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Omurano language

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Omurano language

Omurano is a language isolate from Peru. It is also known as Humurana, Roamaina, Numurana, Umurano, and Mayna. The language was presumed to have become extinct by 1958, but in 2011 a rememberer was found who knew some 20 words in Omurano; he claimed that there were still people who could speak it. The community has otherwise switched to Urarina, another language isolate.

It was spoken near the Urituyacu River (a tributary of the Marañón River), or on the Nucuray River according to Loukotka (1968).

Tovar (1961) linked Omurano to Taushiro (and later Taushiro with Kandoshi); Kaufman (1994) finds the links reasonable, and in 2007 he classified Omurano and Taushiro (but not Kandoshi) as Saparo–Yawan languages.

Maynas, once mistaken for a synonym, is a separate language.

Despite there being previous proposals linking Omurano with Zaparoan, de Carvalho (2013) finds no evidence for this.

Jolkesky (2016) notes that there are lexical similarities with the Urarina, Arawak, Zaparo, and Leko language families due to contact.

Omurano has 10 consonants. No fricative or velar consonants have been attested.

/b/ becomes [β] before /e/.

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