Tutelo-Saponi Adoption String

Jan Ullrich jfu at lakhota.org
Fri Aug 5 09:25:37 UTC 2011


>> I always wondered whether the Lakota word for 'orphan' 
>> wablenica had a 'without' component in the -nica part, nica 
>> being a stem meaning 'not to exist'.   
>> Does anyone have a derivation for it?

> I think there is no doubt about it.  Dakota nica 
> matches 'be none; not to be' in the other languages.  
> For me the mysterious part is Dakota wable.  
> I don't have cognates for it in any of the other languages.

Bob,

Should the "nica" component in wablenica be the word nicA 'to lack smth/sb' then I would expect the 1st singular form of wablenica to be wablemanice. In reality the 1st singular is wamablenica (i.e. 'ma' is not affixed before nica and the final vowel is not ablauted, as it is in nicA). 
This makes me wonder that perhaps nicA 'to lack smth/sb' is not part of wablenica. What do you think?

Jan



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