Cover not available
Article published In:
Diachronica
Vol. 34:3 (2017) ► pp.283–330

Possessive inflection in Proto-Zamucoan

A reconstruction

| Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa
| Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa
This paper presents a comparative analysis of possessive inflection in the three known Zamucoan languages: Ayoreo and Chamacoco – still spoken in the Chaco area between Bolivia and Paraguay – plus †Old Zamuco, described by the Jesuit father Ignace Chomé in the first half of the 18th century. The comparison allows us to build a plausible reconstruction of Proto-Zamucoan possessive inflection. Old Zamuco appears to be the most conservative language among the three, while Chamacoco appears to be the most innovative, although it exhibits relics of special importance for reconstructive purposes. Our analysis identifies in Zamucoan a series of features of general interest for the typology of person marking.
Keywords: person marking, diachronic reconstruction, possessive morphology, verb morphology, Zamucoan languages, kinship terms, syncretism in person/number marking, Chaco region
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
    • 1.1Zamucoan
    • 1.2On Zamucoan noun and verb affixation
  • 2.Old Zamuco possessive inflection
    • 2.1Person inflection
    • 2.2The generic form
  • 3.Ayoreo possessive inflection
    • 3.1Person inflection
    • 3.2Thematic nouns (Ø – thematic vowel – root)
    • 3.3Prefixal nouns (prefix – thematic vowel – root)
    • 3.4Radical nouns (Ø – Ø – root)
    • 3.5The generic form
  • 4.Chamacoco possessive inflection
    • 4.1Person inflection
    • 4.2Thematic nouns (Ø – thematic vowel – root)
    • 4.3Prefixal nouns (prefix – thematic vowel – root)
    • 4.4Radical nouns (Ø – Ø – ROOT)
    • 4.5The generic form
  • 5.Comparison
    • 5.1Thematic vowel
    • 5.2Root allomorphy
    • 5.3Prefixal nouns (prefix – thematic vowel – root)
    • 5.4On the attraction of the 3rd person by the reflexive
    • 5.5Radical nouns (Ø – Ø – ROOT)
    • 5.6Loss of possessive inflection
  • 6.Reconstructing the Proto-Zamucoan possessive inflection
    • 6.1First singular
    • 6.2Second singular
    • 6.3The third person
    • 6.4The reflexive person
    • 6.5First and second plural persons
    • 6.6The generic form
    • 6.7Verbal and possessive inflection in Proto-Zamucoan
  • 7.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
Published online: 19 October 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/dia.34.3.01ciu
References (45)
References
Adam, Lucien & Victor Henry. 1880. Arte y vocabulario de la lengua chiquita. Paris: Maisoneuve y Cia.Google Scholar
Adelaar, Willem F.H. & Hélène B. Brijnen. 2014. Natterer’s linguistic heritage. Archiv für Völkerkunde (Archiv Weltmuseum Wien) 63–64. 163–183.Google Scholar
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y. 2002. Language contact in Amazonia. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Forthcoming. Disentangling a versatile prefix: The nature and development of a polysemous marker in Arawak languages. International Journal of American Linguistics 84(1). DOI logo
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y. & R.W.M. Dixon. 2011. Language at large: Essays on syntax and semantics. Leiden: Brill. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Aronoff, Mark. 1994. Morphology by itself: Stems and inflectional classes. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Baerman, Matthew. 2014. Suppletive kin term paradigms in the languages of New Guinea. Linguistic Typology 18(3). 423–448. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Baerman, Matthew, Dunstan Brown & Greville G. Corbett. 2005. The syntax-morphology interface: A study of syncretism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Baldus, Herbert. 1932. Beiträge zur Sprachenkunde der Samuko-Gruppe. Anthropos 271. 361–416.Google Scholar
Barrios, Armindo, Domingo Bulfe & José Zanardini. 1995. Ecos de la selva. Ayoreode uruode. Asunción: CEADUC.Google Scholar
Bertinetto, Pier Marco. 2011. How the Zamuco languages dealt with verb affixes. Word Structure 4(2). 215–230. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2014 [2009]. Ayoreo. In Mily Crevels & Pieter Muysken (eds.), Lenguas de Bolivia, Tomo 3: Oriente , 369–413. La Paz: Plural Editores. English version [Ayoreo (Zamuco). A grammatical sketch, 2009] at: [URL]. (28 May, 2016.)
Bertinetto, Pier Marco & Luca Ciucci. 2012. Parataxis, hypotaxis and para-hypotaxis in the Zamucoan Languages. Linguistic Discovery 10(1). 89–111. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Boggiani, Guido. 1894. I Ciamacoco. Roma: Società Romana per l’Antropologia.Google Scholar
Campbell, Lyle. 2012. Typological characteristics of South American indigenous languages. In Lyle Campbell & Verónica Grondona (eds.), The indigenous languages of South America: A comprehensive guide, 259–330. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.Google Scholar
