Algonquian, Wiyot, and Yurok: Proving a Distant Genetic Relationship [Reprint 2020 ed.] 9783112420461, 9783112420454

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IVES G O D D A R D

Algonquian, Wiyot, and Yurok Proving a Distant Genetic Relationship

LISSE

THE PETER DE RIDDER PRESS 1975

© Copyright reserved No part of this text may be translated or reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means without written permission from the author. ISBN 90 316 0056 3

The text of this article is reprinted from Linguistics and Anthropology: In Honor of C. F. Voegelin edited by M. Dale Kinkade, Kenneth L. Hale, and Oswald Werner (Lisse: The Peter de Ridder Press, 1975) pp. 249-262

Printed in Belgium by N.I.C.I., Ghent

A L G O N Q U I A N , WIYOT, A N D Y U R O K : PROVING A DISTANT GENETIC RELATIONSHIP IVES GODDARD

Students of the North American Indian languages have, over the years, been very much concerned with the problem of demonstrating historical relationships between these languages. One of the more significant proposals in this regard is the hypothesis of Edward Sapir, set forth in 1913, that there was a genetic relationship between the extensive and well-known Algonquian family of languages - spoken over a large, irregular area in the eastern part of the continent, centering about the upper Great Lakes - and the languages of the Wiyot and Yurok, two small tribes of the northern California coast. 1 The two California languages are at first blush quite dissimilar to Algonquian and, in fact, Truman Michelson, the foremost Algonquianist of the day, vigorously denied that the proposed relationship had been proven.2 At present, however, largely as a result of new data provided by recent fieldwork on Wiyot and Yurok, scholars are in general agreement that the daring hypothesis of Sapir is, indeed, correct.3 Its significance, then, is that it furnishes us an example of a distant and not-at-all obvious genetic linguistic relationship, which nevertheless can be demonstrated rigorously and which obviously has profound implications for the prehistory of North America. The question of how it is possible to prove such a relationship is the topic of this paper. Proving a genetic relationship between two languages is a matter of showing that they share similarities which can only be accounted for by the assumption that the languages have descended from a common ancestor. There are, logically, two stages in such a demonstration. It is necessary to show not only that the resemblances are so numerous and detailed as to exclude the possibility of chance as an explanation but also that they are so tightly woven into the basic fabric of the languages that they cannot be explained simply as borrowings.4 It goes without saying that there is not always agreement about how many and what sorts of resemblances can be reasonably explained away as merely accidental,

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or about what sorts must necessarily be a common genetic inheritance. Proof in such matters, then, can never be completely objective. Accordingly, it will be argued here that the kinds of similarities which are most valuable for showing genetic relationship are those which involve details of the morphological structures of the languages. If one finds in two languages what is essentially the same system, with the same internal structure, embedded in their grammars, then it is likely that the criteria for proof can be met. Similarities between lexical items are much less satisfactory, since individual words are readily borrowed and since each comparison must stand alone and does not have the added impact which it would gain from being part of a system of similarities. The discussion below of the data from Algonquian, Wiyot, and Yurok will try to make clear the way in which certain kinds of morphological similarities are indicative of genetic relationship. When comparing elements in different languages it is important first of all to have some idea of the overall morphology of the languages and of the place of the elements in the system. Otherwise there is a risk of comparing elements which do not correspond as to category. Algonquian, Wiyot, and Yurok each have three word classes: nouns, verbs, and particles.5 Nouns and verbs each have their distinct patterns of inflection, while the particles are uninflected. In Algonquian nominal and verbal stems are built up out of three types of elements: roots, medials, and finals. Take for example the following, from Cree: kaskika-te-sin'break one's leg falling', which consists of the root kask- 'break', the medial -(i)ka-te•- 'leg', and the final -sin- 'fall'; pakamihkwe-hw- 'hit (someone) on the face', from root pakam- 'hit', medial -(i)hkwe-- 'face', and final -hw- 'act upon animate object'. It is clear that the corresponding Wiyot and Yurok forms are exactly parallel in formation: Wiyot takwa?Sonor- 'break arm by falling', from takw- 'break', -assort- 'arm', and -or- 'by falling', Yurok s'o-pe?weyet- 'hit (someone) in the face', from s'o-p- 'hit', -e?wey- 'face', -et- 'transitive marker'. This general parallelism in the types of stem formation does not itself demand an historical explanation, but it insures at least prima facie verisimilitude in the comparison of similar elements. Inflection in Algonquian, Wiyot, and Yurok is largely a matter of adding suffixes after the nominal and verbal stems. However, in each of the three languages there is also a small number of prefixes. These prefixes share so many similarities of form and function, that they alone would be sufficient to demonstrate a genetic relationship between the languages. Each language has a set of precisely four, mutually exclusive,

