Adelaar Willem, Muysken Pieter. The languages of the Andes

Подождите немного. Документ загружается.

134 2 The Chibcha Sphere

Rojas Curieux provides some intriguing examples in which person markers occur on

the object noun rather than on the verb:

(200) t

uw-a

ʔʔ

s uy-∅∅-t

ʔʔ

hedgehog-AC.SG see-AO-1S.PL.DV

‘We saw the hedgehog.’

(Rojas Curieux 1991a: 35)

(201) t

uw-c

ʔʔ

s-t

ʔʔ

wuy

hedgehog-PL.S-AC.SG-1S.PL.DV see

‘We saw the hedgehog.’

(Rojas Curieux 1991a: 35)

The relatively free clitic character of the person markers in Nasa Yuwe is conﬁrmed

by Nieves Oviedo’s (1991a: 129–33) analysis of nominal predication. She shows that

the above contrast between (200) and (201) should be analysed in terms of focus, on the

basis of the following examples:

(202) mis

-a

ʔʔ

karlos-a

ʔʔ

swa

ʔʔ

-ku-k

cat-TO Carlos-AC.SG bite-RM-3S.SG.EV.DV

‘The cat bit Carlos.’

(Nieves Oviedo 1991a: 129)

(203) mis

-ku-k karlos-a

ʔʔ

swa

ʔʔ

cat-RM-3S.SG.EV.DV Carlos-AC.SG bite

‘It was the cat that bit Carlos.’

(Nieves Oviedo 1991a: 129)

(204) mis

-a

ʔʔ

karlos-ku-k wa

ʔʔ

cat-TO Carlos-RM-3S.SG.EV.DV bite

‘It was Carlos that the cat bit.’

(Nieves Oviedo 1991a: 129)

When there is no particular focus on any of the participants in the sentence, the

tense, person and mood markers are attached to the verb. Otherwise, however, they are

attached to the focused constituent. In one of Nieves Oviedo’s analyses (1991a: 132–3),

the focused constituent constitutes the true predicate of the sentence in all cases.

Person marking is closely linked both to a gender distinction (for the ﬁrst and second

persons), the active/stative distinction (for the third person) and to epistemic modality (for

all persons). Rojas Curieux (1991a) gives the following minimal pair for the active/stative

distinction:

(205) wala-∅∅-a

ʔʔ

be.tall-AO-3S.SG.ST.DV

‘He is tall.’

(Rojas Curieux 1991a: 40)

(206) wala-∅∅-k

be.tall-AO-3S.SG.EV.DV

‘He grew.’

(Rojas Curieux 1991a: 40)

2.15 P´aez (Nasa Yuwe) 135

Table 2.17 Person markers in Nasa Yuwe (based on Rojas Curieux

1991a, b; Nieves Oviedo 1991a; Jung 2000)

Direct Inferential Interrogative/

Pronoun knowledge knowledge no knowledge

1 sing. masc. a

-t

(u) -nha -tka

1 sing. fem. ˜u

e-t

(u) -nha -tka

2 sing. masc. i

g(u) -

ga -

2 sing. fem. i

e-i

e-k

3 sing. stative t

a-a

(∼ -ha

) -na -na

3 sing. active t

a -k(u) -ka -ka

1 plur. k

-t

w -nha

w -tk

2 plur. i

-i

e-k

3 plur. stative t

awe

-ta

-t

na -t

3 plur. active t

awe

-t

(i) -t

na -t

Depending on the stativity of the predicate, -a

or -k(u) is chosen. Most verbs will

take one of the two markers, while there is a subset of predicates like wala- ‘be tall/grow’

that can take either.

Jung (1989) shows that with nominal predicates, the use of a copula marks a possibly

temporary state:

(207)

ʔʔ

h-a

ʔʔ

wala ka

-a

ʔʔ

road-TO very bad-3S.SG.ST.DV

‘The road is very bad.’

(Jung 1989: 75)

(208)

ʔʔ

h-a

ʔʔ

wala ka

˜us-a

ʔʔ

road-TO very bad be-3S.SG.ST.DV

‘The road is very bad at the moment.’

(Jung 1989: 75)

Table 2.17 contains the full array of the person markers.

