A NOTE ON THE FIRST PERSON PLURAL IN CHIMARIKO
By E. SAPIR
I know of few irrevocable facts in the domain of American linguistics that are quite so regrettable as our scanty knowledge of Chimariko. What attention I have been able to give the Hokan problem has tended to convince me that in Chimariko we possess, or possessed, one of the most archaic languages of the whole group, perhaps the one language in California which came nearest a faithful representation of the theoretical Hokan prototype. As it is, we must make shift to get on with such material as has been spared us and be doubly thankful for the fragmentary data that Dixon was able to secure in 1906 from the one or two aged or half-witted survivors of the tribe[1]. The present note will serve to illustrate how unexpected and far-reaching may be the threads that bind Chimariko to geographically remote languages in California.
The first personal pronominal affix for Chimariko verbs always, or nearly always, shows clearly related forms for singular and plural. This will be evident from the following[2]:
“tc-, first person singular. Prefixed or suffixed as subject of intransitive verbs, with adjectival stems. Prefixed as object of transitive verbs.
tca-, tco-, first person plural. Prefixed or suffixed as subject of intransitive verbs, with adjectival stems. This suffix[3] is distinguished from singular tc- by change of vowel. If the singular has a as connecting vowel, the plural has o, and vice-versa. Prefixed as object of transitive verbs.
i-, y-, first person singular. Prefixed or suffixed as subject of intransitive verbs, with verbal stems. Prefixed as subject of transitive verbs.
ya-; we-, w-, first person plural. Prefixed or suffixed as subject of intransitive verbs, with verbal stems. Prefixed (va-) as subject of transitive verbs.”
Further on Dixon remarks[4]:
“It will be seen that two wholly different forms are given in both singular and plural for the first person. In the use of the one or the other of these, there is a fairly clear distinction in use. The first type, tc, is never employed with verbal stems indicating action or movement, but with those, on the contrary, which indicate a state or condition. On the other hand, whereas the second form, i, y, is invariably used with the former class of verbal stems, it is also used with the latter, but is then always suffixed. In most cases, there is no confusion between the two forms, i. e., if the first person singular is i or y, the first person plural is ya. A few instances appear, however, in which this does not hold, and we have i in the singular, and tc or ts in the plural. In a limited number of cases also, either form may apparently be used, as qε·-i-xanan, qε·-tce-xanan I shall die, i-saxni, tca-sxani I cough [perhaps better understood as stem asax-, with i displacing a- of stem; tc- prefixed: tc-asax-ni. Cf. tc-a·wi·n I fear and other singulars in tc-a-]. A phonetic basis is to some extent observable,
- ↑ Roland B. Dixon, The Chimariko Indians and Language (University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology, vol. 5, pp. 293-380, 1910).
- ↑ Dixon, op. cit., p. 318.
- ↑ Read doubtless “affix”.
- ↑ Op. cit., pp. 325, 326.
