Proto-TransâÂÂNew Guinea is the reconstructed proto-language ancestral to the TransâÂÂNew Guinea languages. Reconstructions have been proposed by Malcolm Ross and Andrew Pawley.
Proto-TransâÂÂNew Guinea is reconstructed with a typical simple Papuan inventory: five vowels ; three phonations of stops at three places , , ; plus a palatal affricate , the fricative , and the approximants . Syllables are typically (C)V, with CVC possible at the ends of words. Many of the languages have restricted tone systems.
The Proto-TransâÂÂNew Guinea vowels are reconstructed as having a cross-linguistically frequent five-vowel system:
Ross reconstructs the following pronominal paradigm for TransâÂÂNew Guinea, with *a~*i ablaut for singular~non-singular:
There is a related but less commonly attested form for 'we', *nu, as well as a *ja for 'you', which Ross speculates may have been a polite form. In addition, there were dual suffixes *-li and *-t, and a plural suffix *-nV, (i.e. n plus a vowel) as well as collective number suffixes *-pi- (dual) and *-m- (plural) that functioned as inclusive we when used in the first person. (Reflexes of the collective suffixes, however, are limited geographically to the central and eastern highlands, and so might not be as old as proto-TransâÂÂNew Guinea.)
Studies group Madang, Finisterre-Huon, and Kainantu-Goroka together as part of a larger Northeast New Guinea (NENG) group on the basis of morphological evidence, such as mutually reconstructable verbal suffixes that mark subject:
Lexical words, such as *niman 'louse', may also be reconstructed:
The Proto-TransâÂÂNew Guinea negative is reconstructed as *ma-. Negatives in TransâÂÂNew Guinea languages usually have either an mV- or nV- form.
For other lexical comparison tables of Papuan languages, see also: