break off (1)

verb physical_contact_deformation

Proto-Siouan-Catawba

Proto-Siouan *-ksá

Proto-Mississipi-Valley *-ksá

Proto-Dakota *-ksA´

Lakota -ksA, pa- ‘break something with the hand by pushing or pressure; sitting e.g. on a board and breaking it; measure and cut cloth or buckskin with a machine at the factory’ EB:429a, EJ , -ksA, wa- ‘cut off e.g. a stick with a knife or saw; to separate anything by cutting crosswise; cut meat’ EB:533a, EJ , -ksá, wo- ‘break off by punching or shooting e.g. a stick, limb etc.; to break while running, as a team running against a tree and breaking the neck-yoke, etc.’ B-604a; ‘cut by punching or pulling’ EB:604a , -ksA, wó- ‘pull e.g. corn’ EJ , -ksA, ya- ‘harvest, pull ear off stalk’ EB:623a , -ksA, yu- ‘bite off e.g. a stick’ EB:642a , -ksA, aká- ‘break off e.g. a stick with the hand’ EB:68a , -ksA, na- ‘cut off on something, cut off from, cut off in addition to’ EB:350a

Dakota yuksá ‘break off’ SRR:630b

Proto-Dhegiha *-sa

Omaha-Ponca ðisá ‘cut with scissors’ RTC

Quapaw íkasa dedé ‘throw sth. down from above’ RR

Proto-Southeastern

Proto-Biloxi-Ofo

Biloxi ksâ , †ksa ‘broken’ D&S:213a

General comment

If the Lakota forms are cognate here, rather than with ‘break (2)’, then they have been drawn irregularly into the productive class of ablauting roots. Apparent Proto-Siouan *ks initial clusters are frequently reconstructible to pre-Proto-Siouan *ki-s- with a reflexive/possessive or vertitive meaning. It is not clear that this is possible here, so the cluster is reconstructed. Biloxi kso ‘broken’ (DS-213a), although not cognate with either kse or ksa, is related by vocalic sound symbolism.

Language Cognate Phonetic Siouan Meaning Comment Sources