The Algic languages (also Algonquian–Wiyot–Yurok or Algonquian–Ritwan) are an indigenous language family of North America. Most Algic languages belong to the Algonquian subfamily, dispersed over a broad area from the

Rocky Mountains The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in great-circle distance, straight-line distance from the northernmost part of Western Can ...

Atlantic Canada Atlantic Canada, also called the Atlantic provinces (), is the list of regions of Canada, region of Eastern Canada comprising four provinces: New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island. As of 2021, the landma ...

. The other Algic languages are the

Yurok The Yurok people are an Algic-speaking Indigenous people of California that has existed along the or "Health-kick-wer-roy" (now known as the Klamath River) and on the Pacific coast, from Trinidad south of the Klamath’s mouth almost to Cresc ...

and

Wiyot The Wiyot ( Wiyot: Wíyot, Chetco-Tolowa: Wee-'at xee-she or Wee-yan' Xee-she', Euchre Creek Tututni: Wii-yat-dv-ne – "Mad River People", Yurok: Weyet) are an indigenous people of California living near Humboldt Bay, California and a small ...

of northwestern

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

, which, despite their geographic proximity, are not closely related to each other. All these languages descend from

Proto-Algic Proto-Algic (sometimes abbreviated PAc) is the proto-language from which the Algic languages (Wiyot language, Yurok language, and Proto-Algonquian) are descended. It is estimated to have been spoken about 7,000 years ago somewhere in the America ...

, a second-order

proto-language In the tree model of historical linguistics, a proto-language is a postulated ancestral language from which a number of attested languages are believed to have descended by evolution, forming a language family. Proto-languages are usually unatte ...

estimated to have been spoken about 5,000 years ago and reconstructed using the reconstructed

Proto-Algonquian language Proto-Algonquian (commonly abbreviated PA) is the proto-language from which the various Algonquian languages are descended. It is generally estimated to have been spoken around 2,500 to 3,000 years ago, but there is less agreement on where it was ...

and the

and

languages. Cree_type_proof

History

The term ''Algic'' was first coined by

Henry Schoolcraft Henry Rowe Schoolcraft (March 28, 1793 – December 10, 1864) was an American geographer, geologist, and ethnologist, noted for his early studies of Native American cultures, as well as for his 1832 expedition to the source of the Mississippi ...

in his ''Algic Researches'', published in 1839. Schoolcraft defined the term as "derived from the words Allegheny and

Atlantic The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the Age of Discovery, it was known for se ...

, in reference to the indigenous people anciently located in this geographical area." Schoolcraft's terminology was not retained. The peoples he called "Algic" were later included among the speakers of Algonquian languages. This language group is also referred to as "Algonquian-Ritwan" and "Wiyot-Yurok-Algonquian." When

Edward Sapir Edward Sapir (; January 26, 1884 – February 4, 1939) was an American anthropologist-linguistics, linguist, who is widely considered to be one of the most important figures in the development of the discipline of linguistics in the United States ...

proposed that the well-established Algonquian family was genetically related to the Wiyot and Yurok languages of northern

, he applied the term ''Algic'' to this larger family. The Algic

urheimat In historical linguistics, the homeland or ( , from German 'original' and 'home') of a proto-language is the region in which it was spoken before splitting into different daughter languages. A proto-language is the reconstructed or historicall ...

is thought to have been located in the

Northwestern United States The Northwestern United States, also known as the American Northwest or simply the Northwest, is an informal geographic region of the United States. The region consistently includes the states of Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming ...

somewhere between the suspected

homeland A homeland is a place where a national or ethnic identity has formed. The definition can also mean simply one's country of birth. When used as a proper noun, the Homeland, as well as its equivalents in other languages, often has ethnic natio ...

of the Algonquian branch (to the west of

Lake Superior Lake Superior is the largest freshwater lake in the world by surface areaThe Caspian Sea is the largest lake, but is saline, not freshwater. Lake Michigan–Huron has a larger combined surface area than Superior, but is normally considered tw ...

according to

Ives Goddard Robert Hale Ives Goddard III (born 1941) is a linguist and a curator emeritus in the Department of Anthropology of the National Museum of Natural History at the Smithsonian Institution. He is widely considered the leading expert on the Algonqui ...

