Tolomako language

language
name=Tolomako
states=Vanuatu
region=Big Bay, Espiritu Santo Island
speakers=less than 500
familycolor=Austronesian
fam2=Malayo-Polynesian
fam3=Central Eastern
fam4=Eastern
fam5=Oceanic
fam6=Central-Eastern
fam7=Remote Oceanic
fam8=North and Central
fam9=Northeast
fam10=West Santo
iso2=map|iso3=tlm

Tolomako is a language of the Oceanic subgroup of Austronesian languages. It is spoken on Santo island in Vanuatu. It distinguishes four numbers for its personal pronouns: singular, dual, trial, plural. Its verbs have no tense or aspect marking, but two moods, realis and irrealis. Substantives and numerals also have the same two moods. E.g.

"na"	tatsua	"mo"	tea	"mo"	tsoa
"realis"	person	"realis"	one	"realis"	not to be

Someone is missing

"te"	tatsua	"i"	tea	"mo"	tsoa
"irrealis"	person	"irrealis"	one	"realis"	not to be

There is nobody.

Tolomako is characterized by having dentals where the mother language had labials before front vowels. It shares this feature with Sakao, but not with its very close dialect Tsureviu. Thus:

Tolomako		Tsureviu
tei		pei	"water"
nata		mata	"eye"

When labials do occur preceding front vowels they seem to be reflexes of older labiovelars:

Tolomako		Tsureviu
pei		pei	"good"
mata		mata	"snake"

Compare with Fijian ŋata "snake" (spelt gata).

It has been speculated that Tolomako is a very simplified daughter-language or pidgin of the neighboring language Sakao.Who|date=October 2007 However, Tolomako is more likely a sister language of Sakao, not a pidgin. It cannot be phonologically derived from Sakao, whereas Sakao can be from Tolomako to some extent. Comparing Tolomako with its close dialect of Tsureviu allows to reconstruct an earlier state, from which most of Sakao can be regularly derived. This earlier state is very close to what can be reconstructed of Proto-Vanuatu. Thus Tolomako is a very conservative language, whereas Sakao has undergone drastic innovations in its phonology and grammar, both in the direction of increased complexity.

External links

* [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=tlm Ethnologue report]
* [http://listserv.brown.edu/archives/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0311c&L=conlang&F=&S=&P=56813 A 1992 mailing list message from Jacques Guy, describing some of his fieldwork on the language]
* [http://wiw.org/~jkominek/lojban/9412/msg00214.html A 1994 message from Jacques Guy] , citing Tolomako as a counterexample to the thesis that all languages are equally complex