Kamchatkan Languages - Classification

Classification

Kamchatkan (Itelmen) is not closely related to the Chukotkan languages. Although distant enough for doubts about its relationship to have been raised (as in Volodin 1976), cognate morphology clearly demonstrates that it forms a family with Chukotkan (Comrie 1981), though it also has some striking contrasts, especially in the area of phonology. The Chukotko-Kamchatkan proto-language has been partially reconstructed (Fortescue 2005).

Michael Fortescue believes that Kamchatkan may have a substratum of a language formerly spoken by a remnant Beringian population (Fortescue 1998:210).