Guaraní (Avañe'ẽ) is an Amerind language spoken by about 4.6 million people in Paraguay. There are also small communities of Guaraní speakers in Bolivia, Brazil and Argentina. Guaraní is one of the offical languages of Paraguay, along with Spanish, and started to appear in writing in the form of religious texts during the 18th century.
Guaraní has co-existed with Spanish in Paraguay for four centuries and as a result, has absorbed a lot of Spanish vocabulary. Guaraní has also contributed a number of loanwords to English such as cougar, toucan and jaguar.
The Guaraní alphabet shown below was introduced after a Guaraní language congress in Montevideo, Uruguay. The idea was to take the spelling of Guaraní away from the Spanish model.