World Language Map

Where is Principense spoken?

Principense (lunguyê) is an Indo-European language, spoken in São Tomé and Príncipe. It is marked on the map by a ringed point.

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Key

Language families (largest ten)

  • Atlantic-Congo
  • Austronesian
  • Sino-Tibetan
  • Indo-European
  • Afro-Asiatic
  • Nuclear Trans New Guinea
  • Otomanguean
  • Austroasiatic
  • Tai-Kadai
  • Pama-Nyungan

Everything else

  • All other families Smaller families, isolates and unclassified languages.
  • Point A language with no area map. The dot sits at its Glottolog position, in its family colour.

How to read the map. Each colour is a language family: a group of languages that share a common ancestor. The ten largest families have their own colour and every other family is grey. Areas are see-through, so where two languages share a place the colours mix. Tap anywhere to list every language whose area covers that spot. Areas are generalisations drawn from published atlases, many of them decades old, and cities are multilingual, so an area never says that everyone there speaks the language. A dot marks a language that has no area map. The family name is always given in words, because colour alone is hard to tell apart for some people.

Where Principense is spoken

Principense is spoken in one country: São Tomé and Príncipe.

Country
São Tomé and Príncipe

Principense has no area on the map because no open area map covers it. The ringed point is the position Glottolog gives for the language.

How many people speak Principense?

Wikidata gives about 100 speakers (Wikidata, with no source given, 2023). These figures are approximate: they come from different sources, years and definitions of a speaker.

Status: Nearly extinct. Glottolog lists it as nearly extinct: only a few elderly speakers are left.

Where Principense sits in the language family tree

Glottolog classifies Principense as follows, from the largest family down to the language itself.

  1. Indo-European
  2. Classical Indo-European
  3. Italic
  4. Latino-Faliscan
  5. Latinic
  6. Imperial Latin
  7. Romance
  8. Italo-Western Romance
  9. Western Romance
  10. Shifted Western Romance
  11. Southwestern Shifted Romance
  12. West Ibero-Romance
  13. Galician Romance
  14. Macro-Portuguese
  15. Gulf Guinea Creole Portuguese
  16. Principense

More about Principense

Codes: ISO 639-3 pre, Glottolog prin1242. Glottolog macroarea: Africa.

Principense is a Romance language, descended from Latin. Latin’s footprint: the Roman Empire at its height → Latin spread along Roman roads →

Questions about Principense

Where is Principense spoken?

Principense is spoken in São Tomé and Príncipe. On the map it is shown as a single point, because no open area map covers it.

How many people speak Principense?

Wikidata gives about 100 speakers (Wikidata, with no source given, 2023). Speaker numbers are approximate and differ between sources: counting who is a speaker, and whether to include second-language speakers, is not settled.

Which language family is Principense in?

Glottolog places Principense in the Indo-European family, in the branch Classical Indo-European, Italic, Latino-Faliscan, Latinic, Imperial Latin, Romance, Italo-Western Romance, Western Romance, Shifted Western Romance, Southwestern Shifted Romance, West Ibero-Romance, Galician Romance, Macro-Portuguese and Gulf Guinea Creole Portuguese.

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