Iskit/Secret Island

[Mike Cleven]

>From: Sally Thomason <thomason at UMICH.EDU>
>Reply-To: Sally Thomason <thomason at UMICH.EDU>
>To: CHINOOK at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG
>Subject: Re: Iskit/Secret Island
>Date: Fri, 21 Apr 2000 06:54:01 -0400
>
>   I'm not wowed by the possibility of a p/k switch in a
>context like that: I mean, anything's possible, but it
>doesn't seem awfully likely.
>
>   On the other hand, there's the well-attested Chinook
>Jargon word itsxut `black bear' (from Chinook).  None
>of the 14 or so attestations that I have of the word
>have a k; most have h or w (or both), as in itswoot
>or ichwet, and a few have f, as in ichfat.  But in other
>anglicizations of Northwest Native words a k sometimes
>replaces a velar fricative x; and s replacing the ts
>isn't unusual, either.  So iskut, which Mike Cleven
>suggested as related, would be a pretty good match for
>itsxut.  Iskit is less likely (the rounding tends to
>remain in anglicizations of labialized CJ consonants
>like "xw", "kw", "qw", and so forth), but still possible
>-- there are other examples.

Is itswoot/itsxut re "bear" where the Iskut River got its name; I'd thought
it was Tahltan or maybe Inland Tlinkit just because of where it is.....

(Boston tillikum can refer to the Mount Edziza Provincial Park region inland
from the Alaska Panhandle).


________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com