The Piaroa-Salivan languages, also called simply Saliban, are a small language family of the middle Orinoco Basin in Venezuela and the northern plains of Colombia, an independent grouping surrounded by Cariban and Arawakan speaking peoples. The family divides into a Piaroan branch, comprising Piaroa and Wiro (also called Maco), and a Saliban branch represented by Saliba, to which the poorly documented extinct Ature language likely also belonged. Some researchers have proposed linking Piaroa-Salivan with other languages of the region in a broader Jodi-Saliban or Duho grouping, though whether such similarities reflect common ancestry or long contact between neighboring peoples remains contested.
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