Penutian

[ puh-noo-tee-uhn, -shuhn ]

noun
  1. a group of American Indian language families of central and coastal California, including Wintu, Maidu, Yokuts, Miwok, and Costanoan, thought to be descendants of a single protolanguage spoken at a remote period.

  2. any of several hypothesized genetic groupings of Indigenous languages that include those of central and coastal California as well as several unclassified languages of the Pacific Northwest, Columbia River plateau, Mexico, and Central America.

adjective
  1. of or relating to Penutian.

Origin of Penutian

1
First recorded in 1913; pen + uti, schematized bases for “two” in Maidu-Wintu-Yokuts and Miwok-Costanoan, respectively + -an

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

British Dictionary definitions for Penutian

Penutian

/ (pɪˈnjuːtɪən, -ʃən) /


noun
  1. a family of North American Indian languages of the Pacific coast

  2. a phylum of languages of North and South America, including Araucanian, Chinook, Mayan, and Sahaptin

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