butterfly

[Rory M Larson]

Bob wrote:
> No, Quapaw /piza/  "appears" to be 'dry'.

So the /ppiza/ in the original was a typo?
Or do *p and *pp come out the same in Quapaw?


>  Just as
> /nikka/ "appears" to be 'man, person'.  But this
> appearance is just what I'm questioning.  We may
> be over-analyzing some of this.  And I don't care
> for the idea of turning Quapaw into New Guinea
> Pidgin with 'fella' attached to everything.  :-)

Nor I!


> You're quite right that the syntax is often funny
> in these forms.  I think it's just as likely that
> this/these is/are a different /nikka/.

But is the syntax really funny, or are we just
misinterpreting it?  I can't think of any single
morpheme class that makes grammatical sense following
a stative verb, in which the whole construction
reduces to a noun.  Well, possibly an adverb...

   sv    +  N       !=> N
  [piza] + [nikka]  !=> N

But if we assume that /nikka/ is itself a compound,
perhaps of the form I think John was suggesting,

   V      + [*ka]    => N
  [*niNh] + [*ka]    => [*niNhka] > [nikka]
  'live'  + [*ka]    => 'living one', 'person', 'man'

then we might have an avenue to a solution:

If
   sv     +  V       => V
  [*puza] + [*niNh]  => [*puzaniNh]
  'dry'   + 'live'   => 'live dryly'

and
   n      +  V       => V
  [*z^aN] + [*niNh]  => [*z^aNniNh]
  'wood'  + 'live'   => 'live around wood'

then
   V           + [*ka] => N
  [*puzaniNh]  + [*ka] => [*puzaniNhka] > Qw [pizanikka]
  'live dryly' + [*ka] => 'one that lives dryly'

  [*z^aNniNh]        + [*ka] => [*z^aNniNhka] > Qw [z^aNnikka]
  'live around wood' + [*ka] => 'one that lives around wood'

This way, we would still have the same /nikka/,
but the order of evaluation of the morphemes
would be different.

Not (sv)(nikka), but (sv nik)(ka).


>  Seems to
> me I also have one of the spider terms with
> /nikka/ too, but I can't find it right now.

Hope you can locate it!  It sounds like it would
fit right in.

Rory