Southern Quechua is the most widely spoken of the major regional groupings of dialects within the
Quechua language familyThe neologism 'Quechuan' is synonymous with Quechua, the name of the most widely spoken Native American language family of the indigenous peoples of the Americas, with a total of probably some 6 to 8 million speakers...
, with about 5 million speakers. The term 'Southern Quechua' refers to the forms of
QuechuaQuechua is a Native American language family spoken primarily in the Andes of South America, derived from an original common ancestor language, Proto-Quechua. It is the most widely spoken language family of the indigenous peoples of the Americas, with a total of probably some 6 to 8 million speakers...
spoken in regions of the
AndesThe Andes are the world's longest exposed mountain range. They lie as a continuous chain of highland along the western coast of South America...
south of a line roughly east-west between the cities of
HuancayoHuancayo is the capital of the Junín Region, in the central highlands of Peru. It is located in Huancayo Province, of which it is also capital. Situated near the Mantaro Valley at an altitude of 3,271 meters, it has a population of 323,054...
and
HuancavelicaHuancavelica is a city in Peru. It is the capital of the Huancavelica region and has a population of approximately 40,000. Indigenous peoples represent a major percentage of the population...
in central
PeruPeru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean.Peruvian territory was home to the Norte Chico...
. It includes the Quechua varieties spoken in the regions of
AyacuchoAyacucho is the capital city of Huamanga Province, Ayacucho Region, Peru.Ayacucho is famous for its 33 churches which represent one for every year of Jesus's life.. Ayacucho entertains large religious celebrations especially during Holy Week...
, Cuzco and
PunoPuno is a city in southeastern Peru, located on the shore of Lake Titicaca. It's also the capital city of the Puno Region and the Puno Province. The city was established in 1668 by viceroy Pedro Antonio Fernández de Castro as capital of the province of Paucarcolla with the name San Juan Bautista de...
in Peru, in much of
BoliviaBolivia, officially Plurinational State of Bolivia , is a landlocked country in central South America. It is bordered by Brazil to the north and east, Paraguay and Argentina to the south, and Chile and Peru to the west....
and parts of north-west
ArgentinaArgentina, officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America, constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires. It is the eighth largest country in the world by land area and the largest among Spanish-speaking nations, though Mexico,...
.
In the traditional classification of the
Quechua language familyThe neologism 'Quechuan' is synonymous with Quechua, the name of the most widely spoken Native American language family of the indigenous peoples of the Americas, with a total of probably some 6 to 8 million speakers...
by
Alfredo ToreroAlfredo Augusto Torero Fernández de Córdova was a Peruvian anthropologist and linguist....
, Southern Quechua is equivalent to Torero's 'Quechua IIc' (or just 'QIIc').
Southern Quechua is the most widely spoken of the major regional groupings of dialects within the
Quechua language familyThe neologism 'Quechuan' is synonymous with Quechua, the name of the most widely spoken Native American language family of the indigenous peoples of the Americas, with a total of probably some 6 to 8 million speakers...
, with about 5 million speakers. The term 'Southern Quechua' refers to the forms of
QuechuaQuechua is a Native American language family spoken primarily in the Andes of South America, derived from an original common ancestor language, Proto-Quechua. It is the most widely spoken language family of the indigenous peoples of the Americas, with a total of probably some 6 to 8 million speakers...
spoken in regions of the
AndesThe Andes are the world's longest exposed mountain range. They lie as a continuous chain of highland along the western coast of South America...
south of a line roughly east-west between the cities of
HuancayoHuancayo is the capital of the Junín Region, in the central highlands of Peru. It is located in Huancayo Province, of which it is also capital. Situated near the Mantaro Valley at an altitude of 3,271 meters, it has a population of 323,054...
and
HuancavelicaHuancavelica is a city in Peru. It is the capital of the Huancavelica region and has a population of approximately 40,000. Indigenous peoples represent a major percentage of the population...
in central
PeruPeru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean.Peruvian territory was home to the Norte Chico...
. It includes the Quechua varieties spoken in the regions of
AyacuchoAyacucho is the capital city of Huamanga Province, Ayacucho Region, Peru.Ayacucho is famous for its 33 churches which represent one for every year of Jesus's life.. Ayacucho entertains large religious celebrations especially during Holy Week...
, Cuzco and
PunoPuno is a city in southeastern Peru, located on the shore of Lake Titicaca. It's also the capital city of the Puno Region and the Puno Province. The city was established in 1668 by viceroy Pedro Antonio Fernández de Castro as capital of the province of Paucarcolla with the name San Juan Bautista de...
in Peru, in much of
BoliviaBolivia, officially Plurinational State of Bolivia , is a landlocked country in central South America. It is bordered by Brazil to the north and east, Paraguay and Argentina to the south, and Chile and Peru to the west....
and parts of north-west
ArgentinaArgentina, officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America, constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires. It is the eighth largest country in the world by land area and the largest among Spanish-speaking nations, though Mexico,...
