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69-460: The name comes from the Maya words jeʼelel (rest) and chakʼan (savanna). It is at an altitude of 10 m above sea level. The city was founded close to a cenote by inhabitants of the former city of Xkalumkin, between the years 1500 and 1600. In this city some important historic events took place, such as the battle between Don Francisco de Paula Toro and the federalists, led by Don Felipe Montero, who

138-596: A proto-language is a postulated ancestral language from which a number of attested languages are believed to have descended by evolution, forming a language family . Proto-languages are usually unattested, or partially attested at best. They are reconstructed by way of the comparative method . In the family tree metaphor, a proto-language can be called a mother language. Occasionally, the German term Ursprache ( pronounced [ˈuːɐ̯ʃpʁaːxə] ; from ur- 'primordial', 'original' + Sprache 'language')

207-626: A Western Chʼolan variety diffused from the Usumacinta region from the mid-7th century on, and a Yucatecan variety found in the texts from the Yucatán Peninsula. The reason why only few linguistic varieties are found in the glyphic texts is probably that these served as prestige dialects throughout the Maya region; hieroglyphic texts would have been composed in the language of the elite. Stephen Houston, John Robertson and David Stuart have suggested that

276-473: A complete explanation and by Occam's razor , is given credibility. More recently, such a tree has been termed "perfect" and the characters labelled "compatible". No trees but the smallest branches are ever found to be perfect, in part because languages also evolve through horizontal transfer with their neighbours. Typically, credibility is given to the hypotheses of highest compatibility. The differences in compatibility must be explained by various applications of

345-473: A few millennia ago, allowing the descent to be traced in detail. The early daughter languages, and even the proto-language itself, may be attested in surviving texts. For example, Latin is the proto-language of the Romance language family, which includes such modern languages as French, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Catalan and Spanish. Likewise, Proto-Norse , the ancestor of the modern Scandinavian languages ,

414-578: A few villages on the outskirts of the Selva Lacandona , in Chiapas . Wastek (also spelled Huastec and Huaxtec) is spoken in the Mexican states of Veracruz and San Luis Potosí by around 110,000 people. It is the most divergent of modern Mayan languages. Chicomuceltec was a language related to Wastek and spoken in Chiapas that became extinct some time before 1982. Proto-Mayan (the common ancestor of

483-427: A language family. Moreover, a group of lects that are not considered separate languages, such as the members of a dialect cluster , may also be described as descending from a unitary proto-language. Typically, the proto-language is not known directly. It is by definition a linguistic reconstruction formulated by applying the comparative method to a group of languages featuring similar characteristics. The tree

552-411: A language to change, and "[as] a result, our reconstructions tend to have a strong bias toward the average language type known to the investigator." Such an investigator finds themselves blinkered by their own linguistic frame of reference . The advent of the wave model raised new issues in the domain of linguistic reconstruction, causing the reevaluation of old reconstruction systems and depriving

621-464: A strategy of self-representation for the Maya movements and its followers. The Academia de Lenguas Mayas de Guatemala (ALMG) finds twenty-one distinct Mayan languages." This pride in unity has led to an insistence on the distinctions of different Mayan languages, some of which are so closely related that they could easily be referred to as dialects of a single language. But, given that the term "dialect" has been used by some with racialist overtones in

690-410: Is a statement of similarity and a hypothesis that the similarity results from descent from a common language. The comparative method, a process of deduction , begins from a set of characteristics, or characters, found in the attested languages. If the entire set can be accounted for by descent from the proto-language, which must contain the proto-forms of them all, the tree, or phylogeny, is regarded as

759-408: Is also used to refer to ethnic or cultural traits. Most Maya identify first and foremost with a particular ethnic group, e.g. as "Yucatec" or "Kʼicheʼ"; but they also recognize a shared Maya kinship. Language has been fundamental in defining the boundaries of that kinship. Fabri writes: "The term Maya is problematic because Maya peoples do not constitute a homogeneous identity. Maya, rather, has become

