Quingnam language

Documentation

Ivan Meléndez (1681) mentioned that a grammar, dictionary and other documents describing a language spoken in the Chicama Valley were written by a Dominican friar named Pedro de Aparicio, who arrived there in the 16th century. The language that was described by Aparicio could be either Mochica or Quingnam, but these materials have not been found. Works by the Mercedarians Benito de Jarandilla and Bartolomé de Vargas have also been lost, including a grammar by Vargas titled Arte de la lengua que llaman pescadora. The name of the grammar strongly suggests that it is a description of Quingnam.^: 149

A letter dated to the early 17th-century was found during excavations in the ruins of a church at Magdalena de Cao Viejo in the El Brujo Archaeological Complex. It includes a list of decimal numerals on the back which are probably Quingnam (Pescadora).^: 154

Language contact

It is possible that Quingnam, along with Mochica, were in contact with the Cholón language, historically spoken along part of the Marañón River. Speakers of Quingnam may have traded goods, such as salt, with the Cholón people.^: 20–21

Quingnam shares a number of lexical items with other languages of the northern Peruvian coast and elsewhere. Urban (2019) lists four correspondences: possibly Quingnam choloque (?) 'tree which has a fruit encased in a green-yellow shell' : Culli choloc 'soapberry tree', possibly Quingnam maichill (?) 'kind of plant used in folk medicine' : Culli maichill~maichil 'Cascabela thevetia', possibly Quingnam cuchumic 'you are drunk' : Colán cũm 'drink' : Catacao conecuc 'drink' : Mochica cɥuma- 'drink' : Culli cumù 'drink' : Yurumanguí chuma 'drink', Quingnam chari '1' : Cuica kári '1'.^{: 206–207}

Extinction

Quingnam disappeared early in the colonial history of Peru. Toribio de Mogrovejo reported that Quechua was already spoken along portions of the central Peruvian coast in the early 16th century. Spanish had also begun to replace the native languages of the coast; for example, residents in Guaman in the Moche Valley already spoke Spanish in 1582 Quingnam is not mentioned in a 1651 document listing languages needed for the "evangelization of the North Coast", nor in Baltasar Jaime Martínez Compañón's late-18th-century Codex Martínez Compañón, indicating that by then, according to Urban (2019), "it was not considered relevant for the aims of the Spanish".^: 175 Miguel Feyjoo [Wikidata] reported that in 1763, Quingnam had already become extinct in favor of Spanish.^: 3–5 The exact reason for its extinction is unclear. Spanish religious evangelism contributed to Indigenous language loss throughout Quechua-speaking regions, and in the region of Trujillo, much cultural loss can be attributed to major epidemics which drastically reduced the population.^: 176 Nevertheless, it would appear as though some knowledge of vocabulary from the Indigenous language of Trujillo persisted past its demise; in 1793, some non-Quechua vocabulary was recorded in a general description of the area by D. José Ignacio de Lecuanda.^: 175

Lengua pescadora

Fishermen along the Chimú coast were reported to have spoken a language called Lengua Pescadora 'fisherman language' by Spanish missionaries, and disambiguated as Yunga Pescadora by linguists; this is presumably the same as Quingnam. A report by Calancha indicates that Pescadora and Quingnam were the same language, but Pescadora was more "guttural". However, the designation lengua pescadora has also referred to Mochica, entirely unrelated to Quingnam, as well, further confusing the designations.^: 27–35 Willem Adelaar does not consider the issue of the lengua pescadora to be resolved.^: 306 Eloranta (2020) believes that the term Pescadora was used as a cover term to designate all languages spoken in "maritime regions", such as "by the seashore, next to the sea, in the Pacific coast, at harbors", as opposed to the Yunga languages, spoken inland and far from the coastal areas.^: 35 Rojas-Berscia and Eloranta (2019) propose that the lengua pescadora was a "general label" referring to both Quingnam as well as Sechura.^: 18

