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Re: Fluency Wish-List

From:Sally Caves <scaves@...>
Date:Thursday, April 13, 2000, 21:37
Matt Pearson wrote:

> I've never thought about what to do with animals. I think what I'll > do is adapt the words for human limbs to four-legged animals: So > "nalhie" means "pair of arms" when used of a person, and "pair > of forelegs" when used of an animal, while "kalie" means "pair of > legs" when used of a person, and "pair of hind legs" when used of > an animal. > > The proverb "Eyes for the owl, legs for the rabbit" uses the > word "kalie" for "legs". I suppose this is reasonable, since > it's a rabbit's hind legs which make the difference. > > Matt.
In Teonaht, so I've decided, all mammals have arms and legs (except bats, who have hands and wings). Centipedes, however, have mimllarod, "many legs," mim- meaning either "some" or "many," depending on context. Spiders, I suppose, and ants, and silver fish, have mimllarod as well. And mimmepan. More than two eyes. :-) Sal ============================================================ SALLY CAVES scaves@frontiernet.net http://www.frontiernet.net/~scaves (bragpage) http://www.frontiernet.net/~scaves/teonaht.html (T. homepage) http://www.frontiernet.net/~scaves/contents.html (all else) ===================================================================== Niffodyr tweluenrem lis teuim an. "The gods have retractible claws." from _The Gospel of Bastet_ ============================================================