The Edoid languages are a few dozen languages spoken in Southern Nigeria, predominantly in the former Bendel State.[1] The name Edoid derives from its most widely spoken member, Edo, the language of Benin City, which has 30 million native and secondary speakers.
Classification
Elugbe (1989)
The following classification is based on that of Elugbe (1989).[2]
Several dialects, Agbarho accepted as standard. Okpe and Uvbiẹ, often regarded as dialects of Urhobo, are treated as distinct languages (q.v.) on purely linguistic grounds
Proto-Edoid is reconstructed as having a contrast between oral and nasal consonants and oral and nasal vowels typical for the region. However, in some Edoid languages nasal vowels have been reanalyzed as allophones of oral vowels after nasal consonants, and in others nasal consonants have been reanalyzed as allophones of oral consonants before nasal vowels, reducing the number of phonemically nasal consonants. Urhobo retains three nasals, /m,n,ɲ/, and has five oral consonants with nasal allophones, /ɺ,l,ʋ,j,w/; in Edo this is reduced to one phonemic nasal, /m/, but eight additional consonants with nasal allophones, /p,b,t,d,k,ɡ,kp,ɡb/; and in Ukue there are no indisputably phonemic nasals and only two consonants with nasal allophones, /l,β/.
^Elugbe, Ben Ohiọmamhẹ. 1989. Comparative Edoid: Phonology and Lexicon. (Delta Series, 6.) Port-Harcourt: University of Port Harcourt Press.
^Lewis, Ademola Anthony. 2013. North Edoid relations and roots. Doctoral dissertation, University of Ibadan.
^Blench, Roger (2019). An Atlas of Nigerian Languages (4th ed.). Cambridge: Kay Williamson Educational Foundation.
^Schaefer, R.P. 1987. An initial orthography and lexicon for Emai: an Edoid language of Nigeria. Indiana University Linguistics Club, Studies in African Grammatical Systems, 5, Bloomington.
^Okojie, C. and P.E. Ejele 1987. Esan orthography. In: Orthography Manual V. ed. R.N. Agheyisi. National Language Centre, Federal Ministry of Education, Lagos.
^Bradbury, R.E. 1957. The Benin kingdom and the Edo-speaking peoples of south-south Nigeria (Ethnographic survey of Africa, Western Africa 13). London: Oxford Univ. Press; International African Inst. (IAI).
^Temple, Olive 1922. Notes on the Tribes, Provinces, Emirates and States of the Northern Provinces of Nigeria. Argus Printing and Publishing Co. Cape Town.
Bibliography
Frank Kügler, Caroline Féry, Ruben Van De Vijver (2009) Variation and Gradience in Phonetics and Phonology
Elugbe, Ben Ohiọmamhẹ. 1989a. "Edoid". In Bendor-Samuel (Ed.), The Niger–Congo Languages. Lanham: The United Press of America. 291-304.
Elugbe, Ben Ohiọmamhẹ. 1989b. Comparative Edoid: phonology and lexicon. Delta Series No. 6. Port Harcourt: University of Port Harcourt Press.