) and the earliest known location of the Wiyot and Yurok (along the middle

Columbia River The Columbia River (Upper Chinook language, Upper Chinook: ' or '; Sahaptin language, Sahaptin: ''Nch’i-Wàna'' or ''Nchi wana''; Sinixt dialect'' '') is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The river headwater ...

according to Whistler).

Classification of Algic

The genetic relation of Wiyot and Yurok to Algonquian was first proposed by

(1913, 1915, 1923), and argued against by Algonquianist Truman Michelson (1914, 1914, 1935). According to Lyle Campbell (1997), the relationship "has subsequently been demonstrated to the satisfaction of all." This controversy in the early classification of North American languages was called the "Ritwan controversy" because Wiyot and Yurok were assigned to a genetic grouping called "Ritwan." Most specialists now reject the validity of the Ritwan genetic node. Berman (1982) suggested that Wiyot and Yurok share sound changes not shared by the rest of Algic (which would be explainable by either areal diffusion or genetic relatedness); Proulx (2004) argued against Berman's conclusion of common sound changes. More recently, Sergei Nikolaev has argued in two papers for a systematic relationship between the Nivkh language of

Sakhalin Sakhalin ( rus, Сахали́н, p=səxɐˈlʲin) is an island in Northeast Asia. Its north coast lies off the southeastern coast of Khabarovsk Krai in Russia, while its southern tip lies north of the Japanese island of Hokkaido. An islan ...

and the

Amur river The Amur River () or Heilong River ( zh, s=黑龙江) is a perennial river in Northeast Asia, forming the natural border between the Russian Far East and Northeast China (historically the Outer and Inner Manchuria). The Amur ''proper'' is ...

basin and the Algic languages, and a secondary relationship between these two together and the Wakashan languages.

Internal Classification

The following tree follows the paradigm established by Goddard (1994) wherein Blackfoot was the first language to diverge from

, followed by Arapaho and Cree, then the Eastern Great Lakes or "Core Central" languages, and finally the

Eastern Algonquian languages The Eastern Algonquian languages constitute a subgroup of the Algonquian languages. Prior to European contact, Eastern Algonquian consisted of at least 17 languages, whose speakers collectively occupied the Atlantic coast of North America and adj ...

; this is reflected by "newer" languages being lower on the tree. Algic

*Algic ** '' Wiyot'' (†) ** '' Yurok'' ** Algonquian *** Blackfoot/Siksiká *** Arapahoic ****

Arapaho The Arapaho ( ; , ) are a Native American people historically living on the plains of Colorado and Wyoming. They were close allies of the Cheyenne tribe and loosely aligned with the Lakota and Dakota. By the 1850s, Arapaho bands formed t ...

**** Gros Ventre/Atsina (†) **** Nawathinehena (†) *** Cree-Montagnais-Naskapi **** Atikamekw* **** Cree (dialect continuum) **** Montagnais/Innu **** Naskapi *** Cheyenne *** Menominee *** Eastern Great Lakes **** Shawnee **** Fox ***** Kickapoo ***** Sauk **** Ojibwe-Potawatomi ***** Potawatomi ***** Ojibwe (dialect continuum) **** Miami (†) *** Eastern **** Mi'kmaq **** Abenaki ***** Eastern Abenaki ***** Western Abenaki **** Massachusett/Wampanoag **** Narragansett (†) **** Maliseet-Passamaquoddy **** Mohegan-Pequot **** Powhatan (†) **** Nanticoke (†) **** Delawaran ***** Munsee ***** Unami (†) ***** Mahican

Proto-language

References

Bibliography

Journals and books

* * * * * * * *Michelson, Truman. 1915. Rejoinder. ''American Anthropologist'', n.s. 17:194–198. * * (hbk); . * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * {{North American languages Language families Indigenous languages of the North American Subarctic Indigenous languages of California Indigenous languages of the North American Plains Indigenous languages of the North American eastern woodlands Indigenous languages of the North American Southeast Algonquian–Wakashan languages Endangered Algic languages