camas & pre-CJ trade vocabulary

[David D. Robertson]

Howdy,

Thanks to Alan, Scott B., Scott T., Dell, and many others for a good
discussion of both "camas" and a possible pre-CJ trade vocabulary.  We've
touched just lightly on the latter idea in previous conversations here, so
I wonder if folks may have more to say on that subject now.

In light of some excellent work on "Nootka Jargon", "Haida Jargon", and
etymologies of some of the first words recorded from the core Chinook
Jargon region along the Columbia River, it's fascinating to consider a
possible pre-contact trade-centered lingo.

What vocabulary can we infer, and what can we reconstruct, of such a
lingo?

How much shall we discount the occurrence of area-wide terms for certain
concepts, given that the Pacific Northwest is a classic
linguistic "Sprachbund" (a region where even unrelated language families
share a significant set of characteristics)?

For example, terms for "frog" and "duck" are uncannily similar throughout
NW languages, but that's no proof of any particular sort of relations
among 'em.  Of course frogs and ducks aren't human social phenomena, which
as Dell et al. rightly point out, are among the most promising materials to
look at for evidence of intercultural contact.  Items we know were
exchanged through trade networks are particularly likely to have had widely
understood names.

Brand recognition!

As you can see, I'm very interested in the question of discerning various
kinds of language contact:  Neighborly relations through centuries; abrupt
mutual discovery; long-distance trade networks; and so forth.

Your thoughts?

Dave