The Ch'ol (Chol) language is a member of the western branch of the Mayan language family used by the Ch'ol people in the states of Chiapas, Tabasco, and Campeche in Mexico. This language, together with Chontal, Ch'orti', and Ch'olti', constitute the Cholan language group.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; p. 3.

The Cholan branch of the Mayan languages is considered to be particularly conservative and Ch'ol along with its two closest relatives the Ch'orti' language of Guatemala and Honduras, and the Chontal Maya language of Tabasco are believed to be the modern languages that best reflect their relationship with the Classic Maya language.Houston, S., O. Chinchilla, Stuart D. "The Decipherment of Ancient Maya Writing", U. of Oklahoma Press, 2001.

Ch'ol-language programming is carried by the CDI's radio station XEXPUJ-AM, broadcasting from Xpujil, Campeche.

Dialects There are two main dialects of Chʼol: Chʼol of Tila spoken by 43,870 people of whom 10,000 are monolinguals in the villages of Tila, Vicente Guerrero, Chivalito and Limar in Chiapas. Chʼol of Tumbalá spoken by 90,000 people of whom 30,000 are monolinguals in the villages of Tumbalá, Sabanilla, Misijá, Limar, Chivalita and Vicente Guerrero.

Phonology Consonants There are 21 consonantal segments in Chʼol. Below is the consonant inventory of Chʼol.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; p.34-35 Corresponding orthography is presented in the angle brackets next to the IPA symbols.

Labial Alveolar Palatal Velar GlottalPlosive Affricate Fricative Nasal Liquid Glide

For the segments in the palatal column, [, ] are palatalized alveolar consonants, and [, ] are palato-alveolar affricates. Another property of the consonant inventory is that only the labial has a voiced segment [b], which corresponds to the voiced bilabial implosive [ɓ] in Proto-Mayan.Kaufman, Terrence and William M. Norman. An outline of Proto-Cholan phonology, morphology and vocabulary. In Phoneticism in Mayan Hieroglyphic Writing, ed. by John Justeson and Lyle Campbell, 77-166. Institute for Mesoamerican Studies, State University of New York, Albany, 1984; p.86-88

Alveolar sounds [, ] are only heard as allophones of /, /.

Vowels Chʼol has a six vowel system, as shown below in the vowel inventory.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; p.41 FrontCentralBackHigh Mid Low

The vowel ä is a distinctive segment in Chʼol, as in other Chʼolan languages. According to Kaufman and Norman (1984), long vowels in the Proto-Mayan language merged with their short counterparts in Chʼolan languages, except for *aa (long) and *a (short). These segments went under a sound change, in which *aa became a and *a became ä.Kaufman, Terrence and William M. Norman. An outline of Proto-Cholan phonology, morphology and vocabulary. In Phoneticism in Mayan Hieroglyphic Writing, ed. by John Justeson and Lyle Campbell, 77-166. Institute for Mesoamerican Studies, State University of New York, Albany, 1984; p.85

Syllable Structure Chʼol can have CV, CVC, CVCC, CCVC, CCVCC as possible syllable structures. The most common ones are CV and CVC.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; p.46

muty [mutʲʰ] CVC pul [pul̥] CVC ja' [xaʔ] CVC ixik [ʔi.ʃikʰ] CV.CVC wiñik [wi.ɲikʰ] CV.CVC

Like many other Mayan languages, Chʼol does not allow onsetless syllables, which means words that appear to start with vowel in fact have a glottal stop as the onset.

ich [ʔit͡ʃ] CVC ax [ʔax] CVC ok [ʔokʰ] CVC ej [ʔex] CVC

Although complex onsets and complex codas exist, the former only occur across morpheme boundaries, and the latter are limited to jC.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; p.47

kpam [kpam̥] ktyem [ktʲem̥] ch'ujm [t͡ʃ'uxm̥] mujk [muxkʰ]

Stress The main stress of a word typically falls on the ultima in Chʼol. This is true for most of the bisyllabic native words and polysyllabic loanwords. In the following examples, the stress is indicated by an acute accent on the nucleus.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; p.43

‹ ‹ ‹

Compound words also have the main stress on the ultima. A secondary stress, indicated by a grave accent, can be heard in the first part of a compound word. This weak stress usually goes on the ultima of the first part.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; p.44

(male+chicken) ' (red+deer) (forest+pig) (jaguar+tree)

Orthography

Alphabet Chʼol writers have agreed upon the following alphabet, based on the Latin alphabet, proposed and developed by Diaz Peñate in 1992. Uppercase A B Ch Chʼ E I J K Kʼ L M N Ñ O P Lowercase a b ch chʼ e i j k kʼ l m n ñ o p Uppercase Pʼ R S T Ts Tsʼ Ty Tyʼ U W X Y Ä - Lowercase pʼ r s t ts tsʼ ty tyʼ u w x y ä

Relationship with Mayan glyphs The absence of glyphic material in Guatemala points that the calendar was a creation of the lowland Maya. Ch'ol has been considered one of the closer languages to several Mayan glyphs inscriptions. Lounsbury suggested that the ancient Palenqueños spoke a Proto-cholean language. A certain Palenque ruler has the glyph of a Quetzal head for his name and because the word for Quetzal in Chol is kuk, it is conjectured that his name was Lord Kuk. The affix Landa's I that occurs only with posterior date indicators retains resemblance with the idea of past time of Ch'ol, such in hobix 'five days hence', hobixi 'five days ago'. As vocabularies of Ch'ol, Chontal, Chorti, and Tzotzil are far from complete, it is not possible to establish some cognates between these languages and Mayan glyphs.

