| Abstrakt: |
In a recent article, Scott Ortman and co-author Linda McNeil (2018:158) contend that "the absence of cognate terms for 'turtle' in Kiowa, Towa, and Tewa means that PKT [Proto Kiowa-Tanoan] speakers lived outside the range of Chrysemys picta [painted turtle], and that Proto-Tiwa speakers became aware of this species at some point between the Tiwa-Tewa split and the diversification of Proto-Tiwa into Northern Tiwa and Southern Tiwa." As a result of the subsequent Tewa migration to the Northern Rio Grande, the authors believe that the attested (current) Tewa word, "turtle," was borrowed from their resident Tiwa relatives because PKT peoples had no previous knowledge of turtles. This scenario is offered in further support of Ortman's earlier thesis that posits an original PKT homeland in the eastern Basketmaker and adjacent Fremont regions of eastern and northeastern Utah, regions where turtles are not native, but which presumably were the jumping-off places for points north by the Kiowas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
