Maramanandji is a non-Pama Nyungan language from the Daly River region of the Northern Territory. Tryon locates Maramanandji in the Daly Family, Brinken-Wogaity group and Brinken sub-group, along with Marengar N102 and Marithiel N7 and its dialects.
The name is constructed from mara- 'language' and manandjil 'what', following a convention in Daly River languages, where 'what' is usually distinct in each language.
Tryon reports twenty speakers living in the Daly River and surrounding cattle stations and in camps near Darwin (1974:104-5). Tryon compiled a sketch grammar in 1974. Ellis reports one elderly speaker at the Daly River community who knew of only three other speakers (1988:50).
Batchelor College published a draft dictionary of Marramaninyshi (N16) in 1995.
Green and Nordlinger classify this as a non Pama-Nyungan Western Daly language along with Merranunggu N13, Emmi N15, Menthe N6, Marri Ngarr N102, Makati ke N163, Marrithiyel N7, Marri Tjevin N161, Marri Ammu N162, Marri Dan N9 (viewed November 2020).
... somewhere south of Hermit Hill, in the Central Daly region (Capell 1963 as quoted by Tryon 1974). South of Hermit Hill, central Daly River (Tindale 1974). The general association was to the drainage of Doon Creek between Flood Hill and the Docherty Hills on the west, and extending to the level of Quartz Knob on the east. There was no precise information on the eastern limit of Marrimaninjsji associations in 2007 (Harvey ASEDA 802).
Marramaninjsji (N16) was traditionally spoken in an area to the east of the Docherty Hills and to the south of the Dilke Range (Green & Nordlinger viewed November 2020).
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Speaker numbers were measured differently across the censuses and various other sources listed in AUSTLANG. You are encouraged to refer to the sources.
Speaker numbers for ‘NILS 2004’ and ‘2005 estimate’ come from 'Table F.3: Numbers of speakers of Australian Indigenous languages (various surveys)' in 'Appendix F NILS endangerment and absolute number results' in McConvell, Marmion and McNicol 2005, pages 198-230 (PDF, 2.5MB).
