[TLINGIT_LANGUAGE-L] Tlingit alphabet names

[Dave Robertson]

LhaXayam,

John, though I don't know Lingit, the word you mention below looks likely to be borrowed from Chinook Jargon /saplil/.  Lingit presumably would substitute the unpronounceable /p/ with a "kw", and unpronounceable /l/ with "n".

Many Native languages borrowed this same word, for example Coast Salish languages of Washington.  The origin of the word hasn't been pinned down, but it's apparently from the lower Columbia River region, rather than from Lingit.

So it may be just a coincidence that "sakwnein" looks like it contains the Lingit "sakw".

As for the original meaning of the word, a funny thing is that this also hasn't been determined.  Scholars of Chinook Jargon debate whether the word first referred to flour or to bread, or to a root harvested by Native people; what's clear from the earliest records is that if you wanted to be very clear that you meant bread (not flour) in Chinook Jargon, you could say /paya saplil/...that's literally "cooked saplil"...the exact same description found in Lingit!

Hope these notes are of some use.

Lhush-san,

--Dave R.

John Palmes <johnpalmes at GCI.NET> wrote:

>Another example is a word I just figured out because Jeff Leer gave us
>the word sakw.... sakw means something like the ingredients for
>something, or something that will become something else after some
>process. I probably won't be gramatically correct,,, but Axh hit sakw...
>might be a pile of building materials for my future house.
>
>So sakwnein is the word for flour. Bread is sakwnein eewu.... "cooked
>bread" is the translation in the dictionary. These days people
>(including teachers) have gotten sloppy and tell you that sakwnein is
>the word for bread. The meaning of the word has been lost because of
>tranlation.. and it is lost to speakers as well as students because
>almost nobody "thinks" about these things the way you say we do.


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