34 MEXICO AND CENTRAL AMERICA 



The second most important linguistic stock is the 

 Mayan, now spoken by over half a million people. 

 This stock has only one outlying member, namely, the 

 Huasteca of northern Vera Cruz. The other twenty- 

 one languages cover a continuous area in the Mexican 

 states of Yucatan, Tabasco, and Chiapas and in the 

 republic of Guatemala. The most important language 

 of the group is the Maya proper, which is spoken by the 

 natives of Yucatan and by the Lacandone Indians of the 

 Usumacinta Valley. The Tzental, Quiche, Cakchiquel, 

 Choi, and Chorti are other prominent languages. 



In the region of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec are the 

 Zapotecan and Mixtecan stocks, which differ widely in 

 sound and structure from the Mayan and Nahuan 

 tongues that hem them in. West and east of the 

 Valley of Mexico are, respectively, the Tarascan and 

 Totonacan stocks, which show no great amount of 

 subdivision. In Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa 

 Rica are several language groups that have never been 

 carefully studied. It seems likely that some of these 

 will be consolidated when words and grammatical 

 structures are better known. The Chiapanecan lan- 

 guages were spoken in three localities on the Pacific 

 side of Nicaragua and Costa Rica, while a fourth divi- 

 sion occupied a small area far to the northwest on the 

 banks of the Chiapas River. It is now believed that the 

 Mazatecan, the Otomi group, as well as a number of 

 minor languages, belong in a single stock with the Chia- 

 panecan. If this supposed connection should prove true a 

 northern movement of the stock would be pretty surely 

 indicated. Parts of the Isthmian region were held by 

 tribes having linguistic affiliation with South America. 

 It is not unlikely that a considerable back flow from 

 South America made itself felt along the Atlantic coast 

 of Central America, if we may judge by ethnological 

 features and by suggested linguistic connections. 