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828-667: Is attested only fragmentarily. There are no objective criteria for the evaluation of different reconstruction systems yielding different proto-languages. Many researchers concerned with linguistic reconstruction agree that the traditional comparative method is an "intuitive undertaking." The bias of the researchers regarding the accumulated implicit knowledge can also lead to erroneous assumptions and excessive generalization. Kortlandt (1993) offers several examples in where such general assumptions concerning "the nature of language" hindered research in historical linguistics. Linguists make personal judgements on how they consider "natural" for

897-551: Is attested, albeit in fragmentary form, in the Elder Futhark . Although there are no very early Indo-Aryan inscriptions, the Indo-Aryan languages of modern India all go back to Vedic Sanskrit (or dialects very closely related to it), which has been preserved in texts accurately handed down by parallel oral and written traditions for many centuries. The first person to offer systematic reconstructions of an unattested proto-language

966-479: Is based on changes shared between groups of languages. For example, languages of the western group (such as Huastecan, Yucatecan and Chʼolan) all changed the Proto-Mayan phoneme * /r/ into [j] , some languages of the eastern branch retained [r] (Kʼichean), and others changed it into [tʃ] or, word-finally, [t] (Mamean). The shared innovations between Huastecan, Yucatecan and Chʼolan show that they separated from

1035-613: Is one of the best-documented and most studied in the Americas . Modern Mayan languages descend from the Proto-Mayan language , thought to have been spoken at least 5,000 years ago; it has been partially reconstructed using the comparative method . The proto-Mayan language diversified into at least six different branches: the Huastecan , Quichean , Yucatecan , Qanjobalan , Mamean and Chʼolan–Tzeltalan branches. Mayan languages form part of

1104-612: Is reflected as [x] in the eastern branches (Quichean–Mamean), [n] in Qʼanjobalan, Chʼolan and Yucatecan, [h] in Huastecan, and only conserved as [ŋ] in Chuj and Jakaltek. Vowel quality is typically classified as having monophthongal vowels. In traditionally diphthongized contexts, Mayan languages will realize the V-V sequence by inserting a hiatus-breaking glottal stop or glide insertion between

1173-642: Is rejected by most historical linguists as unsupported by available evidence. Writing in 1997, Lyle Campbell , an expert in Mayan languages and historical linguistics, argued that the most promising proposal is the " Macro-Mayan " hypothesis, which posits links between Mayan, the Mixe–Zoque languages and the Totonacan languages , but more research is needed to support or disprove this hypothesis. In 2015, Campbell noted that recent evidence presented by David Mora-Marin makes

1242-562: Is spoken by 12,000 as a result of recent migrations. The Uspantek language , which also springs directly from the Quichean–Mamean node, is native only to the Uspantán municipio in the department of El Quiché , and has 3,000 speakers. Within the Quichean sub-branch Kʼicheʼ (Quiché) , the Mayan language with the largest number of speakers, is spoken by around 1,000,000 Kʼicheʼ Maya in

1311-825: Is spoken by 77,700 in Guatemala's Huehuetenango department, with small populations elsewhere. The region of Qʼanjobalan speakers in Guatemala, due to genocidal policies during the Civil War and its close proximity to the Mexican border , was the source of a number of refugees. Thus there are now small Qʼanjobʼal, Jakaltek, and Akatek populations in various locations in Mexico, the United States (such as Tuscarawas County, Ohio and Los Angeles, California ), and, through postwar resettlement, other parts of Guatemala. Jakaltek (also known as Poptiʼ )

1380-576: Is spoken by about 400,000 people in an area stretching from Guatemala City westward to the northern shore of Lake Atitlán . Tzʼutujil has about 90,000 speakers in the vicinity of Lake Atitlán. Other members of the Kʼichean branch are Sakapultek , spoken by about 15,000 people mostly in El Quiché department, and Sipakapense , which is spoken by 8,000 people in Sipacapa , San Marcos . The largest language in