.
In the traditional classification of the
Quechua language familyThe neologism 'Quechuan' is synonymous with Quechua, the name of the most widely spoken Native American language family of the indigenous peoples of the Americas, with a total of probably some 6 to 8 million speakers...
by
Alfredo ToreroAlfredo Augusto Torero Fernández de Córdova was a Peruvian anthropologist and linguist....
, Southern Quechua is equivalent to Torero's 'Quechua IIc' (or just 'QIIc'). It thus stands in contrast to its many sister varieties within the wider
Quechua familyThe neologism 'Quechuan' is synonymous with Quechua, the name of the most widely spoken Native American language family of the indigenous peoples of the Americas, with a total of probably some 6 to 8 million speakers...
that are spoken in areas north of the Huancayo-Huancavelica line: Central Quechua (Torero's QI) spoken from Huancayo northwards to Ancash; North Peruvian Quechua around
CajamarcaCajamarca may refer to:Colombia*Cajamarca, Tolima a town and municipality in Tolima DepartmentPeru* Cajamarca, city in Peru.* Cajamarca District, district in the Cajamarca province.* Cajamarca Province, province in the Cajamarca region....
and Inkawasi (Torero's IIa, but whose classification is problematic); and Ecuador Quechua (locally known as 'Quichua', part of Torero's Quechua IIb).
The Peruvian linguist Rodolfo Cerrón-Palomino has devised a standard
orthographyThe orthography of a language specifies the correct way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example for Kurdish, there can be more than one orthography. Orthography is derived from Greek ὀρθός orthós and γράφειν...
intended to be viable for all the different regional forms of Quechua that fall under the umbrella term Southern Quechua. This orthography is a compromise of conservative features in the pronunciations of the various regions that speak forms of Southern Quechua. It has been accepted by many institutions in Peru and Bolivia, and is also used on Wikipedia Quechua pages, and by Microsoft in its translations of software into Quechua.
Some examples of regional spellings verses the standard orthography:
| Ayacucho |
Cuzco |
Southern Quechua |
Translation |
| upyay |
uhay |
upyay |
"to drink" |
| utqa |
usqha |
utqha |
"fast" |
| llamkay |
llank'ay |
llamk'ay |
"to work" |
| ñuqanchik |
nuqanchis |
ñuqanchik |
"we (inclusive)" |
| -chka- |
-sha- |
-chka- |
(progressive suffix) |
| punchaw |
p'unchay |
p'unchaw |
"day" |
In Bolivia, the same standard is used, except for "j", which is used instead of "h" for the sound [h] (like in
SpanishSpanish or Castilian is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that originated in northern Spain and gradually spread in the Kingdom of Castile, evolving into the principal language of government and trade in the Iberian peninsula...
).
The following letters are used for the inherited Quechua vocabulary and for
loanwordA loanword is a word borrowed from one language and incorporated into another.-General:By contrast, a calque or loan translation is a related concept, whereby it is the meaning or idiom that is borrowed rather than the lexical item itself.The word loanword is itself a calque of the German...
s from
AymaraAymara is an Aymaran language spoken by the Aymara people of the Andes. It is one of only a handful of Native American languages with over a million speakers. Aymara, along with Quechua and Spanish, is an official language of Peru and Bolivia...
:
a, ch, chh, ch', h, i, k, kh, k', l, ll, m, n, ñ, p, ph, p', q, qh, q', r, s, t, th, t', u, w, y.
Instead of "sh" (appearing in the northern and central Quechua varieties), "s" ist used.
Instead of "ĉ" (appearing in the Quechua varieties of Junín, Cajamarca, and Lambayeque), "ch" is used.
The following letters are used in loanwords from Spanish and other languages (not from Aymara):
b, d, e, f, g, o.
The letters e and o are not used for native Quechua words, because the corresponding sounds are simply
allophoneIn phonetics, an allophone is one of several similar speech sounds that belong to the same phoneme. A phoneme is an abstract unit of speech sound that can distinguish words: That is, changing a phoneme in a word can produce another word...
s of i and u that appear predictably next to q, qh, and q'. This rule applies to the official Quechua orthography for all varieties in general. Thus the spellings
and are pronounced [qo] and [qe].
These letters appear only in proper names or words adopted directly from Spanish:
c, v, x, z;
j (in Peru; in Bolivia, it is used instead of h).
External links