Quechua, origins, multidialectism and information about two great Andean linguists Dr. Cesar Itier & Dr. Rodolfo Cerron–Palomino. I have found interesting data on issues pertaining to the origins, historical references, and configurations of language-use in pre-Hispanic Andean territories. Using historical linguistics both linguists and anthropologists (since the 1960s) have adduced that the Quechua language we identify at present as the lingua franca of the Inca Empire, was actually not the native language of the Incas. Actually the native L of the Incas was Aymara. I am including the following data for general information on the topic. I am also including additional information on Dr. Rodolfo Cerron-Palomino; the most important Quechua linguist at present time and Dr, Cesar Itier also distinguished Quechua linguist.I will follow with an essay on Quechua multidialectalism, an explanation about Quechua being a family of languages rather than a single language. I am reproducing texts from the web page of Dr. Paul Heggarty for your information if you would like to get much more information I am including his wesite link at the end of this text. 1- Was Quechua the native L of the Incas? The answer is no, linguistic clues reveal: “the enigmatic ‘Cantar de Tupac Yupanqui’ is not Quechua, nor even are such names as Vilcanota, Ollantaytambo, even Cuzco itself. The trail leads instead to Aymara, first ‘official language of the Incas’, and perhaps ultimately to the Puquina of Tiahuanaco — beguiling clues to the Incas’ origin myths and their ultimate homeland…” (Cerron- Palomino, 2001) 2- Did Quechua come from the Incas? The short answer: definitely, unquestionably, NO! A popular but totally erroneous myth. The Quechua in Bolivia and Northern Argentina does indeed come from the expansion of the Inca empire, yes. But not all Quechua by any means. The Quechua in Ecuador probably not, the Quechua in central and northern Peru has nothing at all to do with the Incas, it pre-dates them by many centuries, perhaps a thousand years. People in these areas were already speaking Quechua when the Incas arrived. Certainly, a different variety of Quechua, but just as much Quechua as the form the Incas spoke. 3- Is Cuzco Quechua the ‘Proper’, ‘Best’ or ‘Original’ Quechua? Again, the short answer: definitely, unquestionably, NO! Another popular but totally erroneous myth. No variety (dialect, accent, etc.) of Quechua is better or worse than any other. What would ‘proper’, ‘best’ or ‘original’ be supposed to mean anyway? Some have more Spanish loanwords and some Spanish influence on their grammar, true, so in this one sense only one might make some arguments. But otherwise no variety of Quechua is particularly more original or native than any other, it’s pretty nonsensical to talk in these terms about languages. All regional forms of Quechua come from the same origin, and all have changed in their own ways since that original Quechua, in different ways in different regions, giving rise to the regional variants we find today. Cuzco

Quechua as the ‘purest’? Hardly: it is much more heavily influenced by the other native language Aymara than are other regional varieties of Quechua. 4- Where did Quechua come from originally? Cuzco? Where was the original Quechua homeland? That is not known for certain, but all the evidence points to one thing for certain: yet again, that it was NOT Cuzco . Many people in Cuzco and elsewhere will try to tell you so, but I cannot stress strongly enough that this is simply yet another of the widespread but totally unfounded myths about Quechua. Most people just pass this on by hearsay. Some (like the Cuzco Quechua Academy ) actively peddle it because they have reasons to wish this to be the case, but they simply don’t know what they’re talking about. The moment you look into the issue in any depth, all the signs point obviously to Quechua not having originated in Cuzco . It’s far more likely to have had its initial homeland somewhere in Central Peru . Alfredo Torero traced the origins to Chincha, in the coast of Peru (note form M. Yataco). 5- What Was the ‘Secret Language of the Incas’? In several Spanish documents from after the Conquest, there are references to a ‘secret language’ spoken by the Inca nobility that most people could not understand. It suits the Quechua Academy in Cuzco to claim that this was some more original or perfect form of the language (which they somehow inherited!?!), to reinforce their nonsensical case that they alone speak the perfect, pure Quechua and are therefore in a unique position to decree standards for the language. It is far more plausible that the ‘secret language’ was no form of Quechua at all, but an entirely different language spoken by the small ‘Inca’ tribe, before they moved to and conquered the Cuzco area, and learnt Quechua from tribes already living there. Their own ‘secret language’ that they kept amongst themselves could well have been none other than … an Aru language (according to Alfredo Torero), alias a form of ‘Aymara’ though importantly by no means exactly the same as the language now spoken from Lake Titicaca southwards into Bolivia. Other candidates have also been proposed, including Puquina and Callahuaya, though Torero’s arguments seem pretty convincing. For details on his views, read Alfredo Torero’s works. 6- Here some information on the ‘Regional Differences in Quechua.’ It is well known that Quechua is spoken widely in several countries in the Andes, particularly in Ecuador , Peru and Bolivia , but also in northern Argentina and by small numbers of people in other countries. It is also well known, though, that Quechua is not by any means the same everywhere. The Quechua in one country or region can be quite different, sometimes very different, to the Quechua spoken in another country, or even in another region of the same country (especially in Peru). We’ll begin with the Quechua spoken in just two particular places in Peru , which happen to illustrate the differences well. It so happens, too, that both of them have been designated by the United Nations’ Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) as ‘World Heritage Sites’, in recognition of their great importance in the history and culture of the Andes. These two places are: • Cuzco , the old Inca capital in Southern Peru ;