1449-546: Is spoken by almost 100,000 in several municipalities of Huehuetenango . Another member of this branch is Akatek , with over 50,000 speakers in San Miguel Acatán and San Rafael La Independencia . Chuj is spoken by 40,000 people in Huehuetenango, and by 9,500 people, primarily refugees, over the border in Mexico, in the municipality of La Trinitaria , Chiapas , and the villages of Tziscau and Cuauhtémoc. Tojolabʼal

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1518-926: Is spoken by around 49,000 people in several small pockets in Guatemala . Yucatec Maya (known simply as "Maya" to its speakers) is the most commonly spoken Mayan language in Mexico . It is currently spoken by approximately 800,000 people, the vast majority of whom are to be found on the Yucatán Peninsula . It remains common in Yucatán and in the adjacent states of Quintana Roo and Campeche . The other three Yucatecan languages are Mopan , spoken by around 10,000 speakers primarily in Belize ; Itzaʼ , an extinct or moribund language from Guatemala's Petén Basin; and Lacandón or Lakantum, also severely endangered with about 1,000 speakers in

1587-552: Is spoken in eastern Chiapas by 36,000 people. The Quichean–Mamean languages and dialects, with two sub-branches and three subfamilies, are spoken in the Guatemalan highlands . Qʼeqchiʼ (sometimes spelled Kekchi), which constitutes its own sub-branch within Quichean–Mamean, is spoken by about 800,000 people in the southern Petén , Izabal and Alta Verapaz departments of Guatemala, and also in Belize by 9,000 speakers. In El Salvador it

1656-477: Is spoken today. The earliest proposal which identified the Chiapas-Guatemalan highlands as the likely "cradle" of Mayan languages was published by the German antiquarian and scholar Karl Sapper in 1912. Terrence Kaufman and John Justeson have reconstructed more than 3000 lexical items for the proto-Mayan language. According to the prevailing classification scheme by Lyle Campbell and Terrence Kaufman,

1725-647: Is termed "Pre-X", as in Pre–Old Japanese. It is also possible to apply internal reconstruction to a proto-language, obtaining a pre-proto-language, such as Pre-Proto-Indo-European. Both prefixes are sometimes used for an unattested stage of a language without reference to comparative or internal reconstruction. "Pre-X" is sometimes also used for a postulated substratum , as in the Pre-Indo-European languages believed to have been spoken in Europe and South Asia before

1794-406: Is the position of Chʼolan and Qʼanjobalan–Chujean. Some scholars think these form a separate Western branch (as in the diagram below). Other linguists do not support the positing of an especially close relationship between Chʼolan and Qʼanjobalan–Chujean; consequently they classify these as two distinct branches emanating directly from the proto-language. An alternative proposed classification groups

1863-408: Is used instead. It is also sometimes called the common or primitive form of a language (e.g. Common Germanic , Primitive Norse ). In the strict sense, a proto-language is the most recent common ancestor of a language family, immediately before the family started to diverge into the attested daughter languages . It is therefore equivalent with the ancestral language or parental language of

1932-565: The Guatemalan highlands, around the towns of Chichicastenango and Quetzaltenango and in the Cuchumatán mountains , as well as by urban emigrants in Guatemala City . The famous Maya mythological document, Popol Vuh , is written in an antiquated Kʼicheʼ often called Classical Kʼicheʼ (or Quiché) . The Kʼicheʼ culture was at its pinnacle at the time of the Spanish conquest. Qʼumarkaj , near

2001-696: The Lencan and Xinca people , possibly during the Classic period (250–900). During the Classic period the major branches began diversifying into separate languages. The split between Proto-Yucatecan (in the north, that is, the Yucatán Peninsula) and Proto-Chʼolan (in the south, that is, the Chiapas highlands and Petén Basin ) had already occurred by the Classic period, when most extant Maya inscriptions were written. Both variants are attested in hieroglyphic inscriptions at

2070-403: The Maya sites of the time, and both are commonly referred to as " Classic Maya language ". Although a single prestige language was by far the most frequently recorded on extant hieroglyphic texts, evidence for at least three different varieties of Mayan have been discovered within the hieroglyphic corpus—an Eastern Chʼolan variety found in texts written in the southern Maya area and the highlands,