5

ALGONQUIAN, WIYOT, AND YUROK TABLE 1 The pronominal prefixes in Proto-Algonquian (PA), PA First person Second person Third person Indefinite

Wiyot Set I du(?)khu{?)-

*ne*ke*we*me-

Wiyot, and Yurok

Set II dkhwb-

Yurok ?nek'eme-

Examples 'my 'your 'his 'a

tooth': tooth': tooth': tooth':

Cree ni-pit ki-pit wi-pit mi-pit

Wiyot dâpt khâpt waptâ^l bâpt

Yurok ?nerpel k'erpei ?werpel merpel

pronominal prefixes; they correspond exactly in form and meaning (see Table 1). A few formal notes may be helpful. In Wiyot d and b are in morphophonemic alternation with n and m respectively, and internal evidence alone indicates that d- 'first person' is from *n- and b- indefinite from *m-.6 The glottal stop 3 appears in the Set I endings before certain consonants and is absent before others; h( 9 )- is presumably from earlier *wm(9)-. The Yurok first and third person prefixes have the forms and fwe- if they follow without pause a word ending in a vowel; otherwise they are ne- and we-. The alternant ?k- occurs regularly before certain consonants. The glottalization in the Yurok prefixes appears to be secondary, as it is not found in the independent pronouns: nek 'I', ke9l 'you (sing.)' (stem kel-), nekah 'we', and kelew 'you (pi.)'. In addition to the obvious congruence of form, there are detailed similarities in the use of the prefix system in the three languages. In all three languages these prefixes are used with both nouns and verbs. Added to nouns, they indicate possession, and their use permits nouns to be divided into two classes: dependent nouns (which always have a prefix) and non-dependent nouns (which may occur without a prefix). This opposition has had an important consequence in Wiyot, where a formal differentiation has arisen between the Set II prefixes, used with forms which are always prefixed (the dependent nouns and negative

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IVES GODDARD TABLE 2

Wiyot prefixes of Set II elided before a consonant First person Second person Third person Indefinite

'maternal aunt' citi chtil culàiI citi

'not' 'not' kado kho ko, earlier kwo

verbs), and the Set I prefixes, used with non-dependent nouns. Set II is almost completely elided before a consonant initial stem (Table 2), and it is clear that Set I must be the result of a renewal, in the productive morphological category only, of the older prefixes which continue, as Set II, in the nonproductive categories. In all three languages the prefix for indefinite possessor (Algonquian *me-, Wiyot b-, Yurok me-) is found only with dependent nouns. Several idiosyncratic morphological details related to the use of the prefixes in Algonquian are also found in either Wiyot or Yurok. When one of the latter languages lacks such a feature, its absence can safely be ascribed to loss, as some have dropped out of a number of the descendant Algonquian languages as well. In Algonquian and Wiyot vowelinitial non-dependent nouns insert a -t- after the prefixes: Fox ahkohkwa 'kettle', netahkohkwa 'my kettle' (with ne- plus -/-); Wiyot Pi 'intestines', dutPl 'my intestines' (with du- and -t-).1 In Algonquian and Yurok there is a subset of the dependent nouns - which includes all those that are kinship terms - that does not take the indefinite-possessor prefix; those that do take this prefix are mostly body-part terms. Thus there is Yurok ">wipl 'his tongue', mipl 'someone's tongue' and Cree wi-pit 'his tooth', mi-pit 'a tooth'; but Yurok fwenos 'her husband', Cree wi-sta-wa 'his brother-in-law' have no forms with m-.s In Algonquian there are two genders, conventionally called animate and inanimate; when an animate noun has a third person possessor it takes a so-called obviative ending, *-ali (singular) or *-ahi (plural), as in *ni-wi-6a 'my horn' (grammatically animate), *wi-wi-0ali 'his horn'. This pattern may be compared with that in Wiyot (which has no gender), where all thirdperson possessed nouns add an ending (with variants), as in p6s 'basket plate', dupds 'my basket plate', uposa^l 'his basket plate'. When the use of the prefixes in the verbal systems of Wiyot, Yurok, and Algonquian is examined, the same sorts of striking similarities

