Cacan

The Diaguita and Calchaquí peoples of the northwest of Argentina and the north of Chile spoke the unclassified Cacán language. The name Diaguita is said to come from a Cacán phrase for ‘village inhabitant’. In the sixteenth century they lived in many subtribes, among them the Calchaquí, Pazioca and Quilme, across Catamarca, La Rioja and parts of Salta and San Juan.

The Diaguita were never a single people but a patchwork of chiefdoms, whose dialects varied from valley to valley. The Inca took their lands by war, which depopulated the valleys of Chile. Diego de Almagro's expedition reached the Copiapó valley in April 1536.