• Chavín de Huantar, in the Ancash department of central Peru , home to one of the oldest cultures in the Andes , many centuries before the Incas. Paul Heggarty’s web- site: http://www.quechua.org.uk/Eng/Main/ Dr. Rodolfo Cerron-Palomino Rodolfo Cerrón Palomino (born in Huancayo , Peru ) is a Peruvian linguist who has crucially contributed to the investigation and development of the Quechua language. He has also made outstanding contributions to the study of the Aymara, Mochica and Chipaya languages. He pursued his Doctoral Degree at the National University of San Marcos in Lima . After graduating, he obtained his Master’s degree at Cornell University and his Ph.D. degree at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He started his studies by researching the Quechua variety spoken in his homeland: the Mantaro Valley region. Engaged by the Peruvian Ministry of Education, he wrote the first dictionary of the Wanka Quechua, published in 1976. He fought strongly for preservation and development of the Quechua language and all of its varieties. In 1994 he published a dictionary of Southern Quechua, proposing a unified orthographic standard for all Quechua of southern Peru , Bolivia and Argentina . This standard has been accepted by many institutions in Peru and is used officially for Quechua in Bolivia . Cerrón is currently a Professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru in Lima . Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodolfo_Cerr%C3%B3n_Palomino Video clip in Spanish -2008. El Chipaya or The Chipaya Language - interview 2008 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAQTPv7BCOI Dr. Cerron- Palomino http://academiaperuanadelalengua.org/academicos/cerron La Lengua primera de los Incas fue el Aymara y luego el Quechua. Entrevista al Dr. Cerron-Palomino http://peru21.pe/impresa/noticia/rodolfo-cerron-palomino-lengua-oficial-incas-fue-aimara-luego-quechua/2008-09-12/224460 Dr. Cesar Itier Specialist in Quechua language, education & research (a/o) of the INALCO institute in Paris . His overview of Andean languages is similar in some ways to Cerron-Palomino’s. (See next paragraph. The distinguished French output on the Andes still does not have the hearing it should in the Anglophone world.)

(From Itier, C. EnterText article. Reference below.) From the sixteenth century until about the 1960s, that’s to say when modern linguistics began to be applied to the Andean languages, the Quechua spoken in Cuzco was always considered the most “typical, genuine, original and pure.” It was believed that it was the Incas who had spread Quechua the length and breadth of the Andes and that in the process the “original Cuzco Quechua” had been modified on contact with the other languages, which in turn came to be replaced by Quechua. The works of linguists has successfully challenged this traditional vision from the 1960s onwards, which have shown that the expansion of Quechua throughout the Andes is very much more ancient than the Inca period and its initial “focus of expansion” is not in any way Cuzco . Because of that one cannot talk objectively of a Quechua more genuine than another, “more Quechua” than another, less still talk about Cuzco Quechua as “purer” when it has received more influence from the Aymara language than any other Quechua “dialect.” <for the rest of the article see: http://arts.brunel.ac.uk/gate/entertext/2_2_pdfs/itier.pdf Interview in French L. http://www.archivesaudiovisuelles.fr/EN/_EncycloPubByThema.asp?theme=a35a63d6b-df8c-49fa-add5-92a766d17351 Bibliography of Dr. Cerron Palomino (partial list) * 1976 Diccionario Quechua de Junín-Huanca- Castellano y vice versa. Ministerio de educación del Perú * 1987 Unidad y diferenciación lingüística en el mundo andino. Lexis, 11: 1, pp. 71-010-t. También en López, Luis Enrique (Comp.) Pesquisas en lingüística andina. Lima: Gráfica Bellido, pp. 121-152. * 1987 Lingüística Quechua. Cuzco, Perú: Bartolomé de Las Casas * 1989 Quechua y mochica: lenguas en contacto. Lexis, 13: 1, pp. 47-68. * 1989 Lengua y sociedad en el Valle del Mantaro. Lima: Instituto de Estudios Peruanos. * 1990 Reconsideración del llamado quechua costeño. Revista Andina, 16: 2, pp. 335-409. * 1991 El Inca Garcilaso o la lealtad idiomática. Lexis, 1.5: 2, pp. 133-178. * 1992 Diversidad y unificación léxica en el mundo andino. En Godenzzi, Juan Carlos (Comp.) El quechua en debate: ideología normal y enseñanza. Cuzco: C.E.R.A. "Bartolomé de Las Casas", pp. 205-235. * 1993 Los fragmentos de Gramática del Inca Garcilaso. Lexis, 17: 2, pp. 219-257.

