Karankawa language
| Karankawa | |
|---|---|
| Clamcoëhs | |
| Native to | United States |
| Region | Texas coast, from Galveston Island to Corpus Christi |
| Ethnicity | Karankawa people |
| Extinct | 1858 |
|
unclassified | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 |
zkk |
zkk | |
| Glottolog |
kara1289[1] |
|
Pre-contact distribution of the Karankawa language | |
Karankawa is the extinct, unclassified language of the Texas coast, where the Karankawa people migrated between the mainland and the barrier islands. It was not closely related to other known languages in the area, much of which are also poorly attested, and may have been a language isolate. A couple hundred words are preserved, collected in 1698, 1720, and 1828; in the 1880s, three lists were collected from non-Karankawa who knew some words.
Karankawa has sometimes been included with neighboring languages in a Coahuiltecan family, but that is now thought to be spurious.
Phonology
Consonants
| Bilabial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive | normal | p | t | tʃ | k | ʔ | |
| voiced | b | d d̥ | dʒ | ɡ | |||
| Fricative | s | ʃ | x | h | |||
| Trill | r | ||||||
| Nasal | m m̥ | n | |||||
| Approximant | w | l | j | ||||
Vowels/Nasal Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i (i) | u (u) | |
| Mid | e (e) | ə (ä,ë) | ɔ~o (o) |
| Open | a (a) |
Vocabulary
Though very little can be said for certain regarding the Karankawa language, the following are selected words recorded by contemporary various sources.[3]
- naatsa "one"
- haikia "two"
- dootn habe "ten"
- a'al "speak"
- ahaks / alaks "man"
- ashadee "woman"
- comcom "water"
- ahajica "friend"
References
- ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "Karankawa". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
- ↑ The Karankawa Indians, The Coast People of Texas. p. 88.
- ↑ Grant, Anthony P. (1994). "Karankawa linguistic Materials" (PDF). Kansas Working Papers in Linguistics. University of Kansas. 19.