Support for ‘100’ coming from Chinookan ‘tree’
Apparently my suggestion that Chinuk Wawa’s tak’umunaq ‘one hundred’ is etymologically Chinookan for ‘(fir) tree’ isn’t outlandish.
A stick that counts to 100 cm (image credit: Brighterly)
Compare the following notes about a range of Indigenous languages from other families along the Oregon and northern California coast:
Nevertheless, the trope of using the expression ‘one stick’ for ‘one hundred’, which is found also in Hupa in northern California, an Athabaskan language which does not border upon Coast Oregon Penutian territory, is recorded for both Oregon Athabaskan languages such as Tututni and for the potentially Penutian [therefore unrelated!] Hanis and Miluk…
— from “Fabric, Pattern, Shift and Diffusion: What Change in Oregon Penutian Languages Can Tell Historical Linguists” (UC Berkeley, Survey Reports, Survey of California and Other Indian Languages, 2000).
Assuming “one stick” can be equated with “one tree”, Chinook Jargon-style, we’re cooking with gas now!
Should we infer that the metaphor TREE::100 is of ancient vintage?
Was there some such cultural practice as a tally stick for higher numbers in the old days? That would make more sense to me than my previous and vague idea that TREE::BIG::100.
Along the coast, it’s not hard to conceive of people having a need, traditionally, for counting large quantities, due to the use of haykʰwa / alikʰuchik / kupkup (dentalium “tusk” shells) as money.
My spontaneous thought was that it could have to do with the large number of branches and twigs that protrude from a tree.
Many languages of course have numeral systems based on fingers (and toes, if vigesimal). Now Nahuatl is vigesimal, reflecting the ”twigs” of the human body, but what is more interesting is that the word for 400 (i.e. 20 × 20) is derived from the word for ’hair’. In other words ”an almost unfathomably large number of things protruding from the body”.
It was with this in mind that I read your tree etymology.
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Nice suggestion! Naika wawa masi!
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Haʔ, interesting. Incidentially, in Southern Wakashan there is a remote connection between the terms for “tree” (Nuuchahnulth suč̓as) and “one hundred” (NCN suč̓iiq), via the numeral “five” (suč̓a). One could speculate about an underlying metaphorical concept of the tree’s root holding on to the ground like a hand, i.e. five fingers. Fluent speakers are aware of the similarity and wonder about it, and the connection is also confirmed in Ditidaht, where both words have an initial š-: šuč̓as and šuč̓ (note: there is no generalized sound shift s <> š between the two languages, NCN s usually corresponds to DTD s, so both lexemes sound-shifted in the same, less common pattern). Because of the vigesimal (twenty-based) counting system in NCN the numeral “hundred” is expressed by “five score” (5×20, suč̓(a)-iiq). If one was looking for a symbol or an icon representing “100”, the word “tree” would lend itself.PS: Ditidaht has an iconic expression for “100”, where “100” is not “10×10” or some basic lexeme, but ʔubaaqƛ “fitting into it” (according to John ƛ̓iišał Thomas referring to 100 dried dog salmon fitting into a tightly bound storage basket).
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Fantastic, thank you for schooling us some more on this subject!
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