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Quechua

Indigenous Languages of the Americas

Quechua, also called Runa Simi in Southern Quechua, is an indigenous language family that originated in central Peru and thereafter spread to other countries of the Andes.

Facts
ISO 639-3 Code
que 1
Speaker Count
7,200,000 1
Native speakers, family-wide estimate; other estimates run 8-10 million (2004).
Status
Living 1
Region
Central Andes: Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru 1
Partially Attested
Attested From (Year)
from 1560 1
Domingo de Santo Tomas learned Quechua from 1540 and published the first grammar in 1560; the article calls his work the oldest written records of the language.
Quechua
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Written In

Latin Script, Scripts

Quechua is standardly written in the Latin alphabet.

Sources
1. Wikipedia: Quechuan Languages
Wikimedia Foundation
  • Lead section
    Quechua, also called Runa simi in Southern Quechua ('people's language'), is an indigenous language family that originated in central Peru and thereafter spread to other countries of the Andes.
  • Infobox, ISO 639-3
    que
  • Infobox, Speakers (Total)
    7.2 million native speakers
  • Official status
    In 1975, Peru became the first country to recognize Quechua as one of its official languages.
  • Infobox, Region
    Throughout the central Andes Mountains including Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru.
  • History, first written records
    He published his Grammatica o arte de la lengua general de los indios de los reynos del Perú (Grammar or Art of the General Language of the Indians of the Kingdoms of Peru) in 1560.
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