"Lumbee" word list.

BARudes at aol.com BARudes at aol.com
Mon Jan 24 15:48:32 UTC 2000


Just a quick look at the "Lumbee" word list that Bob kindly sent around
reveals
much of the vocabulary is Iroquoian, specifically Seneca, with
some Cherokee, Mohawk, Catawba and other languages thrown in as
well.  I have put my comments between curly brackets to
distinguish them from Bob's.  Seneca data are from Wallace L.
Chafe, 1967, Seneca Morphology and Dictionary.  Washington, DC:
Smithsonian.  I have used <ae> for the ae digraph of Seneca.
Cherokee data are from Durbin Feeling and William Pulte, 1975,
Cherokee-English Dictionary, Tahlequah, Okla: Cherokee Nation of
Oklahoma.  The Mohawk form is from Gunther Michelson, 1973, A
Thousand Words of Mohawk, Mercury Series No. 5, Ottawa: National
Museum of Man, National Museums of Canada.

I  have not analyzed every word, but clearly who ever composed
the list worked from an old Seneca source.  The word for 'Great
Feather Dance', for example, is particularly revealing since it
comes from Proto-Northern Iroquoian *yoct'ohra? 'feather' which,
by regular sound changes of Seneca, becomes osto:wae?
'headdress'.  In any event, either a Seneca war party took up
residence in the Carolinas and became the Lumbee or, as appears
more likely, the list is a late fabrication.


Acorn    Ogo  {Seneca oko:wae? 'red oak, acorn' (Chafe 1967,
#1032)}
Anisgina  Evil Spirits [all other words are in English
alphebetical order] {Cherokee anisgina 'demons, devils}
Blackberries   Otasha
Blueberries    Getda
Black River    Lumbee [here <ee> clearly has its English value]
Big Tree  Yattkin  [c.f. the Yadkin tribe, of unknown
affiliation]
Blackman  Negsi  [clear English influence here]
Bear      Niagi {Seneca (o)nyahkwai? 'bear' (Chafe 1967, #1327)}
Cherry    Gowa {Cherokee khuwa 'mulberries'}
Christ    Sega
Corn      Pagatour
Creator   Hodia
Devil     Segoe  [c.f. Christ, above]
Christian Gaitur
Food      Gowa  [c.f. Cherry, above]
Fire      Ode  [there are a number of Siouan fire/burn forms with
de sequences.] {Catawba de 'blaze'--(Siebert's notes)}
Great Spirit
  or God  Mantoac [looks superficially more Algonquian] {looks
exactly an Eastern Algonquian form of Manitou /mantu:wak/ with
the animate plural ending -ac; it could be Munsee, Unami,
Massachussett, Abenaki, etc.}
Grapes    Wisa
Greetings Bezon  [Some SE languages have bizzare variants of
               "bonjour".  this could be another one.]
Grandfather    Wuniish
Grandmother    Shiyoosh
Great Corn
  Ceremony     Waanowa
Great Feather
  Dance        Ostowa {Seneca osto:wae? 'headdress',
ost'owae?ko:wa:h '(Great) Feather Dance' (Chafe 1967, #1617)
Great Eagle
  Ceremony     Shago
Grand Head
  Chief        Gaa-Yu {? Cherokee ogvwiyuhi 'chief'}
Huckleberries  Oya  [How are these different from blueberries?]
{Seneca o:ya? 'fruit, berry' (Chafe 1967, #298)}
Heaven         Tainade
Lord      Rhoya {Mohawk roy'e:ner 'lord, Christ'}
Whiteman  Honio
Jesus     Jeru
Male      Hadji {Seneca haji:no~h 'he's male' (Chafe 1967, #859}
Maple     Wata (Seneca w'ahta? 'sugar, hard maple' (Chafe 1967,
#52}
Moon      Soika
Nut       Onio
May       Yai
Peach     Odjya
Pear      Ogwa {Seneca okwa:a? 'orange' (Chafe 1967, #1063)
Plum      Gae
Prophet   Proa
Red Raspberries     Dagwa {Seneca takw'a?tae:ne~? 'red raspberry'
(Chafe 1967, #1608)}
Reptile        Dunuwa
River     Iswa  [This is clearly Catawban, though the final V
should be nasalized.] {Catawba 'i:suwa~? 'river'--Siebert notes}
Root      Oka (? Seneca okt'eae? 'root' (Chafe 1967, # 1060)}
Sioux     Wasawi  [no comment]
Strawberries   Odjist (Seneca (o)jisto~t'a?shae? 'strawberry'
(Chafe 1967, #868)}
Snake     Usugi
Sugar     Owan {Seneca owae:no~? 'sugar, maple sugar, candy'
(Chafe 1967, #346)
Sun       Mus
Warrior Society     Unlum
To Fall   Tukar
Tree      Geit {Seneca kae:it 'tree' (Chafe 1967, #340)}
Tobacco   Openna  [Looks Siouan/Catawban, but there are "ope"
words referring to tobacco all the way to the west coast, I
think.]
War Chief Dioni
Women     Yeow (Seneca yeo~h 'she's a female' (Chafe 1967, #779)}
Warrior   Waaow
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