Timbisha language facts for kids

Timbisha (also called Tümpisa or Panamint) is the language of the Native American people called the Timbisha Shoshone. They have lived in and around Death Valley, California, and the southern Owens Valley for a very long time.

Today, only a few older people can speak Timbisha. They live in California and Nevada. All of them also speak English every day. For many years, these people called themselves and their language "Shoshone." Later, the tribe became officially recognized by the government as the Death Valley Timbisha Shoshone Band of California.

The name "Timbisha" comes from the native name for Death Valley, tümpisa. This word means "rock paint." It refers to the rich sources of red ochre found in the valley. Timbisha is also spoken by groups in places like Bishop, Big Pine, Darwin, Independence, and Lone Pine in California. It is also spoken in Beatty, Nevada.

Language Family and Connections

Timbisha belongs to the Central Numic group of languages. This group is part of the larger Uto-Aztecan language family. Timbisha is most closely related to the Shoshoni and Comanche languages.

Where Timbisha Was Spoken

Timbisha was once spoken in a large area. This area stretched from the Sierra Nevada mountains in eastern California to just east of Death Valley in Nevada. The main valleys where Timbisha villages were located include Owens Valley, Indian Wells Valley, Saline Valley, Panamint Valley, and Death Valley. There were also villages along the southern parts of the Kawich Range in Nevada.

Different Ways of Speaking Timbisha

Each valley had its own way of speaking Timbisha. These differences were mostly in the words used. However, there was a general change in how the sound h was pronounced. As you moved west across the Timbisha lands, the h sound almost disappeared in the Owens Valley areas.

Linguists (people who study languages) have written about Timbisha. One study by McLaughlin focuses on the way Timbisha is spoken in Beatty, Nevada, which is in the far eastern part of the territory. Another study by Dayley looks at a central way of speaking from Death Valley.

How Timbisha Sounds

Vowel Sounds

Timbisha has five main vowel sounds, which is common for Numic languages. It also has a common diphthong (two vowel sounds together) ai. This ai sound can sometimes sound like e. However, some words always use ai and others always use e.

Consonant Sounds

Timbisha also has a typical set of Numic consonant sounds. The table below shows these sounds. The letters in parentheses are how they are usually written.

How Timbisha is Written

The way Timbisha is spelled uses the regular Roman alphabet. It is based on the work of a linguist named Dayley. For example, the sound ɨ is written as ü, and the sound ŋ is written as ng.

Grammar Basics

Linguists Jon Dayley and John McLaughlin have studied Timbisha grammar. Dayley also created a dictionary for the language.

Word Order and Nouns

In Timbisha, the usual word order is Subject-Object-Verb (SOV). This means the person or thing doing the action comes first, then the thing the action is done to, and finally the action itself. For example, taipo kinni'a punittai means 'white-man falcon saw', or "The white man saw a falcon."

Suffixes (word endings) are used to show who owns something or if a word is the object of a verb. Small words called postpositions are added to nouns to show relationships, like "on the house" (kahni-pa'a, 'house-on'). Adverbs are also used.

Adjectives (describing words) are usually put before the noun they describe. For example, tosa-kapayu means 'white-horse', referring to a specific type of pale horse. If an adjective describes something that is only temporarily that way, it will be a separate word with a special ending. For example, tosapihtü kapayu means 'white/pale horse', for a horse that just happens to be white or pale.

Verbs and Actions

Verbs (action words) in Timbisha use suffixes to show when something happened or how complete an action is. They also use prefixes and suffixes to show how many things are involved in the action.

Some common verbs have different forms depending on if the subject (the one doing the action) is singular or plural. Also, some verbs have different forms depending on if the object (the one receiving the action) is singular or plural. Other than these cases, verbs do not change to match the subject or object.

See also

In Spanish: Idioma timbisha para niños