West Gyalrongic languages

The West Gyalrongic languages constitute a group of Gyalrongic languages. On the basis of both morphological and lexical evidence, Lai et al. add the extinct Tangut language to West Gyalrongic. Beaudouin through a morphosyntactic analysis based on phonetic correspondences, shows that Tangut should be included within the Horpa languages.

History

Sagart et al. estimate that West and East Gyalrongic had diverged from each other about 3,000 years before present.
Although Tangut is most commonly associated with Yinchuan, the capital of the Tangut Empire, Zhoushan in Jinchuan County had a historically attested population of Tangut people in 945 AD. As a result, based on both historiographical and linguistic evidence, Lai et al. place the ultimate homeland of the Tangut in present-day western Sichuan.
However, the Tangut were already rulers of the Dingnan Jiedushi from 881AD, which indicates another scenario, as they could not migrate to a place they were already situated.