2139-511: The Mesoamerican language area , an area of linguistic convergence developed throughout millennia of interaction between the peoples of Mesoamerica. All Mayan languages display the basic diagnostic traits of this linguistic area. For example, all use relational nouns instead of prepositions to indicate spatial relationships. They also possess grammatical and typological features that set them apart from other languages of Mesoamerica, such as

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2208-429: The realist or the abstractionist position. Even the widely studied proto-languages, such as Proto-Indo-European , have drawn criticism for being outliers typologically with respect to the reconstructed phonemic inventory . The alternatives such as glottalic theory , despite representing a typologically less rare system, have not gained wider acceptance, and some researchers even suggest the use of indexes to represent

2277-430: The wave model . The level of completeness of the reconstruction achieved varies, depending on how complete the evidence is from the descendant languages and on the formulation of the characters by the linguists working on it. Not all characters are suitable for the comparative method. For example, lexical items that are loans from a different language do not reflect the phylogeny to be tested, and, if used, will detract from

2346-557: The 20th century and nationalist and ethnic-pride-based ideologies spread, the Mayan-speaking peoples began to develop a shared ethnic identity as Maya, the heirs of the Maya civilization . The word "Maya" was likely derived from the postclassical Yucatán city of Mayapan ; its more restricted meaning in pre-colonial and colonial times points to an origin in a particular region of the Yucatán Peninsula. The broader meaning of "Maya" now current, while defined by linguistic relationships,

2415-521: The Belizean speaker population figures around 30,000. The Chʼolan languages were formerly widespread throughout the Maya area, but today the language with most speakers is Chʼol , spoken by 130,000 in Chiapas. Its closest relative, the Chontal Maya language , is spoken by 55,000 in the state of Tabasco . Another related language, now endangered, is Chʼortiʼ , which is spoken by 30,000 in Guatemala. It

2484-781: The Central Lowlands. They may have served as prestige languages, coexisting with other dialects in some areas. This assumption provides a plausible explanation for the geographical distance between the Chʼortiʼ zone and the areas where Chʼol and Chontal are spoken. The closest relatives of the Chʼolan languages are the languages of the Tzeltalan branch, Tzotzil and Tzeltal , both spoken in Chiapas by large and stable or growing populations (265,000 for Tzotzil and 215,000 for Tzeltal ). Tzeltal has tens of thousands of monolingual speakers. Qʼanjobʼal

2553-626: The Chʼolan group and moved south into the Chiapas Highlands , they came into contact with speakers of Mixe–Zoque languages . According to an alternative theory by Robertson and Houston , Huastecan stayed in the Guatemalan highlands with speakers of Chʼolan–Tzeltalan, separating from that branch at a much later date than proposed by Kaufman. In the Archaic period (before 2000 BCE), a number of loanwords from Mixe–Zoquean languages seem to have entered

2622-569: The Chʼoltiʼan languages are retentions rather than innovations, and that the diversification of Chʼolan in fact post-dates the classic period. The language of the classical lowland inscriptions then would have been proto-Chʼolan. During the Spanish colonization of Central America, all indigenous languages were eclipsed by Spanish , which became the new prestige language. The use of Mayan languages came to an end in many important domains of society, including administration, religion and literature. Yet

2691-496: The Huastecan branch as springing from the Chʼolan–Tzeltalan node, rather than as an outlying branch springing directly from the proto-Mayan node. Studies estimate that Mayan languages are spoken by more than six million people. Most of them live in Guatemala where depending on estimates 40%–60% of the population speaks a Mayan language. In Mexico the Mayan speaking population was estimated at 2.5 million people in 2010, whereas

2760-455: The Mamean sub-branch is Mam , spoken by 478,000 people in the departments of San Marcos and Huehuetenango. Awakatek is the language of 20,000 inhabitants of central Aguacatán , another municipality of Huehuetenango. Ixil (possibly three different languages) is spoken by 70,000 in the " Ixil Triangle " region of the department of El Quiché . Tektitek (or Teko) is spoken by over 6,000 people in

