Iroquoian languages

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Iroquoian languages

The Iroquoian languages are a First Nation and Native American

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans in the United States are the Indigenous peoples of the Americas from the regions of North America now encompassed by the continental United States United States, including parts of Alaska and the island state of Hawaii....
language family

Language family

A language family is a group of languages related Genetic from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family.As with Alpha taxonomy, the evidence of relationship is observable shared characteristics....
. The language family, amongst others, includes Mohawk

Mohawk language

Mohawk is a Native Americans in the United States language spoken by the Mohawk nation in the United States and Canada. It is part of the Iroquoian family....
, Huron-Wyandot

Wyandot language

Wyandot is the Iroquoian language traditionally spoken by the people known variously as Wyandot, Wendat, or Huron. It was last spoken primarily in Oklahoma and Quebec....
and Cherokee

Cherokee language

Cherokee is an Iroquoian languages spoken by the Cherokee people which uses a Cherokee syllabary writing system. It is the only Southern Iroquoian languages language that remains spoken....
.

Every language in this family has at least one nasal

Nasal consonant

A nasal consonant is produced with a lowered soft palate in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. The oral cavity still acts as a resonance chamber for the sound, but the air does not escape through the mouth as it is blocked by the tongue....
vowel phoneme

Phoneme

In human language, a phoneme is the smallest posited linguistically distinctive unit of sound. Phonemes carry no semantic content themselves. In theoretical terms, phonemes are not the physical segment s themselves, but cognitive abstractions or categorizations of them....
. Cherokee's is a nasal schwa

Schwa

In linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa can mean the following:*An stress and tone neutral vowel sound in any language, often but not necessarily a mid-central vowel....
, written in transliteration as 'v' (for example, "Hv?" sounds like "Huh?" nasalized, and means the same thing).

Iroquoian family comprises 11 languages:

Southern Iroquoian

1.

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Encyclopedia

The Iroquoian languages are a First Nation and Native American
Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans in the United States are the Indigenous peoples of the Americas from the regions of North America now encompassed by the continental United States United States, including parts of Alaska and the island state of Hawaii....
language family
Language family

A language family is a group of languages related Genetic from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family.As with Alpha taxonomy, the evidence of relationship is observable shared characteristics....
. The language family, amongst others, includes Mohawk
Mohawk language

Mohawk is a Native Americans in the United States language spoken by the Mohawk nation in the United States and Canada. It is part of the Iroquoian family....
, Huron-Wyandot
Wyandot language

Wyandot is the Iroquoian language traditionally spoken by the people known variously as Wyandot, Wendat, or Huron. It was last spoken primarily in Oklahoma and Quebec....
and Cherokee
Cherokee language

Cherokee is an Iroquoian languages spoken by the Cherokee people which uses a Cherokee syllabary writing system. It is the only Southern Iroquoian languages language that remains spoken....
.

Every language in this family has at least one nasal
Nasal consonant

A nasal consonant is produced with a lowered soft palate in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. The oral cavity still acts as a resonance chamber for the sound, but the air does not escape through the mouth as it is blocked by the tongue....
vowel phoneme
Phoneme

In human language, a phoneme is the smallest posited linguistically distinctive unit of sound. Phonemes carry no semantic content themselves. In theoretical terms, phonemes are not the physical segment s themselves, but cognitive abstractions or categorizations of them....
. Cherokee's is a nasal schwa
Schwa

In linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa can mean the following:*An stress and tone neutral vowel sound in any language, often but not necessarily a mid-central vowel....
, written in transliteration as 'v' (for example, "Hv?" sounds like "Huh?" nasalized, and means the same thing).

Family division
The Iroquoian family comprises 11 languages:

Southern Iroquoian
1. Cherokee
Cherokee language

Cherokee is an Iroquoian languages spoken by the Cherokee people which uses a Cherokee syllabary writing system. It is the only Southern Iroquoian languages language that remains spoken....

Northern Iroquoian
Tuscarora-Nottoway 2. Tuscarora
Tuscarora language

Tuscarora, sometimes called Skarure, is an Iroquoian languages of the Tuscarora , spoken in southern Ontario, Canada, and northwestern New York around Niagara Falls, in the United States....
3. Nottoway
Nottoway Tribe

The Nottoway, "adders," in their own language Cheroenhaka , "fork of a stream," are an Iroquoian languages tribe native to Virginia, now occupying areas around Southampton, Virginia....
Huronian 4. Neutral
Neutral Nation

The Neutrals, also known as the Attawandaron, were an Iroquoian nation of Aboriginal peoples in Canada who lived near the shores of Lake Ontario and Lake Erie....
5. Huron-Wyandot
Wyandot language