ALGONQUIAN, WIYOT, AND YUROK

7

appear as in the case of the noun. All three languages have some verbal paradigms which use the three personal prefixes and some which do not. The prefixing paradigms use prefixes and suffixes together to indicate the subjects of intransitive verbs and the subjects and objects of transitives; the non-prefixing paradigms indicate the participants with suffixes alone.9 In Algonquian and Wiyot any form having a second-person participant (as either subject or object) takes the second-person prefix; any form having a first-person participant, but no second person, takes the first-person prefix; forms having only third-person participants take the third-person prefix.10 Thus Fox has kewa-pamene 'I look at you', kewa-pama-wa 'you look at him', with second-person ke-, and newa-pamekwa 'he looks at me', newa-pama-wa 'I look at him', with first-person ne-, just like Wiyot kho waldsaf 'I don't see you', kho walaf 'you don't see him', with kho from second-person kh- plus ko 'not', and kado walawilU 'he doesn't see me', kado waffl 'I don't see him', with kado from first person d- plus ko.11 The adding of the prefixes to preverbal particles separate from the verb stem, as in these Wiyot examples, is also found in Yurok and is the regular pattern in Algonquian: Yurok k'ema-no-^monemek' '(that) you carried him', Menomini neke-s-mi-cehsim 'I have eaten'. Here Yurok ma 'past' and Menomini ke-s 'completed', though joined to what follows by a hyphen to indicate their syntactic status as pre verbs, are followed by a full word boundary; in Algonquian fully independent words may appear between a preverb (whether prefixed or not) and the rest of the verb.12 In Algonquian there is a pattern of derivation by which verbs of possession are made from third-personprefixed noun stems; when prefixes are used in the verbal paradigm they appear before the derivational third person prefix: *ni-wa 'my wife', *wi-wali 'his wife', *wi-w-i- 'have a wife' (verb stem), *newvwi 'I have a wife'. The same pattern is attested in Yurok: ?nahpew 'my wife', ?wahpew 'his wife', ?wahpew- 'to marry (said of a man)', ^ne^wahpewok' '(that) I am married'. The resemblances between the pronominal prefix systems of Algonquian, Wiyot, and Yurok would be sufficient to demonstrate the genetic relationship of these languages. These are not vague similarities pulled at random from various parts of the grammar, but represent a single, self-contained system which is found in virtually identical form in all three languages. It is quite unlikely that such a system, with all its complexities, could have arisen independently in more than one language, or could have been borrowed from one language to another. For the protolanguage which must be postulated as the ancestor of Wiyot, Yurok,

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IVES GODDARD

and Algonquian, we can confidently reconstruct the entire prefix system which these languages have been seen to share, including many idiosyncratic details of its use. 13 Additional comparisons between Algonquian, Wiyot, and Yurok serve to fill out our understanding of just how much of the grammar of the ancestral protolanguage has been continued in the descendant groups. One interesting morphological subsystem which is strikingly parallel in the three languages is that of numerals and enumeration. The lower numbers (1 through 5 in Algonquian, 1 through 4 in Wiyot and Yurok) are indicated by roots which combine freely with a variety of medials and finals, but the higher numbers appear only as invariable independent particles in conjunction with a special root (glossed 'so many') to which the various non-initial elements are affixed.14 Thus we have Menomini ni-siwak 'they are two' (root ni-s- 'two'), no-hekan tahse-wak 'they are seven' (particle no-hekan 'seven', root talis- 'so many'); Wiyot ditad 'they are two' (root dit- 'two'), oVaw alad 'they are seven' (particle o^law 'seven', root al- 'so many'); Yurok nPiyei 'they are two' (ni 'two'), cawasik' co-^mei 'they are seven' (cawasik' 'seven', co-?m- 'so many'). Note that it is structures and not lexical items that are being compared. Up to this point we have examined only morphological structures in Algonquian, Wiyot,and Yurok; we have purposely omitted any reference to the type of resemblance most often cited in support of newly postulated genetic relationships in North America, namely, sets of similar lexical stems. It is widely believed that, when accompanied by lists of the corresponding sounds, a moderate number of lexical similarities is sufficient to demonstrate a linguistic relationship. These lists of correspondences are presented to show that the resemblances are not random or accidental, but systematic and regular. However, there are several reasons why this approach is unsatisfactory. In general, the establishing of phonological correspondences is something that goes on within the framework of a family of languages already known to be related. For example, the statement that Fox p regularly corresponds to Cree p is merely an abbreviated way of asserting that Fox p and Cree p both derive from a single source in the protolanguage, according to regular rules. (In this case Proto-Algonquian *p gives Fox p and Cree p in all positions.) This statement is part of a complex hypothesis about the phonological system of the protolanguage and the various changes which it underwent while developing into the systems of the descendant languages. When, on the other hand, there is no systematic hypothesis about the phono-

