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The 'Eastern Algonquian languages' are a subgroup of the larger Algonquian family, itself a member of the Algic family; prior to European contact, the family consisted of around 17 languages, which stretched from Newfoundland south into North Carolina. Eastern Algonquian languages descend from a putative proto-language, Proto-Eastern Algonquian. While Algonquian languages are often grouped into three large groups based on shared similarities (''Plains Algonquian'', ''Central Algonquian'', and ''Eastern Algonquian''), only Eastern Algonquian constitutes a separate genetic subgroup.

Contents

Family division

Notes

See also

External links

Bibliography

Family division

The languages are listed below along with dialects and subdialects. This classification follows Goddard (1996, 1997) and Mithun (1999).
1. 'Míkmaq' (also known as Micmac, Mi’kmaq, Mi’gmaq, or Mi’kmaw)

I. Abenakian
: 2. 'Eastern Abenaki' (also known as Abenaki or Abenaki-Penobscot)
::
★ Penobscot ''(also known as Old Town or Old Town Penobscot)''
::
★ Caniba
::
★ Aroosagunticook
::
★ Pigwacket
: 3. 'Western Abenaki' (also known as Abnaki, St. Francis, Abenaki, or Abenaki-Penobscot)
: 4. 'Maliseet' (also known as Maliseet-Passamquoddy or Malecite-Passamquoddy)
::
★ Maliseet ''(also known as Malecite)''
::
★ Passamaquoddy
5. 'Etchemin' (uncertain - See Note 1)

II. Southern New England
: 6. 'Massachusett' (also known as Massachusett-Narragansett)
::
★ North Shore
::
★ Natick
::
★ Wampanoag
::
★ Narragansett
::
★ Nauset
::
★ Cowesit
: 7. 'Loup A' (probably Nipmuck) (uncertain - See Note 1)
: 8. 'Loup B' (uncertain - See Note 1)
: 9. 'Mohegan-Pequot'
::
★ Mohegan
::
★ Pequot
::
★ Niantic
::
★ Montauk
: 10. 'Quiripi-Naugatuck-Unquachog' (also known as Quiripi-Unquachog)
::
★ Quiripi ''(also known as Quinnipiak or Connecticut)''
::
★ Naugatuck
::
★ Unquachog
III. Delawarean
: 11. 'Mahican' (also known as Mohican)
::
★ Stockbridge
::
★ Moravian
: i. Lenape (also known as Delaware)
:: 12. 'Munsee'
:: 13. 'Unami'
:::
★ Northern Unami
:::
★ Southern Unami
:::
★ Unalachtigo
14. 'Nanticoke' (also known as Nanticoke-Conoy)
:
★ Nanticoke
:
★ Choptank
:
★ Piscataway ''(also known as Conoy)''
15. 'Pamlico' (also known as Carolina Algonquian, Pamtico, Pampticough, Christianna Algonquian)

16. 'Powhatan' (also known as Virginia Algonquian)

17. 'Shinnecock' (uncertain)

Notes

# 'Etchemin' and 'Loup' were ethnographic terms used inconsistently by French colonists and missionaries. There is some debate whether distinct groups could ever have been identified with those names.

'Etchemin' is only known from a list of numbers from people living between the St. John and Kennebec Rivers recorded in 1609 by Marc Lescarbot. The numbers in this list share features in common with different Algonquian languages from Massachusetts to New Brunswick, but as a set do not match any other known Algonquian language. Certain intriguiguing similarities between the Etchimin list and Wampanoag might suggest that languages closely related to Wampanoag might have been spoken as far north as the coast of Maine in the precontact period.

The name 'Etchemin' has also been applied to other material from what many scholars of Algonquian ethnography and linguistics believe to be Maliseet, Passamaquoddy, or Eastern Abenaki.

Some of the attested 'Loup' vocabulary can be identified with different eastern Algonquian communities, including the Mahican, Maliseet, Passamaquoddy and other groups. 'Loup A' and 'Loup B' refer to two vocabulary lists which cannot be conclusively identified with another known community. 'Loup A' is most likely Nipmuck, and is also somewhat similar to the handful of words attested for Agawam. 'Loup B' seems like a composite of different dialects. It is closest to Mahican and Western Abenaki. They also may represent unknown tribes or bands, or may have been interethnic trade pidgins of some kind. Documentary evidence for Loup B is very thin (14 pages); the documentary evidence for Loup A is much more extensive (124 pages), being documented in a manuscript dictionary from the French missionary period. See Uncertain/Extinct Algonquian Languages.

See also

★ Algonquian languages

★ Proto-Algonquian language

★ Algonquian peoples

External links

★ Algonquian Family

★ Algonquian languages

Bibliography

★ Campbell, Lyle (1997). ''American Indian languages: The historical linguistics of Native America''. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-509427-1.

★ Goddard, Ives (1994). The West-to-East Cline in Algonquian Dialectology. In William Cowan, ed., Papers of the 25th Algonquian Conference 187-211. Ottawa: Carleton University.

★ ———— (1997). "Introduction". In Ives Goddard, ed., "Languages". Vol. 17 of William Sturtevant, ed., ''The Handbook of North American Indians''. Washington, D.C.: The Smithsonian Institution.

★ Grimes, Barbara F. (Ed.) (2000). ''Ethnologue: Languages of the world'', (14th ed.). Dallas, TX: SIL International. ISBN 1-55671-106-9. Online edition: http://www.ethnologue.com/, accessed on Mar. 3, 2005.

★ Mithun, Marianne (1999). ''The languages of Native North America''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-23228-7 (hbk); ISBN 0-521-29875-X.