(O)maha

[Koontz John E]

On Wed, 24 Mar 2004, David Costa wrote:
> Or Dakota /ho'taNke/, or Iowa-Otoe <hotu'nge>.

Although those have th (aspirated t).  I thought Dhegiha -tt- ~ -ht- might
be more likely to yield -d-.  I'm not sure about the final e in the
Dakotan form.  Maybe -a?  IO tunge is probably thaN<eng>e ~ thaN<enye>e,
depending on dialect, as this is what happens to forms like *-thaNka in
IO.  Nobody know what this would have been in Michigamea, of course ...
:-).

> Either the name was not borowed from Winnebago directly, or it was
> borrowed from Winnebago before that language had palatalized /t/ to /c/.
> We're talking at least 300 years ago, so the latter idea seems entirely
> possible.

True, though I think Winnebago has had c^ in forms attested for about the
last 200 of those years.