ALGONQUIAN, WIYOT, AND YUROK

9

logical histories of the languages in question, there can be no sound correspondences, properly speaking. In the initial framing of such an hypothesis it is always a set of good etymologies which forms the basis for the eventual postulation of true sound correspondences.15 The criteria which have usually been considered necessary for a good etymology are very strict, even though there may seem to be a high a priori probability of relationship when similar words in languages known to be related are compared. In the case of lexical comparisons it is necessary to account for the whole word in the descendant languages, not just an arbitrarily segmented 'root', and the reconstructed ancestral form must be a complete word. 16 Where grammatical elements are etymologized it is necessary to present an hypothesis about the system of which they are a part in its entirety. It is obvious also that the greater the number of descendant languages attesting a form, and the greater the number of comparable phonemes in it, the more likely it is that the etymology is a sound one and the resemblances not merely the result of chance. A lexical similarity between only two languages is generally considered to be insufficiently supported, unless the match is very exact both phonologically and semantically, and it is rare that a match of only one or two phonemes is persuasive. If the meanings of the forms compared differ, then there must be an explicit hypothesis about how the meaning has changed in the various cases. Now, if these strict criteria have been found necessary for etymologies within known linguistic families, it is obvious that much stricter criteria must be applied to word-comparisons between languages whose relationship is in question. In fact it is virtually impossible to prove a distant genetic relationship on the basis of lexical comparisons alone. 17 A consideration of some proposed word-comparisons in Wiyot, Yurok, and Algonquian may help to indicate why this is so. 18 In general, when similar words are found in two languages known to be related, there is a certain a priori probability of their being cognate. A deeper examination, however, often shows the comparison to be less likely than appears on the surface - or even impossible. The counterevidence may come from phonological, morphological, or semantic analysis; an example of each will be considered. Proto-Algonquian *-to-n- has been compared with Wiyot -lul and Yurok -lui; all three words mean 'mouth' and require pronominal prefixes indicating possessor. Now, in Yurok, nouns ending in postvocalic -i (which seem more common than those in -/) replace -i by -/ before the locative ending -oi: k'elul 'your mouth', k'elulol 'on your