Campbell, Lyle & Verónica Grondona. 2012. Languages of the Chaco and Southern Cone. In Lyle Campbell & Verónica Grondona (eds.), The indigenous languages of South America: A comprehensive guide, 625–668. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chafe, Wallace. 1990. Use of defocusing pronominal prefixes in Caddo. Anthropological Linguistics 321. 57–68.Google Scholar
Chomé, Ignace. 1958 [ante 1745]. Arte de la lengua zamuca. Présentation de Suzanne Lussagnet. Journal de la Société des Américanistes de Paris 471. 121–178. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ciucci, Luca. 2010a. La flessione possessiva dell’ayoreo. Quaderni del Laboratorio di Linguistica, n.s., 9(2) Google Scholar
. 2010b. La flessione possessiva del chamacoco. Quaderni del Laboratorio di Linguistica, n.s., 9(2) Google Scholar
. 2013. Chamacoco lexicographical supplement. Quaderni del Laboratorio di Linguistica, n.s., 121.Google Scholar
. 2014. Tracce di contatto tra la famiglia zamuco (ayoreo, chamacoco) e altre lingue del Chaco: prime prospezioni. Quaderni del Laboratorio di Linguistica, n.s., 131.Google Scholar
. 2016 [2013]. Inflectional morphology in the Zamucoan languages. Asunción: CEADUC.Google Scholar
Ciucci, Luca & Pier Marco Bertinetto. 2015. A diachronic view of the Zamucoan verb inflection. Folia Linguistica Historica 36(1). 19–87.Google Scholar
. Forthcoming. Towards the reconstruction of Proto-Zamucoan nominal suffixation.
Clark, Charles Upson. 1937. Jesuit letters to Hervás on American languages and customs. Journal de la Société des Américanistes 291. 97–145. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Combès, Isabelle. 2009. Zamucos. Cochabamba: Instituto de Misionerología.Google Scholar
Comrie, Bernard, Lucía A. Golluscio, Hebe González & Alejandra Vidal. 2010. El Chaco como área lingüística . In Zarina Estrada Férnandez & Ramón Arzápalo Marín (eds.), Estudios de lenguas amerindias 2: contribuciones al estudio de las lenguas originarias de América, 85–130. Hermosillo, Sonora (Mexico): Editorial Unison.Google Scholar
Cristofaro, Sonia. 2013. The referential hierarchy: Reviewing the evidence in diachronic perspective. In Dik Bakker & Martin Haspelmath (eds.), Languages across boundaries: Studies in memory of Anna Siewierska, 69–94. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cysouw, Michael. 2003. The paradigmatic structure of person marking. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Epps, Patience. Forthcoming. Amazonian linguistic diversity and its sociocultural correlates. To appear in Mily Crevels, Jean – Marie Hombert & Pieter Muysken (eds.), Language dispersal, diversification, and contact: A global perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Evans, Nicholas. 2005. Australian languages reconsidered: A review of Dixon (2002). Oceanic Linguistics 44(1). 242–286. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fabre, Alain. 2007a. Diccionario etnolingüístico y guía bibliográfica de los pueblos indígenas sudamericanos. Edición electrónica, [URL]. (24 February, 2017.)
. 2007b. Morfosintaxis de los clasificadores posesivos en las lenguas del Gran Chaco (Argentina, Bolivia y Paraguay). UniverSOS 41. 67–85.Google Scholar
Falkinger, Sieglinde & Roberto Tomichá (eds.). 2012. Gramática y vocabulario de los Chiquitos (s. XVIII). Cochabamba: Instituto de Misionología – Editorial Itinerarios.Google Scholar
Higham, Alice, Maxine Morarie & Greta Paul. 2000. Ayoré-English dictionary. 31 vols. Sanford, FL: New Tribes Mission.Google Scholar
Kelm, Heinz. 1964. Das Zamuco – eine lebende Sprache. Anthropos 591. 457–516 & 770–842.Google Scholar
Mithun, Marianne. 1991. The development of bound pronominal paradigms. In Winfred P. Lehman & Helen-Jo Jakusz Hewitt (eds.), Language typology 1988: Typological models in reconstruction, 85–104. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 1993. Reconstructing the unidentified. In Henk Aertsen and Robert Jeffers (eds.), Historical Linguistics 1989: 9th International Conference on Historical Linguistics, 329–347. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Morarie, Maxine. 1980. Simplified Ayoreo grammar. Cochabamba: Publicaciones Nueva Vida (mimeo).Google Scholar
Seifart, Frank. 2011. Bora loans in Resígaro: Massive morphological and little lexical borrowing in a moribund Arawakan language. Cadernos de Etnolingüística. Série de Monografias 21.Google Scholar
Sušnik, Branislava. 1957. Estructura de la lengua chamacoco-ebitoso (con fraseario del dialecto Ebitoso). Boletín de la Sociedad Científica del Paraguay y del Museo Andrés Barbero, Etnolingüística 11.Google Scholar
. 1972. Familia Zamuko. Čhamakoko – Ayoweo. Asunción: Museo Etnográfico “Andrés Barbero”.Google Scholar
Ulrich, Matthew & Rosemary Ulrich. 2000. Diccionario Ɨshɨro (Chamacoco) – Español / Español – Ɨshɨro (Chamacoco). Asunción: Misión Nuevas Tribus Paraguay.Google Scholar
Wichmann, Søren, Eric W. Holman & Cecil H. Brown (eds.). 2016. The ASJP Database (version 17) [URL] (24 February, 2017.)
Cited by (11)

