Japanese “hayaku” + Chinuk Wawa “áyáq” = ???
This resemblance has been pointed out since the 19th century…
But it’s been noted on this website only in a footnote, so far.
Image credit: Hyack Sushi, in New Westminster, of course
A remark by Sam Sullivan the other day reminded me to write a small note about the resemblance between Chinook Jargon’s áyáq ‘fast, quickly; hurry’ and Japanese hayaku ‘quickly’.
That may not look to you like much of a similarity, so far.
But what if I remind you the Settler-colonizers who spoke Chinuk Wawa often made an analogy between this word and the similarly intensive-feeling CW words, háyás(h) ‘big’ and háyú ‘a lot’?
Maybe you’re not quite following me, so far.
Those oldtimers, in their quaint English-language-accented Jargon, often said the word for ‘fast’ as hyack. That’s the most common spelling they used for it.
Are you understanding me, so far?
Good, then you’ve got the whole point.
Some Settler folks with enough exposure to both Jargon & Japanese — be it via immigrants or from visiting Japan — saw this similarity.
And some of them extrapolated from it, that Native people in North America must be related to Japanese people.
That’s a fishy idea at best!
