The northwestern Makuran language family, a sub-grouping of the Makuran family which derives from Proto-Makuran, encompasses several branches of wildly divergent descendants. It is generally considered slightly more conservative than its direct sister-grouping, the northern Makuran branch; most northwestern languages preserve many features lost in their more north-eastern cousins.
The northwestern Makuran family is made up of two sub-branches, one of which branches further off:
- Edāsan languages
- Elahan (†)
- Silari languages
- Three major clades of Silari languages
- Bentardari (†)
All northwestern languages share some common historical developments, both grammatical and phonological, that point to a common ancestor rather than a wave-like spead of changes.
Proto-NW-Makuran (PNWM) as a monolithic language is certainly older than the earliest strata of the second Imperium, and was most likely spoken before the actual establishment of the modern Imperial Authority, and the complete split between the Edāsan and Bentardari languages can't have been earlier than the establishment of the Second Imperium proper.