Page:An Australian language as spoken by the Awabakal.djvu/46

 5XXV1 INTRODUCTION.

((?.) In the Kamalarai dialect (N.S.W.), kagal means 'bad,' 'no good'; the -gal here, as elsewhere, is formative, and ka is the root. Now ka is a ►Sk. prefix meaning ' bad '; in Tiji, 'bad' is ca, and in the New Hebrides, sa ; in New Britain it is a-ka-ina,

{e.) The Awabakal word for ' good ' is murrarag ; in Wirad- hari, it is marang ; in Kamalarai, it is murraba; the Port Jackson tribe at Sydney called it bujari. The root is ma, mu, bn ; Mr, Threlkeld's spelling should thus have been ma-ra-rag, that is, ma-ra with the last syllable reduplicated and -ag added ; and murraba should be ma-ra-ba ; in bu-jari, the -jari is a very common formative. Analogues to these are: — Albannic, bo-ina, 'good'; Ebudan (Aneityum), up-ene (u p /or bu) ; Malay, ba-ik; Papuan, mage, bo-en a, na-mo, na-ma. The Sanskrit bha-dra means 'best,' ' happy,' ' well '; and the insular Keltic ma-th is 'good,' 'wholesome,' 'happy.' I believe that the Latin bonus (of which Latin etymologists cannot trace the origin) is connected with these ancient roots; for the Keltic ma-th, z.e., mad, would easily give bon-us.

{/.) The Wiradhari balun, 'dead,' seems to be the same word as the Dra vidian ma-1, 'to die,' and of the same origin as the Polynesian ma-te, ' dead,' and the Malay ma-ti, mang-kat, 'dead.' The old Assyrian has maatu, 'to die,' and the Sanskrit mri (mar), the Malay mi-ta, the Hebrew miith, miitli, are all cognate verbs. The Keltic has bath, bas, 'death.'

((/.) Korien is an Awabakal negative. If it were an Ebudan word, its form in -en would make it a verbal noun equivalent to ' the denying.' Now, it happens that, in the Motvi dialect of New Guinea, gorea means ' to deny,' and the Maori ha-hore or here means 'no' (A for k), and whaka-kore-kore, 'to deny.' The Ebudan of Efate has koro, 'to deny.' Another Awabakal nega- tive is kya-wai, where the kya is for ka. The Maori ka-ua (imperative or optative) also means 'not.'

(h.) Wiyalli is to 'speak.' The Sanskrit vad, va^, 'to spei ,k,' would give the wiy a, and the -alii is the usual verbal foi-m. The Albannic has veti, 'speak.' Fiji has va-ka, 'to say,' and vei wall, 'to joke,' where vei is a reciprocal. The Awabakal wi- ya means ' say,' ' tell'; New Britain has wi, ' to tell, to inform.'

{k.) The Awabakal bun means 'to strike,' 'to beat,' ' to kill.' With this compare the Malay bunoh, 'to kill'; the Albannic bua-tari, 'to destroy,' and we-umi, 'to fight,' 'to kill,' of which the we is reciprocal.

(Z.) For an adult ' woman,' the Wiradhari says inar ; the Port Jackson (Sydney) sub-tribe said din or dhin* ; other localities say yinan, ina ; thus the J is radical. Several districts, far apart, in

the 'wife' of a black man (kuri).
 * Hence comes the word jin — so commonly used in Australia to mean

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