Consonants

A number of sounds may be ascertained in Quingnam due to their relative incidence and corresponding phonetic values in Spanish. Among them are voiceless stops [p], [t], [k]; an affricate [tʃ]; nasals [m], [n], [ɲ]; two laterals, sometimes alternating with each other, [l] and [ʎ]; and an approximant [j]. Two sibilants at different points of articulation also appear, one alveolar, similar in quality to [s] and written as ⟨s⟩ or ⟨z⟩, and the other palatal as [ʃ], written ⟨x⟩. The sound written as ⟨r⟩ alternates with ⟨l⟩ and ⟨n⟩, making it more likely to be a tap [ɾ] rather than a trill [r]. The sound [w] may also be postulated based on orthographic alternations of sequences of ⟨ua⟩, ⟨guV⟩ (where V represents a wildcard for any vowel) and ⟨ao⟩, present in both proper names and lexical items. This sound may also be represented by ⟨v⟩ and sometimes ⟨b⟩, which alternate orthographically with the above sequences.^: 165 Quingnam toponyms are distinguished from Mochica toponyms by the absence of /f/ and the presence of /w/. There are very few toponyms in the Moche Valley which contain this letter. This may be due to a co-occurrence of Mochica and Quingnam in the area. In any case, the evidence for /f/ in Quingnam is very weak.^{: 168–169} The other letters representing fricatives are ⟨s⟩, ⟨sh⟩, ⟨x⟩, and ⟨j⟩. The first three alternate with each other before the vowel ⟨a⟩, which could indicate their phonetic value as some sort of postalveolar or palatal fricative, such as [ɕ] or [ç]. In addition, ⟨j⟩ alternates with ⟨x⟩ in both the initial and medial position, and may have still represented the fricative [ʒ] at the time in Spanish writing.^: 169

A number of alternations are noticeable in various proper names. For example, ⟨p⟩ can be found in a few instances alternating with [k], written as ⟨c⟩ or ⟨qu⟩, such as in the names Soloque~Solop and Occopmuña~Ocpocmuña. The latter is particularly notable as it implies that both [p] and [k] were present in the name, possibly even coarticulated as [k͡p], pronounced as a simultaneous [k] and [p]. This sound is extremely rare in the world, but most notably occurs in Muisca, a Chibchan language.^{: 167–168} An extremely frequent alternation of nasals is with zero, the absence of a sound, most commonly in the word-final position and in word-internal clusters. This may indicate a nasalization of the preceding vowel; the letters ⟨m⟩ and ⟨n⟩ are interchangeable in this position, which is indicative of a lack of a precise place of articulation. Further alternations include ⟨n⟩ and ⟨ñ⟩, particularly noteworthy because the two letters alternate in more than one token within the same form, such as in the name Canenam~Cañoñam.^{: 169–170}

Vowels

Five vowels may be posited based on the available data, being [a], [e], [i], [o], and [u]. There is no evidence to suggest that [e] and [o] are allophones, or phonetic variations, of their raised counterparts [i] and [u]. All vowels frequently alternate with zero in the penultimate syllable of trisyllabic forms, such as in Campcha(~)Campocha, with the alternating vowel's quality apparently being phonologically conditioned by the environment. For example, ⟨o⟩ is present in a non-front vowel environment, and ⟨i⟩ appears whenever it is also present in a form. This may be due to a schwa-type vowel which is realized differently based on the environment, or may be a case of vowel epenthesis due to Spanish influence, as suggested by Cerrón-Palomino. A very similar phenomenon also occurs in Mochica with its "sixth vowel", written as ⟨æ⟩ in the colonial grammars, so some of the examples above may actually belong to it rather than Quingnam.^{: 170–171}

Phonotactics

All consonants attested, except for a hypothetical [ŋ], occur in the word-initial position, although [ɾ] only occurs in two proper names, Rina and Rincha. The syllable structure of Quingnam is predominantly (C)V(C), where C represents a wildcard for any consonant and V for any vowel. Very few consonant clusters can be observed in proper names; for example, there are only eight such names attested in the Moche Valley, being Abcla, Olgpa, Ñingle~Ningle, Sevatr, Prexiran, Sept, Tingrahuaman, and the name of Xacchcac Guamanchumo, a ruler of Chimor.^{: 171–172} Plosives can be found word-finally in Quingnam, as in other languages of the region, though this is restricted in the Quechuan and Aymaran languages.

Stress

Stress in Quingnam was evidently word-final, as the vowel in names with three syllables frequently alternates with zero, indicating that the penultimate syllable did not take stress. In the rare cases when stress was marked, it "overwhelmingly falls on the ultima", according to Urban (2024). On the other hand, the final syllable in Mochica could not be stressed.