2829-468: The Maya area was more resistant to outside influence than others, and perhaps for this reason, many Maya communities still retain a high proportion of monolingual speakers. The Maya area is now dominated by the Spanish language. While a number of Mayan languages are moribund or are considered endangered , others remain quite viable, with speakers across all age groups and native language use in all domains of society. As Maya archaeology advanced during

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2898-520: The Mayan family to other language families or isolates , but none is generally supported by linguists. Examples include linking Mayan with the Uru–Chipaya languages , Mapuche , the Lencan languages, Purépecha , and Huave . Mayan has also been included in various Hokan , Penutian , and Siouan hypotheses. The linguist Joseph Greenberg included Mayan in his highly controversial Amerind hypothesis , which

2967-446: The Mayan languages as reconstructed using the comparative method ) has a predominant CVC syllable structure, only allowing consonant clusters across syllable boundaries. Most Proto-Mayan roots were monosyllabic except for a few disyllabic nominal roots. Due to subsequent vowel loss, many Mayan languages now show complex consonant clusters at both ends of syllables. Following the reconstruction of Lyle Campbell and Terrence Kaufman ,

3036-406: The Proto-Mayan language had the following sounds. It has been suggested that proto-Mayan was a tonal language , based on the fact that four different contemporary Mayan languages have tone (Yucatec, Uspantek, San Bartolo Tzotzil and Mochoʼ), but since these languages each can be shown to have innovated tone in different ways, Campbell considers this unlikely. The classification of Mayan languages

3105-424: The arrival there of Indo-European languages. When multiple historical stages of a single language exist, the oldest attested stage is normally termed "Old X" (e.g. Old English and Old Japanese ). In other cases, such as Old Irish and Old Norse , the term refers to the language of the oldest known significant texts. Each of these languages has an older stage ( Primitive Irish and Proto-Norse respectively) that

3174-507: The case for a relationship between Mayan and Mixe-Zoquean languages "much more plausible". The Mayan family consists of thirty languages. Typically, these languages are grouped into 5–6 major subgroups (Yucatecan, Huastecan, Chʼolan–Tzeltalan, Qʼanjobʼalan, Mamean, and Kʼichean). The Mayan language family is extremely well documented, and its internal genealogical classification scheme is widely accepted and established, except for some minor unresolved differences. One point still at issue

3243-441: The case of transitive verbs ), and for plurality of person. Possessed nouns are marked for person of possessor. In Mayan languages, nouns are not marked for case, and gender is not explicitly marked. Proto-Mayan is thought to have had a basic verb–object–subject word order with possibilities of switching to VSO in certain circumstances, such as complex sentences, sentences where object and subject were of equal animacy and when

3312-418: The compatibility. Getting the right dataset for the comparative method is a major task in historical linguistics. Some universally accepted proto-languages are Proto-Afroasiatic , Proto-Indo-European , Proto-Uralic , and Proto-Dravidian . In a few fortuitous instances, which have been used to verify the method and the model (and probably ultimately inspired it ), a literary history exists from as early as

3381-475: The disputed series of plosives. On the other end of the spectrum, Pulgram (1959 :424) suggests that Proto-Indo-European reconstructions are just "a set of reconstructed formulae" and "not representative of any reality". In the same vein, Julius Pokorny in his study on Indo-European , claims that the linguistic term IE parent language is merely an abstraction, which does not exist in reality and should be understood as consisting of dialects possibly dating back to

3450-499: The first division occurred around 2200 BCE, when Huastecan split away from Mayan proper after its speakers moved northwest along the Gulf Coast of Mexico . Proto-Yucatecan and Proto-Chʼolan speakers subsequently split off from the main group and moved north into the Yucatán Peninsula . Speakers of the western branch moved south into the areas now inhabited by Mamean and Quichean people. When speakers of proto-Tzeltalan later separated from

