66 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY Tbull. 40 



such prefix that occurs with considerable frequency, wi-, first person 

 singular possessive of nouns of relationship : 



wiha'm my father 

 hami'H' your father 



§ 28. Suffixation 



Suffixation is the normal method employed in building up actual 

 forms of nouns and verbs from stems. The suffixes in themselves 

 have for the most part very little individuality, some of them being 

 hardly evident at all except to the minute linguistic analyst. The 

 notions they convey are partly derivational of one kind or other. 

 In the verb they express such ideas as those of position, reciprocal 

 action, causation, frequentative action, reflexive action, spontaneous 

 activity, action directed to some one, action done in behalf of some 

 one. From the verb-stem such adjectival and nominal derivations 

 as participles, infinitives, or abstract nouns of action, and nouns of 

 agent are formed by suffixation. In the noun itself various suffixed 

 elements appear whose concrete meaning is practically nil. Other 

 suffixes are formal in the narrower sense of the word. They express 

 pronominal elements for subject and object in the verb, for the pos- 

 sessor in the noun, modal elements in the verb. Thus a word like 

 HomoxiniV we kill one another contains, besides the aorist stem 

 Homo- (formed from do^m-), the suffixed elements -x- (expressing 

 general idea of relation between subject and object), -iji- umlauted 

 from -an- (element denoting reciprocal action [-a;-m- = EACH other, 

 one another]), and -i¥ (first personal plural subject intransitive 

 aorist). As an example of suffixation in the noun may be given 

 t.'ibagwa'n-flc' my pancreas. This form contains, besides the stem 

 Hiha-, the suffixed elements -gw- (of no ascertainable concrete signifi- 

 cance, but employed to form several body-part nouns; e. g., tliba'V'^ 

 PANCREAS 47.17), -an- (apparently meaningless in itself and appear- 

 ing suffixed to many nouns when they are provided with possessive 

 endings), and -i'fc' (first personal singular possessive). 



§ 29. Infijcation 



Infixation, or what superficially appears to be such, is found only 

 in the formation of certain aorist stems and frequentatives. Thus 

 the aorist stem mats lag- (from masg- put) shows an intrusive or 



§§ 28-29 