Numerals

Below are the numerals from the letter found at Magdalena de Cao.^: 155 Although the manuscript does not indicate which language the numerals belong to, Quingnam is assumed as it is the most likely candidate based on location and notable dissimilarity to Mochica:^{: 155 : 14}

Numeral	Form
1	chari
2	marian
3	apar
4	tau
5	himic (?)
6	sut (?)
7	canchen
8	mata
9	yucan
10	bencor
21	mari bencor chari tayac
30	apar bencor
100	chari pachac
200	mari pachac

Other words

Calancha gives the etymology of the name Pacatnamu as meaning 'father of all' or 'common father', due to his "benevolent treatment" of the peoples he conquered, and that the name Pacasmayo is a corruption of it, and gives the word for 'god' as vini in the language of the "maritimos Pescadores". Presumably the element -namo or -namu is some kind of title meaning 'father' or 'lord', due to its common occurrence in personal names, which would leave the element pacat with the meaning 'common, all'.^{: 150–153} Feijoo gives the word chimo as meaning 'powerful' in Quingnam, though the language had already gone extinct at the time of his writing.^: 3–5

Another possible word in Quingnam, patà, refers to a deity and a constellation composed of Alnitak and Mintaka in Orion's Belt, is not registered in any Mochica documentation and is phonologically unusual for Mochica. The term munaos is presumably Quingnam, or at least of a coastal language, due to the presence of a Don Francisco de Azabache Munao Chimo listed as the cacique of Moche in the 17th century. However, it may instead be related to Mochica munà/mena 'grandfather'. Other such terms include morpis 'punishing gods', yale 'strong variety of chicha offered to huacas' (the Mochica word for 'chicha' is cutzhio^: 290), this particular term being used "northward" of Chancay, and ñaca 'cut hair offered to huacas'.^{: 150–153} Mogrovejo, in his description of the Santa Valley, includes two words from Indigenous languages of the region: pez 'reed plantation', but also states that its "actual name" is saucha. It is unclear what Mogrovejo meant by "actual name"; perhaps these words come from the same language, but referred to different things, or they could be from different languages. The Mochica word for 'grass' is pei, and the Quechua word sacha, depending on dialect, means 'weeds' or bushes', which could be linked to saucha.^{: 152–153}

Lecuanda's 1793 description of flora and fauna in the region of Trujillo mentions a number of words that do not have a Spanish origin. He gives machira 'swordfish', chita 'an unidentifiable edible fish', sinamon 'cypress', taparte 'kind of shrub', maran 'a cactus', on which pilcái 'cochineals' lived. Of these, only maran bears any similarity to a language not spoken on the coast of Peru, having a possible relationship to Pacaraos Quechua mara 'agave'.^: 153

As late as 1811, an anonymous priest documented the customs of Virú residents in a report. A number of seemingly Indigenous-language vocabulary terms are found in the report, which cannot be etymologized through any known language of the northern coast of Peru, though equivalents in these languages could also be completely unknown. These terms include colao and anchaco, which refer to varieties of chicha, circil, a sort of textile used to "store maize in holes in the sand for preservation and to sieve it later", a kind of calabash called pulluyo, and a plant "probably" called casoco used in pulverized form for medicinal use, a tree called oberal or nier whose flowers were used to cure jaundice, pay pay 'flour', and an unspecified animal called pac pac "used to cure hernia by opening it alive and placing it on the sick part of the body". A sort of vulture with a red head, possibly the turkey vulture, has a name beginning with vll, the rest of the name being illegible.^{: 153–154}

Loanwords in other languages

In the earliest dictionary of any Quechuan language, two peculiar words with no other Quechuan-language equivalents are found: guaxme 'fisherman' and thome 'sea lion'. In particular, guaxme is found in two other colonial descriptions in the context of a population name, the first in a report made by the Augustinians mentioning that the inhabitants of Huamachuco had "expelled or exterminated" a group called guachemines from the area, and a second by Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala mentioning a "settlement" of the uachime yunga. The variety of Quechua found in the dictionary is typically considered to be the now-extinct Coastal Quechua, which would have been spoken near Quingnam and received lexical influence from it.^: 153

In 1975, Jorge Zevallos Quiñones compiled a list of words used in the local Spanish used around Trujillo which were derived from non-Spanish sources. These include words taken from colonial documents, but most of them were collected in Moche by Eduardo Calderón Palomino [es], where they were still in use as of that time. Most of the words are for cultural items or flora and fauna of the region. In particular, fishing-related vocabulary features prominently in the list. A number of words collected are not of Quingnam origin, though much of the vocabulary could also be. For example, vocabulary from Mochica may be identified by the distinctive presence of /f/, a sound which was probably not found in Quingnam, found in the words flique 'small crustacean which parasitizes the shell of sea snails' and faique 'fruit of algarrobo tree'. Likewise, Quingnam words are probably identifiable by the presence of the sound /w/, such as in cahuan, referring to a sort of fishing net used in rivers or lagoons. Likewise, John Gillin's (1945) ethnographic description of Moche also includes various non-Spanish words used by locals, some of which are exclusive to his document. These words could all be from an unrecorded third language once spoken in the region, but could also be of Quingnam provenance.^{: 155–160}