Cayuse <=> "horses" in Spanish?

[Leanne Riding]

Hmmmm. Well at the risk of fuelling a debate, I'm not so sure 
Chinook Jargon is involved here ... and giving the word a Spanish 
origin might be an over-simplification.

In the Chinook Jargon at least, the word for horse was firmly 
'kiutan' from the very beginning, and stayed that way for almost a 
century. Kinda like the word for domestic dog, 'kamux'. The people 
of the Columbia rivermouth weren't really horse people as I 
understand it. With the spread of Chinook Jargon the word 'kiutan' 
became popular -- but it stayed 'kiutan'. Maybe somebody has some 
examples to the contrary?

Also, I do have a few thoughts about the words Kiutan, Cayuse, and 
Coyote. The word 'kiutan' meant horse, but my ears also hear 
'coyote' -- in rural British Columbia you'll here coyote pronounced 
'kaee-oat'. Wikipedia says that 'coyote' is Nahuatl in origin 
(coyotl). I am inclined to think that 'kiutan' may be a relative of 
'coyotl'. If I were to presume that Spanish 'caballos' could travel 
up from the south and reach the Columbia, then perhaps some form of 
'coyotl' could do the same, by the same route.

The inclination to associate coyotes with horses comes from an 
anecdote that I read. There is an journal excerpt (I think it was 
by David Thompson, describing a time before c. 1810) which featured 
a long discussion with an elderly (Piegan? Kootenai?) man. This man 
recalled his people's first encounter with a horse some years 
before the arrival of white people. They had referred to it 
something like 'big dog'.

Perhaps a 'dog' reference at some point connected with 'horse' as 
'Cayuse'? Well, if so I admit it was not the Mayans who made that 
connection. Apparantly the nahuatl word for horse was 'cahuayo', a 
derivative of 'caballo', which only vaguely sounds like 'Cayuse' or 
'Kiutan'. If 'coyotl' was the root word for 'Cayuse', it was 
another people who were responsible for that. In any case, I'm 
pretty confident 'Cayuse' meaning horse has not much to do with 
Chinook Jargon and comes from a different way of speaking 
altogether. Like Coyote.

'elk' (or moose, which was then called elk frequently in North 
America and still today in Europe) might make a good nickname for a 
horse, too.

Another reason why I'm ambivalent about the idea of a European word 
origin for horse, is that the horse arrived before the Europeans 
did -- and while in many cases it would have shipped all nicely 
tagged and labelled with a prefabricated name, I shouldn't be 
surprised if sometimes, the labels fell off.

;)

-----

Gabriele Franchere c. 1815 recorded that the Chinooks called horses 
'Koutane', domestic dogs 'Kamoux', deer 'Moulak'. He translated 
'Etalapasse' as God or Supreme Being. (Franchère, Gabriel, 
1786-1863. Bibaud, Michel, 1782-1857. "Quelques mots de la langue 
Chinouque ou Tchinouke." Relation d'un voyage à la côte du 
nord-ouest de l'Amérique septentrionale, dans les années 1810, 11, 
12, 13 et 14.  p. 204.)

Alexander Ross, from the same period, recorded horses 'Keutan', 
domestic dog, 'Camux', elk 'Moluk', small deer 'wow-wich', Ross 
clarifies that he considered the previous examples Chinookan. 
(Ross, Alexander. "Chinook Vocabulary."  Ross's Adventures of the 
first settlers on the Oregon or Columbia River, 1810-1813. 
Cleveland, Ohio, A. H. Clark, 1904. 321-329.)

Joel Palmer journeyed west c. 1845, and recorded the Chinook word 
for horse as "K-u-ten", domestic dog as "K-macks", deer as 
"Mow-witch", elk as "Mu-lack",  He adds that the Nez Percé, on the 
other hand, who were much more familiar with horses, called horses 
"Shikam", a colt a "kiah", fox "Tilipa".  (Palmer, Joel. "Words 
used in the Chinook Jargon."  Palmer's Journal of travels over the 
Rocky Mountains, 1845-1846. Cleveland, Ohio: A.H. Clark, 1906.)

In Alexander Caufield Anderson's 1857 book, a glossary was appended 
that gave horse as 'Kiutan', domestic dog 'Kramox', elk as 'Moolak 
or Moose' (keeping in mind that 'elk' could mean 'moose'), mule as 
'Le Mule or Hyas Kolon'. (Anderson, Alexander Caufield. "Chinook 
Jargon." Hand-book and map of the gold region of Frazer's and 
Thompson's rivers. San Francisco, California: J.J. LeCount, 1857. )

Duncan George Forbes MacDonalds, 1863 book gave horse as 'Kiutan', 
domestic dog as 'Namox', deer as 'Mowitch', (Macdonald, Duncan 
George Forbes. "Chapter XII: Chinook Jargon and English 
Equivalents." British Columbia and Vancouver's Island. 3rd Edition. 
London, England: Longman, Green, 1863.)

About the same time, Theodore Winthrop's glossary recorded house as 
'Knitan' and stable as 'Knitan-house'. I guess he had bad 
handwriting or a really confused typesetter. (Winthrop, Theodore. 
"A partial vocabulary of the Chinook Jargon."  The canoe and the 
saddle. Boston : Ticknor and Fields, 1866, c1862. 299-302.)

Anyways, until around the mid-1800s, there seem to be little or no 
mentions in my dictionaries of the very specific animal which we 
today call a coyote. Coyotes in the old days seem to be referred to 
as wolves or foxes, and were very numerous and brazen, just as they 
are today. Wolves were recorded by the French word Le Loup, and 
foxes referred to as something like Talapas. Wolves/coyotes/foxes 
as a group were recorded as Le Loup/Talapas.

Gibbs in 1863 brings up the subject of the Coyote. He writes 
"Tál-a-pus, n.  Chinook, ITALIPAS; Yamama, TELIPA.  (Pandosy.)  The 
coyote or prairie wolf.  A sort of deity or supernatural being, 
prominent in Indian mythology.  A sneak.", (Gibbs, George.  A 
Dictionary Of The Chinook Jargon, Or Trade Language Of Oregon. 
Washington: Smithsonian Institution, 1863.)

A bit later, in Francis Norbert Blanchet's publication, coyote (aka 
prairie wolf) reappears as 'Talapus'.

...hmmm... anyways you get the idea.




On Friday, January 28, 2005, at 09:22 , David Robertson wrote:

> Alan Hartley posted this back in September...Sorry to be dense, 
> but does
> this mean our best guess is that the name "Cayuse" comes 
> ultimately from
> the Spanish word "caballos"="horses", via some NAm aboriginal 
> languages?
> (Cf. William Bright's "Animals of Acculturation in the California 
> Indian
> Languages", UC Press, Berkeley, 1960.  That book shows the same 
> loanword
> from Spanish in such languages as: Pomo, Yuki, Patwin, Maidu,
> Miwok...interestingly not in some of the California languages 
> spoken closes
> to Cayuse, e.g. Yurok, Shasta, Klamath.  The Yurok form incidentally
> is "mulah", perhaps a loan from Spanish for "mule" but perhaps [less
> likely] comparable with CJ /mulak/ 'elk'.)  --  Dave R.

To respond to the CHINOOK list, click 'REPLY ALL'.  To respond privately to the sender of a message, click 'REPLY'.  Hayu masi!