Padaung language
native language of Padaung people (sub-ethnic of Karen people) in Myanmar
Kayan, also known as, Padaung of Burma, spoken by the Kayan people. The Kayan dialects share more than 90% lexical similarity. Padaung is 71% to 76% lexically similar to Lahta.
Distribution
Pekhon, southern Shan State
northwestern Kayah State
Thandaung township, Kayin State
Pyinmana township, Mandalay Region
Kayan Lahwi dialect: Lahwi and northwest Dimawso, Kayah State; southern Pekhon, southern Shan State
Kayan Yinbaw/Kangan dialect: Dimawso area, northwestern Kayah State
Internal classification
The Kayan languages are spoken in Kayah State, southern Shan State, and northern Karen State. There are four branches according to Shintani (2016), namely:
Kangan ("lowland dwellers")
Kakhaung ("highland dwellers")
Lawi ("South")
Latha ("North")
Nangki (sometimes called Langki), documented in Shintani (2016), is one of the Kayan languages belonging to the Kakhaung subgroup. It is spoken only in one village.
Pekong Kayan is documented in Manson (2010).
Sonkan Kayan and Dosanbu Kayan are documented in Shintani (2018a, b). Shintani has also documented:by families or by villages as below:
Phulon Kayan
Lagu Kayan
Totan Kayan
Dokhoncon Kayan
Natwei Kayan
Pimon Kayan
Sonplao Kayan
Dolan Kayan
Thaoku Kayan
Diklon Kayan
Pulon Kayan
Kabla Kayan
Kathan Kayan
Kalondei Kayan
Ramaku, Subao, Kadu, Huason, Hanti, Sonpu Kayan (Shintani 2022)
Dimawso Kayan, a Kayan variety spoken in Wanbanbalo village, Dimawso township, Kayah State, Myanmar, is described in Lew (2018).
Ethnologue lists Padaung (Kayan) dialects as:
Standard Pekon (prestige dialect)
Kayan Lahwi
Kayan Kangan (Yeinbaw, Yinbaw)
Phonology
Consonants
Voiced stops /b, d/ can also range to pre-glottalized stops [ʔb, ʔd] in free variation among speakers.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Padaung language” is native language of Padaung people (sub-ethnic of Karen people) in Myanmar. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Padaung, language and native, not as a finished interpretation.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7123283. The Library of Congress control number is sh2017003889. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2016, 2010, 2022 and 2018.
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This entry incorporates text from “Padaung language” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.