‘Dog’ in Coos
Since I was talking about cats in Quinault yesterday…
How is Coos kwīʹyos ʹdogʹ a Chinook Jargon word, as Leo Frachtenberg claims in “Coos Texts” (1913:205)?
(Image from Carol’s Pet Sitting, Coos Bay, OR)
Is that what Coos speakers thought and told him?
Is it his own idea?
It’s a stretch for my poor brain to see Chinuk Wawa kamuks in the Coos word…
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I’d forgotten Frachtenberg said that!
In Hanis, ‘dog’ is recorded in different points of time by many people.
Dr. Milhau in 1856 talked to 2 unnamed Hanis speakers, he got tkoi-yūs for dog.
St. Clair in 1903 with Jim Buchanan: kwīyōs. Frachtenberg with Jim B. and Tom Hollis a few years later, same.
Frank Drew in 1932 with Melville Jacobs: k’whyús (notebook 92: 176)
Annie Miner Peterson with Melville Jacobs (notebook 100: 71) k’whyús
Frank Drew to Harrington in 1942: k’whús (22:1275b, 121b), k’wyús (24:69b)
Martha Harney Johnson to Jane Sokolow in 1965: k’wiuws.
In Milluk it’s yek’lu (AMP in Jacobs), yé´klu (St Clair with George Barney in 1903). Word literally means, it is said, ‘big eater’ and this word is used as a name for dogs by Hanis speakers. Suggests that not that long ago Milluk speakers may have had a different word for dogs, and it was replaced by yek’lu.
Lower Umpqua also uses k’wyus. Not unusual, there are several animal words (words for cougar, crow) that are the same or nearly so between Lower Umpqua and Hanis. Siuslaw usually same as LU, but on ‘dog’ they differ – shqaxch – which Frachtenberg thought was borrowed/influenced by Alsea.
I don’t know how far back the origin of K’wyus is, but I doubt it is borrowed from Jargon. Only animal words I know for sure that came from Jargon are post-contact animals like cow (musmus), cat (pus), horse (k(y)utan).
Thanks shichils for the historical search. You are right that all the words cited cannot be posterior to CJ. The word attributed to Alsea is most likely from a Salishan language (Alsea is full of them).
DDR, kamuks is one of the words for ‘dog’ in Chinook (not J). At least according to Boas.
Excellent research on this, hayu masi! Definitely doesn’t look like a borrowing from Jargon. Dang, I always get excited when I see a linguist noticing loans…