Shameful news about másháchi ‘bad, harmful, terrible, mean’
Alexander Ross was quite good with languages.
Image credit: Redbubble
In 1849 he published an excellent narrative of his time at early Fort Astoria, which was 1811 and onwards a bit.
Ross put together one of the very earliest lexicons of Chinook Jargon. I’ve been analyzing the sources of each word in his list(s), and I found that an unexpected pairing of items led to a new insight.
We’ve always wondered where the heck Chinuk Wawa’s mashachi comes from. Well, if you don’t mind wading through some historical linguist notes…
R1#126: < mass-atsy > ‘bad’
presumably from a Lower Chinookan (LC) form, but the attested form is /i-iá-q̓atx̣ala/ ‘he is bad’ (Boas 1894:199) while /masáci-ɬx/ is ‘pretty’ (Boas 1901:68), as is Kathlamet /masáči-ɬ/ (Boas 1901:146); cf. perhaps the Clackamas ideophone /mašá-maša/ ‘not look good’ (Jacobs 1958-1959(I):57), idem ‘homely’ (op. cit.(II):335). Probably these forms relate to /mása/ ‘ashamed’, viz. at R1#214. We can consider whether e.g. posthumous onomastic tabooing has taken place since Ross’s time. Later CJ más(h)áchi. Contrast Kathlamet /i-iá-məla/ ‘it is bad’ (Boas 1901:78), Clackamas /i-yá-mla/ ‘a bad one’ (Jacobs 1958-1959(I):49), Kiksht /i-ia-k̓áməla/ ‘ugly’ (flesh; Sapir 1909:32-33).
R1#214: < nachamats > ‘shame’
evidently from LC, cf. /naxə-máčtaičk/ ‘she was ashamed’ (Boas 1894:184); see also comments at R1#126. Contrast with Kathlamet /igax̣ə-másait/ ‘she was ashamed’ (Boas 1901:16), Clackamas /i-mí-mas/ ‘you are ashamed’ (lit. ‘your shame’, singular possessor; Jacobs 1958-1959(II):388), and Kiksht /mása/ ‘ashamed’ (Sapir 1909:192-193).
The upshot: I really suspect mashachi goes back to a pan-Chinookan root for ‘shame; ashamed’, with some misunderstandings in Ross’s time where perhaps ‘ashamed; bashful; shy’ was taken wrongly as ‘ugly’, and then as ‘bad’.
𛰅𛱁𛰃𛱂 𛰙𛱁𛱆𛰅𛱁 𛰃𛱄𛰙𛰃𛱄𛰙? qʰáta mayka tə́mtəm?
kata maika tumtum? Qu’en penses-tu?
What do you think?
And can you say it in Chinuk Wawa?
Hey! Teach Yourself northern-dialect Chinook Jargon!
And join free Zoom sessions…
Contact me for the Zoom link.
