Chimuan languages
Chimuan or Yuncan is a hypothetical small extinct language family of northern Peru and Ecuador.
Family division
Chimuan is proposed to be consisted of at least three attested languages:Chimuan- * Mochica
- * Cañar–Puruhá
- ** Cañari
- ** Puruhá
Campbell classifies Mochica and Cañar–Puruhá each as separate language families.
Mochica was one of the major languages of pre-Columbian South America. It was documented by Fernando de la Carrera and Middendorff in the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries respectively. It became extinct ca. 1950, although some people remember a few words. Adelaar & Muysken consider Mochica a language isolate for now.
Cañari and Puruhá are documented with only a few words. These two languages are usually connected with Mochica. However, as their documentation level is so low, it may not be possible to confirm this association. According to Adelaar & Muysken, Jijón y Caamaño's evidence of their relationship is only a single word: Mochica nech "river", Cañari necha; based on similarities with neighboring languages, he finds a Barbacoan connection more likely.
Quingnam, likely the same language as Lengua Pescadora, is sometimes taken to be a dialect of Mochica, but it is effectively unattested, unless a list of numerals discovered in 2010 turns out to be Quingnam or Pescadora as expected. Those numerals are not, however, Mochica.
Mason (1950)
Yunca-Puruhán internal classification by Mason :- Yunca–Puruhán
- *Yuncan
- **North group
- ***Puruhá
- ***Canyari
- ***Manabila
- **South group
- ***Yunga
- ***Morropé
- ***Eten
- ***Chimu
- ***Mochica
- ***Chanco
- *Atalán
- **Wancavilca
- ***Mania
- ***Tumbez
- ***Puna
- ***Carake: Apichiki, Cancebi