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IVES GODDARD

mouth'. There is thus the possibility that we have to do with a stem in original -/, with devoicing to -i in word-final position. This speculation seems immediately confirmed by the Wiyot word, since on this earlier level the Yurok and Wiyot words would be identical: Yurok *-lul (whence -lui ~ -/«/-) and Wiyot -lul. But this hypothesis, while it strengthens the comparison of the Wiyot and Yurok words with each other, seems to weaken the comparison with Algonquian *-to-n-; the connection can probably be made only if an ad hoc postulation of assimilation between the initial and final consonants is allowed.19 An ad hoc assumption, however, always weakens severely the persuasiveness of an etymology, and in the end it must be admitted that deeper examination reveals the proposed comparison of the words for 'mouth' to be less convincing than it appears on the surface. Wiyot witaH 'his tongue' (stem -it) has been compared to Algonquian *wi-Qanyiwi 'ibid.' (stem *-{i-)9anyiw-), a form reflected by Fox, Kickapoo, Shawnee, Delaware, Arapaho, etc. 20 But this Algonquian word must in the first instance be compared with *wete-lanyiwi 'his tongue' (stem *-te-lanyiw-), which is attested by Cree, Menomini, and Ojibwa. Comparison of these two words for 'tongue' suggests that the sequence *-anyiw-, which both have in common, should be segmented out. Supporting this segmentation is the occurrence of the remaining portions of each word (*-/•#- and *-te-l-) in other body-part terms, e.g. *-i-8'head', *-i-0eW'hair of head' (with *-eW- 'hair'), and *-te-lilcom'nostril' (with *-kom- 'nose'). It seems, then, that it is *-anyiw- that is to be associated with the meaning 'tongue'; this is preceded by an element *-i-0'head' or *-te-l-, meaning perhaps 'orifice'. 21 Thus morphological analysis of Algonquian *wi-9anyiwi 'his tongue' shows that it is very likely the wrong part of the word that has been compared with Wiyot -it-, and the proposed equation must be rejected. Yurok nepuy 'salmon' has been compared with Algonquian *name-wa 'sturgeon'. The Algonquian word is related to a number of other forms referring to fish, e.g. *name-c>sa 'fish', *name-kwa, *name-kwehsa 'lake trout'. The Yurok word, however, seems to be related to nep- 'to eat', which also has the derivatives nepe^wis 'fish', nepe^wo- 'first salmon to run up the Klamath River', nunepew ~ nunepuh ~ nunepuy 'food, fish', nuneg 'food' (from *nunegep-; compare neg 'eater' [in compounds], from negep-).22 The reduplication nu- in nunepuy (and its variants) and nuneg does not seem to be found elsewhere in Yurok, but it seems impossible to disassociate neg and nuneg from nepuy and nunepuy. The indication that nepuy 'salmon' is a derivative of nep- 'to eat' is imme-

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11

diately confirmed by consideration of the semantic relationship of these words in neighboring languages, whose speakers had cultures nearly identical with that of the Yurok. In Wiyot the word boiak 'salmon' is a verbal derivative which literally means 'one feasts'.23 In Karok fa-ma 'salmon' (which has the compounding variant lamva-) is a derivative of ? a/n— ?av- 'to eat'; note the word ?amva-mva-n 'otter' (?amva- 'salmon' + amva-n 'eater') and compare Yurok nepe^wisneg 'otter' (nepe?wis 'fish' and neg{ep-) 'eater').24 Thus an examination of the semantic associations of the word for 'salmon' in Yurok makes it clear that its apparent resemblance to the Algonquian word for 'sturgeon' is purely fortuitous. The three cases considered in the preceding paragraphs may give some notion of the extent to which pure chance may be the explanation for lexical resemblances between languages, even when the languages are related. It follows that resemblances between languages not known to be related may be due to chance alone on an even greater scale. The three proposed etymologies first considered are poor ones; as they are examined more closely they appear less and less attractive, or even impossible. A good etymology, on the other hand, is one which looks better and better as the synchronic and diachronic relationships of the words become more fully known. As examples, let us consider three proposed comparisons : 1) Algonquian *we8kani, Wiyot watkaddt, Yurok iwalks'*, all meaning 'bone'. 2) Algonquian *we6kweni, Wiyot watwad, Yurok fwaikun, all meaning 'liver'. 3) Algonquian *-a-pe6k-, Wiyot piatk, both meaning 'stone'. It is the recurring correspondence in the consonant clusters in these words that first attracts attention: Algonquian *0k, Wiyot tk, Yurok ik; Algonquian *6kw, Wiyot tw, Yurok iku\ Algonquian *6k, Wiyot tk. This gives an initial plausibility to the comparisons and is more than a sound correspondence of the usual sort, discussed above; it throws light on the background of the patterns of consonant clustering in the three languages, a matter which has long been a challenge to Algonquianists.25 There are some discrepancies, but when they are examined they fit into patterns which recur elsewhere. First, on the semantic level, there is the fact that Algonquian *we9kani and *wedkweni actually mean respectively 'his bone', and 'his liver'.26 In a number of the descendant Algonquian languages, however, these words have incorporated the third person prefix *we- into the basic form, e.g. Menomini ohka-n

