Chicham

Chicham, natively called aent and better known as Jivaroan, is the language of the peoples living along the headwaters of the Marañón River and its tributaries, in northern Peru and the Ecuadorian Oriente. It forms a small family, comprising Shuar, Achuar-Shiwiar, Awajun and Huambisa, while the extinct language of the Palta may also have belonged to it. The name Jivaro probably derives from xivar, the Shuar word for people.

In 1527 the Shuar defeated an Inca army sent by Huayna Capac, and in 1599 they drove the Spanish settlers out of their territory, which kept the language alive in the forest through the colonial era; its speakers combined slash-and-burn gardening with hunting by blowgun and curare-tipped darts.