The Paniai Lakes languages, also known as the Wissel Lakes or Wissel Lakes – Kemandoga River, are a small family of closely related Trans–New Guinea languages spoken in the Paniai Lakes region of the highlands of Western New Guinea in the Paniai Lakes region of Papua.
Foley (2003) considers their Trans–New Guinea status to be established.
[1] Independent pronouns and possessive prefixes are: The following basic vocabulary words are from Larson & Larson (1972)[2] and Voorhoeve (1975),[3] as cited in the Trans-New Guinea database.
[4] The words cited constitute translation equivalents, whether they are cognate (e.g. homa, huma for “stone”) or not (e.g. bodiya, usa for “fire”).
Paniai Lakes reflexes of proto-Trans-New Guinea (pTNG) etyma are:[5] Ekari language: Moni language: