OT: name of Vancouver BC

[Leanne Riding]

Hi David!

That touches almost the whole BC Coast and a lot of the Interior, too. 
My expectation would be that everyone living away from Vanc. who 
interacted shared at least one name for the place. With the growth of 
Vancouver there was tons of movement and interaction between everyone on 
the coast and along major river systems. No coincidence there.

Maybe a Kwak'wala speaker happened to come up with the catchiest name?

^_^

Leanne



David Robertson wrote:
> Off topic a little, but maybe interesting:
>
> Ts'amas / Ts'amis / Ts'am'as
>
> is the name of Vancouver, BC in languages of at least 3 unrelated families:
>
> Wakashan, Salish and Tsimshian.
>
> A Kwak'wala speaker has told me it means "pointing place", referring to the 
> spires of all the churches in a city.  She has it as the name of Victoria, 
> BC as well as of Vancouver.
>
> I wonder how this name got shared so widely? Victoria is older, and for a 
> while was more important than Vancouver, so that may be the older meaning.  
> And if the name is Kwak'wala (Kwakiutl), does that help explain its wide 
> distribution?  (Speakers of Kw. & closely related languages traditionally 
> live in territories pretty far northward from here.)
>
> -Dave R.
>
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