| Cusabo | |
|---|---|
| Cusaboan | |
| Native to | United States |
| Region | South Carolina |
| Ethnicity | Cusabo, ?Ashepoo, ?Combahee, ?Escamaçu, ?Etiwan, ?Kiawah, Wando |
| Extinct | 18th century |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | None (mis) |
| Glottolog | cusa1237 |
The Cusabo language is a now-extinct and virtually unknown language formerly spoken by the Cusabo. It did not appear to be related to other known language families on the North American continent.3
There is evidence that at least five tribes on the coast, in the territory from the lower Savannah to the Wando River (east of Charleston), spoke a common language that was different from the Guale and Sewee languages of neighboring peoples. It is likely the Ashepoo, Combahee, Escamaçu, Etiwan, and Kiawah also spoke this language, which has been referred to as Cusaboan.
Classifiation
Although in the 1930s, American anthropologist John Swanton theorized that the Cusabo may have spoken a form of the Muskogean language, linguistic research since the late 20th century disputes this.
The place names do not seem to be related to the Algonquian, Siouan, Iroquoian, and Muskogean languages, or languages used by other South Carolina coastal and Piedmont tribes. (In places where the Sewee and Santee lived, the place names are in the Catawban languages, a branch of the large Siouan languages family, likely reflecting earlier dominance by the Catawba.)
Vocabulary
Only a few words (mostly town names) of this language were recorded in the 16th century by French explorer René Goulaine de Laudonnière. (One example was Skorrye or Skerry 'bad', 'enemy'). Most words lack translations. Approximately 100 place names and 12 personal names in Cusabo have survived.
John R. Swanton thought that the bou or boo element in the Cusabo word Westo boe 'Westoe River', which occurs in many coastal place names, is related to the Choctaw word -bok (river). He speculated that Cusabo was related to the Muskogean family. Later scholars of the 21st century think this relation of sounds might have been a coincidence without meaning, especially since the older Choctaw form was bayok (meaning small river, river forming part of a delta). They believe that Cusabo was from a different language family altogether.456
Blair Rudes has suggested that the -bo suffix and other evidence may indicate a relationship to the Arawakan languages of the Caribbean indigenous peoples, some of whom originated on the South American continent.7
References
References
- Picone, Michael D.; Davies, Catherine Evans, eds. (2015). New perspectives on language variety in the South: historical and contemporary approaches. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press. pp. 31–80. ISBN 978-0-8173-1815-4.
- Sturtevant, William C., ed. (1978). Handbook of North American Indians. Washington: Smithsonian Institution : For sale by the Supt. of Docs., U.S. G.P.O. pp. 254–264. ISBN 978-0-16-080388-8.
- Zamponi, Raoul (2024). "Unclassified languages". The Languages and Linguistics of Indigenous North America. De Gruyter. pp. 1627–1648. doi:10.1515/9783110712742-061. ISBN 978-3-11-071274-2.
- Goddard, Ives. (2005). "The indigenous languages of the Southeast", in Anthropological Linguistics, 47 (1), 1-60.
- Martin, Jack. (2004). "Languages", in R. D. Fogelson (Ed.), Handbook of North American Indians: Southeast (Vol. 14, pp. 68-86). Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution.
- Waddell, Gene. (2004). "Cusabo", in R. D. Fogelson (Ed.), Handbook of North American Indians: Southeast (Vol. 14, pp. 254-264). Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution.
- Rudes, Blair A. "Pre-Columbian Links to the Caribbean: Evidence Connecting Cusabo to Taino", paper presented at Language Variety in the South III conference, Tuscaloosa, AL, 16 April 2004.