* 1994 Quechua sureño, diccionario unificado quechua-castellano, castellano-quechua. Lima, Biblioteca Nacional del Perú. * 1994 Quechumara. Estructuras paralelas del quechua y del aymara. Lima: CIPA, 42 * 1995 La lengua de Naimlap (reconstrucción y obsolescencia del mochica). Lima: Fondo editorial de la PUC. * 1996 "El Nebrija indiano". Prólogo a la edición de la Grammatica de Fray Domingo de Santo Tomás, Cuzco: C.E.R.A. Bartolomé de las Casas. * 1996 Normalización y uso idiomáticos. Paper presented at the Seminario Internacional sobre `El aprendizaje de lenguas en las poblaciones indígenas en América Latina.' Iquique, Chile. * 1998 El cantar de Inca Yupanqui y la lengua secreta de los incas. Revista Andina, 32, pp. 417-452. * 1999 Tras las huellas del aimara cuzqueño. Revista Andina, 33, pp. 137-161. * 2000 Lingüística aimara Cuzco: C.E.R..A. Bartolomé de Las Casas. * 2003. Castellano Andino. Aspectos sociolingüísticos, pedagógicos y gramaticales. Lima: PUCP. * 2006 El chipaya o la lengua de los hombres del agua Lima: PUCP. Cesar Itier Bibliography (very partial list) Cesar Itier – only a very very brief Bibliographical annotation ( I am working on this ..) Consult the following site: http://celia.cnrs.fr/ Itier, César. 1987. A propósito de los dos poemas en quechua de la crónica de Fray Martín de Murúa. Revista Andina 9:211-227 Itier, César. 1991. Un drame du XIXe siècle en quechua cuzquénien: 'Yawar Waqaq' d'Abel Luna. In Andes et Méso-Amérique. Culture et société. Etudes en hommage à Pierre Duviols, 477-499. Aix-en-Provence: Université de Provence. Itier, César. 1991. Lengua general y comunicación escrita: cinco cartas en quechua de Cotahuasi-1616. Revista Andina 17:65-107

Itier, César. 1992. Un texto quechua colonial desconocido: la 'Plática que se ha de hazer a los indios en la predicación de la bulla de la Santa Cruzada' (1600). Revista Andina 19:135-146 Itier, César. 1992. Un nuevo documento colonial escrito por indígenas en quechua general: la petición de los caciques de Uyupacha al obispo de Huamanga (hacia 1670). Lexis XVI (1):1-21 Itier, César ed. 1993. Pachacuti Yamqui Salcamaygua, Juan de Santa Cruz. Relación de antigüedades deste reyno del Pirú. Con edición facsimilar del códice de Madrid. Edición de César Itier, estudio y comentario histórico de Pierre Duviols, estudio, comentario lingüístico y edición de César Itier. Lima: Instituto Francés de Estudios Andinos - Centro de Estudios Regionales Andinos "Bartolomé de Las Casas", 276 p. Itier, César. 1995-2000. El teatro quechua en el Cuzco. Lima: Instituto Francés de Estudios Andinos - Centro de Estudios Regionales Andinos 'Bartolomé de Las Casas' Itier, César. 1996. Le jeune homme et l'étoile ou le voyage au pays de la multiplication des grains: un mythe andin sur les dangers de l'exogamie. Journal de la Société des Américanistes 82:159-191 Itier, César. 1997. Parlons quechua. La langue du Cuzco. Paris: l'Harmattan Itier, César ed. 1997. La tradition orale et la mythologie andines. Bulletin de L'Institut Français d'Études Andines, 36 (3). Lima: Institut Français d'Etudes Andines, 471 p. Itier, César. 1997. El Zorro del Cielo: un mito sobre el origen de las plantas cultivadas y los intercambios con el mundo sobrenatural. In Bulletin de l'Institut Français d'Etudes Andines, 36(3), 39-87. Lima: Institut Français d'Etudes Andines. Itier, César. 1999. Karu ñankunapi. 40 cuentos en quechua y castellano de la comunidad de Usi (Quispicanchi - Cuzco). Cuzco: Centro de Estudios Regionales Andinos 'Bartolomé de Las Casas' - Institut Français d'Etudes Andines Itier, César. 1999. Los problemas de edición, datación, autoría y filiación de El robo de Proserpina y sueño de Endimión, auto sacramental colonial en quechua. In Edición y anotación de textos coloniales hispanoamericanos, ed. I. Arellano & J.A. Rodríguez Garrido, 213-231: Universidad de Navarra / Iberoamericana / Vervuert. Itier, César. 1999. Le problème de l'origine des représentations dramatiques de la mort d'Atahuallpa dans la sierra centrale du Pérou du point de vue de la langue quechua. Bulletin de l'Institut Français d'Etudes Andines 28 (2):305-309 Itier, César. 1999. Literatura nisqap qichwasimipi mirayñiymanta. Amerindia 24:31-46

