The Kiranti Languages
The Kiranti (Nep. किरान्ती Kirāntī) languages are members of the northwestern or Bodic subbranch within the eastern branch of the Tibeto-Burman language family, the world’s largest language family in terms of speakers after Indo-European. In modern parlance, the term ‘Kiranti’ applies to the Tibeto-Burman peoples native to eastern Nepal, specifically the Limbu and Rai groups.
The Limbu language
The Limbu (Nep. लिम्बू Limbū) are the easternmost ethnic group of Kiranti people, and the Limbu language is spoken by roughly 300,000 people (van Driem 2001: 665), of which 254.000 live in Nepal (HMG 1995).
The Rai languages
The term ‘Rai’ (Nep. राई Rāī) is an ethnonym which is used to denote different groups of Mongoloid stock speaking closely related Kiranti languages. This honorific term became widespread after the unification of Nepal and has replaced older ethnic denominators such as ‘Khambu’ and ‘Jimdar’. The different Rai groups of eastern Nepal comprise around 439.000 individuals (HMG 1995) in total. According to Gurung (1994), the different Rai groups form a demographic majority in the first six districts. Rai groups form the second largest ethnic body in the Udayapur district. Substantial Rai groups are found in the two last districts.
- Solu-Khumbu: 30.5% of the total population (= 29,618 individuals);
- Sankuwa-Sabha: 23.7% (= 33,600 individuals);
- Khoṭāṅ: 38.8% (= 83,725 individuals);
- Bhojpur: 33.1% (= 65,874 individuals);
- Dhankuṭā: 23.5% (= 34,366 individuals);
- Ilām: 24.6% (= 56,326 individuals);
- Udaypur: 17.1% (= 38,804 individuals);
- Okhalḍhuṅgā: 12.0% (= 16,679 individuals);
- Pāñcthar: 13.7% (= 24,020 individuals).
Kiranti subgroups
On the basis of phonological developments, lexical isoglosses, what is known from grammar and the ethnic divisions recognised by the Kiranti people themselves, van Driem (2001: 615) presents the following Kiranti subgroups from east to west:
Limbu
- Eastern Limbu: Pāñcthare, Tamarkhole
- Western Limbu: Phedāppe, Chathare
Eastern Kiranti
- Greater Yakkha: Yakkha, Chɨlɨng, Āṭhpahariyā
- Upper Aruṇ: Lohorung, Yamphu, Mewahang
Central Kiranti
- Khambu: Kulung, Nachiring, Sampang, Sām
- Southern: Chamling, Puma, Bantawa, Chintang, Dungmali
Western Kiranti
- Midwestern: Thulung
- Chaurasiya (Chaurasia): Ombule (Wambule), Jero
- Upper Dūdhkosī: Dumi, Khaling, Kohi
- Northwestern: Bahing, Sunwar, Hayu
The Chaurasia linguistic unit
It can be argued that Wambule and its western neighbour Jero do not constitute two distinct languages, but rather two separate but mutually intelligible sets of dialects of a single language. A suitable name for the hypothetical language combining the Wambule and Jero dialect groups may well be ‘Chaurasia’. This name is a slight modification of Hodgson’s (1857) ‘Chouras’ya’, which is an anglicised version of the historical Nepali name ‘चौरासिय Caurāsiya’, i.e. the ‘eighty-four’ counties. This name is a toponym which denotes most of the main area inhabited by the Wambule and Jero people. The Chaurasia linguistic unit forms part of the Western Kiranti group, which belongs to the northwestern or ‘Bodic’ subbranch of the eastern branch of the Tibeto-Burman language family. The languages Thulung, Dumi, Khaling, Kohi, Bahing, Sunwar and Hayu are closely related.
First linguistic investigations
The Kiranti languages were first studied by Brian Houghton Hodgson (1857), who wrote an important contribution on the Hayu language. Hodgson (1858) discusses Bahing language and presents a sketch of the history and ethnic affiliation of the Kiranti people. Hodgson’s pioneering work has remained the only accessible source on the Kiranti languages for a long time. On the basis of Hodgson’s material, Sten Konow presented his ‘short note on each dialect [of] Khambu’ more than 50 years later (Grierson 1909: 340).
Modern linguistic research
More recently, however, an increasing number of Kiranti languages have become the object of detailed linguistic research. Grammars have been written on Hayu by Boyd Michailovsky (1981, 1988), Dumi by George van Driem (1993b), Yamphu by Roland Rutgers (1998), Kulung by Gerard Tolsma, Wambule by myself (Opgenort 2002, 2004b) and Jero by myself (Opgenort, 2005c), and Sunwar by Dörte Borchers (2007). René Huysmans of the Himalayan Languages Project at Leiden University is currently preparing a descriptive grammar of Sampang. The group of less well-studied Rai languages includes Yakkha, Bantawa and Chamling. To linguists, virtually nothing is known about Tilung or Tiling.