Indigenous people of New Guinea

Languages

Ethnologues 14th edition lists 826 languages of Papua New Guinea and 257 languages of Western New Guinea, a total of 1083 languages, with 12 languages overlapping. If we adopt the figure proposed by Glottolog for Papua New Guinea, namely 928 languages, the total is even higher. This corresponds to of the world's 7700 languages.

In terms of linguistic families, the indigenous languages of New Guinea can be divided into two groups: 283 languages belong to the Austronesian family, and the other 858 are non-Austronesian—a grouping commonly described as "Papuan languages" for convenience.

The term Papuan languages refers to an areal grouping, rather than a linguistic one. So-called "Papuan" languages are distributed into as many as eighty unrelated linguistic phyla, including 43 families and 37 isolates.

Origin and genetics

The origin of Papuans is generally associated with the first settlement of Australasia by a lineage dubbed 'Australasians' or 'Australo-Papuans' during the Initial Upper Paleolithic, which is "ascribed to a population movement with uniform genetic features and material culture" (Ancient East Eurasians), and sharing deep ancestry with modern East Asian peoples and other Asia-Pacific groups. It is estimated that people reached Sahul (the geological continent consisting of Australia and New Guinea) between 50,000 and 37,000 years ago. Rising sea levels separated New Guinea from Australia about 10,000 years ago. However, Aboriginal Australians and Papuans had diverged genetically much earlier, around 40,000 years BP. Papuans are more closely related to Melanesians than to Aboriginal Australians.

Haplogroups

The majority of Papuan Y-DNA Haplogroups belong to subclades of HaplogroupMS, and HaplogroupC1b2a. The frequency of each haplogroup varies along geographic clines.

Autosomal DNA

The genetic makeup of Papuans is primarily derived from Ancient East Eurasians, which relates them to other mainland Asian groups such as the "AASI", Andamanese, as well as East/Southeast Asians, although although there is possible gene flow from an earlier Out-of-Africa group (xOoA), around 2%, next to additional archaic Denisovan admixture in the Sahul region. Papuans may harbor varying degrees of deep admixture from "a lineage basal to West and East-Eurasians which occurred sometimes between 45 and 38kya", although they are generally regarded "as a simple sister group of Tianyuan" ("Basal East Asians"). They are also closely related to Andamanese Onge and East Asians and mainly differ due to their Denisovan admixture. According to a 2025 study, Papuans are a sister group to East Asians with no genetic input from earlier Out-of-African populations. They diverged from Europeans and East Asians about 51.2 and 46.2 thousand years ago respectively and mixed with Denisovans about 31.2 thousand years ago, contributing to about 3.23% of their genetic makeup. Compared to Europeans and East Asians, Papuans also experienced severe bottlenecking.[[File:Procrustes-transformed PCA plot of genetic variation of worldwide populations.png|thumb|PCA plot of genetic variation of worldwide populations. Papuans (green) cluster relative close to other East Eurasians, such as East/Southeast Asians.]]Papuans display pronounced genetic diversity, explained through isolation and drift between different subgroups after the settlement of New Guinea. The most notable differentiation was found to be between Highlanders and Lowlanders. Papuan Highlanders fall into three clusters, but form a single clade compared against Lowlanders. The Highlanders underwent a population bottleneck around 10,000 years ago, associated with the adoption of Neolithic lifestyles. Papuan Lowlanders display increased diversity and can be broadly differentiated into a Southern Lowlander cluster and a Northern Lowlander cluster. The genetic differentiation among Papuans is suggested to date back at least 20kya, while the sub-structure among Highlanders dates back around 10kya, with higher diversity among western Highlanders than Eastern ones. The genetic diversity is paralleled by linguistic and cultural diversity.

East Asian-related admixture is also observed in modern Papuans, especially coastal Papuan groups.

Based on a reevaluation of mitogenomes, Gandini et al. 2025 proposed a "long chronology", which suggested an earlier settlement of Sahul by two migration routes about ~60 ka. One route came from northern Sunda via the Philippine archipelago whilst the other came from southern Sunda via Mainland Southeast Asia, with both routes ultimately tracing back to South Asia. The settlers that undertook these routes were ancestral to populations indigenous to Australia, New Guinea and Oceania, and related to other East Eurasians instead of belonging to a separate wave.

Archaic introgression

Based on his genetic studies of the Denisova hominin, an ancient human species discovered in 2010, Svante Pääbo claims that ancient human ancestors of the Papuans interbred in Asia with these humans. He has found that people of New Guinea share 4%–7% of their genome with the Denisovans, indicating this exchange. Denisovan introgressions may have influenced the immune system of present-day Papuans and potentially favoured "variants to immune-related phenotypes" and "adaptation to the local environment".

