Cacaopera language

Cacaopera is an extinct language belonging to the Misumalpan family, formerly spoken in the department of Morazán in El Salvador by the Cacaopera people. It was closely related to Matagalpa, and slightly more distantly to Sumo, but was geographically separated from other Misumalpan languages.

Cacaopera
Native to	El Salvador
Region	Morazán Department
Ethnicity	Cacaopera people
Extinct	20th century[citation needed]
Language family	Misumalpan Sumalpan Matagalpan Cacaopera
Language codes
ISO 639-3	ccr
Glottolog	caca1247

Map of El Salvador's Indigenous Peoples at the time of the Spanish conquest: 1. Pipil people, 2. Lenca, 3. Kakawira o Cacaopera people, 4. Xinca, 5. Maya Ch'orti' people, 6. Maya Poqomam people, 7. Mangue o Chorotega.

The last semi-speakers of Cacaopera lived in the 1970s.^[1] All native speakers had died before this time.

Phonology

Consonants

Misumalpan consonant phonemes

		Labial	Coronal		Dorsal
Nasal	voiceless	m̥	n̥		ŋ̥
	voiced	m	n		ŋ
Plosive	voiceless	p	t		k
	voiced	b	d
Fricative			s		x
Liquid	voiceless		r̥	ɬ
	voiced		r	l
Semivowel		w			ɥ

Vowels

Misumalpan vowel phonemes

	Front		Back
	short	long	short	long
Close	i	iː	ɯ	ɯː
Open	a	aː

References

1. Campbell, Lyle (1973). "MesoAmerican Languages Collection of Lyle Campbell". Archive of the Indigenous Language of Latin America. University of Texas at Austin. Archived from the original on July 1, 2016. Retrieved May 2, 2016.

External links

• Recording of a semi-speaker of Cacaopera from 1973, from the MesoAmerican Languages Collection of Lyle Campbell at the Archive of the Indigenous Languages of Latin America.