rau ISO 639

Raute

  • Geography

    NP Sudur Pashchimanchal province: Dadeldhura district, Parashuram municipality.
  • Language Cloud

A language of Nepal

rau
Boto boli, Khamchi, Ra’te, Raji, Rajwar, Rautya, Rautye
501, all users. L1 users: 460 (2011 census), decreasing. L2 users: 41 (2011 census). All nomadic Raute are monolingual.
Sudur Pashchimanchal province: Dadeldhura district, Parashuram municipality.
Western Nepal
6b (Threatened). Language of recognized indigenous nationality: Raute.
Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Western Tibeto-Burman, Himalayan, Central Himalayan, Raute-Raji
None known. There are reportedly many similarities with Raji [rji], but the relationship of Raute with and intelligibility between Rawat [jnl] and Raji [rji] needs further investigation. Lexical similarity: 80% with Rawat [jnl], 60% with Chepang [cdm], 25% with Kham.
SOV; postpositions; noun head final; no noun classes or gender; content q-word in situ; clause constituents indicated by case-marking; verbal affixation marks person and number; ergativity; both tense and aspect; nontonal; 35 consonant and 7 vowel phonemes.
Home, friends, religion, work. Some young people, all adults. Used mostly by younger children, older adults, and elderly. Some use among adolescents and young adults. Some also use Hindi [hin], especially youth. Some also use Nepali [npi], especially settled Raute, youth.
Dictionary. Texts.
Unwritten [Qaax].
The name may be of Tibeto-Burman origin, from ra- meaning human plus a person marker, -to or -te. Other scholars suggest it derives from the Sanskrit Indo-Aryan word raut from Sanskrit, rajaputra, prince. Rautes deem their language sacred and are linguistically conservative toward adopting non-Raute words or grammatical features. Only the headman communicates with outsiders. Traditional religion.
OLAC resources in and about Raute