Chimuan languages

Chimuan (also Chimúan) or Yuncan is a hypothetical small extinct language family of northern Peru and Ecuador (inter-Andean valley).

Chimúan
Yuncan
(controversial)
Geographic
distribution		Peruvian Andes
Linguistic classificationProposed language family
Subdivisions
GlottologNone

Family division

Chimuan consisted of three attested languages:

  • Mochica (a.k.a. Yunga, Chimú)
  • Cañar–Puruhá
    • Cañari (a.k.a. Cañar, Kanyari)
    • Puruhá (a.k.a. Puruwá, Puruguay)

All languages are now extinct.

Campbell (2012) classifies Mochica and Cañar–Puruhá each as separate language families.[1]

Mochica was one of the major languages of pre-Columbian South America. It was documented by Fernando de la Carrera and Middendorff in the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries respectively. It became extinct ca. 1950, although some people remember a few words. Adelaar & Muysken (2004) consider Mochica a language isolate for now.

Cañari and Puruhá are documented with only a few words. These two languages are usually connected with Mochica. However, as their documentation level is so low, it may not be possible to confirm this association. According to Adelaar & Muysken (2004), Jijón y Caamaño's evidence of their relationship is only a single word: Mochica nech "river", Cañari necha; based on similarities with neighboring languages, he finds a Barbacoan connection more likely.

Quingnam, possibly the same language as Lengua (Yunga) Pescadora, is sometimes taken to be a dialect of Mochica, but it is unattested, unless a list of numerals discovered in 2010 turns out to be Quingnam or Pescadora as expected. Those numerals are not, however, Mochica.

Mason (1950)

Yunca-Puruhán (Chimuan) internal classification by Mason (1950):[2]

Yunca-Puruhán
  • Yuncan
    • North group (Puruhá-Cañari)
      • Puruhá
      • Canyari (Cañari)
      • Manabila (Mantenya)
    • South group (Yunca)
      • Yunga
      • Morropé
      • Eten (?)
      • Chimu
      • Mochica (Chincha)
      • Chanco
  • Atalán
    • Wancavilca (Huancavilca)
      • Mania
      • Tumbez
      • Puna
      • Carake: Apichiki, Cancebi

Mason (1950) also included Atalán, which is no longer considered to be part of the Yunca-Puruhán (Chimuan) family.

Vocabulary

Loukotka (1968) lists the following basic vocabulary items for the Chimuan languages.[3]

glossChimúEtenCañariPuruhá
one onkóunik
two atputatputpax
head lekxätsgíchan
hand möchmetsan
water lengxakayla
fire hogóx
sun sheangsheangchán
maize aixamangmanga
bird ñaíññaíññay
jaguar räkrakguagalguagua
fish shl'akt'akshl'ak
house ánikanánán
gollark: Why would you want that?
gollark: It's very simple: consign shatter to one group and ARC to another.
gollark: There's now object grouping.
gollark: Could be very cool - a bunch of screens around you.
gollark: Just use a canvas generated with addFrame.

See also

References
  1. Campbell, Lyle (2012). "Classification of the indigenous languages of South America". In Grondona, Verónica; Campbell, Lyle (eds.). The Indigenous Languages of South America. The World of Linguistics. 2. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. pp. 59–166. ISBN 978-3-11-025513-3.
  2. Mason, John Alden (1950). "The languages of South America". In Steward, Julian (ed.). Handbook of South American Indians. 6. Washington, D.C., Government Printing Office: Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 143. pp. 157–317.
  3. Loukotka, Čestmír (1968). Classification of South American Indian languages. Los Angeles: UCLA Latin American Center.

Further reading
  • Adelaar, Willem F. H.; & Muysken, Pieter C. (2004). The languages of the Andes. Cambridge language surveys. Cambridge University Press.
  • Campbell, Lyle. (1997). American Indian languages: The historical linguistics of Native America. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-509427-5.
  • Kaufman, Terrence. (1994). The native languages of South America. In C. Mosley & R. E. Asher (Eds.), Atlas of the world's languages (pp. 46–76). London: Routledge.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.