Zamucoan (also Samúkoan) is a small language family of Paraguay (northeast Chaco) and Bolivia (Santa Cruz Department). The family has hardly been studied by linguists (as of Adelaar & Muysken 2004), although several studies have recently appeared (see: Bertinetto 2009, 2010, 2013; Ciucci 2007/08, 2009, 2010a, 2010b, 2013a, 2013b). Recent studies show that the Zamucoan languages are characterized by a rare syntactic configuration which is called para-hypotaxis, where coordination and subordination are used simultaneously to connect clauses (Bertinetto & Ciucci 2012).

Extant languages

Zamucoan consists of two living languages:

Genetic relations

From the historical record of the Zamucoan peoples, the living Zamucoan languages appear to have had several relatives, now extinct. It is not clear if these were necessarily distinct languages, or even that they were Zamucoan, but Mason (1950) listed them as follows:

Vocabulary

Loukotka (1968) lists the following basic vocabulary items for Zamucoan language varieties.