Introduction

The Tem language group, located in Togo, West Africa, has a population of 234,000 (Gblem-Poidi and Kantchoa 2012). In total, there are 381,300 speakers of Tem worldwide. Most of the Tem population is situated in the following regions of Togo: Centrale region, Tchaoudjo and Sotouboua prefectures, Bafilo, Sokode, and Sotouboua; Plateaux region, north Agou prefecture near Badou; Kara region, Bassar and Assoli prefectures. Sokode is the principal Tem village. Tem is also spoken to the west in Ghana and to the east in Bénin.

The Ethnologue code for this language is kdh (Ethnologue.com). The classification of the language is under the following group and subgroups: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Gur, Central, Southern, Grusi, Eastern. Alternate names for Tem are: Cotocoli, Kotokoli, Temba, Tim, and Timu. There are three principal dialects of Tem: the standard dialect "Tchaoudjo", the dialect of Bafilo, and the dialect of Fazao. This dictionary is based on the Tchaoudjo dialect.

The Tem value their language, and use it at home as well as in the marketplaces and at work. Other languages spoken by Tem speakers are French and Standard Arabic. They have produced radio programs in Tem, and Bible portions were done during the years 1998-2015.