The category ‘Inferential knowledge’ corresponds to knowledge that the speaker has

no direct access to, to supposed or inferred events, while the category ‘Interrogative/no

knowledge’ corresponds to knowledge that the speaker has to discover, most often by

asking a question. In the paradigm in table 2.17 the vowel u generally corresponds with

‘Direct knowledge’, the vowel a with ‘Inferential knowledge’, and the vowel a

with

‘Interrogative/no knowledge’. Further analysis will have to reveal whether or not the

exceptions to this imply that we can separate the categories of person and epistemic

morphosyntactically. (The short forms in table 2.17 are used after a vowel, -ha

after a

glottalised vowel. Note that the endings corresponding to second person feminine and

plural are identical.)

136 2 The Chibcha Sphere

Turning brieﬂy to word order, Rojas Curieux (1991a) notes that all determiners precede

the noun except the adjective. Personal pronouns preceding the noun indicate pronominal

possession. While adjectives follow the noun, qualifying adverbs tend to precede the

verb.

(209) t

ʔʔn

dz alku k

˜uc

that I two dog black

‘those two black dogs of mine’

(Rojas Curieux 1991a: 25)

Often there is an SOV order, in which the object is marked -(a)

s ‘singular object’

or -t

i ‘plural object’. Ordinarily the subject is not marked, although it can be marked

comitative and topic, in examples such as the following:

(210) n

-t

˜e

-yak

-a

ʔʔ

tata-

ʔʔ

s ϕ

-∅∅-t

ʔʔ

brother-older-C-TO father-AC.SG wake.up-AO-1S.PL.DV

‘My brother and I woke my father up.’

(Rojas Curieux 1991a: 26)

Nonetheless, as Rojas Curieux (1991a: 27) notes, clausal order is rather free and the

object can follow the verb as well. The object marker can be attached both to direct

objects and to indirect objects, as well as to the causee in causative constructions, as

shown by the following contrast:

(211) nasa yuwe-a

ʔʔ

s piya-na ˜us-t

nasa yuwe-AC.SG learn-N be-1S.SG.DV

‘I am learning Nasa Yuwe.’

(Jung 1989: 74)

(212) hwan-a

ʔʔ

˜u

ʔʔ

kwe-

ʔʔ

s nasa yuwe-

ʔʔ

s ka:-piya-

ʔʔ

h-na ˜us-a

ʔʔ

Juan-TO I.FE-AC.SG nasa yuwe-AC.SG CA-learn-T-AG

be-3S.SG.ST.DV

‘Juan is teaching me Nasa Yuwe.’

(Jung 1989: 74)

In addition to the comitative case and object markers, there are a number of other case

markers as well, mostly relating to a complex locative system (Jung 1989: 188–95):

(213) -h˜ı: ‘on behalf of’, ‘for (benefactive)’

-hu ‘away from’

-ka ‘upward to’

-k

e ‘downward to’

-na ‘towards’

-su ‘through’, ‘among’

-te ‘neutral’,‘towards’

-uy ‘across’, ‘in front of’

2.15 P´aez (Nasa Yuwe) 137

There is a set of question words morphologically related to indeﬁnite and negative

universal quantiﬁers (Jung 1989: 306):

(214) bakac

bakac

-pa bakac

pa ‘when/ever/never’

k˜ı

-pa k˜ı

pa ‘what/something/nothing’

kim kim-pa kim yu

pa ‘who/someone/no one’

ma: ma:-pa ma: yu

pa ‘which/anyone/no one’

m-te: m-te:-pa m-te: yu

pa ‘where/somewhere/nowhere’

The existence of an indeﬁnite marker -pa suggests that the nominal negator yu

is itself morphologically complex. Notice that m-te: is also morphologically complex,

containing the locative marker -te:. Through reduplication of the question word the

referent may be extended: k˜



=k˜



-pa ‘many things’, m-te:=m-te:-pa ‘everywhere’.

Subordination is achieved primarily through verb nominalisation. In embedded

clauses the verb is in ﬁnal position and no topic is allowed (Jung 1989: 238). Nom-

inalised clauses can occur in the same main clause positions as noun phrases. Inﬁnitive

complements are marked with -ya

and generally precede the main verb, which is some-

times best analysed as a modal or aspectual auxiliary. Notice there is no case marking

in these complements:

(215) yat-te ka:-piya-

ʔʔ

h-ya

ʔʔ

tak

-e-

ʔʔ

-t

house-L CA-learn-T-IF begin-IA-CU-3S.PL.EV.DV

‘They begin teaching them in the house.’

