noun
social_kin
Proto-Siouan-Catawba
Proto-Siouan
*i-htų́•-
Pre-Mandan
*-tų-
Mandan
tų́hą
‘male’s sister’s child’
H:258
Proto-Mississipi-Valley
*ihtų́•žą
Proto-Dakota
*thu- ~ *thų-
Lakota
thųžą́
‘female’s brother’s daughter’
EJ
Assiniboine
thuža
‘male’s sister’s daughter’
[Sask.]
PAS
Proto-Hoocąk-Chiwere
Hoocąk
hičųžą́k ~ čų́ųžąk
‘niece from mother’s brother, granddaughter’
KM:834
,
hicųžąk ~ cųųžąk
Proto-Dhegiha
*ihtížǫ < **ihtǘžǫ
Omaha-Ponca
ittížǫ
Kanza/Kaw
iččížo
Osage
iṭsízhoⁿ
, †ihcížǫ
LF:81a
Quapaw
ittížǫ
‘male’s sister’s daughter’
General comment
Quapaw and Dakota preserve both ‘niece’ terms. Shaw notes no nasalization in
the Saskatchewan Assiniboine form. J RTC has noted that speaker differences in ‘nephew’
and ‘niece’ involve nasalization. I would only add that nasalization
correlates with same sex: ‘woman’s niece, man’s nephew’.
Only MVS has a male, female speaker distinction.
RR: *i-htų́•- may have been Proto-Siouan, but with a
distribution only in Mandan and MVS this is hard to prove. The sibilant present in
the MVS forms may well represent an analogical development based on ‘nephew,
female speaker?, sister’s son (1)’.
JEK The morpheme žą in the MVS forms is from Proto-Siouan *yą́ka
~ *yą́kE ‘daughter’. DH hti may be by analogy with DH
*ihtipro (?) ‘woman’s elder brother’. The Mandan term also occurs in
‘nephew (1), male’s sister’s son’.