Chimuan languages
| Chimúan | |
|---|---|
| Yuncan | |
| (controversial) | |
| Geographic distribution |
Peruvian Andes |
| Linguistic classification | Proposed language family |
| Subdivisions |
|
| Glottolog | None |
Chimuan (also Chimúan) or Yuncan is a hypothetical small extinct language family of northern Peru and Ecuador (inter-Andean valley).
Chimuan consisted of three attested languages:
All languages are now extinct.
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.
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