Coahuiltecan languages

Last updated
Coahuiltecan
(obsolete)
Geographic
distribution
Texas, northern Mexico
Extinct by 1900s
Linguistic classification related to Hokan?
Subdivisions
Map of Indians Texas 1500.png
The   range of Indians of Coahuiltecan culture in Texas, although most authorities would not include the Karankawa and Tonkawa as Coahuiltecan.

Coahuiltecan was a proposed language family in John Wesley Powell's 1891 classification of Native American languages. [1] Most linguists now reject the view that the Coahuiltecan peoples of southern Texas and adjacent Mexico spoke a single or related languages. [2] Coahuiltecan continues to be a convenient collective term for the languages and people of this region.

Contents

Language relationships

Similarities among the cultures among the indigenous people and the physical setting of south Texas led linguists to believe that the languages of the region were also similar. [3] The Coahuiltecan language family was proposed to include all the languages of the region, including Karankawa and Tonkawa. Linguistic connections were proposed with Hokan, a language family of several Native American peoples living in California, Arizona, and Baja California. [4]

Most modern linguists, by contrast, see the Coahuiltecan region as one of linguistic diversity. A few words are known from seven different languages: Comecrudo, Cotoname, Aranama, Solano, Mamulique, Garza, and Coahuilteco or Pakawa. [5] Coahuilteco or Pakawa seems to have been a lingua franca of Texas Coahuiltecans living at or near the Catholic Missions established at San Antonio in the 18th century. Almost certainly, many more languages were spoken, but numerous Coahuiltecan bands and ethnic groups became extinct between the 16th and 19th century and their languages were unrecorded. In 1886, ethnologist Albert Gatschet found perhaps the last surviving speakers of Coahuiltecan languages : 25 Comecrudo, 1 Cotoname, and 2 Pakawa. They were living near Reynosa, Mexico. [6] In 1690, the population of Indians in northeastern Mexico and southern Texas may have been 100,000. The Coahuiltecans were sold into slavery, died of introduced European diseases, and were absorbed by the surrounding Hispanic population. [7]

Linguists have postulated a Comecrudan language family with Comecrudo, Mamulique, and Garza as related and Coahuilteco and Cotoname possibly related. Comecrudo and Cotoname are the best known of the languages. They were spoken in the delta of the Rio Grande. [8] Not enough information exists to classify Solano and Aranama. However, linguistic conservatives say that all these languages should be considered language isolates, with insufficient data to establish relationships between and among the languages. [9]

The Coahuiltecan languages and cultures are now extinct. The names of many bands have been preserved, including the Ervipiame, Mayeye, Pajalat, Quems, Quepano, Solano, and Xarames.

Colonial era religious text is Coahuitlecan and Spanish from the first half of the 18th century Confes indios cohahuit y esp.pdf
Colonial era religious text is Coahuitlecan and Spanish from the first half of the 18th century

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Comecrudan languages</span> Extinct language family of Texas and Mexico

Comecrudan refers to a group of possibly related languages spoken in the southernmost part of Texas and in northern Mexico along the Rio Grande of which Comecrudo is the best known. These were spoken by the Comecrudo people. Very little is known about these languages or the people who spoke them. Knowledge of them primarily consists of word lists collected by European missionaries and explorers. All Comecrudan languages are extinct.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Coahuiltecan</span> Historic Indigenous tribe of Mexico and U.S. (Texas)

The Coahuiltecan were various small, autonomous bands of Native Americans who inhabited the Rio Grande valley in what is now northeastern Mexico and southern Texas. The various Coahuiltecan groups were hunter gatherers. First encountered by Europeans in the 16th century, their population declined due to European diseases, slavery, and numerous small-scale wars fought against the Spanish, criollo, Apache, and other Indigenous groups.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Payaya people</span> Historic Native American tribe from present-day San Antonio, Texas, US

The Payaya people were Indigenous people whose territory encompassed the area of present-day San Antonio, Texas. The Payaya were a Coahuiltecan band and are the earliest recorded inhabitants of San Pedro Springs Park, the geographical area that became San Antonio.

The Pakawan languages were a small language family spoken in what is today northern Mexico and southern Texas. All Pakawan languages are today extinct.

The Pastia people were a hunter-gatherer tribe of the Coahuiltecan. The Pastias inhabited the area south of San Antonio, largely between the Medina and San Antonio Rivers and the southward bend of the Nueces River running through modern day La Salle and McMullen counties. They were first contacted by Spanish explorers in the early eighteenth century, and were extinct as an ethnic group by the middle of the following century.

The Tap Pilam Coahuiltecan Nation is a cultural heritage organization of individuals who identify as lineal descendants of the Coahuiltecan people. They have a nonprofit organization, the American Indians in Texas-Spanish Colonial Missions, based in San Antonio, Texas.

References

  1. Powell, J. W. "Indian Linguistic Families of America, north of Mexico." Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1885–1886. Washington: GPO, 1891, pp. 68–69
  2. Logan, Jennifer L. "Chapter 8: Linguistics" Reassessing Cultural Extinction: Change and Survival at Mission San Juan Capitstrano, Texas. College Station: Center for Ecological Archaeology, Texas A&M, 2001
  3. Newcombe, Jr., W. W. The Indians of Texas: from Prehistoric to Modern Times. Austin: U of TX Press, 1961, pp.29–30
  4. Sapir, E. "The Hokan and Coahuiltecan Languages. International Journal of American Linguistics. Vo. L, No 4 (Dec 1020), p. 280
  5. Logan
  6. Powell, J. W. 7th Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1885–1886. Washington: GPO, 1891, p. 68
  7. "Coahuiltecan Indians." Handbook of Texas Online. www.tshaonline.org/handhook/online/articles/bmcah, accessed 16 Feb 2012.
  8. Salinas, Martin. Indians of the Rio Grande Delta. Austin: U of TX Press, 1990, pp. 142–147
  9. Logan, Jennifer L. "Chapter 8: Linguistics" Reassessing Cultural Extinction: Change and Survival at Mission San Juan Capistrano, Texas. College Station: Center for Ecological Archaeology, Texas A&M, 2001

Bibliography