Yurumanguí is an extinct language isolate formerly spoken in Colombia. It is known solely from a wordlist collected in the 1760s and was proposed in 1942 by French linguist Paul Rivet to be a member of the proposed Hokan language family, though this is no longer accepted by modern classifications.
History
Documentation It is known only through a short list of words and phrases recorded by Father Christoval Romero and given by him to Captain Sebastián Lanchas de Estrada, during an expedition in 1766, who included them in the report of his travels of 1768. Thereafter, the language and its speakers disappear from the historical record.
Classification Father Romero's word list was discovered in the archives and published, with analysis and commentary, by Rivet (1942), who argued that the language was a member of the Hokan language family. This claim was accepted by Joseph Greenberg (1960), but is currently considered poor and unconvincing; a critique of Greenberg is given by William Poser (1992). Jacinto Jijón y Caamaño (1945) sought to connect Yurumanguí with both Hokan and Chibchan, whereas Swadesh (1963) saw connections with Ofaye (Macro-Jê) and Chamicura (Maipurean). Willem Adelaar (2004) notes similarities with Esmeralda (Takame). However, it is generally considered to be a language isolate (e.g. by Terrence Kaufman (1990) and Adolfo Constenla Umaña (1991)).
Geographical distribution Yurumanguí was spoken along the upper Yurumanguí, Cajambre, and Nava Rivers of Colombia.
Phonology A few elements of Yurumanguí phonology may be ascertained; for example, the letters are completely absent, there is only a singular attestation of , four instances of , and five occurrences of ; many tokens of the latter are variants of . is typically found between vowels or after ; only two instances of word-initial are known, one of which ( ) is probably onomatopoeic. The letters typically follow their usages as in Spanish, though there are some instances of before , and it also alternates with (e.g. ~ ''), possibly hinting at an affricate phonetic value for these letters., though they may simply have been "difficult to distinguish" in the original document. A sequence of five vowels (or six if is counted as ) is attested in the word . Closed, or consonant-final, syllables are rare, and Matthias Urban (2019) describes that "their presence can only be guessed at" from a number of words.
Morphology Adelaar (2004) describes a number of affixes, such as , which "characterises the citation form of several verbs", and , found in body parts and kinship terms, though there are a number of words belonging to the latter semantic categories which do not exhibit the prefix.
Vocabulary Below are selected entries from the 1768 Yurumanguí vocabulary given in Ortiz (1946), with original Spanish glosses and translated English glosses.Ortiz, Sergio Elias (1946) Los Indios Yurumanguíes. Boletín de Historia y Antigüedades XXXII.731-748.
Spanish gloss (original) English gloss (translated) Yurumanguí comer eat lamá come tu you eat lamaé beber drink chuma bebe tu you drink chumaé la candela, o fuego candle; fire angua la leña firewood anga el río river ayo el agua water aia plátano banana cua el sol sun cicona la luna moon digia la casa house yuiua dormir sleep angasa bañarse bathe pun pun los frijoles beans aimaca mujer woman quitina hombre man queobai madre mother caigi padre father maa el tigre jaguar aguabai layaco; cananagua el conejo rabbit naupica el puerco montés wild pig naubaca el gavilán hawk yuoica el papagayo parrot taucano el maíz maize aocona los oídos ears auciá el peine comb aubaisa la ceniza ashes augafa las alas de ave wings of bird aicán el relámpago lightning angaisa yo I acá; asa está lejos far aiaba el camino path angaipoa machete machete baical el hacha axe totoque la puerta door bai el sombrero hat sipana la olla pot lictina el canasto basket pitina la yuca cassava nasotasi el corazón heart colopeiaisa; bibaspa el alma o respiración soul; breath sipia sinaisa el cielo sky siaa morir die saisa ya murió died saibai mariposa butterfly cauba coser sew blaisa matar kill aimasa los dientes teeth tina la cabeza head caicona los ojos eyes couna el pelo hair cailusa la frente forehead laiga la cara face caumaca la mano hand aisca las uñas fingernails yacuisa estar cansado be tired cafeisa hermanos siblings yasa la leche milk tuiusa el queso cheese vecatuta las estrellas stars nanaa la noche night maisa el día day baisa aguja needle ypena afeitar shave yebe el perro dog cuan el colmillo fang tinza la vena vein yaisina la sangre blood yaa el tábano fly (insect) quipua estar lloviendo raining siga tronar thunder (verb) bisca fruta silvestre wild fruit tamea periquito parakeet ilica la arena sand sibesa la saliva saliva zoima la tierra earth minni
Bibliography Loukotka, Čestmír (1968) Classification of South American Indian Languages. University of California, Los Angeles.
References