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'bone', but (with readdition of third person o(-t)-, from *we(-t)-) oto-hkanem 'his bone'. 27 Thus if we assume that Wiyot and Yurok have incorporated the third-person prefix, the comparison becomes exact. This is equivalent to postulating that the sources of these two words in the original protolanguage of Wiyot, Yurok, and Algonquian were bimorphemic words meaning 'his bone' and 'his liver'. It is important to note that the postulation of prefix incorporation in the Wiyot and Yurok words is not an ad hoc assumption (an assumption with no function except to explain the problem at hand), since this process is independently attested in several of the Algonquian languages. In the words for 'bone' and 'liver' Wiyot has d (phonetically a flap [r]) where Algonquian has *n. Wiyot stems in final -d replace this with n before suffixes: tdd 'father', t6na.fl 'his father'. Probably, then, Wiyot d goes back to earlier *n in all cases, and the appearance of d in the words for 'bone' and 'liver' merely provides other examples of an independently attested process.28 In the word for 'bone' Wiyot has tk and Algonquian *6k, while in the word for 'liver' Wiyot has tw beside Algonquian *0kw. An obvious hypothesis is that earlier *tkw in Wiyot became tw; there would then be a correspondence of Algonquian *0k, Wiyot tk, and Yurok Ik in both words (and another, without a Yurok representative, in the word for 'stone'). This hypothesis is readily confirmed by several independently established facts. There is no sequence tkw in Wiyot; thus there are no possible exceptions to the rule that *tkw becomes tw. Also, when a stem in -tk suffixes a -w- the sequence -tkw- is reduced to -tw-; this shows that the postulated rule actually exists in the modern Wiyot language. For example, Wiyotpiatk 'stone' suffixes a -w- before any added element, and piatkw- plus the locative -okw gives piatwdkw 'on the rock'. The comparison of Algonquian *-a'peOk- 'stone' with this Wiyot word piatk seems to furnish another example of the *6k: tk correspondence, but the Algonquian word has an initial *-a- not reflected by Wiyot, and Wiyot has a medial -1- not apparent in Algonquian. The additional *-a•- in Algonquian is easily explained in terms of known facts of Algonquian morphology. Many Algonquian medials29 occur with or without a preceding *-a-, as *-a-ntep- ~ *-ntep- 'head' and *-a-kamy- ~ *-kamy- 'liquid'. In fact, *-peQk- is attested as a rarer variant of *-a-peOk-, for example in Ojibwa a-sipikk, Menomini a-sepeh 'rock, cliff', and in Massachusett pumipsk 'rock' (with roots *a-s- and *pem-, respectively). Thus there is independent justification for comparing an Algonquian *-pedk- with Wiyot pl&tk. It remains to motivate

ALGONQUIAN, WIYOT, AND YUROK

13

the equation of the Algonquian sequence pe with Wiyot pla. It is likely a priori that a source for both of these would resemble more closely the more complex Wiyot sequence than the Algonquian one. Now, in Algonquian there are no clusters with *p as first member, so a cluster *pi, *pl, or whatever, in the original protolanguage would have been modified in some way in Algonquian. A clue to the possible treatment of this sequence is found in the root *mela-- 'smell', which turns up in noninitial form as *-mya•-: Menomini mena-htam 'he gets the smell of it' (mena•- from *mela•-) and koci-miahtam 'he tries the smell of it' {-mia- from *-mya--). *-mya- must continue an earlier *-mla-, which would reflect *me!a•- with loss of the short *e in word-medial position.30 If pre-Algonquian *-ml- became *-my-, pre-Algonquian *-pl- can reasonably be assumed to have become *-py-.31 A reduction of *-ya- to *-ewould be unexceptional, since *-ya- does not occur within the root in Algonquian. Thus all of the discrepancies between Algonquian *-(a-)pedkand Wiyot platk can be explained without resorting to ad hoc assumptions. In the case of the Wiyot and Yurok words for 'bone', it must be admitted that the history of the latter part in each case is not completely clear. Wiyot watkaddt seems to have an extra syllable -ot, and Yurok ^waika? has an unexplained but no trace of an -n. The etymologies are certain enough to stand even in the absence of an explanation of these details; they, in fact, form the basis for the correct formulation of the remaining problems, both of which show some promise of eventual solution. Thus the addition of -ot in Wiyot may be correlated with similar incremental elements in other Wiyot nouns, and Haas has indicated a possible Yurok parallel for the loss of *«.32 These, then, are three examples of good etymologies connecting distantly related languages; their distinguishing characteristic is that they lead to productive hypotheses. At first they are just resemblant forms which subjectively appear as though they might well be cognate. When examined more closely they reveal in intersection of phonological, morphological, and semantic parallels which lead to the formulation of rules and the recognition of facts not assumed in the original hypothesis, but in agreement with independently known features of the respective languages. Good etymologies one can talk about; poor etymologies lie inert on the page or, when examined, crumble away. In the final analysis, however, there is a certain superfluity to lexical comparisons in the cases where a relationship can be demonstrated by reference to detailed grammatical and structural parallels. Or, to state

