Mru language

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For the Kuki-Chin language of Myanmar, see Mro language.
Mru
Mrung
Shukla Mro.svg
The word 𖩌𖩑𖩗 'Kow (Village)' in Mro script[1]
RegionBangladesh, Burma, India
EthnicityMru
Native speakers
50,000 (1999–2007)[2]
Mru script, Latin script
Language codes
ISO 639-3mro
Glottologmruu1242
ELPMru
Mru women harvesting rice
A group of Mrus foraging in the hills
The Mru people and language are located in the lower right-hand corner of the map of Bangladesh

Mru, also known as Mrung (Murung), is a Sino-Tibetan language and one of the recognized languages of Bangladesh. It is spoken by a community of Mros (Mrus) inhabiting the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh with a population of 22,000 according to the 1991 census, and in Burma. The Mros are the second-largest tribal group in Bandarban District of the Chittagong Hill Tracts. A small group of Mros also live in Rangamati Hill District.

The Mru language is considered "Severely endangered" by UNESCO.[4]

Classification[edit]

Mru forms the Mruic language branch with Hkongso and Anu, which are spoken in Paletwa Township, Chin State, Myanmar. The position of Mruic with Sino-Tibetan is unclear.

Distribution[edit]

Map of Bandarban District

The Mros live in forest areas of Lama, Ruma, Alikaram, and Thanchi near Chimbuk Mountain of Bandarban District (Rashel 2009). They also live in Sittwe (Akiab), Rakhine State, Burma.

Subdivisions[edit]

Ethnologue (22nd edition) lists 3 main dialects as Anok, Dowpreng (Dopreng), and Sungma (Tshungma), as well as the 2 minor dialects of Domrong and Rumma.

  • Anok: largest and central
  • Tshungma: in the north
  • Domrong: in the lowlands north of the Matamuri
  • Dopreng: in far south and into Arakan
  • Rumma: in far south and into Arakan

There are five Mru dialects according to Ebersole (1996).

  • Anawk
  • Süngma
  • Dopreng
  • Tamsa
  • Rengmitsa

There are five major Mro clans (Rashel 2009).

  • Dengua
  • Premsang
  • Kongloi
  • Maizer
  • Ganaroo Gnar

Rashel (2009) also lists another classification scheme which lists ten Mro clans.

  • Yarua (subdivisions below)
    • Khatpo
    • Chimlung
    • Zongnow
  • Sangkan
  • Chawla
  • Ngaringcha
  • Tang
  • Deng
  • Kough
  • Tam-tu-chah
  • Kanbak
  • Prenju
  • Naichah
  • Yomore
  • Rum/Rumthu

Grammar[edit]

Unlike the Kuki-Chin languages, Mru has SVO (subject-verb-object) word order (Ebersole 1996).

Numerals[edit]

Rashel (2009:159) lists the following Mro numerals.

  1. lok
  2. pre
  3. sum
  4. tle
  5. tnga
  6. trok
  7. rinit
  8. riyat
  9. tako
  10. homod

Script[edit]

Mru
Mro, Krama[2]
Script type
alphabet
LanguagesMru
ISO 15924
ISO 15924Mroo, , ​Mro, Mru
Unicode
Unicode alias
Mro
U+16A40–U+16A6F

The Mru script is an indigenous, messianic script: In the 1980s Menlay Murang (also known as Manley Mro) created the religion of Khrama (or Crama) and with it a new script for the Mru language.[5][6]

The script is written from left to right and has its own set of digits. It does not use tone marks.

The Mru language is written in both the Latin and Mru scripts.

Unicode[edit]

Main article: Mro (Unicode block)

The Mru alphabet was added to the Unicode Standard in June, 2014 with the release of version 7.0.

The Unicode block for the Mru script, called Mro, is U+16A40–U+16A6F:

Mro[1][2]
Official Unicode Consortium code chart (PDF)
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 A B C D E F
U+16A4x 𖩀‎ 𖩁‎ 𖩂‎ 𖩃‎ 𖩄‎ 𖩅‎ 𖩆‎ 𖩇‎ 𖩈‎ 𖩉‎ 𖩊‎ 𖩋‎ 𖩌‎ 𖩍‎ 𖩎‎ 𖩏‎
U+16A5x 𖩐‎ 𖩑‎ 𖩒‎ 𖩓‎ 𖩔‎ 𖩕‎ 𖩖‎ 𖩗‎ 𖩘‎ 𖩙‎ 𖩚‎ 𖩛‎ 𖩜‎ 𖩝‎ 𖩞‎
U+16A6x 𖩠‎ 𖩡‎ 𖩢‎ 𖩣‎ 𖩤‎ 𖩥‎ 𖩦‎ 𖩧‎ 𖩨‎ 𖩩‎ 𖩮‎ 𖩯‎
Notes
1.^ As of Unicode version 14.0
2.^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Hosken, Martin; Everson, Michael (24 March 2009). "N3589R: Proposal for encoding the Mro script in the SMP of the UCS" (PDF). Retrieved 2 August 2014.
  2. ^ a b Mru at Ethnologue (21st ed., 2018)
  3. ^ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Mruic". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  4. ^ Evans, Lisa (2011-04-15). "Endangered languages: the full list". The Guardian. Retrieved 2018-11-26.
  5. ^ Hosken, Martin; Everson, Michael (24 March 2009). "N3589R: Proposal for encoding the Mro script in the SMP of the UCS" (PDF). Retrieved 2 August 2014.
  6. ^ Zaman, Mustafa (24 February 2006). "Mother Tongue at Stake". Star Weekend Magazine. The Daily Star. 5 (83).

Further reading[edit]

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