Volume Ii Part 15 (1/2)

Tupi (Brasil) : Coaracy : Iacy.

Peruvian (Quichua) : Inti : Quilla.

Araucan (Chili) : Antu : Cuyen.

IN THE OLD WORLD:

Mongol : Nara (naran) : Sara (saran).

Mantchou : Choun : Bia.

Tschaghatai : Koun : Ay.

Ossete (of Caucasus) : Khourr : Mai.

Tibetan : Niyma : Rdjawa.

Chinese : Jy : Yue.

j.a.panese : Fi : Tsouki.

Sanscrit : Surya, aryama, mitra, aditya, arka, hamsa : Tschandra, tschandrama, soma, masi.

Persian : Chor, chorschid, afitab : Mah.

Zend : Houere.

Pehlvi : Schemschia, zabzoba, kokma : Kokma.

Phoenician : Schemesih.

Hebrew : Schemesch : Yarea.

Aramean or Chaldean : Schimscha : Yarha.

Syrian : Schemscho : Yarho.

Arabic : Schams : Kamar.

Ethiopian : Tzabay : Warha.

The American words are written according to the Spanish orthography. I would not change the orthography of the Nootka word onulszth, taken from Cook's Voyages, to show how much Volney's idea of introducing an uniform notation of sounds is worthy of attention, if not applied to the languages of the East written without vowels. In onulszth there are four signs for one single consonant. We have already seen that American nations, speaking languages of a very different structure, call the sun by the same name; that the moon is sometimes called sleeping sun, sun of night, light of night; and that sometimes the two orbs have the same denomination. These examples are taken from the Guarany, the Omagua, Shawanese, Miami, Maco, and Ojibbeway idioms.

Thus in the Old World, the sun and moon are denoted in Arabic by niryn, the luminaries; thus, in Persian, the most common words, afitab and chorschid, are compounds. By the migration of tribes from Asia to America, and from America to Asia, a certain number of roots have pa.s.sed from one language into others; and these roots have been transported, like the fragments of a s.h.i.+pwreck, far from the coast, into the islands. (Sun, in New England, kone; in Tschagatai, koun; in Yakout, kouini. Star, in Huastec, ot; in Mongol, oddon; in Aztec, citlal, citl; in Persian, sitareh. House, in Aztec, calli; in Wogoul, kualla or kolla. Water, in Aztec, atel (itels, a river, in Vilela); in Mongol, Tscheremiss, and Tschouva.s.s, atl, atelch, etel, or idel.

Stone, in Caribbee, tebou; in the Lesgian of Caucasus, teb; in Aztec, tepetl; in Turkish, tepe. Food, in Quichua, micunnan; in Malay, macannon. Boat, in Haitian, canoa; in Ayno, cahani; in Greenlandish, kayak; in Turkish, kayik; in Samoyiede, kayouk; in the Germanic tongues, kahn.) But we must distinguish from these foreign elements what belongs fundamentally to the American idioms themselves. Such is the effect of time, and communication among nations, that the mixture with an heterogenous language has not only an influence upon roots, but most frequently ends by modifying and denaturalizing grammatical forms. ”When a language resists a regular a.n.a.lysis,” observes William von Humboldt, in his considerations on the Mexican, Cora, Totonac, and Tarahumar tongues, ”we may suspect some mixture, some foreign influence; for the faculties of man, which are, as we may say, reflected in the structure of languages, and in their grammatical forms, act constantly in a regular and uniform manner.”

CHAPTER 2.22.

SAN FERNANDO DE ATABAPO.

SAN BALTHASAR.

THE RIVERS TEMI AND TUAMINI.

JAVITA.

PORTAGE FROM THE TUAMINI TO THE RIO NEGRO.