[Algonquiana] Prehistoric Language contact ?

[Conor Quinn]

Dia dhaoibh, a chairde!

If I'm not mistaken, the notional dual contrast is found in most (all?) of
Eastern Algonquian, and definitely at least as far south as Western and
Eastern Abenaki.

It's a tricky pattern, because the "duals" are actually just the familiar
verbal plurals of the rest of Algonquian.  E.g. they reflect the various
plural person markings (among them reflex of PA *-aki (with Idp) or the
EAlg version of PA *-wa·-t, i.e. *-hətī-t).  While the more-than-dual
plurals are limited to AI stems, with an added stem-extensional
element---most but not all arising historically from transitivization (=
TA), then reciprocalization (= AI again)---which then takes the same
pluralization morphology as the "dual".

So the contrast looks like it emerges from a notion of a minimal plural (=
just the general Algonquian plural morphology) vs. an extended/non-minimal
plural (= this new stem-extensional element added in).

What's particularly striking about these systems is that they're not in
fact strictly dual vs. strictly (more-than-two) plural.  The
familiar-Algonquian-type simple plurals generally do get a dual
reading...but if the stems inherently imply more-than-two -type
participants---e.g. if they incorporate a number 'three' or above, or refer
to collective/mass action---they very often do not use the stem-extensional
element, and so superficially have a "dual" pluralization pattern.

As far as I know, the only place where there's a completely strict dual vs.
plural distinction is in the Mi'gmaq motion verbs, where -ie/-a' and -a'si
(roughly, 'go..., change...') are systematically replaced with -a'ti for
dual, and -(i)ta' for plural.

Apropos of the original question, I think Ives might have suggested a
possible Iroquoian contact influence in one of his two papers on the
"intrusive nasal" reflex of PEA *ā.  But I might be thinking of some other
source; and it's always struck me as a little tenuous given that the N.
Iroquoian languages I'm aware of systematically have contrastive
nasalization only in vowels other than /a/.  So the contact effect would be
oddly indirect/abstracted.

David Pentland and I have both independently noted some possible cases of
lexical borrowing. Off the top of my head, 'eel' and 'great horned owl' in
the northeastern-area Algonquian languages (i.e. Mi'gmaq gat(ew)-, PsmMl
kàt(e); Penobscot tihtəkəli, PsmMl tihtikòl) may have Iroquoian links. I
don't have the relevant Iroquian material at hand, though, and David likely
has a more extensive list.

Hope that helps!

Till later, keep safe and sane.

Slán,
bhur gcara


P.S.  Is the Denny article the one that suggests PA *šentiy- 'conifer' as a
possible loan from/with Siouan?  And points out the calque-cognacy
(functional equivalence) of *wiki-wa·-hm- with tʰi-pi?  If not, who wrote
that?
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/algonquiana/attachments/20141119/ecf1565f/attachment.htm>