Kiowa-Tanoan languages
The Kiowa-Tanoan languages are a family of Native American languages spoken in New Mexico, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas.
Within the family, the Tañoan group is made up of the Tewa, Tigua, and Towa or Jémez languages. Tigua presents differences between its northern dialects (taos, picurís), its southern dialects (watermelon, isleta, isleta del sur, piro). These languages are mostly spoken in the region inhabited by the Pueblo Indians in New Mexico. On the other hand, the Kiowa group is currently represented by a single language, spoken in southwestern Oklahoma, and which previously occupied a larger territory divided between New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma. There are other extinct languages of the Pyro subgroup that are considered closer to the Tanoan group.
Classification
Family languages
There is no complete consensus on the ramification and diversification of the Kiowa-Tanoan family, although a widely accepted proposal is the following:
Kiowa-Tañoana |
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Relations with other languages
Several authors have postulated that there is some distant relationship between the Kiowa-Tañoan languages and the Uto-Aztecan languages (Azteco-Tañoan hypothesis) but the evidence is scant and far from conclusive (in the lexicon section it can be verified that some Kiowa-Tanoan forms bear some resemblance to the Uto-Aztec forms, but by themselves these coincidences do not allow the kinship to be certain).
Common features
Phonology
The table below reflects the reconstructed consonant inventory for Proto-Kiowa-Tanoan, the proto-language that would have given rise to today's Kiowa-Tanoan languages, as reconstructed by Hale (1967) based on the regular correspondences in initial position:
Labial Alveolar Velar Labio-velar Gloss Occlusive Sonora ♪ ♪ * (*g) ♪ sorda ♪ ♪ *c ♪ *kw * glotized ♪ ♪ *c ♪ ♪kw vacuum ♪ ♪ ♪ *kh *kwh Nasal ♪ ♪ Fridge ♪ ♪ Semivocal ♪
The signs /c, cʼ, cʰ/ are the AFA signs used for affricates (in IPA are denoted as /ʦ, ʦʼ, ʦʰ/). The evidence in favor of /*g/ derives from the prefixes; the phoneme /*g/ does not appear in strict initial position and is therefore indicated here in parentheses. Hale also reconstructs the nasality feature for nasal vowels. Vowel quality and other prosodic characteristics such as vowel quantity, tone, or accent have not yet been properly reconstructed. Despite this, Hale (1967) outlines some correspondence sets that include vowel quantity.
The following table illustrates the phonetic correspondences between the reconstructed initial consonants for Proto-Kiowa-Tano and the corresponding sounds in modern languages:
Initial consonants in protolengua and modern languages PROTO-
KIOWA-TAÑOTaos Tewa Jémez Kiowa PROTO-
KIOWA-TAÑOTaos Tewa Jémez Kiowa Consonant context
phonetic♪ h h ∅ h ♪ dz j j, d z d * . . . ∅ ♪ oral vowel l d d ♪ p p p p nasal vowel n n n ♪ p. p. p. p. ♪ n ♪ ph f ph ♪ w w w j ♪ m m m b ♪ kw ♪ m (*)) k k ♪ t t t t ♪ k k *ts t implied ts s *kw kw kw ♪ th θ MIN th ♪kw kw kw (k) *tsh s s ♪ (k) (k) (k) ♪ c s *kh x x h kh ♪ t. t. t. t. *kwh xw xw ♪ ". ts
As can be seen in the table above, there have been a good number of sound confusions or loss of phonemic contrasts in different languages
Morphology
Personal pronouns in the Kiowa-Tanoan languages distinguish between three grammatical persons. Although Piro and Tewa systematically distinguish singular from plural, in Tiwa and Kiowa the plural forms are identical to the singular:
PERSON Kiowa Tigua Tewa Piro proto-KT proto-UA 1. a No. ną ną na-oé ♪ ♪ i-2nd a Åą Pencil e-kié * im-♪ im-3a ąwaną wa
Where the spelling <ą, ų> represents the nasal vowels /an, un/.
Another interesting grammatical aspect is the opposition between direct/reverse diathesis.
Lexical comparison
Numerals
The numerals for different Kiowa-Tanoan languages are:
GLOSA Kiowa-Towa Tewa-Tiwa PROTO-
KIOWA-TAÑOJémez Kiowa Tewa Tiwa
septen.Tiwa
Merid.'1' pˀɨ̜ pá Agenda wî WHICH ^wimaa *pamaa '2' wî(š) jítile Hey. Worse Đwisi ♪ Wihihi '3' (ta) phãò poeye Pôyùo ^pac a *payuwo '4' wí devoted(l) jíkjá yôenu woan wian ♪ Wian- '5' pːō Русский pːaː ponyùo ^pandandaa ♪ '6' MILITARY ḿ,ś Yes. mõ devoted ^ma i ♪ Masi '7' ś. pã́nsē é ù shú * '8' h́. já́zco khâtileve xwílì hwiři *kwhidi '9' h h̄ ḱ. whäː xwizco haa ♪kwhiã- '10' "; k kkhĩ̀ tä̜ trumped up Đtið *tæn-
The term for '3' from Jémez is a borrowing from Navajo. The northern tiwa corresponds to the Taos variety.
Cognates
Here are some cognates that support the correspondences examined in the phonology section:
Taos Tewa Jémez Kiowa GLOSA ♪ m› mã ḿ; bɔ 'to take.' ♪ mæ¢n- mãn mãté m- turning 'Mano' *d (+V) līlū- di dél devoted - 'gallo' *d (+)) ¢Ü ¢Ü ¢Ü ¢Ü ¢Ü ¢Ü ¢Ü ¢Ü ¢Ü ¢Ü ¢Ü nãn ## d- turning-m 'arena' (in Taos), 'soil' (in Tewa, Kiowa),
'slow' (in jamez)♪ ## ## ### nː turning 1.a of the signatory *ts ро ро ро ри tsí I know. ta 'Ojo' ♪ ♪ tṹ t́. tõ- 'say' *tsh sŭ s/25070/ ś. thõ-m 'beber' ♪ ^th ̄ θá gil tha- 'romper' (in Taos, Tewa, Jémez),
'to give a lot' (in Kiowa)*ts’ ^t・ - - t'--l 'higado' *t’ ". ton t ' a t ' ː 'antilope' ♪ dz j̄ - z devoted dɔ "chanting" (in Taos, Jémez),
'cantar' (in Kiowa)
Similarities with Uto-Aztec
Some examples of lexical forms compared in Kiowa, in Tewa and in Proto-Uto-Aztecan.
GLOSA Kiowa Tewa Tigua proto-UA 'One' pá Agenda wî WHICH ♪ 'two' and Hey. Worse *wō- 'three' phãò poeye Pôyùo *pahai 'four.' Yíkyá yôenu woan ♪nā-woho- 'five' Русский pːaː ponyùo ♪ 'Man' ch i sen soan *taka 'woman' Ma kwe ♪uka, ♪ 'Mano' m- turning mãn mæ¢n- ♪ 'sol' pay than ♪ 'luna' p pahy póóe ♪ 'agua' T ton pooe Pâ *pād 'me' nː turning ## ## *n) coin()) 'you' a Русский Åã *)m())