Nyole language (Uganda)

Nyole
Lunyole
Native to	Uganda
Region	Tororo District
Native speakers	340,000 (2002 census)
Language family	Niger–Congo Atlantic–Congo Benue–Congo Bantoid Bantu Northeast Bantu Great Lakes Bantu Masaba–Luhya (J.30) Nyole
Language codes
ISO 639-3	nuj
Glottolog	nyol1238
Guthrie code	JE.35

Nyole (also LoNyole, Lunyole, Nyuli) is a Bantu language spoken by the Luhya people in Tororo District, Uganda near Lake Kyoga. There is 61% lexical similarity with a related but different Nyole language in Kenya.

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar
Nasal		m	n	ɲ	ŋ
Plosive	voiceless	p	t	tʃ	k
	voiced	b	d	dʒ	g
	voiced prenasalized	ᵐb	ⁿd	ᶮdʒ	ᵑg
Fricative	voiceless	ɸ	s		x
	voiced	β
Approximant		w	l~ɾ	j	(w)

Nyole has series of voiceless, voiced, and prenasalized stops. /w/ is labio-velar.

Vowels

	Front	Back
High	i	u
Mid	e	o
Low	a

Historical changes

Nyole has an interesting development from Proto-Bantu *p → Nyole /ŋ/. Schadeberg (1989) connects this sound change to rhinoglottophilia, where the sound change developed first as *[p] → [ɸ] → [h]. Then, given the acoustic similarity of [h] and breathy voice to nasalization, the sound change progressed as [h] → [h̃] → [ŋ]. The velar place of articulation development is due to velar nasals being the least perceptible of the nasals and its marginal status in (pre-)Nyole and other Bantu languages. In closely related neighboring languages, *p developed variously into /h/ or /w/ or was deleted.

This historical development results in so-called "crazy" alternations, like /n/ + /ŋ/ resulting in /p/ as in the following:

n-ŋuliira ("hear" stem form) : puliira "I hear"

n-ŋumula ("rest" stem form) : pumula "I rest"

In the above two words, when the first person singular subject prefix /n-/ is added to the stem starting with /ŋ/, the initial consonant surfaces as /p/. In other forms (like /oxu-ŋuliira/ "to hear" and /oxu-ŋumula/ "to rest"), the original stem-initial /ŋ/ can be seen.

See also

• Luhya language

References

• Eastman, Carol M. (1972). Lunyole of the Bamenya, JAL, 11 (3), 63-78.
• Morris, H. F. (1963). A note on Lunyole. Uganda Journal, 27, 127-134.
• Schadeberg, Thilo C. (1989). The velar nasal in Nyole (E. 35). Annales Aequatoria, 10, 169-179. (Available online).