Nias (language)

Nias
Spoken in	Nias ( Indonesia )
speaker	770,000 (Indonesia) ( SIL , 2000)
Linguistic classification	Austronesian languages Malayo-Polynesian languages Northwest Sumatra Nias (language)
Language codes
ISO 639-3	nia

Nias is a language spoken by the Nias people on the island of Nias off Sumatra and on the Batu Islands . It belongs to the northwest Sumatra branch of the Malayo-Polynesian languages within the Austronesian languages .

According to Ethnologue (17th edition) there are the following dialects:

• North : (especially Gunung Sitoli) Prestige dialect and "lingua franca"
• South : (especially Teluk Dalam variety) lower prestige
• Northwest : Alasa area, Sirombu and Mandrehe areas
• Central : Gomo area, Teluk Dalam and Batu Islands .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Nias at Ethnologue (17th edition, 2013)

Test Wikipedia on Nias (language)