Simalgyax

[David D. Robertson]

LhaXayam, Colin,

Thanks for posting this nice list of words.

A few comments:

Like a number of linguists, I see <buu> "blow" as quite likely part of the
Pacific NW languages' tendency to have similar forms for some words, across
unrelated language groups.

<siipkw> & <k'ohl> look only coincidentally like their Jargon counterparts,
which come from English.  In other words, it seems unlikely to me that
anyone would have taken the English originals & added such non-English
sounds as /kw/ (rounded "K") and /hl/ (voiceless "L"), or added a P in the
middle of "sick".

Similarly, <waas> might be a more convincing match for the Jargon
term "wash", from English.  However, that would entail a huge meaning
shift, for which I see little motivation.

I know very little about Tsimshian/Sm'algyax but some of these forms could
be just coincidentally similar to Jargon forms.  Now, <mismuus> for "cow"
is just about certain to be a loan from Jargon, an extremely common event
in Native languages because cows were not aboriginally present.  But the
prefixes <n-> and <m-> may look like Jargon items only by accident --
though I bet you can find scholars who believe Tsimshianic languages are
members of one "Penutian" family along with (Old) Chinookan, which donated
<nayka>, <mayka> etc. to the Jargon.

On Thu, 8 May 2003 09:00:51 +1000, Colin Bruce <cbruce at SMARTLINE.COM.AU>
wrote:

>I've just been digging a little into Simalgyax:
>
>Simalgyax      Chinook Jargon
>
>t'axtoox = suck          tatoosh = milk/breast
>buu = blow          poo = blow
>siipkw = sick       sick = sick
>k'ohl = year        kol = cold/winter/year
>waas = rain         snass = rain
>Galipliip = thunder liplip = boil
>lax = down/on       lagh = down/on
>mismuus = cow       moosmoos = cow
>noo = mother        noho = mother
>n = I (preposed)         na = I/my (preposed)
>m = you (preposed)  ma = you/your (preposed)
>Tsiits = Grandma    Cheech = Grandma
>
>The above examples were taken from an old Tsimshian Grammar
>and I can see that some words are direct loan words from CJ.
>But I thought the last four examples (Mother, I , you, Grandma)
>and even the first one (suck) would usually stay constant.
>Can anyone talk about how related Old Chinookan and
>Simalgyax are?  Or maybe it's Nuu-cha-nulh that's cross polinating...