3519-413: The form of affixes attached to the numeral; in others such as Tzeltal, they are free forms. Jakaltek has both numeral classifiers and noun classifiers, and the noun classifiers can also be used as pronouns. The meaning denoted by a noun may be altered significantly by changing the accompanying classifier. In Chontal, for example, when the classifier -tek is used with names of plants it is understood that

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3588-595: The municipality of Tectitán, and 1,000 refugees in Mexico. According to the Ethnologue the number of speakers of Tektitek is growing. The Poqom languages are closely related to Core Quichean, with which they constitute a Poqom-Kʼichean sub-branch on the Quichean–Mamean node. Poqomchiʼ is spoken by 90,000 people in Purulhá , Baja Verapaz , and in the following municipalities of Alta Verapaz : Santa Cruz Verapaz , San Cristóbal Verapaz , Tactic , Tamahú and Tucurú . Poqomam

3657-676: The new state of Campeche. That law came into effect on January 1, 1916. In 1957 Hecelchakán was given city status by Governor of Campeche Alberto Trueba Urbina . Mayan language The Mayan languages form a language family spoken in Mesoamerica , both in the south of Mexico and northern Central America . Mayan languages are spoken by at least six million Maya people , primarily in Guatemala , Mexico , Belize , El Salvador and Honduras . In 1996, Guatemala formally recognized 21 Mayan languages by name, and Mexico recognizes eight within its territory. The Mayan language family

3726-457: The numeral cannot appear without an accompanying classifier. Some Mayan languages, such as Kaqchikel, do not use numeral classifiers. Class is usually assigned according to whether the object is animate or inanimate or according to an object's general shape. Thus when counting "flat" objects, a different form of numeral classifier is used than when counting round things, oblong items or people. In some Mayan languages such as Chontal, classifiers take

3795-429: The objects being enumerated are whole trees. If in this expression a different classifier, -tsʼit (for counting long, slender objects) is substituted for -tek , this conveys the meaning that only sticks or branches of the tree are being counted: un- one- tek "plant" wop jahuacte tree un- tek wop one- "plant" {jahuacte tree} Proto-language In the tree model of historical linguistics ,

3864-670: The other Mayan languages before the changes found in other branches had taken place. The palatalized plosives [tʲʼ] and [tʲ] are not found in most of the modern families. Instead they are reflected differently in different branches, allowing a reconstruction of these phonemes as palatalized plosives. In the eastern branch (Chujean-Qʼanjobalan and Chʼolan) they are reflected as [t] and [tʼ] . In Mamean they are reflected as [ts] and [tsʼ] and in Quichean as [tʃ] and [tʃʼ] . Yucatec stands out from other western languages in that its palatalized plosives are sometimes changed into [tʃ] and sometimes [t] . The Proto-Mayan velar nasal * [ŋ]

3933-572: The past, as scholars made a spurious distinction between Amerindian "dialects" and European "languages", the preferred usage in Mesoamerica in recent years has been to designate the linguistic varieties spoken by different ethnic group as separate languages. In Guatemala, matters such as developing standardized orthographies for the Mayan languages are governed by the Academia de Lenguas Mayas de Guatemala (ALMG; Guatemalan Academy of Mayan Languages), which

4002-526: The present-day city of Santa Cruz del Quiché , was its economic and ceremonial center. Achi is spoken by 85,000 people in Cubulco and Rabinal , two municipios of Baja Verapaz . In some classifications, e.g. the one by Campbell , Achi is counted as a form of Kʼicheʼ. However, owing to a historical division between the two ethnic groups, the Achi Maya do not regard themselves as Kʼicheʼ. The Kaqchikel language

4071-500: The proto-Mayan language. This has led to hypotheses that the early Maya were dominated by speakers of Mixe–Zoquean languages, possibly the Olmec . In the case of the Xincan and Lencan languages , on the other hand, Mayan languages are more often the source than the receiver of loanwords. Mayan language specialists such as Campbell believe this suggests a period of intense contact between Maya and

