Beothuk language facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Beothuk
Beothukan
Native to	Canada
Region	Newfoundland
Ethnicity	Beothuk people
Extinct	1829, with the death of Shanawdithit (Mary March)
Language family	unclassified (Algonquian?)
Linguist List	bue
Pre-contact distribution of Beothuk language

The Beothuk language (pronounced bee-AW-tuhk or BAY-uh-thook), also called Beothukan, was once spoken by the Beothuk people. They were an Indigenous group from Newfoundland, Canada. Sadly, the Beothuk people and their language became extinct in 1829. This happened with the death of Shanawdithit, the last known Beothuk person.

Because the language died out so long ago, we don't have many written records of it. This means we know very little about how the Beothuk language worked. We have almost no information about its grammar or structure.

What We Know About Beothuk

Is it Related to Other Languages?

For a long time, people have wondered if Beothuk was connected to the Algonquian languages family. This family includes many other Indigenous languages in North America. Some researchers, like John Hewson, found similarities in sounds and word parts. If these links are true, Beothuk would be a very different kind of Algonquian language.

However, other experts think these similarities might just be words borrowed from one language to another. They don't believe it means the languages are truly related. Since we have so little information about Beothuk, it's hard to say for sure. Many experts, like Ives Goddard and Lyle Campbell, believe we might never know if Beothuk was related to Algonquian languages.

A Recorded Song?

In 1910, an American anthropologist named Frank Speck made an interesting recording. He recorded a 74-year-old woman named Santu Toney singing a song. She claimed it was in the Beothuk language. This recording was found again much later, near the end of the 1900s.

Santu Toney said her father taught her the song. This is interesting because she was born around 1835. This could mean someone with a connection to the Beothuk language was still alive after Shanawdithit died in 1829. The words in the song are hard to hear and understand. Today, researchers are trying to write down the words and make the recording clearer. Some Indigenous groups have even learned the song.

However, not everyone believed Santu Toney. James P. Howley, who studied the Beothuk for many years, doubted her story in 1914.

Beothuk Wordlists

We know about the Beothuk language mostly from several wordlists. These lists were put together in the 1700s and 1800s. People like George C. Pulling (1792), Rev. John Clinch, Rev. John Leigh, and Hercules Robinson (1834) collected these words.

They gathered over 400 words from Beothuk speakers. These speakers included Oubee, Demasduit, and Shanawdithit. But these lists only have single words. They don't have examples of full sentences or conversations. Other people who collected wordlists were W. E. Cormack (who worked with Shanawdithit) and Richard King. James P. Howley (1915) also collected words from a woman named Jure.

It's hard to figure out the exact sounds of Beothuk from these lists. This is because the words were written down differently by different people. Sometimes, the same word might look like two different words on the lists. Also, we know that the lists have many mistakes. Because of these problems and the lack of full sentences, it's very difficult to rebuild the Beothuk language.

Beothuk Numbers

Here are some numbers in the Beothuk language, from different wordlists:

Beothuk Months

Here are the names of the months in Beothuk, from William Cormack's list, which he got from Shanawdithit:

See also

In Spanish: Idioma beothuk para niños