ASPM gene

In a 2005 study of ASPM gene variants, Mekel-Bobrov et al. found that the Papuan people have among the highest rate of the newly evolved ASPM HaplogroupD, at 59.4% occurrence of the approximately 6,000-year-old allele. While it is not yet known exactly what selective advantage is provided by this gene variant, the haplogroupD allele is thought to be positively selected in populations and to confer some substantial advantage that has caused its frequency to rapidly increase.

Papuan ethnic groups

File:Jally Cultural Society - panoramio.jpg|Yali in the Yahukimo Regency, Indonesia File:Friends2.jpg|Melanesian girls from Papua New Guinea File:Mall culture jakarta102.jpg|Papuan people in folk dress in Jakarta A married couple.jpg|Newly married Kayu Batu couple in Jayapura, Indonesia The following indigenous peoples live within the modern borders of Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. Austronesian-speaking (AN) groups are given in italics.

Indonesia

West Papua

Southwest Papua

Papua

Highland Papua

Central Papua

South Papua

Papua New Guinea

• Abelam
• Angu
• Baruya
• Biangai
• Bilibil
• Chambri
• Duna
• Etoro
• Fore
• Gadsup
• Gogodala
• Haroli
• Hewa
• Huli
• Iatmul
• Kaluli
• Kwoma
• Koteka
• Maisin (AN with many non-AN elements)
• Melpa
• Mian
• Morkai
• Motu
• Min
• Mundugumor
• Ogea
• Orokaiva
• Sambia
• Swagap
• Tairora
• Tanga
• Telefol
• Tsembaga
• Urapmin
• Wiru
• Wola
• Wopkaimin
• Yaifo
• Zia

Bismarck Archipelago

• Baining
• Tolai
• Trobriand

Notable people

• Abba Bina, Papua New Guinean businessman and politician
• Archie Thompson, former Australian soccer player
• Elie Aiboy, former Indonesian footballer
• Marlina Flassy, Indonesian anthropologist and the first woman to be appointed Dean of Cenderawasih University
• Frans Kaisiepo, 4th Governor of Papua and National Hero of Indonesia
• Nitya Krishinda Maheswari, Indonesian badminton player and 2014 Asian Games women's doubles gold medalist
• Nowela Auparay, professional singer and Indonesian Idol winner
• Peter O'Neill, 7th Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea
• Freddy Numberi, Indonesian politician and former Minister of Transportation
• Raema Lisa Rumbewas, Indonesian weightlifter and silver medallist at the 2000 and 2004 Summer Olympics
• Boaz Solossa, Indonesian footballer
• Titus Bonai, Indonesian footballer
• Ricky Kambuaya, Indonesian footballer
• Michael Somare, former Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea
• Heather Watson, English female tennis player
• Benny Wenda, West Papuan independence leader
• Machmud Singgirei Rumagesan, King of Sekar and National Hero of Indonesia
• Abdul Hakim Achmad Aituarauw, Member of People's Representative Council
• Alwin Komolong, Papua New Guinean footballer
• Kusuga Komolong, Papua New Guinean footballer
• Saiful Islam Al-Payage, Indonesian Islamic preacher
• Ricky Kayame, Indonesian footballer
• Ibrahim Kosepa, Indonesian footballer
• Lukas Rumkorem, fighter for the liberation of West Irian or integration into Indonesia

References

References

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2. From the Malay word ''pəpuah'' 'curly hair'. {{OED. Papuan
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15. "Almost all living people outside of Africa trace back to a single migration more than 50,000 years ago".
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17. (2025). "Resolving out of Africa event for Papua New Guinean population using neural network". Nature Communications.
18. (April 2021). "Genomic insights into population history and biological adaptation in Oceania". Nature.
19. (15 September 2017). "A Neolithic expansion, but strong genetic structure, in the independent history of New Guinea". Science.
20. (2025). "The impact of human dispersals and local interactions on the genetic diversity of coastal Papua New Guinea over the past 2,500 years". Nature Ecology & Evolution.
21. (28 November 2025). "Genomic evidence supports the "long chronology" for the peopling of Sahul". Science Advances.
22. Carl Zimmer. (22 December 2010). "Denisovans Were Neanderthals' Cousins, DNA Analysis Reveals". NYTimes.com.
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24. (9 September 2005). "Ongoing Adaptive Evolution of ASPM, a Brain Size Determinant in Homo sapiens". Science.