Araucanian (redirected from Araucan)

Araucanian

South American Indian people who are now concentrated in the valleys and basins between the Bío Bío and Toltén rivers in south-central Chile. When the Spanish conquistadores arrived in Chile, they encountered three Araucanian populations: the Picunche, who were accustomed to Inca control; the Huilliche, who were too few and scattered to resist the conquistadores; and the Mapuche, successful farmers and artisans. The first two were soon assimilated, but the Mapuche managed to resist Spanish and Chilean control for some 350 years. They were subdued in the late 19th century and were settled on reservations; they now live independently.

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Araucanian 

an Indian language of South America, widespread in Chile and in parts of Argentina. Araucanian is spoken by more than 300,000 people (1961). It is sometimes conditionally classified as a member of the so-called Andean language group. It is subdivided into a few closely related dialects, such as Mapuche, Picunche, Huilliche, and Ran-quelche. The Araucanian phonological system consists of six vowels (a, i, u, e, o, a) and 21 consonant phonemes. The stress is movable. The morphological structure is characterized by an agglutinative type of suffixation. Many lexical items have been borrowed from the Quechua language.

REFERENCES

Lenz, R. Estudios araucanos. Santiago de Chile, 1895–97.
Rosas, J. M. de. Gramática y diccionario de la lengua Pampa (Pampa, Pranquel, Araucano). Buenos Aires, [1947].

G. A. KLIMOV