali led to confusion of the two languages. Some Korku-speakers refuse to acknowledge the Nihali as a distinct community, and describe the emergence of the Nihalis as resulting from a disruption of Korku civil society.[9]
Linguist Norman Zide describes the recent history of the language as follows:"Nihali's borrowings are far more massive than in such textbook examples of heavy outside acquisition asAlbanian." In this respect, says Zide, modern Nihali seems comparable tohybridised dialects ofRomani spoken inWestern Europe. Zide claims that this is a result of a historical process that began with a massacre of Nihalis in the early 19th century, organised by one of the rulers of the area, supposedly in response to "marauding". Zide alleges that, afterwards, the Nihalis "decimated in size", have "functioned largely as raiders and thieves ... who [have] disposed of ... stolen goods" through "outside associates". Zide adds that Nihali society has "long been multilingual, and uses Nihali as a more or less secret language which is not ordinarily revealed to outsiders" and that early researchers "attempting to learn the language were, apparently, deliberately rebuffed or misled".[12]
| Front | Back | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| short | long | short | long | |
| Close | i | iː | u | uː |
| Mid | e | eː | o | oː |
| Open | a | aː | ||
Lengthening of vowels is phonemic. The vowels [e] and [o] have lower varieties at the end of morphemes.
Nasalization is rare and tends to occur in borrowed words.
| Labial | Dental/ Alveolar | Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ɳ | ɲ | ||
| Plosive/ Affricate | voiceless | p | t | ʈ | tʃ | k |
| aspirated | pʰ | tʰ | ʈʰ | tʃʰ | kʰ | |
| voiced | b | d | ɖ | dʒ | ɡ | |
| breathy | bʱ | dʱ | ɖʱ | dʒʱ | ɡʱ | |
| Fricative | s | ʂ | ʃ | h | ||
| Rhotic | r | ɽ | ||||
| Approximant | ʋ | l | j | |||
There are 33 consonants. Unaspirated stops are more frequent than aspirated stops.[13]
The language has a very large number of words adopted from neighboring languages, with 60–70% apparently taken from theMundaKorku language, fromDravidian languages (ṭoːl "skin";coːpo "salt"), and fromIndo-Aryan languages. However, much of its core vocabulary, such ascorṭo "blood" andkalen "egg", cannot be related to them nor any other languages. Less than 25% of the language's ancestral vocabulary seems to be in use.[13]
Below are some Nihali basic vocabulary words without clear external parallels (in Korku, Hindi, Marathi, Dravidian, etc.) listed in the appendix of Nagaraja (2014).
| head | peːñ |
| hair (head) | kuguso |
| eye | jikit |
| ear | cigam |
| nose | coːn |
| tooth | menge |
| mouth | kaggo |
| hand | bakko |
| shoulder | ṭ/tagli |
| intestines | koṭor |
| navel | bumli |
| liver | gadri |
| blood | corṭo |
| bone | paːkṭo |
| bird | poe, pyu |
| egg | kalen |
| snake | koːgo |
| fish | caːn |
| louse | keːpe |
| mosquito | kaːn |
| fly (insect) | eḍ(u)go |
| tree | aːḍḍo |
| water | joppo |
| rain | maːnḍo |
| stone | caːgo, caːrgo |
| road, path | ḍãːy |
| house | aːwaːr |
| name | jumu |
In Nihali, many verbs are suffixed with -be.
| eat | ṭyeː-, tyeː- |
| drink | ḍelen- |
| bite | haru- |
| blow | bigi-, bhigi- |
| die | betto-, beṭṭo- |
| kill | paḍa- |
| laugh | haːgo- |
| cry, weep | aːpa- |
| go | eːr-, eṛe- |
| come | paːṭo, pya |
| give | beː- |
| see | ara- |
| hear | cakni- |
The personal pronouns in Nihali are:[14]
| singular | dual | plural | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1st person | jo | tye:ko | ingi |
| 2nd person | ne | na:ko | la |
| 3rd person | eṭey | hiṭkel | eṭla < eṭey + la |
The table below compares the demonstrative paradigm between Nihali and Korku, the surroundingMunda language.[15]
| Nihali | Korku | |
|---|---|---|
| 'what' | nan | co:(ch) |
| 'who' | nani | je |
| 'why' | naway, nawa:san | co:- ~ co:ch |
| ‘when’ | meran ~ miran | co:-la |
| ‘where’ | mingay | ṭone ~ ṭongan 'at where' |
| ‘how much’ | m(i)yan | co-ṭo |
| ‘how’ | naw-ki | co-phar |
| ‘whose’ | nan-in | je-konṭe ‘whose child’ |
| ‘which (book)’ | nu-san | (pustak) ṭone-bukko ‘which (book)’ |
Nihali morphosyntax is much simpler than that of Korku and other Munda languages, and is unrelated to that of Munda languages.[16] Word order is SOV.
nani
who
hi
this
palso-ki
child-to
duːdo
milk
delenkamay
gave
nani hi palso-ki duːdo delenkamay
who this child-to milk gave
"Who gave milk to this child?"
kyamp
tomorrow
jo
I
minga-ka-bi
anywhere
beṭhe
neg
eːr
go
kyamp jo minga-ka-bi beṭhe eːr
tomorrow I anywhere neg go
"I will not go anywhere tomorrow."
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