Nimoa

Nimoa, also called Rifao, is an Oceanic Austronesian language spoken on Nimoa and neighbouring islands of the Louisiade Archipelago off the eastern tip of New Guinea. With Sudest, the language of nearby Tagula or Vanatinai Island, it forms the Nimoa–Sudest family of the Kilivila–Misima linkage within the Papuan Tip branch.

Most Papuan Tip languages have adopted the verb-final word order of their Papuan neighbours, but Nimoa, Sudest and the Kilivila island languages keep the older subject–verb–object order typical of Austronesian. The Spanish expedition of Luís Vaez de Torres first sighted Tagula and its neighbours on 14 July 1606, charting them as Tierra de San Buenaventura.