,52 THE SPEECH OF THE TASMANIAN ABORIGINES. 



Again, we have regularly an epitlietic vowel, a, e, or 

 i ; every word is an example of this. 



Within the word, the vowels found places where they 

 could. We have treinia, terinia, taranienna, triunia for 

 "hard-beaked bird," e.g., owl, crow; ria, rilia, riena, 

 raiana, for hand ; raumpta and raumata, for wombat ; 

 pengana, panugana, pugrena, pugerinna, for dirt ; lan- 

 . gana, languna, lugana, langna, dogna, lagerra, for foot ; 

 lowanna, nowana, Iowa, loanna, loa, loalla, lowla, for 

 woman; leni, loa, liena, lia, lina, for water. 



(3) Within their respective groups, the consonants 

 may be freely interchanged. This has already been 

 touched upon, and will be further illustrated in the 

 sequel. 



III.— ETYMOLOGY. 



It is beyond the scope of our present research to 

 examine all the words recorded by H. Ling Roth, whose 

 list, as has already been stated, may be considered as 

 practically complete. It Vv^ill be sufficient to deal with 

 such a number of them as will enable a critic to test our 

 theory. 



We shall take Norman's list for the Eastern speech, 

 and Miiligan's for the Southern, Eastern, and North- 

 western and Western words. Unfortunately Milligan 

 did not discriminate between the last two dialects, but 

 this is not of great importance, as they have much in 

 common with each other. 



We shall find some instances of onomatopoetic 

 words, such as pratteratta, hail, from which we get 

 paratta, ice, frost ; but we need not do more than 

 acknowledge the existence of such words, as their con- 

 nection with our theory is remote, and possibly merely 

 accidental. 



Nor need we take notice of evidently interjectional 

 words, for we are not now concerned with the origin of 

 language generally, but Avith the elements and develop- 

 ment of the speech of the Tasmanian Aborigines. 



I have dissected some 1,200 Tasmanian words, but 

 shall confine my present discussion to a much smaller 

 number of characteristic specimens, taking, them, g^ene- 

 rally, in alphabetical order. 



