Salvadoran Lenca, Chilanga or Potón is a Lencan language spoken in El Salvador, of which two dialects have been described: that of Chilanga (extinct), and that of Guatajiagua. Other dialects may have existed in the past in the other towns where the Lencas lived in present-day El Salvador.
Salvadoran Lenca belongs to the small Lencan language family, which also includes Honduran Lenca. There have been attempts to link the Lencan languages to other language families, but none have been successful.Campbell, Lyle. Glossary of Historical Linguistics. Edinburgh University Press, 2007. According to Adolfo Costenla Umaña, Salvadoran Lenca and Honduran Lenca separated 2,295 years ago; approximately the same time at which the archaeological site of Quelepa was founded.
History At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, the use of Salvadoran Lenca began to decline; in the 1970s, a speaker was found in Chilanga. At the end of the nineties, Consuelo Roque, a linguist at the University of El Salvador (UES), found Mario Salvador Hernández, a semi-speaker from Guatajiagua who had learned the language from his grandmother, and the two would together write an instructional book titled Poton piau, nuestra lengua Potón.
However, linguist Alan R. King, in his 2016 book titled Conozcamos el Lenca, una lengua de El Salvador (where he also used the Potón Piau primer as a reference), points out that: "Today no one knows how to speak Lenca, although certain individuals have memories of—or have learned—some fragments of that now lost language. This type of partial knowledge is not even remotely close, in any case that we have been able to verify, to a real mastery of the historical language, whose disappearance dates back to the mid-twentieth century...".
Research in 2004 by the University of El Salvador recorded 380 words, a phonological inventory of five vowels and 16 consonants, alternation between “g” and “k”, and reduplication to create plurals from singular forms. Currently, there are rehabilitation projects in El Salvador that aim to prevent the language from going extinct.
Phonology
Consonants +Consonants in Chilanga LencaDel Río Urrutía, 1999LabialAlveolarPalatalVelarGlottalNasalPlosivevoicelessejectiveAffricateFricativeLateralRhoticGlide
Obstruents can be voiced allophonically.
Vowels +Vowels in Chilanga Lenca Front Back Close Mid Open
Morphology The following overview is based on King (2016).
Pronouns Person/Number Independent pronouns Intensive independent pronouns Clitic pronouns 1s unani uno u 2s manani mano ma 3s inani ino i 1p pinani pino pi 2p kinani kino ki 3p anani ano a
Normal independent pronouns serve as the subject of a clause, but are can be dropped. The intensive independent pronouns are used for the purpose of emphasis, such as before the predicative suffix. Clitic pronouns serve as possessives when placed before nouns, direct objects before verbs, and complements before postpositions. is used to form genitive constructions in a structure similar to other Mesoamerican languages (see Mesoamerican language area#Nominal possession). However, the order is noun2 his noun1, contrasting with many other Mesoamerican languages where the order is his noun1 noun2. For example, (the man's house, literally "man-the his house").
Nouns Salvadoran Lenca nouns do not inherently encode gender or number. However, these can be expressed through suffixes. and qualify male and female respectively for humans, while and do the same for animals. acts as a diminutive.
is the predicative enclitic, often corresponding in meaning to the English copula. is the definitive enclitic. There is no dedicated indefinite article, but the numeral "one" can be used with that meaning. Adjectives, numerals, quantifiers and postpositions all follow nouns. Compound nouns can be formed with the head noun coming last. Salvadoran Lenca makes an alienability distinction. Inalienable nouns, such as body parts and familial relations, must always be possessed.
Verbs Questions are expressed without any special particles or morphemes, as in Spanish. Question words are placed before verbs and their clitic objects.
Present tense There are three verb classes: class 1 verbs add , etc, class 2 verbs , , and class 3 verbs , . Roots of class 1 and 3 verbs end in vowels, while roots of class 2 verbs end in consonants.
