![]() Distribution of Uto-Aztecan languages in present-day Western United States at the time of first European contact/invasion showing various Numic languages.īands of eastern Shoshoni split off from the main Shoshoni body in the very late 17th or very early 18th century and moved southeastward onto the Great Plains. David Shaul has proposed that the Southern Numic languages spread eastward long before the Central and Western Numic languages expanded into the Great Basin. Jones thinks this evidence to be of a circumstantial nature, but this is a distinctly minority opinion among specialists in Numic. A mitochondrial DNA study from 2001 supports this linguistic hypothesis. Fowler's reconstruction of Proto-Numic ethnobiology also points to the region of the southern Sierra Nevada as the homeland of Proto-Numic approximately two millennia ago. This view is supported by lexicostatistical studies. ![]() Some linguists have taken this pattern as an indication that Numic speaking peoples expanded quite recently from a small core, perhaps near the Owens Valley, into their current range. Northern Paiute (a dialect chain with main regional varieties being Southern Nevada, Northern Nevada, Oregon, and Bannock )Īpart from Comanche, each of these groups contains one language spoken in a small area in the southern Sierra Nevada and valleys to the east (Mono, Timbisha, and Kawaiisu), and one language spoken in a much larger area extending to the north and east (Northern Paiute, Shoshoni, and Colorado River).Mono (two main dialects: Eastern and Western ).Colorado River (a dialect chain with main regional varieties being Chemehuevi, Southern Paiute, and Ute ).Shoshoni (a dialect chain with main regional varieties being Western, Gosiute, Northern, and Eastern ).Timbisha (a dialect chain with main regional varieties being Western, Central, and Eastern ).These languages are classified in three groups: Western Numic languages are shown in green, Central Numic in blue, and Southern Numic in yellow Classification Map of historical distribution of Numic languages. In Kawaiisu it is /nɨwɨ/ and in Colorado River /nɨwɨ/, /nɨŋwɨ/ and /nuu/. ![]() For example, in the three Central Numic languages and the two Western Numic languages it is /nɨmɨ/. The word Numic comes from the cognate word in all Numic languages for “person”, which reconstructs to Proto-Numic as /*nɨmɨ/. It includes seven languages spoken by Native American peoples traditionally living in the Great Basin, Colorado River basin, Snake River basin, and southern Great Plains. Numic is the northernmost branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family. ![]()
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