Waikuri language

Waicuri
Guaicurian
Guaycura
Region	Baja California
Ethnicity	Guaycura
Extinct	before 1800
Language family	unclassified (Guaicurian)
Language codes
ISO 639-3	None (mis)
Linguist List	qjg Guaicura (Waikura, Waykuri)
	qea Waicuri (Waicuru)
	qny Cora (Huchití)
Glottolog	guai1237  Guaicurian monq1236  Monqui
The location of Guaycura. Monqui and Pericú are essentially unattested; Cochimí, which is still spoken, is a Yuman language.

Waikuri (Guaycura, Waicura) is an extinct language of southern Baja California spoken by the Waikuri or Guaycura people. The Jesuit priest Baegert documented words, sentences and texts in the language between 1751 and 1768.

Waikuri may be, along with the Yukian and Chumashan languages and other languages of southern Baja such as Pericú, among the oldest languages established in California, before the arrival of speakers of Penutian, Uto-Aztecan, and perhaps even Hokan languages. All are spoken in areas with long-established populations of a distinct physical type.

Classification

Not to be confused with Guaicuruan languages.

Baegert's data is analyzed by Raoul Zamponi (2004). On existing evidence, Guaycura appears to be unrelated to the Yuman languages to its north. Some linguists have suggested that it belonged to the widely scattered Hokan phylum of California and Mexico (Gursky 1966; Swadesh 1967); however, the evidence for this seems inconclusive (Laylander 1997; Zamponi 2004; Mixco 2006). William C. Massey (1949) suggested a connection with Pericú, but the latter is too meagerly attested to support a meaningful comparison. Other languages of southern Baja are essentially undocumented, though people have speculated from non-linguistic sources that Monqui (Monquí-Didiú), spoken in a small region around Loreto, may have been a 'Guaicurian' language, as perhaps was Huchití (Uchití), though that may have actually been a variety of Guaycura itself (Golla 2007).

The internal classification of Gauicurian (Waikurian) languages is uncertain. Massey (1949), cited in Campbell (1997:169), gives this tentative classification based on similarity judgments given by colonial-era sources, rather than actual linguistic data.

Gauicurian (Waikurian)

• Guaicura branch
  • Gauocura (Waikuri)
  • Callejue
• Huchiti branch
  • Cora
  • Huchiti
  • Aripe
  • Periúe
• Pericú branch
  • Pericú
  • Isleño

However, Laylander (1997) and Zamponi (2004) conclude that Waikuri and Pericú are unrelated.

Phonology

Phonology of the Waikuri language:

Consonants

Consonants were voiceless stops p t č k and maybe glottal stop; voiced b d, nasal m n ny, flap r, trill rr, and approximants w y.

		Labial	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	voiceless	p	t		k	(ʔ)
	voiced	b	d
Affricate				t͡ʃ
Nasal		m	n	ɲ
Rhotic			ɾ, r
Approximant		w		j

Vowels

Waikuri had four vowels, /i, e, a, u/. Whether or not vowel length was phonemic is unknown.

Grammar

The little we know of Guaycura grammar was provided by Francisco Pimentel, who analyzed a few verbs and phrases. Guaicura was a polysyllabic language that involved a lot of compounding. For example, 'sky' is tekerakadatemba, from tekaraka (arched) and datemba (earth).

Beagert and Pimentel agree that the plural is formed with a suffix -ma. However, Pimentel also notes a prefix k- with the 'same' function. For example, kanai 'women', from anai 'woman'. According to Pimentel, the negation in -ra of an adjective resulted in its opposite, so from ataka 'good' is derived atakara 'bad'.

Pronouns were as follows (Golla 2011):

Pronouns

Subject		Object		Inalienable possessive		Alienable possessive
I	be			my	be- ~ m-	bekún
thou	e’i	thee	e’i ?	thy	e-	ekún
s/he	?			his/her	ti- ~ t-
we	katé	us	kepe	our	kepe-	kepekún
you	peté				?
they	?			their		kikún

Text

The Pater Noster is recorded in Guaycura, with a literal gloss by Pimentel (1874: cap. XXV).

Kepe-dare
Padre Nuestro
Kepe-dare	tekerekadatemba	daï,	ei-ri	akatuike	pu-me,	tschakarrake	pu-me	ti	tschie.
Padre nuestro	(que en el) cielo	estás,	te	reconocemos	todos (los que) existimos	(y te) alaban	todos (los que) somos	hombres	y.
Ecun	gracia	ri	atume	cate	tekerekedatemba	tschie.	Ei-ri	jebarrakeme	ti
(Y por) tu	gracia	?	tengamos	nosotros	(el) cielo	(y).	Te	obedeceremos	(los) hombres
pu	jaupe	datemba	pae	ei	jebarrakere	aëna	kea.	Kepekun	bue
todos	aquí	(en la) tierra	como	a ti	obedientes	arriba	siendo.	Nuestra	comida
kepe	ken	jatupe	untairi.	Kate	kuitscharrake	tei	tschie	kepecun	atakamara,
(a) nos	da	este	día.	(Y a) nos	perdona		(y)	nuestro	malo (pecado),
pae	kuitscharrakere	cate	tschie	cavape	atacamara	kepetujake.	Cate	tikakamba	tei
como	perdonamos	nosotros	también	(a) los	(que) mal	(nos) hacen.	(A) nos	ayuda
tschie	cuvume	ra	cate	uë	atukiara.	Kepe	kakunja	pe	atacara
y	(no) querremos	no	nosotros	algo	malo.	(Y a) nos	protege	de	mal
tschie.
y.

References

• Golla, Victor. 2007. Atlas of the World's Languages.
• Golla, Victor. 2011. California Indian Languages.
• Gursky, Karl-Heinz. 1966. "On the historical position of Waicuri". International Journal of American Linguistics 32:41-45.[1]
• Laylander, Don. 1997. "The linguistic prehistory of Baja California". In Contributions to the Linguistic Prehistory of Central and Baja California, edited by Gary S. Breschini and Trudy Haversat, pp. 1–94. Coyote Press, Salinas, California.
• Massey, William C. 1949. "Tribes and languages of Baja California". Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 5:272-307.
• Mixco, Mauricio J. 2006. "The indigenous languages". In The Prehistory of Baja California: Advances in the Archaeology of the Forgotten Peninsula, edited by Don Laylander and Jerry D. Moore, pp. 24–41. University Press of Florida, Gainesville.
• Swadesh, Morris. 1967. "Lexicostatistical Classification". in Linguistics, edited by Norman A. McQuown, pp. 79–115. Handbook of Middle American Indians, Vol. 5, Robert Wauchope, general editor. University of Texas Press, Austin.
• Zamponi, Raoul. 2004. "Fragments of Waikuri (Baja California)". Anthropological Linguistics 46:156-193.