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it differently, when convincing wordcomparisons can be made between two languages, a much stronger case for relationship can probably always be made by a presentation of the morphological identities the languages attest. Harvard University

NOTES 1

Edward Sapir, "Wiyot and Yurok, Algonkin languages of California", A A 15: 617-46 (1913). All languages other than Wiyot and Yurok referred to in the present paper are members of the Algonquian family. 2 Truman Michelson, "Two alleged Algonquian languages of California", A A 16: 361-67 (1914). Subsequent exchanges between Sapir and Michelson are at AA 17:188-98 (1915). Knowledge of Proto-Algonquian kinship terminology is only just now coming to the point where it will be possible to evaluate Sapir's later paper, "The Algonkin affinity of Yurok and Wiyot kinship terms", JSAP15:37-74 (1923). 3 The pivotal recent article is Mary R. Haas, "Algonquian-Ritwan: The end of a controversy", UAL 24:159-173 (1958). Since this the following have appeared (which include some further references): R. H. Robins, The Yurok Language (=UCPL 15) (1958); Karl V. Teeter, The Wiyot Language, (= UCPL 37) (1964); a review of this by Ives Goddard, IJAL 32:398-404 (1966), with corrigenda IJAL 33:261 (1967); Karl V. Teeter, "Algonquian languages and genetic relationship", Proceedings of the Ninth International Congress of Linguists, ed. by Horace G. Lunt. The Hague, 1964), 1026-34; Mary R. Haas, "Wiyot-Yurok-Algonquian and problems of comparative Algonkian", IJAL 32:101-7 (1966). Many of the comparisons made in this paper were earlier made by Sapir, Haas, and Teeter, though often differing in detail. The Wiyot material presented follows the reinterpretations and analysis set forth in my review of Teeter, which may be consulted for further details. There is no intention of reviewing here the extensive literature on the question of what evidence constitutes the best proof of genetic relationship. Beside the classic work of Antoine Meillet, whose precepts are followed here (La méthode comparative en linguistique historique, Oslo, 1925, and later editions), studies especially significant for Americanists would include A. L. Kroeber, "The determination of linguistic relationship", Anthropos 8:389-401 (1913) ; Truman Michelson, "Remarks on American Indian languages : A study in method", J WAS 7:222-34 (1917) ; Norman A. McQuown, "The indigenous languages of Latin America", AA 57:501-70 (1955), esp. 502-3; Dell Hymes, "Genetic classification: Retrospect and prospect", AnL 1/2:50-66 (1959); C. F. and F. M. Voegelin, "Classification of American Indian languages", AnL 7/7:121150 (1965) ( = Languages of the World, Native America fascicle two, sect. 1.6); Robert Longacre, "Systematic comparison and reconstruction", Handbook of Middle American Indians, ed. by Norman A. McQuown, Vol. 5, Linguistics, 117-59 (Austin, 1967), esp. 119-20; Mary R. Haas, The Prehistory of Languages (The Hague, 1969). Some of these give further references. 4 Presumably resemblances due to universal tendencies - such as those in soundsymbolic words - can be readily recognized and discarded. 6 Robins divides the Yurok particles into syntactic classes, but the uses of these correspond to the uses of the Algonquian particles. 9 An example of the alternation between n and d within Wiyot is given below on p. 12.

