It includes Meto spoken on Timor and the languages of Rote Island.

[2][3] Edwards (2018a, 2018b, 2021) studied the phonological history of the Rote–Meto languages and reconstructed the ancestral proto-language, Proto-Rote–Meto, based on internal evidence from the Rote–Meto languages, and also from the top-down by tracing the phonological changes that occurred in Rote–Meto reflexes of Proto-Austronesian and Proto-Malayo-Polynesian reconstructions.

[1][4][5] Inspite of being located at the opposite geopraphical ends of the Rote–Meto speech area, Meto and West Rote varieties share many common features in their lexicon and historical phonology.

[1] This comparison table (a small selection from Edwards (2021:88–403)) illustrates the correspondences between the Rote–Meto languages, including inherited vocabulary as well as Rote–Meto innovations.

Most likely, these words were borrowed from a non-Austronesian language spoken by earlier inhabitants of the area.