Number 'nine' in Chiwere.

Thu Sep 19 00:34:32 UTC 2013

Wow, quite a lot to take in (referring to the other recent emails as well).

I haven’t seen a sense of “to sit on” with the term “agrį.”  The sense I am
familiar with is along the lines of “over” which is what got me to thinking
about the idea of it being related to that prefix “gre-“ when you mentioned
the quinary counting system.  I was curious if that sense of “over” would
have applied 5 digits earlier with that counting system and that maybe for
some reason the term for eight was the last remnant of it.  But even with
the sense of “to sit on” you mentioned, it is used with the current
semi-quinary/semi-decimal counting system when the digits “roll over.”

I am curious about the sense of “to sit on” with that term, though.  Coming
at it from an OM point of view, I can see how the prefix “a-“ would indicate
“on” but haven’t seen anything along the lines of “grį” to mean sit.  The
closest thing I can think of that sounds close to “grį” is the verb “gri”
which is “to return home” (no idea if they are related or not).  Is that
sense a general Siouan concept for that term or is it perhaps from the
Proto-Siouan you mentioned in the other email?

Sky

From: Siouan Linguistics [mailto:SIOUAN at listserv.unl.edu] On Behalf Of
Rankin, Robert L.
Sent: Wednesday, September 18, 2013 6:13 PM
To: SIOUAN at listserv.unl.edu
Subject: Re: Number 'nine' in Chiwere.

We haven't identified the gre•- prefix in Chiwere 'eight', but I don't think
it's related to agriN 'to sit on'.  That's a different root.

Bob

  _____  

From: Siouan Linguistics [SIOUAN at listserv.unl.edu] on behalf of Sky Campbell
[sky at LEGENDREADERS.COM]
Sent: Monday, September 16, 2013 7:21 PM
To: SIOUAN at listserv.unl.edu
Subject: Re: Number 'nine' in Chiwere.

Bob,

Thanks for the info!

When I first saw “no-wunk” as the Hocąk term for eight, my first thought was
the OM term “nuwe/nowe” and how the listed “nope” (as listed in Long’s list
for Hocąk “two”) could shift to “nowe” (the p to w shift that was mentioned
before) and therefore be shoehorned into my “10 minus 2” idea.  It’s amazing
what concessions you allow for when they fit what you want LOL.  That’s why
I try to keep my ideas tentative J.

I see what you’re talking about as far as a quinary system.  The prefix you
are talking about has me curious about how the counting works.  The “gre”
you mention makes me think of the “agrį” that is used when you pass ten (IE
“grebrą agrį iyąnki” for eleven, “grebrą agrį nuwe” for twelve, etc.).  Now
I don’t know much about quinary counting systems but the math side of me can
see how this MAY work as you describe where “agrį danyi” could somehow shift
into “grerabri” (assuming “gre-“ is related to “agrį”).  One problem with
this though is that a contracted version of “grebrą agrį iyąnki” (11) omits
the “grebrą” and just uses the “agrį iyąnki.”  But that would be a possible
formula for six according to what I understand to be the basic quinary
system.  But if that form of six is lost in antiquity and “sagwe” moved in
somehow, I’m guessing the idea of starting over every five digits could
still remain and become the “partial quinary” counting system you are
talking about.

Just some thoughts.  I get into this stuff a little too much sometimes J.

Sky

From: Siouan Linguistics [mailto:SIOUAN at listserv.unl.edu] On Behalf Of
Rankin, Robert L.
Sent: Monday, September 16, 2013 4:39 PM
To: SIOUAN at listserv.unl.edu
Subject: Re: Number 'nine' in Chiwere.

> I’ve been poking around a bit about the number nine and so far I haven’t
found anything to back up the possibility of “grerabri” being related to
“grebrą.”  So I thought I’d try to see what Hocąk has for this.  Note that I
have almost no experience with Hocąk so this is very iffy.  But I found
something interesting (which may be old news to you guys J).

I'm going to leave the Hochunk numerals to the Hochunk specialists, although
I suspect your "one-not" analysis in terms of finger counting is correct.

GrerabriN '8's not related to grebrą '10'.  It's related to rabriN '3'.
'Seven' should be grenoNba, or something close to that, if memory serves.
Systems in which 6 through 10 contain the numbers 1 though 5 are called
quinary (or five-base) counting systems.  In Dhegiha and Chiwere systems the
words for 'seven' and 'eight' usually contain the words for 'two' and
'three' respectively, with a prefix.  The prefix is ppe:- in Dhegiha and
gre:- in Chiwere.  Both prefixes have long vowels.  So Dhegiha and Chiwere
systems are partial quinary counting systems.  This leaves 'nine'
odd-man-out, and various Siouan languages deal with it in different ways, as
we've seen.

Bob

I’ve been going through Maximilian and Long’s Otoe language lists lately and
thought I’d look there for some Hocąk numbers to see if my idea can be
backed up there.  Here is what Long has for nine:

jhink-ich-os-co-ne

Nothing at all like “sanke.”  So based on what’s being said here, I decided
to look at what he has for one:

jhing-ke-de

Looks to me like “one” is definitely part of “nine” here.  I’m not sure what
“(i)ch-o” is doing in there but the “s-co-ne” sure looks like “skunyi” (not)
to me.  So I’m wondering if this is “one – not – (doing whatever)”.  An
EXTREMELY tentative thought I am having right now is maybe the (i)ch-o might
be something along the lines of “ah-kutch-ah” which Henry Merrell has as
“the other side” (that was his spelling as well).  If so, that would be “one
– not – the other side” which perhaps might refer to the idea of holding one
finger down on one hand.  But like I said, that is EXTREMELY tentative.

So I thought, “Ooh!  Maybe eight follows suit!”  But I was stopped cold with
eight being:

no-wunk

I have absolute no idea what is going on there.  It is nothing like
“grerabri.”  I can see how the rest of the numbers match Otoe-Missouria
(with the obligatory shifts and differences, of course) but not eight (or
nine).  So now I am wondering if Hocąk kept the original form of nine but
picked up their eight from somewhere else.

Has anyone else seen or worked with this form of eight before?  Are there
any theories as to its origins?

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