Cayuse language
The Cayuse language ("Cailloux, Willetpoos") is an extinct unclassified language formerly spoken by the Cayuse Native American tribe in the U.S. state of Oregon. The Cayuse name for themselves was "Liksiyu" (see Aoki 1998). Classification. Similarities to Molala, the language of people to the south of them in central Oregon, are thought to have been due to contact (Rigsby 1969: 71). Edward Sapir had originally grouped Cayuse with Molala as part of a "Waiilatpuan" branch with the Plateau Penutian languages; the Waiilatpuan group had been originally proposed by Horatio Hale (1846), based on his 1841 field work with  the Cayuse people at Waiilatpu Mission. However, Cayuse has little documentation, and that which is documented is inadequately recorded. Pronouns. Cayuse pronouns listed by Horatio Hale (1846): Cayuse pronouns listed by McBean: Verbs. Cayuse verb paradigms documented by Henry W. Henshaw: Vocabulary. In 1910 or 1911, Stephens Savage, a Molala speaker, had told Leo Frachtenberg that the following five words were identical in both Cayuse and Molala (considered by Rigsby (1969) to be loanwords). Limited lexical items in Cayuse had also been collected by Bruce Rigsby, Melville Jacobs, Verne Ray, and Theodore Stern. Their Cayuse informants had highly limited knowledge  of Cayuse and were more fluent in Sahaptin or Nez Perce. Hale (1846). A word list of Cayuse with nearby 200 lexical items was documented by Horatio Hale (1846: 570-629). The word list has been reproduced below.