A report in
American Anthologist (behind a paywall) documents the discovery of a letter in the ruins of a church near Trujillo in northern Peru. The significance of the letter is that on the reverse it has a list of numbers in Spanish, and alongside them a translation into an unknown language. The language appears to be similar to
Quechua, an old language that is still spoken in the Andes, and scholars have speculated that it could be either
Quingnam or Pescadora. Both are now extinct languages, possibly even the same language, and the latter was spoken by fisherman (hence the name, presumably) on the northern coast of Peru. The letter is thought to be about 400 years old
This is just one of many languages spoken in the region before the Spanish (and French and Dutch and English and Portuguese) colonised the area, leading to the eradication of much local culture (and people, come to that). Most of these languages were never written, and therefore have been lost to us forever, unless there are more hidden pieces of paper lying around in abandoned buildings. Our breath remains unheld.
