kinkajou

[Rick Mc Callister]

	So what is the kinkajou in Spanish?
	Or, to be more precise, what do locals call it?
	Costa Ricans tend to lump cat and dog-sized wild mammals into
pisotes "fast, climbing mammals", mozotes "shy, quiet nocturnal mammals"
and zorros "road-kill mammals".
	Pisotes include coatis and other raccoon-like animals.
	Mozote is too ambiguous to pin down
	Zorro, literally "fox" in Spain, is used for possum "zorro blanco",
skunk "zorro hediondo" and so on. Zorrilla is also "skunk". In various
parts of South America, they use zorri/n, zorrita, etc. for "skunk".
	Raccoons OTOH are well known enough to have their own name, "mapache"
	Although dictionaries give zarigu"ey, zarigu"eya for "possum", I've
never met anyone who ever used that term or had even heard it.

[ moderator snip ]

>My recent edition of Collins, one of the best British desk dictionaries,
>not only enters 'kinkajou' but gives it two senses.  Sense 1 is the Central
>and South American mammal Potos flavus, also called 'honey bear' or
>'potto', and related to the raccoon.  Sense 2 is as another name for the
>potto, an African prosimian primate, Perodicticus potto, belonging to the
>loris family.  Apparently kinkajous and pottos, in spite of their rather
>distant relationship, resemble each other so strongly that English-speakers
>have not hesitated to transfer the names in both directions.

>Larry Trask
>COGS
>University of Sussex
>Brighton BN1 9QH
>UK

>larryt at cogs.susx.ac.uk
>
>Tel: (01273)-678693 (from UK); +44-1273-678693 (from abroad)
>Fax: (01273)-671320 (from UK); +44-1273-671320 (from abroad)

Rick Mc Callister
W-1634
Mississippi University for Women
Columbus MS 39701