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BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 



[bulletin 25 



farther — continued. 



{awn<a^sese,R. W. ). nnea {mHck and 

 Aunmisse, R. W. ) . 



fast. See fasten; awift; hasten. 



fasten, make fast, memihketmu, he 

 fastens, makes (it) fast (num-mhu.hhee- 

 teo, I fasten, C. ; menukohtde, firmly, 

 ibid. ) ; maum'mikkh, 'tie it hard', R.W. 

 [from memihkeu, it is strong or firm]. 

 uk-keneejmn-un nashpe kenontugwhegaah, 

 'lie fastened it with nails'. Is. 41, 7. 

 khhpiuum, he binds, ties, makes (it) 

 fast (fastens one thing to another); 

 kuBpinush, khhpinush, make thou (it) 

 fast (kipunsh, pi. kspiinemoke, 'tie it 

 fast', R. W.; nuk-kighplniw, I bind, C. ; 

 kishpinnodnk, binding, ibid. ) ; klshpmu, 

 pi. ki.ihpisifuog, fastened, bound, tied 

 (an. obj.), and v. i. act. he fastens, ties; 

 togkuppinmi, he binds (him) fast, makes 

 (him) fast by bonds: freq. or intens. 

 tnhtogkuppinau, taUa</kuppinaii ; suffix 

 iriitolifiif/bippinouh, they bind him fast. 



fat, iriYs, ireis: coweis, its fat, the fat of 

 an animal (cf. veyaiM, flesh; velmte 

 ?(•(';/"!'.'<, fat meat), wunnogqueu, vmnog- 

 ko), he is fat {wauwunockdo, it (a deer) 

 is fat, R. W. ; vmnnoggue netassiiog, fat 

 cattle, C. ) \_immne-hogk(D, he is well 

 covered or of good body]; yn a»ipan- 

 goii,' thus thick of fat', R. W. 



father, coshoh (lit. he comes from him), 

 his father, the father of {osh, a father, 

 R. W. ) ; nmsh {nosh, R. W. ; ncosh, nwshi, 

 C; Muh., iiogh Edw.; Del., nooch 

 Hkw.); kaj»li, thy father (cUsh, R.W.), 

 kooshm, your father; vutcoshUnau (he 

 who is a father) , the Father ( ' ' welooch- 

 rdnk and vetoochemuxit both mean the 

 Father", Hkw.). 



Edwards, in his Observations on the 

 Language of the Muhhekaneew In- 

 dians (page 13), remarks that "a con- 

 siileralile part of the appellatives are 

 never used without a pronoun affixed. 

 The ^JVIohegans can say 'my father' 

 (nogh), 'thy father' (kogh), etc., but 

 they can not say absolutely 'father'; 

 there is no such word in all their lan- 

 guage. If you were to say ogh, which 

 the word would be if stripped of all 

 affixes, you would make a Mohegan 

 l)oth stare and smile." Mr Heckewel- 

 der. "notwithstanding Mr Edwards's 



father — continued, 

 observation", "could not help being 

 of opinion that the monosyllable ooch is 

 the proper word for ' father ' , abstract- 

 edly [?] considered" (correspondence 

 with Duponceau, page 411). Rev Mr 

 Daggett assured Mr Pickering that 

 "there is no word in any of the Indian 

 languages used in the Foreign Mis- 

 sionary School [at Cornwall, Conn.] by 

 which to express in the abstract the re- 

 lation of ' father ' and most of the other 

 social relations" (2 Mass. Hist. Coll., 

 X, 112). More recent writers adopt 

 the statement of Edwards — as Bancroft 

 (in, 2.57), who cites Brebeuf (81) — and 

 Palfrey (Hist. New Engl., i, 42): "The 

 most common relations they had no 

 means of expressing abstractedly." 

 This is, in one aspect, correct, for the 

 Indian languages did not admit of the 

 expression of a correlative name ab- 

 stracted from its relation, nor does the 

 English. But they could approximate 

 as nearly to the expression as does the 

 English word ' father ' by vnttconhimnu 

 (Eliot; vetwchvAnk, Hkw.), 'he is a 

 father', lit. he is proceeded from, is a 

 source. It is surprising — and the fact 

 shows how superficial has been the 

 study of the group of languages about 

 which so much has been written — that 

 the radical significance of the word by 

 which the Indian expressed relation 

 to a father has escaped observation. 

 ncosh, kcosh, ajsh-oh represent the 1st, 2d, 

 and 3d persons singular (indie, pres. ) 

 of a suffix animate verb, and signify 

 'I proceed or originate from (him)', 

 ' thou originatest from ( him ) ' , 'he origi- 

 nates from ( him)' ; intrans.my(an. ) ori- 

 gin or source, thy origin or source, etc. 

 Thus the Indian reversed the expres- 

 sion of relationship which we employ 

 in the word 'father'; instead of 'he is 

 my father', they said 'I am his off- 

 spring' (cf.irutch ni'tjonne vmshik, 'from 

 my forefathers ' , from where first I came 

 from (suppos.), 2Tim. 1,3). Theinani- 

 mate form of the same verb is often to 

 be met with in Eliot, as oatshoh, imitji- 

 shau, vmlchn, he proceeds or originates 

 from orat (a place or inanimate source), 

 and in Roger Williams's Key, as oteshem 



