The Chonan languages are a family of indigenous American languages which were spoken in
Tierra del Fuego
Tierra del Fuego (, ; Spanish for "Land of the Fire", rarely also Fireland in English) is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The archipelago consists of the main island, Isla G ...
and
Patagonia
Patagonia () refers to a geographical region that encompasses the southern end of South America, governed by Argentina and Chile. The region comprises the southern section of the Andes Mountains with lakes, fjords, temperate rainforests, and gl ...
. Two Chon languages are well attested:
Selk'nam
The Selk'nam, also known as the Onawo or Ona people, are an indigenous people in the Patagonian region of southern Argentina and Chile, including the Tierra del Fuego islands. They were one of the last native groups in South America to be enco ...
(or Ona), spoken by the people of the same name who occupied territory in the northeast of Tierra del Fuego; and
Tehuelche spoken by the people of the same name who occupied territory north of Tierra del Fuego. The name 'Chon', or ''Tshon'', is a blend of 'Tehuelche' and 'Ona'.
Previous studies
The
Selk'nam people
The Selk'nam, also known as the Onawo or Ona people, are an indigenous people in the Patagonian region of southern Argentina and Chile, including the Tierra del Fuego islands. They were one of the last native groups in South America to be enco ...
were widely studied by anthropologists such as
Martin Gusinde
Martín Gusinde (29 October 1886, in Breslau – 10 October 1969, in Mödling, Austria) was an Austrian priest and ethnologist famous for his work in anthropology, particularly on the native groups of Tierra del Fuego. He was one of the most nota ...
and
Anne Chapman
Anne MacKaye Chapman (January 27, 1922 – June 12, 2010) was a Franco-American ethnologist who focused on the people of Mesoamerica writing several books, co-producing movies, and capturing sound recordings of rare languages from the Northern Tr ...
throughout the 20th century. However, their language went extinct in the 1970s.
History and demographics
The northern Tehuelche were conquered and later assimilated by the
Mapuche
The Mapuche ( (Mapuche & Spanish: )) are a group of indigenous inhabitants of south-central Chile and southwestern Argentina, including parts of Patagonia. The collective term refers to a wide-ranging ethnicity composed of various groups who sha ...
during the
Araucanization of Patagonia
The Araucanization of Patagonia ( es, Araucanización de la Patagonia) was the process of the expansion of Mapuche culture, influence, and its Mapudungun language from Araucanía across the Andes into the plains of Patagonia. Historians disagree ...
. Some 1.7 million Mapuche continue to live in
Chile
Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...
and southwest Argentina. Further south they traded peacefully with
y Wladfa
Y Wladfa (, "The Colony"), also occasionally Y Wladychfa Gymreig (, "The Welsh Settlement"), refers to the establishment of settlements by Welsh immigrants in Patagonia, beginning in 1865, mainly along the coast of the lower Chubut Valley. In ...
, the colony of
Welsh settlers. Some Tehuelche learnt
Welsh
Welsh may refer to:
Related to Wales
* Welsh, referring or related to Wales
* Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales
* Welsh people
People
* Welsh (surname)
* Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peop ...
and left their children with the settlers for their education. A solid photographic record was made of this people. However, they were later nearly exterminated in the late 19th-century government-sponsored
genocide
Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the Latin ...
s of Patagonia. Of some 5000 speakers in 1900, there were about 20 speakers left.
Tehuelche language
Tehuelche (''Aoniken, Inaquen, Gunua-Kena, Gununa-Kena'') is one of the Chonan languages of Patagonia. Its speakers were nomadic hunters who occupied territory in present-day Chile, north of Tierra del Fuego and south of the Mapuche people. It is ...
is now extinct as of 2019.
Classification
The
Haush
The Haush or Manek'enk were an indigenous people who lived on the Mitre Peninsula of the Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego. They were related culturally and linguistically to the Ona or Selk'nam people who also lived on the Isla Grande de Tierra ...
spoke a language similar to Ona. Some scholars also add to the family the
Teushen language
The Teushen language is an indigenous language of Argentina, which may be extinct. It was spoken by the Teushen people, a nomadic hunter-gatherer people of Patagonia, who lived between the Puelche people to their north and the Tehuelche people ...
—once spoken by the
Teushen
The Teushen or Tehues were an indigenous hunter-gatherer people of Patagonia in Argentina. They were considered "foot nomads", whose culture relied on hunting and gathering.Adelaar and Muysken 550 Their territory was between the Tehuelche people ...
, located between the Tehuelche and Puelche —though it is poorly attested.
Viegas Barros (2005) attempts to demonstrate that
Puelche to the north is related to the Chon languages and would constitute one branch of an extended Chonan family. This proposal has been picked up by
Lyle Campbell
Lyle Richard Campbell (born October 22, 1942) is an American scholar and linguist known for his studies of Indigenous languages of the Americas, indigenous American languages, especially those of Central America, and on historical linguistics in ...
.
[Campbell, Lyle. (in preparation) "The classification of South American languages. In Campbell & Grondona (eds.), ''South America''. Mouton de Gruyte]
/ref> Based on the scanty evidence that is available, the Het peoples
The Het were the people of the northern Patagonian pampas west of the Paraná River: The Chechehet, the Diuihet or Didiuhet, and the Taluhet. The easternmost Didiuhet, near modern Buenos Aires and influenced by the Guarani, were called the Que ...
(or at least the Didiuhet) might be speakers of languages within the proposed Puelche branch.
If this is correct, the Chon family would be as follows:
Vocabulary
Loukotka (1968) lists the following basic vocabulary items for the ''Patagon'' (Chonan) languages.
:
References
External links
*Alain Fabre, 2005, ''Diccionario etnolingüístico y guía bibliográfica de los pueblos indígenas sudamericanos: CHON
{{South American languages
Chonan languages,
Language families
Languages of Argentina
Languages of Chile