OP ukki'e 'to speak to'; X ie' (N.B.) ukki'e 'to speak language X with'

Koontz John E John.Koontz at colorado.edu
Fri Jan 23 15:58:57 UTC 2004


Actually, it appears that in addition to having a reflexive possessive or
suus form ugi'kkie, this verb also has a reciprocal ukki'kkie and a dative
which probably has the form (?) ui'kkie.

The reciprocal occurs in 90:86.5:

ukki'kkia=bi=ama
they talked to each other

Also 90:380.2

ukki'kkia=i=the
they talked together

In conection with 'talk to' I located the desired example of "speak
Omaha"!

Dorsey 90:419.2

INda'daN ukki'tha=i    a?       wa?u'z^iNga, ehe'.
What     (enemy) tribe QUESTION (o) old wman I said

PpaN'kka ebdhe'gaN.  UmaN'haN ie'      ua'wakkia=i.
Ponca    I think     Omaha    language I spoke with them.

This is the aftermath of an attack on the Omaha women as they emptied
their caches.  In the event the Omaha-fluent attackers turn out to be
Dakotas.

Dorsey renders the verb 'they talked to me', which is plainly reversed
in sense from what it is.

And here, by the way, ie' 'word(s); language' does receive final accent in
Dorsey.  This also occurs in wa'xe ie'ska 'English interpreter' and
otherwise in ie'ska 'interpreter' and in ie' u's^kaN 'word and deed' and
ie' dhanaN'?aN 'when you hear (my) word(s)' and ie' ed=e's^e 'word() that
you say'.  Rory's suspicion that the accent shifts in nominal usage seems
to be right on the money.

The dative occurs in 90:613.4:

iNwiN'dhakkie (u-iN-dha-kkie)
you speak to me for her

This suggests the stem for ui'kkie, though that isn't actually attested.



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