Nicobarese - Orientation

The Nicobarese are the majority ethnic and linguistic group living in the Nicobar Island group, a district of India's Andaman and Nicobar Union Territory in the Bay of Bengal. Located between 6°50′ and 9°10′N and 92°10′ and 93°55′ E, the Nicobar group comprises 2,022 square kilometers of surface area, strung along a 262-kilometer NNW-SSE line. The principal islands are Car Nicobar (north); Kamorta, Chowra, and Nancowrie (center); and Great and Little Nicobar (south). The district population was 30,454 in 1981 including about 22,200 Nicobarese and Shampon.

Car Nicobar has the only important city of the district. Also on Car Nicobar is Big Laputi village, thought to be the parent village from which all other Nicobarese settlements originated. This island is flat, with fertile soils, and is home to the majority of the district's population. The other islands are hilly. The islands are densely forested under coconut and betel-nut trees, pandanus, mangoes, margosa, and casuarina. They receive heavy monsoon rains—230 to 330 centimeters annually—and because they lie along one of the Earth's major fault lines, they are subject to severe earthquakes.

Nicobarese is a Mon Khmer language of the Austroasiatic Family. There are three divisions: Car, Central, and Southern Nicobarese. Each of the latter two have four dialects. Chowra and Teressa are related but separate languages.