On the lexical evidence for a genealogical relationship between múra-pirahã and matanawi

This paper shows that the lexical evidence in favor of a genealogical relation between Múra-Pirahã and Matanawi is stronger than so far suspected. It takes into account evidence from the full set of attested doculects making the Múra-Pirahã languoid. And, more importantly, it incorporates information about the nature of attested formal mismatches in evaluating the comparative sets that feature Matanawi lexical elements. I identify a series of formal/semantic matches in basic lexical meanings, in addition to pointing out plausible accounts for unmatched formal residue. Some tentative overlapping correspondences that suggest phonetically motivated diachronic splits are discussed as well. In the end, although the case for a relationship between Múra-Pirahã and Matanawí can be more strongly asserted, the very limited nature of the existing documentation of Matanawi probably precludes a more definite validation of the hypothesis.