Wyandot is the Iroquoian language traditionally spoken by the people known variously as Wyandot, Wendat, or Huron. It was last spoken primarily in Oklahoma and Quebec....
Five Nations
Iroquois

The Iroquois Confederacy is a group of First Nations/Native Americans in the United States that originally consisted of five nations: the Mohawk nation, the Oneida tribe, the Onondaga , the Cayuga nation, and the Seneca nation....
and Susquehannock
Susquehannock

The Susquehannock people were native Americans in the United States of areas adjacent to the Susquehanna River and its tributaries from the southern part of what is now New York, through Pennsylvania, to the mouth of the Susquehanna in Maryland at the north end of the Chesapeake Bay....
6. Seneca
Seneca language

Seneca is the language of the Seneca Nation, one of the Six Nations of the Iroquois League. About 10,000 Seneca live in the United States and Canada, primarily on reservations in western New York state, with others living in Oklahoma and near Brantford, Ontario, Ontario....
7. Cayuga
Cayuga language

Cayuga is a Iroquoian languages of the Iroquois Proper languages subfamily, and is spoken on Six Nations of the Grand River First Nation, Ontario, by around 100 people....
8. Susquehannock
Susquehannock

The Susquehannock people were native Americans in the United States of areas adjacent to the Susquehanna River and its tributaries from the southern part of what is now New York, through Pennsylvania, to the mouth of the Susquehanna in Maryland at the north end of the Chesapeake Bay....
9. Onondaga
Onondaga language

Onondaga Nation Language is the language of the Onondaga First Nation, one of the original five constituent tribes of the League of the Iroquois ....
10. Mingo Mohawk-Oneida 11. Oneida
Oneida language

Oneida is an Iroquoian language spoken primarily by the Oneida tribe people in the U.S. states of New York and Wisconsin, and the Canadian province of Ontario....
12. Mohawk
Mohawk language

Mohawk is a Native Americans in the United States language spoken by the Mohawk nation in the United States and Canada. It is part of the Iroquoian family....

What has been called the Laurentian
Laurentian language

Laurentian, or St. Lawrence Iroquoian, was an Iroquoian languages spoken until the late 16th century along the shores of the St. Lawrence River in Quebec and Ontario, Canada....
language appears to be actually more than one dialect or language.

In 1649 the tribes constituting the Huron
Wyandot

The Wyandot and Huron are indigenous peoples of North America of North America known in their Wyandot language as the Wendat. Modern Wyandots and Hurons emerged in the 17th century from the remnants of two earlier groups, the Huron Confederacy and the Petun....
and Petun confederations were displaced by war parties from Five Nations villages (Mithun 1985). Many of the survivors went on to form the Wyandot
Wyandot

The Wyandot and Huron are indigenous peoples of North America of North America known in their Wyandot language as the Wendat. Modern Wyandots and Hurons emerged in the 17th century from the remnants of two earlier groups, the Huron Confederacy and the Petun....
tribe. Ethnographic and linguistic field work with the Wyandot (Barbeau 1960) yielded enough documentation to be able to make some characterizations of the Huron and Petun languages.

The languages of the tribes that constituted the Neutral
Neutral Nation

The Neutrals, also known as the Attawandaron, were an Iroquoian nation of Aboriginal peoples in Canada who lived near the shores of Lake Ontario and Lake Erie....
and the Erie
Erie (tribe)

The Erie were an Iroquoian language pre- and early-historic group of Native Americans in the United States, who lived from western New York to northern Ohio on the south shore of Lake Erie....
confederations were very poorly documented. These groups were called Atiwandaronk meaning 'they who understand the language' by the Huron, and thus are historically grouped with them.

The group known as the Meherrin
Meherrin

The Meherrin Nation is one of eight state-recognized Nations of Native Americans in the United States in North Carolina. They received formal state recognition in 1986....
were neighbors to the Tuscarora and the Nottoway (Binford 1967) and may have spoken an Iroquoian language, but there is not enough data to determine this with certainty.

The Huronian languages, Nottoway, and Susquehannock are all now extinct.

External relations

Attempts to link the Iroquoian and Caddoan languages
Caddoan languages

The Caddoan languages are a language family of Native American languages. They are spoken across the Great Plains of the central United States, from North Dakota to Oklahoma....
in a Macro-Siouan
Macro-Siouan languages

The Macro-Siouan languages are a proposed language family that would include the Siouan languages, Iroquoian languages, and Caddoan languages families....
family are suggestive but remain hypothetical. Similar attempts to find a connection with the Algonkian languages has been partially useful, but not enough evidence for linguists to propose a hypothetical Macro-Algonkian/Iroquoian language family.

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