moose/orignal

[janilta]

Hello, Mike,

Well, I don't know much about elks in Europe but considering the
linguistical point of view of a surviving population of elks in Euskadi
(Basque Country), the Basque word would also have remained into French
local languages which is not the case...
The French word (rarely used since the animal itself does not exist in
France) is 'elan' which is close to the Indo-European root of this very
word 'eln' or 'elk' (common to every North-European language).

The main source of French immigration to Canada was Normandie and Poitou
(I assume that what you call 'French Breton dialect' is Gallo, a dialect
of French with some Brezhoneg/Breton influence spoken in the East of
Bretagne, but distinct from the dialects spoken in Poitou even if these
regions are not so far from one another), regions where any
Euskara/Basque influence would be impossible.
And as we mentioned earlier, people from these regions would have no
notion of elk anyway. No 'orignal' word brought from France I think.

So, if we go back to 'orignal', the various sources give Basque as
origin (I am not the original source of this theory !). So it could be
as I said 'orein' ('stag'). In Euskara, 'the stag' would thus be
'oreina' and 'the stags', 'oreinak', which is close to apparently the
first recorded form of 'orignal', 'orignac'. (barkatu ! ez dut euskaraz
hitz egiten...).

According to John Holm's 'Pidgins & Creoles', when Cartier explored the
Gulf of St-Laurent in 1542, the Native populations still understood
(some) Basque Pidgin and the existence of Basque Pidgin is even recorded
as late as 1710... so it is thus not impossible that during all these
years some Basque Pidgin words entered the French spoken in
Nouvelle-France (Canada). In a book dating from 1617, the author even
mentioned 'Souriquois' words thought to be Native (Micmac) ones...
whereas in fact they were Basque Pidgin ('zurikoa' meaning 'the
(language) of the Whites' in Euskara/Basque).

And apparently, even US 'gazoony' comes from Maritime Basque
'gassuna'... But we're far from Wawa here... ;-)

Regards, Yann.