Cherokee term for 'china clay'

[Craig Kopris]

As far as attested Cherokee terms are concerned,
according to Pulte & Feeling's 1975 Cheroke-English
dictionary, 'unega' is Cherokee for "white"

Craig Kopris

--- "A.W. Tüting" <ti at fa-kuan.muc.de> wrote:

> Hello experts,
> 
> a Chinese friend of mine, Dr. Siu-Leung Lee, is
> doing research on the 
> topic of pre-columbian Sino-American contacts (Zheng
> He) and only 
> recently had a series of press conference and
> lectures about Zheng He 
> and America on his tour in Hongkong. He owns a
> Chinese medal unearthed 
> in the East Coast area (former Cherokee/Catawba
> territory) and is 
> reflecting about linguistic relationship of the term
> for 'china clay' 
> in former southern Chinese and the Native American
> languages 
> respectively.
> Here's what he is stating:
> 
> "The most fascinating fact is the Cherokee term for 
> china clay is 
> ¡§unaker¡¨, similar to what Chinese call  °îªd
> ¡§uk-na[ke]¡¨ in  southern 
> dialect. Is it a coincidence?   This happened before
> the arrival of the 
> Europeans.   The Chinese name uk-nake was used up to
> Ming dynasty.   It 
> was later replaced by other terms like china clay
> and kaolin.   A 
> Jingdezhen porcelain expert said that Zheng He might
> have brought  the 
> clay bricks (petuntse or baidunzi) along with the
> porcelain gifts 
> (...)"
> 
> I'm quite skeptical and would like to hear your
> opinions on this issue 
> as far as linguistic aspects are involved.
> 
> Here's the link to further details:
> http://www.asiawind.com/zhenghe/
> 
> Thank's in advance!
> 
> Alfred 


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