Cahto (also spelled Kato) is an

extinct Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its Endling, last member. A taxon may become Functional extinction, functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to Reproduction, reproduce and ...

Athabaskan Athabaskan ( ; also spelled ''Athabascan'', ''Athapaskan'' or ''Athapascan'', and also known as Dene) is a large branch of the Na-Dene language family of North America, located in western North America in three areal language groups: Northern, ...

language that was formerly spoken by the

Kato people The Cahto (also spelled Kato, especially in anthropological and linguistic contexts) are an Indigenous Californian group of Native Americans. Today most descendants are enrolled as the federally recognized tribe, the Cahto Indian Tribe of the L ...

of the Laytonville and Branscomb area at the head of the South Fork of the Eel River. It is one of the four languages belonging to the ''California Athabaskan'' cluster of the

Pacific Coast Athabaskan languages Pacific Coast Athabaskan is a geographical and possibly genealogical grouping of the Athabaskan language family. California Athabaskan * California Athabaskan ** Hupa (dining'-xine:wh, a.k.a. Hoopa-Chilula) *** dialects: **** Hupa **** Tsn ...

. Most Kato speakers were bilingual in Northern Pomo and some also spoke Yuki. It went extinct in the 1960s.

Phonology

Consonants

Cahto has 26 consonant phonemes and 30 phones.

Vowels

Cahto has 9 vowel phonemes (including the diphthong) and 12 phones.

References

* University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnography 5(3):65-238. * Goddard, Pliny Earle (1912).
Elements of the Kato Language
'' University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnography 11(1):1-176. * * Golla, Victor (2011). ''California Indian Languages.'' Berkeley: University of California Press. .

External links

Kato language
overview at the

Survey of California and Other Indian Languages The Survey of California and Other Indian Languages (originally the Survey of California Indian Languages) at the University of California at Berkeley documents, catalogs, and archives the indigenous languages of the Americas. The survey also hosts ...

Kato Language (Cahto)
nativelanguages.org

Experimental Cahto lexical database

OLAC resources in and about the Kato language

Kato basic lexicon at the Global Lexicostatistical Database
Pacific Coast Athabaskan languages Extinct languages of North America Languages of the United States Languages extinct in the 1960s Cahto 1960s disestablishments in California {{indigenousAmerican-lang-stub