Grammatical replication: First-person non-singular verbal indexes in Eastern Toba, Western Toba (Guaicuruan) and Tapiete (Tupi-Guaraní)

In this paper we suggest that linguistic features can show traces of the frequency and intensity social interactions between indigenous peoples. We focus on peoples alluvial fan Pilcomayo River (South American Chaco), analyze first-person non-singular verbal encoding in their languages. The corpus is composed (a) data obtained during fieldwork, (b) descriptive grammars, (c) published reports by missionaries, army officers, European travelers. Combining environmental ethnohistorical information, propose subject indexes split visible Eastern Toba Lower River, Western from Upper-Middle (Guaicuruan), Tapiete Upper area (Tupi-Guaraní) could be an outcome language-internal resources used speakers these languages to replicate Matacoan (Maká, Nivaclé, Wichí) external model.