The Western Siouan languages, also called Siouan proper or simply Siouan, are a Native American language family of North America, and the second largest indigenous language family in North America, after Algonquian. The Western Siouan family is related to the Catawban languages, also called Eastern Siouan, which together make up the Siouan (Siouan–Catawban) language family.
While the Lakota and Dakota comprise "the Great Sioux Nation", the language family is much broader and includes "the old speakers", the Ho-Chunk and their linguistic cousins, the Crow. The Siouan family also extends eastward to Virginia and southward to the Gulf of Mexico.
Linguistic and historical records indicate a possible southern origin of Siouan people, with migrations over a thousand years ago from North Carolina and Virginia to Ohio. Some peoples continued down the Ohio River to the Mississippi and up to the Missouri, and others across Ohio to Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota, home of the Dakota.
Read more about Western Siouan Languages: Family Division
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