Vili language

Not to be confused with Vili (Ibhili).

Vili
Civili[1]
Native to	Republic of the Congo, Gabon
Native speakers	(100,000 cited 2000)[2]
Language family	Niger–Congo? Atlantic–Congo Benue–Congo Bantoid Bantu (Zone H) Kongo (Kikongo, H.10) Vili
Language codes
ISO 639-3	vif
Glottolog	vili1238
Guthrie code	H.12[3]

Vili (Civili) is one of the Zone H Bantu languages, grouped with the Kongo clade.

The language has a few thousand native speakers spread along the coast between southern Gabon and Cabinda, most of them in the Republic of the Congo's Kouilou, Pointe-Noire and Niari departments. The Vili people (singular Muvili, plural Bavili) were the population of the 17th- to 18th-century Kingdom of Loango in the same region.

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial	Alveolar	Post-alv./ Palatal	Velar
Nasal		m	n	ɲ
Plosive/ Affricate	voiceless	p	t	t͡ʃ	k
	voiced	b	d	d͡ʒ	ɡ
	prenasal vl.	ᵐp	ⁿt	ᶮt͡ʃ	ᵑk
	prenasal vd.	ᵐb	ⁿd	ᶮd͡ʒ	ᵑɡ
Fricative	voiceless	f	s
	voiced	v	z
	prenasal vl.	ᶬf	ⁿs
	prenasal vd.	ᶬv	ⁿz
Rhotic			r
Approximant		w	l	j

Consonants may also be labialized [ʷ] when preceding /w/.^[4][5]

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i iː		u uː
Close-mid	e eː	ə	o oː
Open-mid	ɛ ɛː		ɔ ɔː
Open		a aː

References

1. Civili is pronounced Tchivili and can also be pronounced Tshivili.
2. Vili at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
3. Jouni Filip Maho, 2009. New Updated Guthrie List Online
4. Loëmbe, Gervais (2005). Parlons vili: langue et culture de Loango. Paris: L'Harmattan.
5. Tele-Pemba, Audrey Mariette (2009). Éléments pour une approche comparée des emprunts lexicaux du civili du Gabon, du Congo-Brazzaville et du Cabinda: proposition d'un modèle de dictionnaire. Libreville: Université Omar Bongo.

External links

• Vili at WolframAlpha