ປຶມປັຣນຽລອາຕຽງຫແຕ ກຣຽງ — Kriang (Ta Oi) Scripture Portions (Laos)
Overview
ປຶມປັຣນຽລອາຕຽງຫແຕ ກຣຽງ ("The Scripture in Kriang") is the Gospel of Luke in the Kriang language of southern Laos, published by Beyond Translation under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license and available via YouVersion/Bible.com (ID 4299). The community's self-designation Ta Oi — meaning approximately "forest people" — is shared with the Ir (irr) language community (IRRBYT), reflecting a cluster of related Katuic Mon-Khmer languages in the Laos-Vietnam border highlands whose speakers identify collectively as Ta Oi despite their linguistic differentiation. "Kriang" is the external/scholarly designation for this specific variety. This is the first scripture in Kriang, written in Lao script.
Language and People
Kriang (ISO 639-3: ngt; autonym: Ta Oi; scholarly name: Kriang or Krieng) is an Austroasiatic language: Austroasiatic → Mon-Khmer → Katuic branch. Kriang belongs to the same Ta Oi/Katuic cluster as Ir (irr) and the related Ta'oih (tth) of Vietnam. The Katuic branch includes Bru (brv), Katu (ktu), and multiple Ta Oi varieties. The "Kriang" label distinguishes this specific Laotian variety from the closely related Ir and Ta'oih; whether these constitute a single language or multiple closely related languages is a matter of linguistic classification; Beyond Translation has produced distinct Luke translations for each, reflecting meaningful communicative differences.
The Kriang community inhabits:
- Saravan Province (Salavan), southern Laos — the Annamite Mountain foothills along the Laos-Vietnam border
- Highland areas of the Bolovens Plateau / Annamite Range zone
Estimated speakers: approximately 5,000–20,000 (the broader Ta Oi/Katuic cluster in Laos and Vietnam has ~20,000–50,000 speakers; Kriang specifically is a sub-set).
Cultural Context
The Ta Oi communities of southern Laos share the history of conflict, displacement, and unexploded ordnance (UXO) contamination that characterizes the entire Laos-Vietnam border zone. The heavy bombing of the Ho Chi Minh Trail through Saravan and Sekong Provinces during 1964–1973 left these highland areas among the most heavily bombed regions in world history. Beyond Translation's CCBT model supports local church communities in building scripture resources in these under-resourced highland languages alongside ongoing UXO clearance and development work.
Publishing and Organizations
Published by Beyond Translation (beyondtranslation.org, Arlington, Texas) under the CC-BY-SA 4.0 license.