land=mother

[Marianne Mithun]

On 'mother'

Something that always tickled my fancy is the fact that the Tuscarora word
for 'my mother' is E:nE? (where E here represents nasalized schwa, with
stress on the first one, and automatic falling tone). Unlike the other
forms for mother, which are quite different, and all other kinship terms,
there is no identifiable pronominal prefix referring to either of the
kinsmen in the relationship, the mother or the child.

As you all know, the Tuscarora were in the Southeast (mostly North
Carolina) until most of them made their way back up north to join the
other Northern Iroquoians at the beginning of the eighteenth century.


Marianne Mithun


On Thu, 22 Aug 2002, Wallace Chafe wrote:

> Yes, ina? is the speaker's mother, while sa:sin? is somebody else's mother.
> My thought has been that sa:sin? is the earlier Caddo word, and that ina?
> developed from the practice of making captive women into Caddo mothers.
> Since the Osages were the prototypical enemies of the Caddos, I thought
> that Osage might be the best source. (?)
> Wally
>
>
>