Na-Dene

in reference to a group of related North American native languages, 1915, coined by U.S. anthropologist and linguist Edward Sapir from *-ne, a stem in the languages for "person, people," and Athabaskan Dene "person, people." "The compound term Na-dene thus designates by means of native stems the speakers of the three languages concerned, besides continuing the use of the old term Dene for the Athabaskan branch of the stock" [Sapir].