Mesqan language

Mesqan (also Mäsqan or Meskan) is an Afro-Asiatic language spoken by the Gurage people in the Gurage Zone of Ethiopia. It belongs to the family's Ethiopian Semitic branch.

Mesqan
Mäsqan
Native to	Ethiopia
Region	Gurage Zone
Native speakers	200,000 (2007)[1]
Language family	Afro-Asiatic Semitic West Semitic South Semitic Ethiopic South Outer South West Gurage Mesqan
Writing system	Unwritten
Language codes
ISO 639-3	mvz
Glottolog	mesq1240

Phonology

Consonants

		Labial		Alveolar	Post- alveolar	Palatal	Velar		Glottal
		plain	lab.				plain	lab.
Nasal		m	mʷ	n		ɲ
Stop/ Affricate	voiceless	(p)		t	t͡ʃ	c	k	kʷ
	voiced	b	bʷ	d	d͡ʒ	ɟ	g	ɡʷ
	ejective	(pʼ)		tʼ	t͡ʃʼ	cʼ	kʼ	kʼʷ
Fricative	voiceless	f	fʷ	s	ʃ	ç	x	xʷ	h
	voiced	(v)		z	ʒ
	ejective			(sʼ)
Rhotic				r
Lateral				l
Approximant						j	w

• Sounds /p, pʼ, v, sʼ/ occur in loanwords, mainly from Amharic.
• /xʷ/ may also have an allophone of [hʷ].
• /b/ may have an allophone of [β] in postvocalic and intervocalic positions.
• /n/ may assimilate to [ŋ] when following a velar consonant.^[2]
• /k, ɡ/ can also be heard as palatalized [kʲ, ɡʲ] when before front vowels.^[3][4]

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i	ɨ	u
Mid	e	ə	o
Open		a