[Lexicog] Turkey

[David Costa]

Actually, */pele:wa/ is more complicated than I realized. 

Here's the breakdown:

'turkey': Shawnee, Fox, Miami, Potawatomi, Delaware

'grouse' (of some kind): Ojibwe, Menominee, Cree, Micmac, Arapaho/GrosVentre

I'm a tad reluctant to reconstruct this as 'grouse' since there are better
Proto-Algonquian candidates for that. Perhaps its true PA meaning is
'salient local game fowl'.

Ojibwe mizise is from an etymon (*/me?$i?le:wa/, lit., 'big flier') that
seems to mean 'turkey' most of the time, and 'prairie chicken' the rest of
the time.

'turkey': Ojibwe, Cree, Cheyenne, Menominee

'prairie chicken': Fox, Miami

Dave


> David Costa wrote:
>
>> The Proto-Algonquian word for 'turkey', */pele:wa/, can be etymologized
>> as literally meaning 'flier'.
>
> which comes out in Ojibway as bine 'partridge, ruffed grouse' and binesi
> 'bird (of a large species)'. Turkey is mizise.
>
> /pele:wa/ descendants in Plains Cree mean 'bird' and 'prairie chicken'.
>
> Alan
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