(Jung 1989: 242)

In addition to a nominaliser for expected events -wa

h, and a participle marker for

realised events -n

i, there is an unspeciﬁed nominaliser -sa that has the remarkable

feature that it can be both subject- (216) and object-oriented (217). With nouns (218), it

indicates the person with a certain property:

(216) ka:-piya-

ʔʔ

h-sa

CA-learn-T-N

‘teacher’

(Jung 1989: 247)

(217) ka:-piya-

ʔʔ

h-n

i-sa

CA-learn-T-SN-N

‘what has been taught’

(Jung 1989: 247)

(218) nasa-sa

P´aez-N

‘someone who is a P´aez’

(Jung 1989: 247)

This marker can be used to form relative clauses.

138 2 The Chibcha Sphere

(219) ka:-piya-

ʔʔ

h-ya

ʔʔ

h-sa-t

˜a: ka:-piya-

ʔʔ

h-n

i-t

ʔʔ

ka-c-me:-tk

ʔʔ

CA-learn-T-IF come-N-AC.PL that CA-learn-T-SN-AC.PL

accept-PR-NE-1S.PL.IR

‘We don’t accept the teachings of those who have come to teach us.’

(Jung 1989: 248)

For samples of analysed and translated text in P´aez see Nieves Oviedo (1991e) and

Jung (2000).

2.16 Andaqu´ı and the languages of the Upper Magdalena valley

From a historical point of view, the Andaqu´ı people are famous for the merciless guerrilla

warwhich they were able to sustain against the Spanish colonial administration for almost

250 years. In literature they have often been presented as identical to the inhabitants of the

Upper Magdalena valley region at the time of the conquest (see, for instance, Rivet 1924).

In that perspective, they would have superseded the people responsible for building the

sculptures and monuments at the archaeological site of San Agust´ın in the proximity of

the Magdalena headwaters. A careful study of the rich historical documentation relating

to the Upper Magdalena region carried out by the historian Juan Friede (1953) has

brought to light a more complex reality.

At the time of the conquest the Upper Magdalena region was inhabited by several

ethnic groups with a more or less egalitarian social structure. Best known among these

groups were the Timan´a and the Yalc´on.

In times of danger they would unite with

neighbouring peoples, such as the Guanaca and the P´aez. The Spaniards, who were

initially well received, experienced this during the great uprising which led to the death

of the conquistadores A˜nasco and Ampudia in 1543. Unfortunately, the extraordinary

bravery of the Upper Magdalena Indians was matched by poor military strategy (massive

noisy attacks in closed formation, always during daytime; inefﬁcient weapons), so that

the Spaniards soon subjugated them. They founded the towns of Timan´a and La Plata

and divided the Indians according to the encomienda system.

Forced to defend them-

selves against aggressive neighbours, such as the Pijao, the impoverished encomenderos

By using an interrogative form in a non-interrogative context an individual speaker can take

distance from a habit characteristic for the group to which he or she belongs (Jung 1989:

123–4).

An important part of Friede’s conclusions are based on the visita (‘inspection’) of Timan´a,

conducted by the Spanish colonial authorities in 1628.

It is not likely that these groups were direct descendants of the sculptor people of San Agust´ın.

Most authors emphasise the differences in religion, burial habits and social organisation.

Encomienda:trust estate granted to colonists by the Spanish kings.

2.16 Andaqu´ı and the Upper Magdalena valley 139

repeatedly moved and relocated the local Indians which they were supposed to protect,

ruthlessly exploiting their work force and using them as scouts or porters. This process led

to the virtual disappearance of the local tribes during the second half of the seventeenth

century. In their misery and despair, many Indians ﬂed the Upper Magdalena region

and found a hiding place on the eastern Andean slopes and in the adjacent Amazonian

lowlands.

The attacks by the Andaqu´ı Indians began at the beginning of the seventeenth century.

(One of their ﬁrst exploits was the destruction of the town of Simancas on the Upper

Caquet´a about 1600.) The habitat of the Andaqu´ı Indians included a huge jungle area,

bordered by the Caquet´ariver in the south and west, its tributary the Cagu´an in the

east, and the Upper Magdalena highlands in the north. During the seventeenth century

they frequently raided the Upper Magdalena region with its dwindling population, in

particular, the area of San Agust´ın and the valley of the Suaza, an eastern tributary of the

Magdalena. Soon the entire population of the Suaza river valley had to be removed, as

it was too exposed to the attacks of the Andaqu´ı. In the eighteenth century the Andaqu´ı

turned their attention to the missionary settlements on the Caquet´ariver. Many of them

were destroyed and abandoned. During the nineteenth century the Andaqu´ı slipped into

oblivion. Today, only some place names, such as Bel´en de los Andaqu´ıes on the Pescado

river (near Florencia), remind us of their existence. There are no known speakers of the

language left.

