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Coahuiltecan

North American Language Families

Coahuiltecan was a language family proposed in John Wesley Powell's 1891 classification of Native American languages, grouping together the poorly documented languages of southern Texas and adjacent northern Mexico, including Coahuilteco (also called Pakawa), Comecrudo, Cotoname, Aranama, Solano, Mamulique and Garza. Most modern linguists reject the idea that these languages were actually related, and now treat them as a set of unrelated isolates or, in the case of Comecrudo, Cotoname and Garza, as members of a separate small Comecrudan family; the original Coahuiltecan proposal rested on cultural similarity among the peoples rather than demonstrated linguistic relationship. The languages were already dying out by the late 19th century, with only 28 known speakers recorded across the group in 1886, and none survive today.

Facts
Region
Southern Texas and adjacent northeastern Mexico 1
Speaker Count
0 1
All Coahuiltecan languages are extinct.
Proto-Language Status
Not reconstructed; most modern linguists reject a single Coahuiltecan genetic grouping altogether, treating the languages as unrelated or unclassifiable isolates. 1
In the Other Atlases
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Coahuiltecan Languages
Wikipedia
  • Lead paragraph
    Most linguists now reject the view that the Coahuiltecan peoples of southern Texas and adjacent Mexico spoke a single or related languages.
  • Language relationships section
    Most linguists now reject the view that the Coahuiltecan peoples of southern Texas and adjacent Mexico spoke a single or related languages.
View the Source
Wikidata: Coahuiltecan
Wikidata Q12954023, class allow-list match (w-wdresolver-0926)View the Source
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