David Eddyshaw
tacitean.bsky.social
David Eddyshaw
@tacitean.bsky.social
Typical patterns: Kusaal has dɛɛg "warthog", kukur "pig" (implausible as it may seem, I am fairly sure this is ultimately from Portuguese porco.) Its neighbour Moba, though, has the cognate of dɛɛg, duol, for "pig" and uses mɔduol ("bush pig") for "warthog."
November 30, 2025 at 4:07 PM
Yes, I reckon so.
November 30, 2025 at 3:51 PM
The etymon in question normally surfaces as meaning "warthog/phacochère", though in some languages it's become the ordinary word for domestic pig, and "warthog" has to be expressed as "wild/bush pig." Sus scrofa, the wild boar, is not around in those parts.
November 30, 2025 at 3:47 PM
I omitted the *real* clincher: "millet beer" is also reconstructable to proto-Oti-Volta ...
So too is "wild pig": the map seems to imply 2Ky for "earliest occurrence" of that, which is frankly impossible. Maybe I've misinterpreted it.
November 30, 2025 at 3:02 PM
Some of the dates on this map look implausibly recent. For example, it's possible to reconstruct words for two distinct cultivars of pearl millet to proto-Oti-Volta; also "grind in a mortar" and "winnow." POV can hardly date from only 2000 years ago (much more internally diverse than e.g. Romance.)
November 30, 2025 at 1:49 PM
Nieman kan mit gerten
kindes zuht beherten.
den man zêren bringen mac,
dem ist ein wort als ein slac.
November 29, 2025 at 2:20 PM
Crocodile
Chameleon
Termite
Hippopotamus
Wirebird
November 28, 2025 at 11:36 PM
Llongyfarchiadau o Abertawe (yng Nghymru)
November 26, 2025 at 5:49 PM
Certainly "culturally conservative" though: board member of the far-right Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (shareholders: Legatum and Paul Marshall.)
November 23, 2025 at 8:05 PM
Berber aṃucc "cat": any connection to Hausa mussa "cat"? (Given that a lot of "cat" words seem to be kinda phonaesthetic anyway, I suppose the resemblance could easily be accidental.)
November 23, 2025 at 7:59 PM
I saw some correspondence on their misclassification of Nabit as a Farefare dialect, from one of the few linguists with an informed opinion on the matter; his proposal was rejected, relying instead on an MA thesis (on Nabit orthography) by an author with no knowlege of the relevant languages at all.
November 22, 2025 at 6:07 PM
On the plus side, when I last had access to look at the specialised area I know most about (Western Oti-Volta) much of the information was significantly wrong anyway.
November 21, 2025 at 12:07 PM
To be fair, some tomatoes _are_ pretty disturbing. (No? Just me, then ...)
November 11, 2025 at 3:23 PM