Pakawan languages

The Pakawan languages were a small language family spoken in what is today northern Mexico and southern Texas.

Classification

Five clear Pakawan languages are attested: Coahuilteco, Cotoname, Comecrudo, Garza and Mamulique. The first three were first proposed to be related by John Wesley Powell in 1891, in a grouping then called Coahuiltecan. Goddard (1979) groups the latter three in a Comecrudan family while considering the others language isolates. The current composition and the present name "Pakawan" are due to Manaster Ramer (1996).

The term Coahuiltecan languages today refers to a slightly expanded and less securely established grouping. Most Pakawan languages have at times been included also in the much larger and highly hypothetical Hokan "stock".

Common vocabulary

The following word comparisons are given by Manaster Ramer (1996):

The following sound changes and correspondences should be noted:

• Vocalization of word-final *l in Cotoname: 'sun', 'straw', red'
• Lenition of *p to /xw/ in Coahuilteco between vowels: #apel', #mapi
• Syncope of
• Apocope of final e (perhaps /ə/) in Comecrudo: 'man', 'low [water]', 'to kneel'.
• /k/, /kw/ in other languages correspond to /x/, /xw/ in Cotoname, when before /a/ ('man', 'low [water]', 'to eat', 'to suck', 'to write'), as well as in Coahuilteco, when before any low vowel (__examples).
• /kiV/ in Comecrudo corresponds to /kuV/ in Coahuilteco: 'blood', 'to go'
• s ~ l (perhaps indicating a lateral fricative /ɬ/) in Comecrudo corresponds to s in Coahuilteco: Comecrudo 'blood', 'devil', 'to fall'.
• Initial y in Comecrudo corresponds to /ts/ in Coahuilteco: I, chest, to hear

Lexical comparison

The Comecrudo, Cotoname, Karankawa, Coahuilteco, Solano, and Maratino data below are all from Swanton (1940). The Quinigua data is from Gursky (1964), which in turn is from del Hoyo (1960). Naolan is from Weitlaner (1948), and Tonkawa is from Hoijer (1949).

References

Further reading

• Manaster Ramer, Alexis. 1996. Sapir's Classifications: Coahuiltecan. Anthropological Linguistics 38/1, 1–38.
• Sapir, Edward. 1920. The Hokan and Coahuiltecan languages. International Journal of American Linguistics, 1 (4), 280–290.
• Swanton, John R. (1915). Linguistic position of the tribes of southern Texas and northeastern Mexico. American Anthropologist, 17, 17–40.