Tiv language

The first reference to the Tiv language (dzwa Tiv) was made by Sigismund Koelle (1854) from liberated slaves from Sierra Leone. Johnston Harry H{{cite web |title=A Comparative Study of the Bantu and Semi-Bantu Languages. |url=https://glottolog.org/resource/reference/id/161489 |publisher=Oxford University Press}} (1919) classified it as a peculiar language among the Semi-Bantu languages, and Talbot P. Amaury (1926) concurred. Roy Clive Abraham{{cite web |title=The grammar of Tiv |url=https://glottolog.org/resource/reference/id/135387 |publisher=Abraham, Roy Clive}}{{cite web |title=A dictionary of the tiv language |url=https://glottolog.org/resource/reference/id/7621 |publisher=Abraham, Roy Clive}} (1933), who has made the most complete linguistic study of Tiv, classifies it as Bantu, stating that its vocabulary is more similar to the East African Nyanza group of Bantu languages than to Ekoi or other neighbouring languages. Malherbe (1933) agrees with Abraham that Tiv is essentially Bantu.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=McgNDgAAQBAJ|title=The Tiv of Central Nigeria: Western Africa|last1=Bohannan|first1=Laura|last2=Bohannan|first2=Paul|date=2017-02-03|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781315295794|language=en|chapter=Language}}

All material on Tiv seems to point to a recent expansion, perhaps in the early 15th century.{{Cite web|url=http://www.rogerblench.info/Language/Niger-Congo/Bantoid/Tivoid/General/Tivoid%20comparative.pdf|title=The Tivoid languages: overview and comparative wordlist|last=Blench|first=Roger|date=June 2016|page=16}}

Tiv is widely spoken in the States of Benue, Nasarawa, Plateau, Taraba, Cross Rivers, Adamawa, Kaduna, and Abuja, Nigeria. Other parts of Nigeria also speak Tiv.

Tarkaa, Makurdi, Gwer East, Gwer West, Ukum, Logo, Konshisha, Gboko, Kwande, Vandeikya, Katsina Ala, Guma, Buruku, and Ushongo Local Government Areas.

Doma, Nasarawa, Lafia, Obi, Keana, and Awe Local Government Areas

Tiv-speaking populations are found in Langtang South, Shendam, Qua’an-Pan and Wase area councils.

Bali, Donga, Ibi, Gassol, Takum, Gashaka, Kurmi and Wukari Local Government Areas.

Together with thousands of other Tivoid groups like the Batu, Abon, Bitare and Ambo in Sardauna Local government area.

Yala, Bekwarra, Obudu and Obanliku Local Government Areas.

Together with thousands of other tivoid groups like the Utanga, Ceve or Becheve, Evant, Eman etc.

There are 1900 Tiv households with approximately 20,000 people at the south-western border of Cameroon Manyu division, with Mamfe as its capital, which is 74 km away from the south eastern Nigerian border. The paramount ruler is Zaki Abaajul, who has the Tiv and Ulitsi as his subjects. The Cameronian Tiv are well educated and live in Anglophone Cameroon{{Cite web |title=Definition of ANGLOPHONE |url=https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anglophone |access-date=2022-08-30 |website=www.merriam-webster.com |language=en}} as their ancestral land, while a few others live in the francophone region. They are mostly farmers but others work in the government.https://www.joshuaproject.net/people_groups/15505/CM

Although some Nigerian tiv people are unaware of some of the Tiv peoples of the Cameroon because of the international border but, these groups always regard themselves as Tiv. Some of them have an additional dialect to the main Tiv language. These Tiv groups are; Bitare, Mesaka, Iyive, Ceve or Becheve, Evant, Eman, Ipulo, Caka etc. They together with the Tiv in Nigeria share the same culture, History, Religion, and Tradition. They are basically the same people.{{Citation needed|date=March 2025|reason=Loaded statement}}

Tiv speakers can understand each other across their territory. Although, the Hyarev people speak some words totally different from others. However, accents (ham) exist.{{cite web |title=The Tivoid languages: Overview and Comparative Word List |url=https://glottolog.org/resource/reference/id/78922 |publisher=Blench, Roger M. 2016}}

• Vowel sounds are phonetically nasalized before nasal consonants.
• {{IPA|/a/}} can be freely heard as {{IPA|[æ̃]}} or {{IPA|[ɑ̃]}} before a nasal consonant.{{cite web |title=Historicolinguistic study of convergence and divergence in the Tivoid languages phylum |url=https://glottolog.org/resource/reference/id/579035 |publisher=University of Nigeria MA thesis. (172pp.), Alyebo, Nelson Orkaan. 2018}}

• {{IPA|/ɣ/}} is heard phonetically as {{IPA|[x]}}, but is often voiced as {{IPA|[ɣ]}}.
• {{IPA|[ɱ]}} is heard in free variation in word-final positions.
• {{IPA|[d͡z]}} occurs in other dialects.{{Cite book|last=Sokpo|first=Rosaline M.|title=An Autosegmental Analysis of Tiv Phonology|year=2016}}

Tiv has three main tones (five if rising and falling are counted as separate tones instead of composites of existing tones).{{cite web |title=The grammar of Tiv. |url=https://glottolog.org/resource/reference/id/135387 |publisher=Kaduna: Nigeria Political Service. 108+202pp. Abraham, Roy Clive. 1933.}} They are most importantly used in inflection.

The accents of Tiv are as follows:

• Ityoisha, spoken in the southeast, noted for its exaggerated palatalisation of vowels;
• Shitile, spoken by most Tiv east of the Katsina Ala River, apparently slower sounding than the other Tiv accents and slurs vowels into their neighbouring consonant;
• Iharev, which gives an exaggerated roll to the phoneme {{IPA|[r]}}~{{IPA|[l]}}
• Kparev, spoken in the centre and south-centre;
• Kunav, a sub-group of Kparev, noted for its preference for {{IPA|[d͡ʒ]}} sounds where other Kparev use {{IPA|[d͡z]}}.

Vocabulary, particularly plant and tool names, changes from one part of Tiv territory to the other.{{cite web |title=A dictionary of the Tiv language |url=https://glottolog.org/resource/reference/id/106714 |publisher=Abraham, Roy C. 1968 [1940?]}}

Tiv has nine noun classes.

• Tiv people
• Ate-u-tiv, a traditional Tiv hut used for reception and gathering

{{Reflist}}

• R.C.Abraham, A Dictionary of the Tiv Language, Government of Nigeria 1940, republished by Gregg Press Ltd., Farnborough, Hants., England 1968. {{ISBN|0576116157}}

• [https://words.tiv.org.ng Tiv-English Dictionary]
• [http://www.bisharat.net/wikidoc/pmwiki.php/PanAfrLoc/Tiv PanAfrican L10n page on Tiv]

{{incubator|code=tiv}}

• [https://www.jw.org/tiv/ Video and audio files, New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures Released and other bible study material in Tiv Language] by Jehovah's Witnesses
• [http://www.bible.is/TIVBSN/Matt/1 The bible in the tiv language]
• [http://globalrecordings.net/es/program/A00450 Gospel]
• [http://www.jesusfilm.org/watch/jesus.html/tiv.html Jesus film in tiv]

{{languages of Nigeria}}

{{Tivoid languages}}

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Category:Languages of Nigeria

Category:Tivoid languages

Category:Tiv people