Opón-Carare (Opone) is an extinct, unusually divergent Cariban language of Colombia. It is most closely related to Yukpa. It is known only from two wordlists, published in 1878 and 1958 respectively.

Phonology

Giraldo and Fornaguera (1958)

Marshall Durbin and Haydée Seijas derive the following phonology for Opón-Carare based on data published in 1958 from Giraldo and Fornaguera.

Consonants
BilabialAlveolarPostalveolarPalatalVelarGlottal
Plosivevoicelessptk(ʔ)1
voicedbdg
Fricativesʃh
Trillr
Nasalmnɲ
Approximantwj
  1. [ʔ] may not be phonemic, it appears only at morpheme boundaries.
Vowels
FrontCentralBack
shortlongshortlongshortlong
Closeiu
Mideəo
Opena

While common in other Cariban languages, nasal vowels are not recorded in Opón-Carare.

Lengerke (1878)

The following phonology is derived from the data in Lengerke (1878).

Consonant phonemes of Opón
BilabialAlveolarPostalveolarPalatalVelarGlottal
Plosivevoicelessptk
voicedb
Fricatives(ʃ)h
Affricate
Trillr
Nasalmn
Approximantwj

The phonology is the same in Carare, with the exception that /tʃ/ and /w/ are not present, and /ʃ/ interpreted for the sequence ⟨sy⟩.

Vowels
FrontCentralBack
Closeiu
Mide(ə)o
Opena

Further reading

  • del Castillo Mathieu, Nicolás (1977). (PDF). Thesaurus: Boletín del instituto Caro y Cuervo. 32 (2): 319. eISSN . ISSN .
  • von Lengerke, Geo. (1878). . Zeitschrift für Ethnologie. 10: 306–306. ISSN .