9 / 48
The Language o! the Tacana lndians (Bolivia).
103
Sentences:
Anonym;ous:
GIL!:
where from?
quie-h-inetia?
quie-x-enelia?
dangerous
re-h-ada
re-x-ada
mounlain(-in)
e-h-i-he(-su)
e-x-i-xe(-su)
Locatif
lo run
h-ududu
x-ududu
Asplrated
h
became guttural
x,
palatal
s
became dental
s.
b)
Phooology
"·
The letters
Í,
l
and
s
(Spanish
ct,
ci) are lacking in Tacana, Cavineña,
Araona and Maropa. The pre-dental
~.
however, is pronounced like
f
by the
Araona women, as for instance,
Mafifi,
instead of
Madidi (Mag-qi).
g
Jt
represents ARMENTIA
1
S
d
and SANJINÉS
1
d
(English
lh).
s
It
sounds like french
eh
in eh e va l.
x
According to SANJINES, it is a guttural sound like
j
(Sp. pr.)
x
As in Spanish
j
(g before
e
and
i).
ls
As in Spanish
eh,
in n o e h e.
ir
It
represents ARMENTIA's
d;
and
Ir
employed by SANJINes. Before
e
it is
pronounced
ts,
and sometimes
15.
ts
87
As in Cavineña
zun,
navel.
According to ARMENTIA, the Spanish
1i
is 1acking in Tacana
38_
SANJINés,
however, writes
ebaña
and
ebania,
indiscriminately
39_
The dental
s
in Spanish words seems to become patatal in these lndian
languages, as for instance:
misa, mass; miSa
40
Unfortunately, the authors
rnake no reference to accentuation and vowel quantities.
The vowels are:
a, e,
i,
o, u.
The diphthongs are:
ai, au, ei, eu, oi.
Vowel and diphthong clusters occur as follows:
aa, ee,
ii,
uu,
ae, ai, au,
ea, ia, ua, ei, eu, ie, iu, ue, aua, eue, iai, iua, eue, eaua.
The only clusters of consonants that 1 found in the material now acces–
sible are
xacli
41,
jacti
42_
In these languages !he rule is that only a vowel (diphthong) rnay
be
final. The authors of the different treatises referred to generally adopted the
r ule of Spanish pronunciation.
·
36
Based on the "Anthropos" Alphabet;
cf.
"Die Sprachlaute und ihre Oarstellung
in einem allgemeinen linguistischen Alphabet" (Les sons du langage el leur représen–
tation dans un alphabet linguistique général). Von P.
\VI.
SCRMIDT, S. V. O.; in "An–
thropos", Bd. Il, Heft
2
bis 6, 1907, pp.
282- J
105.
" The anonymous author o! the Lord's Prayer in the Ouariza dialect gives
etse-tra,
our,
while in the anonymous "Catecismo", 1859, we find
tsine-su
t<>-day
(day-in, on).
Pamapa lsine-su,
every day-on, father
Ú ILI
also writes.
38
uTacana",
p.
28.
39
"Manual",
p.
11.
40
Milsa
also occurs there.
41
"Tacana", p. 62,
jacti,
lo make,
deed; cf.
p. 92, where
ati
lo make;
and
p. 93,
jacti, jatti, jatti
(!).
The !alter is evidently an error.
42
Cf.
"Creed in Tacana",
BRtNT0:\1,
"Studies",
p.
15.
SANJINÉS,
op. cit., p. 19,
g ives
xaÜi cucinasa
deed-w~of
(our deeds).