The identity of the Andaqu´ı Indians is problematic. They may have had an Amazonian

origin, a conclusion which is favoured by their extraordinary adaptation to the jungle

habitat. In contrast to the sixteenth century-Upper Magdalena Indians, their ﬁghting

techniques were excellent. Perfect knowledge of the tropical jungle environment, am-

bushes, night attacks, efﬁcient weapons and the use of intelligence guaranteed their

success as guerrilla ﬁghters. Military expeditions that were launched against them in-

variably turned into disaster. Most striking of the Andaqu´ıistheir total rejection, if not

contempt, of everything Spanish, including the religion and its representatives, and their

hatred of Indians willing to live under Spanish rule. Their doggedness suggests that they

might have been descendants of refugees from the highlands, who would have had good

reasons for being so intransigent. Even during the worst periods of the Andaqu´ıwar,

they were probably not numerous (possibly less than a thousand).

The original languages of the Upper Magdalena region have long become extinct.

Through an analysis of the information on language use supplied by the colonial docu-

ments, Friede (1953) concludes that in 1628, apart from Quechua and Spanish, at least

two Amazonian and four local languages were spoken in the Upper Magdalena area.

One local language originated from the valley of the La Plata river, one from the area

of Pitalito and San Agust´ın (the upper reaches of the Magdalena), one from the area of

Timan´a and one from the upper Suaza valley. All that is known of these languages are

140 2 The Chibcha Sphere

family names and place names mentioned in the colonial documents relating to the area

(Friede 1952).

For the Andaqu´ı language there are two sources. An anonymous list of some twenty

pages of words and expressions, sent to Madrid by Mutis, was published in the Catalogue

of the Royal Library in 1928. A second word list was collected by the priest Manuel Mar´ıa

Albis in 1854 (Albis 1860–1). Given the size and the nature of the material, a systematic

study of it should make it possible to reconstruct some aspects of the language. An

article by Rivet (1924) is based on Albis’s list and is mainly geared at demonstrating a

Chibchan afﬁliation for Andaqu´ı. This is not convincing, but if the alleged P´aez cognates

alone are considered, some interesting parallels emerge.

Possible shared cultural terms are the words for ‘cotton’ (Andaqu´ı guahuahi;P´aez

wewe; cf. Rivet 1924) and ‘sweet potato’ (Andaqu´ı kag´a;P´aez ka

ka ∼ ka

ga ‘potato’; cf.

Jung 2000: 142). Among body-part terms we may mention the words for ‘ear’ (Andaqu´ı

chunguah´e;P´aez t

˜uwa; cf. Rivet 1924) and ‘tongue’ (Andaqu´ı shona´e;P´aez t

une; cf.

Rivet 1924). Compare also the verbs ‘to sit’ (Andaqu´ı caya-, coaya-; P´aez kat

, kac

‘to

sit’) and ‘to sleep’ (Andaqu´ı bonda-, da-; P´aez

The general aspect of Andaqu´ıwords is very different from what is found in P´aez. Long

words, mainly consisting of open syllables, predominate. The only frequent syllable-ﬁnal

consonant is -n. The Madrid word list includes a few unusual symbol combinations, the

value of which can only be guessed. Most conspicuous is fsrr, e.g. in fsrragua ‘a type

of liana’ and fsrrixa ‘agave ﬁbre’. Morphologically, the language combines preﬁxation

and sufﬁxation. Person of subject can be indicated by means of preﬁxes, e.g. ka- ‘second

person’ as in:

(220) ninga ca-mimi

I 2S-love

‘Do you like me?’

(Anonymous 1928: 181)

Modal categories, nominalisation and possibly some parts of personal reference are

indicated by means of sufﬁxes. The second-person imperative marker is -z´a.

(221) fsrrajono-z´a

lie.down-2S.IM

‘Lie down!’

(Anonymous 1928: 185)

Nouns and adjectives frequently contain a lexical sufﬁx with an unidentiﬁed function,

e.g. -hi or -(h)´e (cf. guahua-hi, chungua-h´e and shona-´e above). Case is indicated by

means of sufﬁxes, as in cogo ‘house’, cogo-ra ‘(go) home’.

