Phuthi language
Language of South Africa / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Phuthi (Síphùthì)[3] is a Nguni Bantu language spoken in southern Lesotho and areas in South Africa adjacent to the same border.[4] The closest substantial living relative of Phuthi is Swati (or Siswati), spoken in Eswatini and the Mpumalanga province of South Africa. Although there is no contemporary sociocultural or political contact, Phuthi is linguistically part of a historic dialect continuum with Swati. Phuthi is heavily influenced by the surrounding Sesotho and Xhosa languages, but retains a distinct core of lexicon and grammar not found in either Xhosa or Sesotho, and found only partly in Swati to the north.
Phuthi | |
---|---|
Síphùthì or Siphuthi | |
Pronunciation | [sípʰʊːtʰɪ] |
Native to | Lesotho, South Africa |
Ethnicity | Phuthi people |
Native speakers | (20,000 cited 1999)[1] |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | – |
Glottolog | phut1246 |
S.404 [2] | |
ELP | Siphuthi |
Linguasphere | 99-AUT-fc |
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. |
The documentary origins of Phuthi can be traced to Bourquin (1927), but in other oblique references more than 100 years from the present (Ellenberger 1912). Until recently, the language has been very poorly documented with respect to its linguistic properties. The only significant earlier study (but with very uneven data, and limited coherent linguistic assumptions) is Godfrey Mzamane (1949).