The Bale disappeared as a distinct people sometime after 1931.[1]
Grammar
The Great Andamanese languages are agglutinative languages, with an extensive prefix and suffix system.[3] They have a distinctive noun class system based largely on body parts, in which every noun and adjective may take a prefix according to which body part it is associated with (on the basis of shape, or functional association). Thus, for instance, the *aka- at the beginning of the language names is a prefix for objects related to the tongue.[3]
The basic pronouns are almost identical throughout the Great Andamanese languages.
'This' and 'that' are distinguished as k- and t-.
Judging from the available sources, the Great Andamanese languages have only two cardinal numbers—one and two— and their entire numerical lexicon is one, two, one more, some more, and all.[3]
12George van Driem (2001), Languages of the Himalayas: An Ethnolinguistic Handbook of the Greater Himalayan Region: Containing an Introduction to the Symbiotic Theory of Language, BRILL, ISBN90-04-12062-9, ... The Aka-Kol tribe of Middle Andaman became extinct by 1921. The Oko-Juwoi of Middle Andaman and the Aka-Bea of South Andaman and Rutland Island were extinct by 1931. The Akar-Bale of Ritchie's Archipelago, the Aka-Kede of Middle Andaman and the A-Pucikwar of South Andaman Island soon followed. By 1951, the census counted a total of only 23 Greater Andamanese and 10 Sentinelese. That means that just ten men, twelve women and one child remained of the Aka-Kora, Aka-Cari and Aka-Jeru tribes of Greater Andaman and only ten natives of North Sentinel Island ...
↑Manoharan, S. (1983). "Subgrouping Andamanese group of languages." International Journal of Dravidian Linguistics
XII(1): 82-95.
123Temple, Richard C. (1902). A Grammar of the Andamanese Languages, being Chapter IV of Part I of the Census Report on the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Superintendent's Printing Press: Port Blair.
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