The numeral system is weakly developed. This would speak in favour of an Amazo-

nian origin considering that Andean languages generally have fully developed decimal

systems. Friede, cited by Taylor (1999), attributes a mixed origin to the Andaqu´ı, which

2.17 Barbacoan languages 141

he assumes to have consisted of elements of Cof´an, Pijao and Tucanoan peoples. The lex-

ical similarities with P´aez suggest that the original languages of the Upper Magdalena,

which were neighbours of P´aez and may have been related to it, should not be rejected

as a possible component.

2.17 Barbacoan languages

The Barbacoan languages occupy a relatively large, fragmented area in southern Colom-

bia and the Ecuadorian coastal provinces. There are ﬁve living languages, Cayapa,

Colorado, Cuaiquer, Guambiano and Totor´o, although the last one is moribund. The

three ﬁrst languages are now more often referred to by their native names, which are

Cha



palaachi, Tsaﬁki and Awa Pit, respectively. Cha



palaachi is spoken by some 4,000

Chachi or Cayapa Indians in the province of Esmeraldas (Ecuador), near the Cayapas

river (Vittadello 1988). The Tsachila or Colorado,who speak Tsaﬁki, number about

2,000. They inhabit the area of Santo Domingo de los Colorados and Quevedo in the

western part of the Pichincha province (Ecuador).

The Cuaiquer or Awa are established in the department of Nari˜no (Colombia) on

the upper Telemb´ıriver and in the area of Altaquer and Ricaurte, between T´uquerres

and Tumaco. Several decades ago a substantial number of Awa migrated to Ecuador,

where they mainly reside in the western part of the province of Carchi. In Colombia

the number of Awa has been calculated at approximately 13,000 (Arango and S´anchez

1998), in Ecuador at 1,600. The Awa are known for practising secrecy with respect to

their language and cultural identity. Curnow and Liddicoat (1998) estimate that only a

limited percentage of the Awa continue to speak the language, but reliable ﬁgures are

not obtainable.

Guambiano and Totor´o are spoken in an area to the east and northeast of Popay´an in

the department of Cauca (Colombia). Together with the extinct Coconuco they are also

known as the Coconucan languages. There are 20,000 Guambiano (Arango and S´anchez

1998), who live mainly in the resguardos of Guamb´ıa and Quisg´o, near the market town

of Silvia. The language is well preserved in Guamb´ıa, but less so in Quisg´o. Due to the

growth of their population, many Guambiano now live in areas outside their original

resguardos, also in the neighbouring department of Huila. Totor´oisaresguardo to

the south of Silvia, on the Popay´an–La Plata road. Only four out of 3,600 indigenous

Totore˜nos are said to still know the language, but there has been a strong wish to recover

the original cultural identity (Pab´on Triana 1995a). Guambiano, Totor´o and Coconuco

(originally spoken in Coconuco and Purac´e) are very closely related, and are probably

better treated as dialects of one language.

The afﬁnity of the Coconucan languages and the other Barbacoan languages was ﬁrst

recognised by Brinton (1891). This observation soon became obscured when Beuchat

and Rivet (1910b) reclassiﬁed the Coconucan languages with neighbouring P´aez and

142 2 The Chibcha Sphere

Paniquita, treating them together as a subgroup of Chibchan. The remaining Barba-

coan languages, in turn, were classiﬁed as yet another subgroup of Chibchan. Curnow

(1998) sees as one of the possible causes of this confusion the circulation of a word

list of the so-called ‘Moguex’ language, which in reality represented a mix of P´aez and

Guambiano expressions. The resulting confusion affected all subsequent classiﬁcatory

efforts, including those of Loukotka (1968), Greenberg (1987) and Kaufman (1990),

until Constenla Uma˜na (1991) drew attention to the obvious lexical similarities that

link Guambiano with the other Barbacoan languages. In earlier work Constenla Uma˜na

(1981) had already rejected the Chibchan connection and the alleged close relationship

between Coconucan and P´aez. Curnow and Liddicoat (1998) have elaborated lexical and

phonological, as well as some morphosyntactic correspondences between the Barbacoan

languages, substantiating Constenla’s ﬁndings in a convincing way. Constenla Uma˜na

(1991), as well as Curnow and Liddicoat (1998), propose a division of the Barbacoan

languages in two subfamilies: a northern group comprising Awa Pit and the Coconucan

languages, and a southern group consisting of Cha



palaachi and Tsaﬁki. The languages

of the southern group are very closely related. The northern group is somewhat less

close. One of the phonological differences between the two groups is that the northern

group has retained word-ﬁnal obstruents, where the southern group has lost them.

