Anejom

Anejom, also called Aneityum, is the single indigenous language of Aneityum, the southernmost inhabited island of Vanuatu. It forms its own branch of the Southern Vanuatu group within the Oceanic languages; its nearest kin are the languages of neighbouring Tanna rather than those of Erromango.

Aneityum was settled from Tanna around 874 BC, and long isolation gave the language its distinct shape. The islanders were organised into chiefdoms headed by chiefs called natimarid: oral tradition recalls two original chiefdoms splitting into seven, divided into fifty or sixty districts.

In 1830 the brig Alpha landed to open a sandalwood trade, bringing the first Europeans and beginning upheavals that would end the island's seclusion. Anejom had no native script and was carried by oral tradition.