Class 1: pa (to sleep) Class 2: pit (to fall) Class 2: ay (to say) Class 2: shey (to want) Class 3: wa (to call) 1s pakon piton ayon i sheyon i wajion 2s pakanmi pitanmi ayanmi i sheyanmi i wajanmi 3s pakanpa pitanpa ayanpa i sheyanpa i wajanpa 1p pakanpi pitanpi ayanpi i sheyanpi i wajanpi 2p pakanki pitanki ayanki i sheyanki i wajanki 3p pakanlipa pitanlipa ayanlipa i sheyanlipa i wajanlipa
Participles The present participle is formed by suffixing the verb root with if it ends in a consonant, or if it ends in a vowel. The past participle is formed by suffixing the verb root with .
Auxiliary verbs Auxiliary verbs, placed after head verbs, are used to accomplish a variety of grammatical functions in Salvadoran Lenca: is used to form the present negative when preceded by the present participle, but also forms the negative past when preceded by the past participle. (containing the root and the past suffixes), placed after the present participle, is used as apparently the most common way to form the negative past. , placed after a verb stem, achieves the meaning "already" without distinction in tense. (preterite of "to be") is used in imperfect constructions, as well as appearing after negative verbs to produce the negative past.
These auxiliary verbs are not conjugated like regular verbs, but instead the above stems are directly suffixed with the following endings:
Person/Number Suffix 1s -u 2s -mi 3s -pa 1p -pi 2p -ki 3p -lipa
("to go"), placed after a verb stem, is the most common way to form the future. Unlike the other auxiliary verbs, it is conjugated like a regular class 1 verb, though when used as a future auxiliary an initial k is usually added:
Person/Number Conjugation 1s kokon 2s kokanmi 3s kokanpa 1p kokanpi 2p kokanki 3p kokanlipa
Additionally, ("go!") and ("come!") are used as directional imperatives after the present participle.
Past tense The main past tense is formed by adding suffixes like or a null suffix, followed by the same person suffixes used in the present tense. Number/Person erch'i (to break; transitive) shuray (to sing) liwa (to buy) pat'iwa (to dream) aya (to say) ami (to sell; transitive) o (to go) 1s i erch'iashu shurayashu i liwashu pat'iwaju ayau i amiu aju 2s i erch'iashmi shurayashmi i liwashmi pat'iwajmi ayami i amimi ajmi 3s i erch'iashpa shurayashpa i liwashpa pat'iwajpa ayapa i amipa ajpa 1p i erch'iashpi shurayashpi i liwashpi pat'iwajpi ayapi i amipi ajpi 2p i erch'iashki shurayashki i liwashki pat'iwajki ayaki i amiki ajki 3p i erch'iashlipa shurayashlipa i liwashlipa pat'iwajlipa ayalipa i amilipa ajlipa
Future Although the future is usually expressed through the present tense or through the auxiliary verb "to go", some verbs normally express the future through a series of suffixes: Person/Number Future suffix 1s -shon 2s -shanmi 3s -shanpa 1p -shanpi 2p -shanki 3p -shanlipa
Imperative The second person singular imperative for class 1 verbs is formed by adding the suffix , while for class 2 and 3 verbs, it is formed with the suffix . The suffixes or (the last two being freely interchangeable) can be added to the singular imperative in order to form the plural or negative imperative, respectively. Irregular imperatives include "go", "bring it", and "come".
Lexicon Salvadoran Lenca has borrowed words from both Spanish and Nawat.
Loanwords from Spanish "horse", from "machete", from "Ladino", from "hour", from
Loanwords from Nawat "mountain", from "cat", from "jar", from "basket", from "reed", from "tongue", possibly from "hat", possibly from "woman", possibly from
Loanwords of uncertain etymology "duck", ultimately from Spanish but possibly taken from Nawat "cow", ultimately from Spanish but possibly taken from Nawat "money", ultimately from Spanish but possibly taken from Nawat "hen", ultimately from Spanish but possibly taken from an indigenous language other than Nawat (compare Nawat ) "tomato", possibly taken from Spanish instead of directly from Nawat
Notes
References
Del Río Urrutía, Ximena. 1999. El lenca de Chilanga. Revista de Filología y Lingüística de la Universidad de Costa Rica 25. 193-209. Campbell, Lyle. 1976. "The Last Lenca". International Journal of American Linguistics 42(1): 73–78.