4140-499: The proto-language of its "uniform character." This is evident in Karl Brugmann 's skepticism that the reconstruction systems could ever reflect a linguistic reality. Ferdinand de Saussure would even express a more certain opinion, completely rejecting a positive specification of the sound values of reconstruction systems. In general, the issue of the nature of proto-language remains unresolved, with linguists generally taking either

4209-704: The rich post-Conquest literature in Mayan languages written in the Latin script , provides a basis for the modern understanding of pre-Columbian history unparalleled in the Americas. Mayan languages are the descendants of a proto-language called Proto-Mayan or, in Kʼicheʼ Maya, Nabʼee Mayaʼ Tzij ("the old Maya Language"). The Proto-Mayan language is believed to have been spoken in the Cuchumatanes highlands of central Guatemala in an area corresponding roughly to where Qʼanjobalan

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4278-447: The specific variety of Chʼolan found in the majority of Southern Lowland glyphic texts was a language they dub "Classic Chʼoltiʼan", the ancestor language of the modern Chʼortiʼ and Chʼoltiʼ languages . They propose that it originated in western and south-central Petén Basin, and that it was used in the inscriptions and perhaps also spoken by elites and priests. However, Mora-Marín has argued that traits shared by Classic Lowland Maya and

4347-406: The subject was definite. Today Yucatecan, Tzotzil and Tojolabʼal have a basic fixed VOS word order. Mamean, Qʼanjobʼal, Jakaltek and one dialect of Chuj have a fixed VSO one. Only Chʼortiʼ has a basic SVO word order. Other Mayan languages allow both VSO and VOS word orders. In many Mayan languages, counting requires the use of numeral classifiers , which specify the class of items being counted;

4416-645: The use of ergativity in the grammatical treatment of verbs and their subjects and objects, specific inflectional categories on verbs, and a special word class of "positionals" which is typical of all Mayan languages. During the pre-Columbian era of Mesoamerican history , some Mayan languages were written in the logo-syllabic Maya script . Its use was particularly widespread during the Classic period of Maya civilization (c. 250–900). The surviving corpus of over 5,000 known individual Maya inscriptions on buildings, monuments, pottery and bark-paper codices , combined with

4485-412: The vowels. Some Kʼichean-branch languages have exhibited developed diphthongs from historical long vowels, by breaking /e:/ and /o:/. The morphology of Mayan languages is simpler than that of other Mesoamerican languages, yet its morphology is still considered agglutinating and polysynthetic . Verbs are marked for aspect or tense , the person of the subject , the person of the object (in

4554-405: Was August Schleicher ; he did so for Proto-Indo-European in 1861. Normally, the term "Proto-X" refers to the last common ancestor of a group of languages, occasionally attested but most commonly reconstructed through the comparative method , as with Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Germanic . An earlier stage of a single language X, reconstructed through the method of internal reconstruction ,

4623-426: Was defeated. In 1840, the district of Hecelchakán included the towns of Pomuch, Pocboc, Tenabo, Tepakán, San Antonio Sahcabchén, Dzitbalché , Bécal , Nunkiní , and Calkiní. Around 1846, the district of Hecelchakán included three parishes: Hecelchakán, Calkiní and Bécal. On December 7, 1915, when decree no. 51 approved a new law of interior administration, Hecelchakán became one of the eight free municipalities of

4692-616: Was founded by Maya organisations in 1986. Following the 1996 peace accords , it has been gaining a growing recognition as the regulatory authority on Mayan languages both among Mayan scholars and the Maya peoples. The Mayan language family has no demonstrated genetic relationship to other language families. Similarities with some languages of Mesoamerica are understood to be due to diffusion of linguistic traits from neighboring languages into Mayan and not to common ancestry. Mesoamerica has been proven to be an area of substantial linguistic diffusion. A wide range of proposals have tried to link

4761-558: Was previously also spoken in the extreme west of Honduras and El Salvador , but the Salvadorian variant is now extinct and the Honduran one is considered moribund. Chʼoltiʼ , a sister language of Chʼortiʼ, is also extinct. Chʼolan languages are believed to be the most conservative in vocabulary and phonology, and are closely related to the language of the Classic-era inscriptions found in

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