Itier, César. 2000. Ovide et la christianisation du Pérou. Un auto sacramental mythologique quechua du XVIIe siècle. In Transgressions et stratégies du métissage en Amérique coloniale. Travaux réunis et présentés par Bernard Lavallé, ed. Bernard Lavallé, 165-181. Paris: Presses de la Sorbonne Nouvelle. Itier, César. 2000. Lengua general y quechua cuzqueño en los siglos XVI y XVII. In Desde afuera y desde adentro. Ensayos de etnografía e historia del Cuzco y Apurímac, ed. Hiroyasu Tomoeda & Tatsuhiko Fujii Luis Millones, 47-59. Osaka: National Museum of Ethnology. Itier, César. 2000. ¿Visión de los vencidos o falsificación? Datación y autoría de la Tragedia de la Muerte de Atahuallpa. Bulletin de l'Institut Français d'Etudes Andines 30 (1):103-121 Itier, César. 2001. La propagation de la langue générale dans le sud du Pérou. In Le savoir, pouvoir des élites dans l'empire espagnol d'Amérique. Travaux et Documents n° 3 du Centre de Recherche sur l'Amérique Espagnole Coloniale, 63-74. Paris: Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle Paris III. Itier, César. 2001. Nationalisme ou indigénisme? Le théâtre quechua à Cuzco entre 1880 et 1960. In Ideología e identidad. Lo andino y sus disfraces, ed. Gerald Taylor, 527-540: Institut Français d'Etudes Andines. Bulletin de l'Institut Français d'Etudes Andines, 30 (3) Itier, César ed. 2001. Meneses Lazón, Porfirio - Contes du lever du jour. Achikyay Willaykuna. Bilingue quechua-français. Nouvelles présentées et traduites par César Itier maître de conférences à l'INALCO. Paris: Langues et Mondes-L'Asiathèque, 205 p. Itier, César ed. 2002. Saint-Exupéry, Antoine de - Quyllur llaqtayuq wawamanta [= Le petit prince]. Qillqaqpa dibuhunkunantin. Francés simimanta tikraqkuna [= traducteurs]: Lydia Cornejo Endara, César Itier. Cuzco: Asociación Pukllasunchis / Centro de Estudios Regionales Andinos 'Bartolomé de Las Casas' - Instituto Francés de Estudios Andinos, 101 p. Itier, César ed. 2003. Pierre Duviols - Procesos y visitas de idolatrias. Cajatambo siglo XVII. Revisión paleográfica: Laura Gutiérrez Arbulú y Luis Andrade Ciudad. Selección de los textos y estudios históricos: Pierre Duviols. Textos quechuas editados, traducidos y anotados : César Itier. Lima: Institut Français d'Etudes Andines / Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú Itier, César. 2004. Les caciques de Cajatambo et les cultes autochtones au milieu du XVIIe siècle. In Les autorités indigènes entre deux mondes. Solidarité ethnique et compromission coloniale, 147-157. Paris: Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle - Paris III, Centre de Recherches sur l'Amérique Espagnole Coloniale. Itier, César. 2004. La littérature orale de la région de Cuzco - Pérou. Paris: Karthala - Langues O', 233 p.

Itier, César. 2005. Las cartas en quechua de Cotahuasi. El pensamiento político de un cacique de inicios del siglo XVII. Paper presented at Máscaras, tretas y rodeos del discurso colonial, Lima Itier, César. 2006. Ollantay, Antonio Valdez y la rebelión de Thupa Amaru. Histórica XXX, n°1:65-97 Itier, César. 2007. El hijo del oso. La literatura oral quechua de la región del Cuzco. Lima: Institut Français d'Etudes Andines-Instituto de Estudios Peruanos-Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, 220 p. Itier, César. 2008. Les Incas: Guides des Belles Lettres. Paris: Les Belles Lettres ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Compiled by Miryam Yataco, a Peruvian sociolinguist that works at New York University’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education & Human Development for 18 years.