The confusion surrounding the linguistic afﬁnity of the Guambiano has occasionally

lead to treating them as a sort of historical ‘mystery’ people (cf. V´asquez de Ru´ız 1988:

31–6). However, in view of their linguistic connections to the west and southwest, it

is likely that they may have been a remnant of the people, represented by the Pubenza

federation, which dominated the Popay´an area at the arrival of the Spaniards. The neigh-

bouring Guanaca people of the colonial period have also been suggested as possible

relatives of the Guambiano. Further south, the Pasto Indians, still a numerous group in

the area between the town of Pasto and the Ecuadorian border, almost certainly spoke

a Barbacoan language, although they are Spanish speakers now. The Cara language

spoken in the northern Ecuadorian Andes before the introduction of Quechua may also

have belonged to the Barbacoan family, but the evidence so far is not conclusive (see

chapter 3, section 3.9.1).

In terms of overall description of the Barbacoan languages much remains to be done.

ForAwa Pit there is a reference grammar in dissertation form (Curnow 1997) and

descriptive studies by Calvache Due˜nas (1989, 2000) and Obando Ord´o˜nez (1992).

Several studies of a limited scope discuss aspects of Guambiano phonology and grammar

(Branks and Branks 1973; Long 1985; V´asquez de Ru´ız 1988, 1994, 2000; Trivi˜no

Garz´on 1994). Studies on Tsaﬁki (Moore 1966) and Cha



palaachi (Lindskoog and Brend

1962; Lindskoog and Lindskoog 1964; Vittadello 1988) contain ﬁrst approaches to the

grammar of these languages. Moore (1962) and Curnow and Liddicoat (1998) address

the issue of phonological and lexical reconstruction.

2.17 Barbacoan languages 143

Table 2.18 Guambiano consonant inventory (based on

V´asquez de Ru´ız 2000)

Labial Alveolar Palatal Retroﬂex Velar

Stops p t k

Affricates c ˇcˇc

Fricatives s ˇsˇs

Nasals m n n

Laterals l l

Vibrant r

Glides w y

A characteristic of the Barbacoan vowel systems is the lack of a contrast between o

and u; such a contrast is only found in Tsaﬁki. Guambiano distinguishes ﬁve vowels: a,

e, i,



, u. The



is described as either a high (Branks and Branks; Long), or a mid (V´asquez

de Ru´ız) central vowel. Tsaﬁki distinguishes ﬁve vowels, a, e, i, o, u, and Cha



palaachi

four: a, e, i, u. Furthermore, Cha



palaachi has a length contrast. Nasalised vowels occur

phonetically in Tsaﬁki, but they may reﬂect the presence of a syllable-ﬁnal nasal, rather

than an inherent feature of the vowel itself.

The inventory of vowels in Awa Pit is controversial. Calvache Due˜nas (2000) dis-

tinguishes ﬁve vowels, a, e, i,



, u, with a functionally marginal nasality contrast and a

non-distinctive voice contrast. Curnow (1997: 38–45) distinguishes four voiced vowel

phonemes, a, i,



, u,while interpreting the sound [e] as an allophone of a, i and



.He

also distinguishes three voiceless high vowels,



u, and demonstrates the contrastive

character of the voice opposition by means of minimal pairs such as t

u ‘shoulder bag’

and tu ‘to be in a place’. Vocalic nasality, restricted to vowels and diphthongs occurring

in word-ﬁnal position, is attributed to the presence of a velar nasal phoneme

. Curnow,

furthermore, explains that Awa Pit has sequences of like vowels (e.g. in paas ‘two’, pii

‘river’), and that other vowel sequences do not necessarily merge into a diphthong, for

instance, in au [a(γ )u] ‘we’ (but saw [t

aw] ‘ﬁeld’).

The consonant inventories of Guambiano, Awa Pit, Tsaﬁki and Cha



palaachi are

represented in the tables 2.18–2.21.

Long (1985) distinguishes three additional consonant phonemes in Guambiano: k

ˇz, and

. The sound combination k

is interpreted as kuV by V´asquez de Ru´ız; ˇz may

be an allophone of ˇc. The case of

seems to reﬂect a real difference of observation,

however. It occurs in interrogative expressions such as mak´u

‘do you eat?’. V´asquez de

Ru´ız (1988) has ﬁnal zero in these cases. Guambiano stops and affricates can be subject

to voicing and fricativisation depending on their position in a word form.