Definitions
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- proper noun linguistics, uncountable The hypothetical
ancestor language orprotolanguage of most Polynesian languages. - proper noun anthropology, countable A person who spoke the Proto-Polynesian language.
- adjective linguistics, anthropology Of or pertaining to the Proto-Polynesian language, or the people who spoke it.
Etymologies
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Examples
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South American sweet potatoes have been found in pre-European contexts in Polynesia, and the Proto-Polynesian word for sweet potato, kumala, is similar to the indigenous Peruvian cumal.
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Papua differ widely from the lithe, active, brown-skinned, mop-headed natives of the eastern half of the southern coast; and Professors Haddon and Seligmann have decided that in eastern New Guinea many Proto-Polynesian, Melanesian and
Popular Science Monthly Oct, Nov, Dec, 1915 — Volume 86 Anonymous
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The burly negroid Papuans of the Great River deltas of western Papua differ widely from the lithe, active, brown-skinned, mop-headed natives of the eastern half of the southern coast; and Professors Haddon and Seligmann have decided that in eastern New Guinea many Proto-Polynesian, Melanesian and Malayan immigrants have mingled their blood with that of the more primitive Papuans.
The Scientific Monthly, October-December 1915 Scientific Monthly 1915
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