DATA AND NOTES. 203 



89. 

 emai, emwai, in the distance, far away, 



Samoa, Nukuoro: mao, distant, far. Samoa, Uvea, Fakaafo, Vate, 

 Maori, Hawaii, Mangaia, Manahiki, Rarotonga, Paumotu, 

 Nuguria: mamao, distant, far away. Tonga: mamao, id. 



Futuna: mamao, id. Niue: mamao, id. Tahiti: taumamao, 

 to hang out of reach. Mangareva : akamamao, to send away. 

 Marquesas : memao, distant, far away. 

 Arabic: ma 1 oka, to be far off, distant; ma'k', distance. 

 The Polynesia mamao can scarcely be brought into association with Efate 

 emai, as our author suggests without any consideration of the difficulties. 

 To me emai seems far more likely to be the widespread mai, from, with a 

 verb-making prefix. In neither case can the Semitic be said to have any- 

 thing to do with the matter. 



90. 

 fam i, bam i, to eat. 



Samoa: samusamu, to eat the remains of food; samuti, to eat (jocu- 

 lar). Tonga : hamu, to eat food of one kind only. Futuna : 

 samuko, id. Maori : hamuhamu, to eat scraps. Tahiti : amu, 

 to eat; aamu, a glutton; hamu, gluttonous; aihamu, to eat 

 gluttonously the leavings of others. Hawaii: hamu, to eat 

 fragments of food. Mangareva: amu, to eat with the mouth, 

 not using the hands; to eat scraps or leavings. 

 Hebrew: pa' am, to have the mouth full, to swallow down. Arabic: 

 fa'ama, id. 

 The Proto-Samoan radical is samut. 



Against the identification lie two objections. In my note 77 I have 

 shown how the abrasion of a final syllable may be accounted for as the 

 abrasion of a vowel to a new terminal in a consonant followed b)r a second 

 abrasion of the consonant to a new terminal in a vowel. Such operation is 

 sufficiently rare in our material ; far rarer would be such a case as this, the 

 abrasion first of consonant, then of vowel, to end upon a closed syllable 

 once more. The mutation s-f, s-b, must be rare indeed, for these materials 

 show not a single instance of at all a satisfactory nature, not a single 

 instance in which an s migrates to any point in the labial column. 



The Semitic identification is as remote from Efate as it is from Polynesian. 



9i- 

 fasu, fasua na, a part, portion, member of the body. 



Samoa : fast, to split, a bit, a piece. Fotuna : no-fafasia, to split. 

 Tonga: faahi, a side, a half of anything divided. Futuna: 

 faasi, a side, a portion. Niue: fahi, a side, a place. Uvea: 

 faahi, a side, a part, to divide. Nuguria: te vahi mahina, the 

 crescent moon. 

 Viti : vathi, to cut (chiefly of yams) ; pieces of yam for planting. 

 Hebrew: basa', cut in pieces. Arabic: bas'a'a, to cut, to cleave; 

 bas''at, a part, a piece. 

 The vowel change i-u is not so rare as to vitiate this identification (see 

 17 Journal of the Polynesian Society, 85). 



