As they brought Christianity to the Highlands in the 1930, many of the early Lutheran and Catholic missionaries endeavoured to learn Melpa (and other languages) to translate some of the scriptures into the language. 

Lutheran missionaries Strauss, Vicedom and Tischner all did great work in translation, and also recording local history. 

On the Catholic side, Ross and Steffen both spent time learning the language, and Ernest Brandewie, who had lived among the Kumdi Engamai people at Kwinka, also wrote about the local language and culture. 

The well-known anthropologist, Andrew Strathern, concentrated much of his work among the Melpa speaking people.

In the 1980s, the husband and wife team of Al and Delene Stucky, from the Summer Institute of Linguistics turned their attention to Melpa.

They had previously been working on the neighbouring Nii language in the Wahgi area.

With the cooperation of various churches, the result was the Bible Society of Papua New Guinea’s publication in 1995 of the New Testament. The Melpa title was ‘Got Nga Nombula Rung Ik Kai’.

I admire and respect the immense work the Summer Institute of Linguistics put into recording local languages in PNG.

Most of these languages did not previously have written documents and alphabets, and those studying and translating often had to also develop an appropriate alphabet.

While the translation of Christian scriptural texts into the local language was a key aim of the Institute, in most cases the translators also did important work in recording local history, folk-tales and cultural aspects of life.

Melpa is related to major languages spoken in the Nebyler Valley of Jiwaka, Simbu and part of the Southern Highlands Province.

However, in adjacent Enga Province, the main language spoken is notably different from Melpa.

Mt Hagen people traditionally referred to their own language as Mbo ik and they used the word Melpa to refer to the Waghi area.

A Melpa word that many Papua New Guineans have heard is the word for boy or young man, ‘kange’.

It is not unusual for any young man from the Western Highlands to be simply addressed as ‘kange’.

As with most local languages in PNG, while the history of the Western Highlands of did not exist in written form before the 1930s, their history was recorded in local folklore and in the form of ‘sung tales’ or ‘chanted sagas’. 

Many chanted sagas in Melpa have since been recorded. More information on sung tales can be found here.

Indeed, the internet has become a reliable source of information for many PNG languages. 

And on a BBC website, the program here highlights the vital connection between preserving local languages and understanding local medicinal plants.

“Given that nearly half of all modern medicines are derived from plants,” the website stated, “there's a real possibility that the next life-saving drug could be lost.

“The revival of languages not only preserves information, it can also galvanise local conservation efforts.”

A previous article in PNG Attitude by Robin Hide (‘PNG medicinal plants: a research summary’) referred to Klaus Stopp’s research on the medicinal plants of the Mt Hagen people which had names in Melpa.

SELECT CITATIONS

André Nick, A, Rali, T, Sticher, O. Biological screening of traditional medicinal plants from Papua New Guinea, Journal of Ethnopharmacology, 15 December 1995, vol 49, no 3, pp 147-156

Jorim, RY, Korape, S, Legu, W, Koch, M. An ethnobotanical survey of medicinal plants used in the eastern highlands of Papua New Guinea, December 2012, Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine 8(1):47

Stopp, K. Medicinal plants of the Mt Hagen people (Mbowamb) in New Guinea, 1963, Economic Botany, 17(1), pp 16-22

Straatmans, W. Ethnobotany of New Guinea in its ecological perspective, Journal d'agriculture traditionnelle et de botanique appliquée, 1967, pp 1-20