Off topic: RE Iroquoian 'corn'

[Rankin, Robert L]

Although it probably doesn't explain the Cherokee word for 'corn', there are other Aztec and even Incan words in southeastern languages brought in by Spanish soldiers who had served with Cortez or Pizzaro in Mexico and Peru.  The Creek word totolo:si 'chicken' is one of them and there is a Quechuan term for 'basket' roving around the SE.  I doubt a concept as central to the culture as 'corn' would have such a military source though, so if this is from Aztec, it's probably pre-Spanish.  Is the "x" in xilo a graph for "sh", as in 16th cent. Span., or for [x]??

Bob


-----Original Message-----
From: owner-siouan at lists.Colorado.EDU on behalf of David Kaufman
Sent: Sun 1/31/2010 9:26 PM
To: Siouan List
Subject: Iroquoian 'corn'
 
Hi,

As the title suggests, this is really not a Siouan question but an Iroquoian one, since I know we have a few Iroquoianists here on the List.  My question is this: the Cherokee word for corn is 'selu'; are the words for corn in Northern Iroquoian similar or different?  Also, it seems that the Cherokee word 'selu' may somehow be borrowed from Uto-Aztecan 'xilo'.  Does anyone have any thoughts on how Cherokee could have borrowed this term from Uto-Aztecan? Esp. since no Uto-Aztecan borrowing for corn seems to occur in any other Southeastern language that I know of.  (Correct me if I'm wrong, of course.)  Thanks.

Dave