Bidai language

Last updated
Bidai
Quasmigdo
RegionTexas
Extinct 19th century?
unclassified (language isolate?
Atakapan?)
Language codes
ISO 639-3 None (mis)
Glottolog bida1238

Bidai (also spelled Beadeye, Bedias, Bidey, Viday, etc.; autonym: Quasmigdo) is an unclassified extinct language formerly spoken by the Bidai people of eastern Texas. Zamponi (2024) notes that the numerals do not appear to be related to those of any other languages and hence proposes that Bidai may be a language isolate. [1]

Contents

Word list

Rufus Grimes, a Texan settler in Navasota, Grimes County sent a letter dated November 15, 1887 to Albert S. Gatschet that contained several Bidai words. The word list was published in Gatschet (1891: 39, fn. 2). [1] [2]

glossBidai
onenamah
twonahonde
threenaheestah
fournashirimah
fivenahot nahonde
sixnashees nahonde
boypúskus
corntándshai

Comparison of numerals

Below is Zamponi's (2024) comparison of Bidai numerals with those of neighboring languages. [1]

languageonetwothreefourfivesix
Bidainamahnahondenaheestahnashirimahnahot nahondenashees nahonde
W. Atakapa [3] tanuʹk, taʹnuktsīklāt(h)imatoʹlnīt, nitlatsīʹk
Karankawa [4] náatsaháikiakaxájihájo haknnáatsa béhemahájo háikia
Tonkawa [5] we·ʔis-paxketaymetissikitkaskwasikwa·law
Caddo [6] ’wísts’i’bítdaháw’híwí’diːsik’andáːnkih
Adai [7] nancasnasscolletacacheseppacanpacanancus
Mobilian Jargon [8] (a)čaf(f)atok(o)lotočenaoštataɫapehan(n)ale

Anthony Grant (1995) finds the following cognates shared with Choctaw and Mobilian Jargon. [9]

languageboycorn
Bidaipúskustándshai
Choctaw poškoš ~ poskos ‘child’tãci’
Mobilian Jargon posko(š) ~ poškoš ‘baby, child’tãče ‘baby, child’

See also

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Zamponi, Raoul (2024). "Unclassified languages". The Languages and Linguistics of Indigenous North America. De Gruyter. pp. 1627–1648. doi:10.1515/9783110712742-061. ISBN   978-3-11-071274-2.
  2. Gatschet, Albert S. 1891. The Karankawa Indians, the coast people of Texas. Cambridge, MA: Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology.
  3. Gatschet, Albert S. & John R. Swanton. 1932. Dictionary of the Atakapa language accompanied by text material. (Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 108). Washington: Government Printing Office.
  4. Grant, Anthony P. 1994. Karankawa linguistic materials. Kansas Working Papers in Linguistics 19(2). 1–56.
  5. Hoijer, Harry. 2018. Tonkawa texts: a new linguistic edition. Edited by Thomas R. Wier. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.
  6. Chafe, Wallace. 2018. The Caddo language: a grammar, texts, and dictionary based on materials collected by the author in Oklahoma between 1960 and 1970. Petoskey, MI: Mundart Press.
  7. Grant, Anthony P. 1995. John Sibley’s Adai vocabulary: a contribution to Caddoan lexicography? Paper presented at the 15th annual Siouan and Caddoan Languages Conference, Albuquerque, NM.
  8. Drechsel, Emanuel J. 1996. An integrated vocabulary of Mobilian Jargon, a native American pidgin of the Mississippi Valley. Anthropological Linguistics 38. 248–354.
  9. Grant, Anthony P. 1995. "A note on Bidai." European Review of Native American Studies 9:45–47.