Samuel Sturman, "Pioneer Days on the Little Spokane" (thanks, Tina W.!)

[Mike Cleven]

>      "[The Spokane Indians] spoke the Chinook jargon, and my wife and I
>grew
>      quite proficient in the language.  It goes like this:
>           Nike tica mica -- I like you
>           Nika klatawa siah -- I am going on a long journey
>      They spoke of time as so many moons (a moon being a month).  They
>also
>      used the sign language to a great extent, but all in all, we could
>      speak with them quite fluently."  (page 4)

It's interesting, given this observation concerning the telling of time by
lunar means, that there hasn't been recorded a Jargon word for "moon" in
this context, unless I'm completely fuzzy and have simply forgotten whatever
the obvious one may be.  Presumably there's such a word in GR Wawa, given
the richer vocabulary there; but outside of GR what's most likely to have
been used - "moon"?

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