Biloxi, Ofo, and Tutelo-Saponi Language

David Kaufman dvklinguist2003 at yahoo.com
Tue Oct 13 00:06:34 UTC 2009


The other Dave suggested it might be the southward flow of the rivers in that region.  That probably makes the most sense - "place where [river] water comes [down from the north]".  

Dave

--- On Mon, 10/12/09, Rankin, Robert L <rankin at ku.edu> wrote:

From: Rankin, Robert L <rankin at ku.edu>
Subject: RE: Biloxi, Ofo, and Tutelo-Saponi Language
To: siouan at lists.Colorado.EDU
Date: Monday, October 12, 2009, 2:02 PM

I certainly think it's something like the two Daves suggest.  But FYI the rain probably wouldn't normally come from the South down there.  Prob. mostly from the West and NW, but who knows?

Bob


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-siouan at lists.Colorado.EDU on behalf of David Kaufman
Sent: Mon 10/12/2009 1:23 PM
To: siouan at lists.Colorado.EDU
Subject: RE: Biloxi, Ofo, and Tutelo-Saponi Language
 
Thanks, Bob and Dave.  I had somewhat thought of that myself - could this be, as Bob says, (a)ni 'water' + u 'LOC' + hu 'come' + ye (CAUS), meaning something like 'the water comes there' ?  I suppose water could either refer to the Gulf (the Gulf comes there) or rain (rain comes there from the south)?

Dave

--- On Mon, 10/12/09, ROOD DAVID S <David.Rood at Colorado.EDU> wrote:

From: ROOD DAVID S <David.Rood at Colorado.EDU>
Subject: RE: Biloxi, Ofo, and Tutelo-Saponi Language
To: siouan at lists.Colorado.EDU
Date: Monday, October 12, 2009, 10:35 AM


For what it's worth, the Lakota etymology for 'south' is 'facing downstream'.  Does that help figure out the Biloxi?  If I put together the pieces 'cause' 'come' and 'water', it might give me 'makes the water come', i.e. pulls it southward.

David S. Rood
Dept. of Linguistics
Univ. of Colorado
295 UCB
Boulder, CO 80309-0295
USA
rood at colorado.edu

On Mon, 12 Oct 2009, Rankin, Robert L wrote:

> Ny in Siouan texts is almost invariably underlying /ni/ followed by a vowel.  So in this case it's probably (a)ni 'water', probably referring to the Gulf of Mexico.  Dave's advice on the glossaries is good; don't ever trust the English to Biloxi/Ofo sections.  Always cross-check.
> 
> Bob
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-siouan at lists.Colorado.EDU on behalf of David Kaufman
> Sent: Sun 10/11/2009 4:18 PM
> To: siouan at lists.Colorado.EDU
> Subject: Re: Biloxi, Ofo, and Tutelo-Saponi Language
> 
> Scott,
> 
> I think you have fallen victim to one of the pitfalls of working with the 1912 D-S Biloxi-Ofo dictionary - if you rely only on the English index (without tediously checking through all of the Biloxi entry and examining examples) you will more often than not end up with incorrect glosses and translations.
> 
> --The Biloxi have the words hakanaki for East, xunumi for North, nyuhuyewade for South, and ide for West.--
> 
> (h)akanaki is ((h)aka 'emerge' + naNki 'posit. sit'), the full form of which is ina (h)akanaNki 'sun emerges' (east).  I also have inahuye, which is ina 'sun' + hu 'come' + ye (CAUS), that is, the sun comes (east).  That xunumi 'north' should be xanami, borrowed from Muskogean falammi 'north' (D-S u-breve usually = unstressed a). (See my paper in the Kansas Working Papers in Linguistics, 2006.)  That ide actually just means 'fall (of its own accord)' and in the Biloxi section D-S give the word itaduye (yes, under ide!), which, as best I can tell, means iN(na) 'sun' + ta(ho) + du (?) + ye (CAUS) = ~ 'sun falls' (west).  As for south, nyuhuyewade has me perplexed - take off the -wade, which just means 'toward' and you're left with nyuhuye, which appears to mean nyu(?) + hu 'come' + ye (CAUS), but I haven't been able to figure out yet what that nyu refers to.  So it seems to be 'something or other comes' but I don't know what that something coming
 is.
> 
> David Kaufman
> 
> 
> 
> --- On Sun, 10/11/09, Scott Collins <saponi360 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> From: Scott Collins <saponi360 at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Biloxi, Ofo, and Tutelo-Saponi Language
> To: siouan at lists.Colorado.EDU
> Date: Sunday, October 11, 2009, 8:35 AM
> 
> Biloxi, Ofo, and Tutelo-Saponi; these languages have been classed together before. Is it possible to recontruct words that may be missing or unknown from one of these languages as a substitute for the other?
>  
> For instance in Tutelo-Saponi I can find no words for the four directions seperatly such as North, South, East, West. There is a word that represents the four directions together mon eke topi. The Biloxi have the words hakanaki for East, xunumi for North, nyuhuyewade for South, and ide for West. The Ofo only have two; ano for North and atoki for South.
>  
> I hope this is correct if not please let me know. I am using the Dorsey and Swanton sources on the Biloxi and Ofo languages and the Hale and Oliverio sources on the Tutelo and Saponi languages.
>  
>  
>  
> 
> 
> Scott P. Collins
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ?


      




      
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