Everything about Tupi Languages totally explained
The
Tupi or
Tupian language family comprises some 70 languages spoken in
South America, of which the best known are
Tupi proper and
Guarani.
History, members, and classification
When the
Portuguese arrived in
Brazil, they found that wherever they went along the vast coast of this newly discovered land, most natives spoke similar languages.
Jesuit missionaries took advantage of these similarities, systematizing
common standards then named
línguas gerais "general languages", which were spoken in that region until the 19th century. The best known and most widely spoken of these languages was
Old Tupi, a modern descendent of which is still used today by
Indians around the
Rio Negro region, where it's known as
Nheengatu ([ɲɛʔẽŋaˈtu]), or the "fine language". However, the Tupi family comprises also other languages.
In the neighbouring Spanish colonies,
Guarani, another Tupian language closely related to Old Tupi, had a similar history, but managed to resist the spread of
Spanish more successfully than Tupi resisted
Portuguese. Today, Guarani has 7 million speakers, and is one of the official languages of
Paraguay and
Bolivia.
The Tupian family includes also several other languages with fewer speakers. It may be related to the
Ge and
Carib families in a
Je-Tupi-Carib grouping.
List of Tupian languages
The largest subgroup within the Tupi language family is
Tupi-Guarani, which shouldn't be confused with Tupi or Guarani themselves. Members of this subfamily are:
Other members of the Tupi language family include:
Kanoé
MundurukuFurther Information
Get more info on 'Tupi Languages'.
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