Cited by 11 other publications

Chousou-Polydouri, Natalia, David Inman, Thomas C. Huber & Balthasar Bickel
2023. Multi-variate coding for possession: methodology and preliminary results. Linguistics 61:6 ► pp. 1365 ff. DOI logo
Bertinetto, Pier Marco
2021. Zamucoan Person Marking as a Perturbed System*. Studia Linguistica 75:2 ► pp. 265 ff. DOI logo
Bertinetto, Pier Marco, Luca Ciucci & Margherita Farina
2019. Two types of morphologically expressed non-verbal predication. Studies in Language 43:1 ► pp. 120 ff. DOI logo
Ciucci, Luca
2019. A culture of secrecy. International Journal of Language and Culture 6:1 ► pp. 175 ff. DOI logo
Ciucci, Luca
2020. Matter borrowing, pattern borrowing and typological rarities in the Gran Chaco of South America. Morphology 30:4 ► pp. 283 ff. DOI logo
Ciucci, Luca
2021. From Fieldwork to Reconstruction: Historical Issues in Hotspots of Linguistic Diversity*. Studia Linguistica 75:2 ► pp. 165 ff. DOI logo
Ciucci, Luca
2021. How to restructure a grammatical category: the innovative person system of Chamacoco (Zamucoan, northern Paraguay). Folia Linguistica 55:s42-s1 ► pp. 111 ff. DOI logo
Ciucci, Luca
2021. How Historical Data Complement Fieldwork: New Diachronic Perspectives on Zamucoan Verb Inflection*. Studia Linguistica 75:2 ► pp. 289 ff. DOI logo
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y.
2018. Disentangling A Versatile Prefix: The Nature And Development Of A Polysemous Marker In Arawak Languages. International Journal of American Linguistics 84:1 ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y.
2021. Removing the Owner: Non‐Specified Possessor Marking in Arawak Languages*. Studia Linguistica 75:2 ► pp. 175 ff. DOI logo
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y.
2021. The Indefinite Person: A Journey across Arawak Languages. International Journal of American Linguistics 87:4 ► pp. 459 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 1 july 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.