An alternative hypothesis developed by Houston, Robertson, and Stuart proposed that Classic Maya inscriptions between AD 250 and 850 convey to Eastern Ch'olan languages, more related to Chorti language than Ch'ol language. However, there is no consensus around the topic.

Morphology Affixation

Affixation is the main way of word formation in Chʼol. There are prefixes, infixes and suffixes. Suffixes are considerably more abundant than the other two.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; pp.64

Prefixes

There are two derivational prefixes – the noun class markers aj- and x-. The former can go with proper names, nominalize verbs, and be prefixed to some terms that refer to animals. The latter can also go with proper names and with the name of some animals, but additionally it can be prefixed to the name of some trees and plants.

aj-Maria 'proper name' x-Maria 'a proper name' aj-Wañ 'proper name' x-Wañ 'a proper name' 'the robber' x-wax 'the fox' 'the killer' x-k'uk' 'the quetzal' 'the opossum' x-ch'ujtye' 'cedar' 'the owl' x-kulañtya 'cilantro'

In addition, Set A inflections are prefixed to nouns (10a) and verbs (10b).Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; pp.65

k-wex mi k-wäy-el -pants -sleep- 'my pants' 'I sleep'

Infixes

Infixation is used for passivization and as a mean of deriving numeral classifiers. First, some transitive roots reduce valence by infixing -j- into the root. This process is accompanied by a reduction of the number of core arguments from two to one, and the remaining argument referring to the patient is the subject of the verb.

tyi i-päy-ä-y-oñ tyi päy-i-y-oñ -call- call 'S/he called me' 'I was called'

For the other use of infixation, the derivations come mostly from positionals and verbs.

jäl (POS) 'large and thin' jäjl 'large and thin' wol (V) 'to round' wojl 'rounded' päk (V) 'to fold' päjk 'folded'

Suffixes

There are many suffixes in Chʼol since suffixation is the main way of derivation and inflection. For instance, the suffix -añ on nouns can derive intransitive verbs. The suffix -is causativizes some intransitive verbs. The suffix -b derives ditransitive verbs, and -ty derives some intransitive verbs by passivization of the corresponding transitive verb.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; pp.66-67

(N) 'man' wiñik-añ (IV) 'to be a man' (IV) 'to sleep' wäy-is-añ (TV) 'to make him/her sleep' (TV) 'to buy' pmäñ-b-eñ (DV) 'to buy something for somebody' (TV) 'to talk to' pejkäñ-ty-el (DI) 'to be talked to'

Syntax

Case marking Like almost all other Mayan languages, Ch'ol has two sets of person markers: ergative and absolutive. The Mayan tradition is to label the former as Set A and the latter as Set B.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; pp.74 Chʼol is a split ergative language: its morphosyntactic alignment varies according to aspect. With perfective aspect, ergative-absolutive alignment is used, whereas with imperfective aspect, we rather observe nominative-accusative.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; pp.177-178

Set A markers are generally considered as suffixes; however, Martínez Cruz (2007) and Arcos López (2009) categorized them as proclitics. These markers usually denote the agents of transitive verbs. +Set A/ __ C/ __ V1stk- ~ j- (/ __ k)2nda-aw-3rdi-(i)y- Note that all markers have phonologically conditioned allomorphs: 1st singular marker changes from k to j when it precedes another k, and 2nd singular and 3rd singular markers have glides inserted when they precede consonants.

Set B markers are suffixes. These markers usually denote the patients of transitive verbs or the core arguments of intransitive verbs. +Set B1st -oñ2nd -ety3rd -øThere are three plural markers for plural case marking in Ch'ol – two clitics and one suffix. The two clitics can be attached either before the singular person markers or after the verbal roots.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; pp.80-83 +Plural markers1st (in)la1st (ex)l(oj)oñ2ndla3rd -ob ~ -o'

The exclusive 1st plural marker has a shorter form loñ and a longer form lojoñ. Both are used interchangeably, except when it is attached before a singular marker, in which case only the shorter form is allowed. The plural suffix -ob is often realized as -o''' in speech.

Verbal predicates

The basic word order is VOS. However, word order varies and VOS is not always grammatical: factors including animacy, definiteness, topicalization and focus contribute to determining which word order is appropriate.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; pp.21–22 A Ch'ol simple transitive phrase is comprised minimally of a single transitive verb in the form of [ASP Set A + Verb + Set B]. In the case of non-agentive intransitive verbs, the cross-reference of the single argument is accomplished with either Set A or Set B depending on the aspect of the verb. Verbal predicates can have the following aspects: perfective, imperfective, progressive, inceptive, terminative, and potential.Vázquez Álvarez, Juan Jesús. A Grammar of Chol, a Mayan Language. Austin, Texas: University of Texas at Austin, 2011; pp.263

Transitive verbs