Guanches

Guanches

Statue of Tegueste at Candelaria, Tenerife
Regions with significant populations
Languages
Guanche (historically)
Religion
Animism (Guanche mythology)
Related ethnic groups
Berbers, Canary Islanders

The Guanche were the indigenous inhabitants of the Spanish Canary Islands, located in the Atlantic Ocean some 100 kilometres (60 mi) to the west of modern Morocco and the North African coast.^[1] The islanders spoke the Guanche language, which is believed to have been related to the Berber languages of mainland North Africa; the language became extinct in the 17th century, soon after the islands were colonized.

It is believed that the Guanche may have arrived at the archipelago some time in the first millennium BC. The Guanche were the only indigenous people known to have lived in the Macaronesian archipelago region before the arrival of Europeans. There is no accepted evidence that the other Macaronesian archipelagos (the Cape Verde Islands, Madeira and the Azores) were inhabited.

After the commencement of the Spanish conquest of the Canaries, starting in the early 15th century, many natives were outright killed by the Spanish or died of exposure to new pathogens during the social disruption.^[2][3][1] Eventually, any remaining survivors were assimilated into the new Spanish population and associated culture.^[4] Elements of their original culture survive within Canarian customs and traditions, such as Silbo (the whistled language of La Gomera Island), as well as some lexicon of Canarian Spanish. Some scholars have classified the destruction of the Guanche people and culture as an example of colonial genocide.^[2]

In 2017, the first genome-wide data analysis of the ethnic Guanche confirmed a North African origin, genetically being most similar to ancient North African Berber peoples of the mainland African deserts.^[5]