Osage

[Rankin, Robert L]

>An Osage friend of mine
once
told me that 'waz^az^e' was an Otoe word originally.  I had never heard
this
before.  Has anyone else ever heard this or anything like it?

I tend to doubt it.  it seems to go back a long way. Some say it has to do
with snakes in some way.

>Also, I have seen in a couple of places a word like 'nialus^ka' or
something to that effect (forgive me if I messed that up, I am having
difficulty recalling the word) used as the "Osage word for  Osage,"

A Nialus^ka (forMrs. Rowe Mialus^la) is a water monster in Kaw.

>The popular story around these parts is that
'Osage' is a corruption of the words for "middle water" (isn't that similar
to the word for China?).

Chungguo 'middle kingdom'

That Osage term wazhazhe is very old and unanalyzable unless John's idea is
right.  Middle waters occurs prominently in Matthews's book, but I don't
know if it extendsto the OS language.  Carolyn would probably have better
idea.

Bob