Saho–Afar
Geographic
distribution		Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti
Linguistic classificationAfro-Asiatic
Subdivisions
Glottologsaho1245

The Saho–Afar languages (also known as Afar–Saho) are a dialect-cluster belonging to the Cushitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic family. They include the Afar and Saho languages, which are spoken in Djibouti, Eritrea and Ethiopia.[1][2]

Characteristic features of Saho-Afar include the following:[3]

  • Preservation of the pharyngeal fricatives /ħ/ and /ʕ/
  • Consistent Subject-Object-Verb word order
  • Unique numerals '7' and '8': Saho malħin, baħar, Afar malħina, baħra.
  • A contrast of high and low tone; gender is often marked by a high-low tone pattern on masculine nouns, low-high on feminine nouns, e.g. báḍà 'son', bàḍá 'daughter'.
  • The Cushitic prefix conjugation is used commonly (ca. 40% of the vocabulary), and is also applied to loanwords from Ethiopian Semitic languages.
  • A general negative prefix má- is used in both the imperative and declarative moods. The past tense of suffix-conjugated verbs uses in addition a single negative suffix for both, the present tense lacks a distinct negative suffix entirely.

Notes

  1. ↑ Raymond G. Gordon Jr., ed. 2005. Ethnologue: Languages of the World. 15th edition. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics.
  2. ↑ "Saho-Afar languages". Encyclopedia Britannica. Archived from the original on 2022-01-04. Retrieved 2022-01-04.
  3. ↑ Banti, Giorgio; Vergari, Moreno (2017). "Aspects of Saho dialectology". Afroasiatica Romana. Proceedings of the 15th meeting of Afroasiatic linguistics. Sapienza Università de Roma. pp. 65–81.


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