ALGONQUIAN, WIYOT, AND YUROK

15

7 Yurok has no vowel-initial stems and no trace of this inserted -/-. Similarly, in Cheyenne, which has hV- from PA *V- and V- from certain PA *pV- and *kV-, the intercalated *-t- has been completely leveled out of the inflection of verbs. 8 Some details on which sufficient data are not available cannot be discussed here; for example some dependent body-part terms in Yurok and Menomini do not take the indefinite-possessor prefix. 9 The use of the prefixing paradigms cannot be described in detail here, but the sysstems of Wiyot and Yurok are comparable to those of some of the descendant Algonquian languages. Thus Wiyot, which has the prefixes only in the negative, may be compared to Arapaho, which has them only in the negative, interrogative, and narrative. 10 In Algonquian forms with only one third-person participant or with only an indefinite actor take no prefix rather than taking *we-. The most recent structural explication is in Ives Goddard, Delaware Verbal Morphology: A Descriptive and Comparative Study, unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard (1969). 11 Yurok has a complicated system governing the use of the verbal prefixes which is clearly specialized and has probably developed out of the 2-1-3 preference rule found in Wiyot and Algonquian. (In these Wiyot examples the alterations that are introduced by the rules of sentence sandhi have not been indicated.) 12 An example is Fox nepyeci-keta'nesa-wa pama'pena 'we have come to see your daughter', where keta'nesa 'your daughter' appears between the preverb pye'li 'come to' (which has the first-person prefix ne-) and the suffixed verb stem (Leonard Bloomfield, Language, New York [1933], 232). 13 The discovery of identical morphological systems in different languages obviates the necessity of making systematic, theory-based statements about morphological change, which have seemed to some scholars to be a prerequisite to the use of morphological evidence in the proof of genetic relationships. As will be seen below, systematic statements about phonological change are also of limited applicability in this context. 14 Some of the descendant Algonquian languages replace the original root for five with a particle and thus have only 1 through 4 as freely-combining roots. Some languages fuse the higher numbers with the special root meaning 'so many'. The status of 'ten' in Yurok and Algonquian is ambiguous. 15 Unfortunately the time depth of the relationship between Algonquian, Wiyot, and Yurok is so great that little can be said at present in the way of systematic formulation of sound correspondences, given the small number of reliable etymologies. Some speculative first attempts, however, are to be found in the first article of Haas cited in note 3 (Haas 1958). 16 The better known a language family becomes, the more certain we can be in comparing morphemes which are smaller than whole words, but this is only possible because extensive knowledge of the languages involved justifies the particular segmentation of the forms which is assumed in such cases. 17 The discovery of a number of similar words exhibiting regular phonological correspondences does not suffice, since such a situation is also characteristic of loanwords when compared with their prototypes in their language of origin - for example the French loanwords in English. 18 The proposed etymologies discussed below - both those rejected and those accepted - are all ones that have actually been put forth by other scholars. 19 Such an assimilation was conjectured by Sapir, AA 15:642 (1913). 20 An earlier Proto-Algonquian reconstruction *wi'9ani (Truman Michelson, I JAL 8:139 [1935]) has been proved wrong by better knowledge of Algonquian comparative grammar; note Fox owi'naniwi (IJAL 4:184 [1927]). The attesting languages may reflext either *i or *yi in the third syllable; *yi is reconstructed here in anticipation of the comparison made in the next sentence.

16 21

IVES GODDARD

The partially or even completely redundant compounding of elements is not uncommon in Algonguian derivational morphology. 22 The -eg- in the last two forms is a common element; the apocope of final -ep reflects a common Yurok morphophonemic process. The analysis of neg is Robins's and gives strong support to the analysis here given of nuneg. 23 Teeter 1964:65. 24 William Bright, The Karok Language (= UCPL 13) (1957), Lexicon, entries 86 and 201; Robins 1958:15. 25 Wiyot and Algonquian especially have similar patterns of consonant clustering, in which t as a second member enters into the same combinations as the dental continuants, instead of behaving like the other stops; see also the comments at IJAL 32:399 (1966). 26 Morphemically these are dependent nouns containing the third person prefix *we- (see Table 1 and the accompanying discussion). In accordance with a general pattern of Algonquian body part terms, however, these words would also have meant 'an animal's bone' and 'an animal's liver', respectively; this may help explain the developments discussed in the rest of this paragraph. 27 For the insertion of -/- before a vowel see p. 6, above; the adjustment of vowel lengths is regular. 28 See also the discussion of the first person prefix on p. 5, above. 29 For this term see p. 4, above. 30 In Algonquian derivation of this type the loss or shortening of vowels and the loss of consonants is common. 31 There is evidence for an alternative treatment whereby *-ml- gave *-y- and *-pl- gave *-'/-; Fox reflects a *-ya- in the words for 'smell', and Delaware reflects both *-ya- and *-mya'-. Our understanding of such phonological processes in preAlgonquian is just beginning, and Wiyot and Yurok may throw valuable light on problems of this kind. 32 IJAL 24:171 (1958).