The traces of Chinook Jargon in Tuwáduqucad (Twana, Coast Salish)

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Publicly posted on the web is a wonderful research tool that’s new to me…The “Twana Dictionary: Student Version” is made available by the Skokomish Tribe (western Washington).

I’ve recently been doing a deep dose of one of my favorite pastimes, dictionary reading, in order to do something I’ve already posted for other Indigenous languages of the Pacific NW.

I’m going to list all the loan words in Tuwáduqucad a.k.a. Twana that I think are reasonable to attribute to Chinook Jargon as the direct source. (I’ll leave out the names of tribes and places, except where I see a story to tell.)

These are in the practical orthography for Tuwáduqucad, which may take you a moment to get used to, but which does a fine job of showing the Indigenous sounds. (For instance ? = ʔ, X = x̣, 3 = ə, ‘ = stress.)

Now in no particular order:

  • mal?aX ‘tin’
  • 3’j3n3s ‘onion’
  • 3’p3l3s ‘apple’
  • as[-]ma’liyi ‘he’s married’
  • m3’las ‘syrup’
  • mi’tas ‘leggings’
  • miyu’l ‘donkey’
  • bu’kW ‘book’
  • mul3′ ‘mill’
  • cHa’yni ‘Chinese’
  • ch3du’kW ‘Chinook’
  • ch3’lis ‘cherry’
  • slaha’l ‘bone game’
  • hu’d[-]al[-]gWihL ‘steamboat’ (literally ‘fire on canoe’, compare CJ paya-ship)
  • hL3’k3tat ‘Sahaptin people’ (ultimately a Chinookan word, here showing pronunciation changes due to being passed around a bunch of languages)
  • ihLs3’q pa’st3d ‘half-breed’ (a literal translation (calque) of the CJ sitkum-sawash)
  • i’p3n ‘apron’
  • kapu’ ‘coat’
  • k3li’si ‘crazy’
  • khLi’sk3s ‘cattail mat’ (this pronunciation suggests English influence)
  • kukW[-]a’ltxW ‘kitchen’ (CJ kuk-haws)
  • sku’l ‘school’
  • kul?u’yal ‘kerosene’ (‘coal oil’, the old word for this in English)
  • ku’pi ‘coffee’
  • a possible root ~ kut (which shows up in other Coast Salish languages from CJ for ‘coat’) in:
    • asku’t ‘skirt’
    • cHa’cHk3t ‘blouse’
  • kWa’t3 ‘a quarter’
  • kWi’sHu ‘pig’
  • la’b ‘alcoholic beverage’
  • lab[-]?a’ltxW ‘tavern’ (‘alcohol-house’, common in Coast Salish)
  • lala’b ‘oar’
  • ? bilala’b ‘he’s looking’ (compare CJ ~ x̣ax̣aʔ-milalam ‘confession’ in Catholicism; compare Twana hL3tS[-]Xa’Xa ‘God’
  • ? lawa’d3 ‘brass pin’
  • lawi’d ‘oats’
  • la’ys ‘rice’
  • bi[-]l3ku’s[-]ad ‘cross oneself’ (this l3ku’s suggests CJ ~ lakwa as well as influence from English ‘cross’)
  • l3p3’skWi ‘hardtack’
  • l3piyu’sH ‘hoe’
  • l3swi’ ‘velvet’, la’swid ‘silk’ (both from CJ laswe ‘silk’)
  • lisa’q ‘sack’
  • liju’m ‘devil’
  • lika’y ‘spotted horse’
  • li’kli ‘key’
  • lilu’t ‘train’ (‘railroad’, a common word in Coast languages)
  • li’plid ‘priest’
  • lipu’w3 ‘pea’
  • lisHa’l ‘shawl’
  • lasH ‘cut (bushes in field)’ (indicates English ‘slash’ as in ‘slash pile’, analyzed by Tuwáduqucad speakers as having their prefix s- ‘noun’)
  • lu’sH3n ‘Russian’ (from ‘Roossian’ and possibly ‘Aleutian’, this word would denote mainly Alaskan Natives; note the existence also of sTiKi’d)
  • pa’st3d ‘white person’
  • bi[-]pa’wwaw[-]cH3d ‘I’m dancing’ (in the smokehouse, cf. English powwow)
  • pi’sHpsH ‘cat’
  • spu’n ‘spoon’
  • sa’plal ‘bread’
  • si’l ‘cloth’
  • sil?[-]a’ltxW ‘tent’ (CJ sil-haws)
  • su’ljus ‘soldier’
  • sHu’kWa? ‘sugar’
  • sta’kd ‘stocking’
  • ta’l3 ‘dollar’
  • tama’naw3s ‘guardian spirit power’ (this pronunciation implies changes caused by passing through a number of languages)
  • ta’wd ‘town’
  • ta’ws3d ‘thousand’
  • ? t3’m?s ‘rudabega [rutabaga]’ (see also swi’law3h)
  • ti’b3l ‘table’
  • ti’ntin ‘bell’
  • sTiKi’d ‘Alaskan Indian’ (note the existence also of lu’sH3n; in a Grand Ronde style of spelling this is st’ik’íd, i.e. ‘Stickeen/Stikine’ from Lingít Shtaxʼhéen ‘biting itself river’, as pronounced by Salish people who lack the Tlingit /x’/ sound; stikin is also known in BC Chinook Jargon)
  • tSi’ktSik ‘wagon’
  • stSX3stahLi’sab ‘Friday’ (apparently ‘fifth day’, as in older Chinook Jargon)
  • u’l3njus ‘orange’
  • wa’sH3nt3n ‘President of the U.S.’
  • waXpush ‘rattlesnake’ (from Sahaptian, also reported in CJ)
  • ? swi’law3h ‘rutabaga’ (see also t3’m?s)

That’s an extra-large helping of Jargon loans!

The Skokomish people’s territory is a kind of a crossroads area, traditionally having contact with all sorts of folks from the coast, Puget Sound, and beyond.

There are plenty more borrowed words in the Twana dictionary, not just tribal and place names but also quite a few from Dxʷləšucid / Txʷəlšucid (Lushootseed or Puget Sound Salish) and Sahaptin.

qʰata mayka təmtəm?
What do you think?

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