The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 103, July 1999 - April, 2000 Page: 275
554 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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"Comanche Land and Ever Has Been'
native language also includes a rich vocabulary for describing geographic
features such as elevation, bodies of water, and vegetation.4
Today these semantic interests are expressed confidently in English as
well. Bearings for travel are given exactly, the provider visualizes the
course and notes landmarks while indicating direction by pointing with
pursed lips or by moving their right hand, sign-language fashion, down
and out in a slicing motion. Verbal directions, too, include the repeti-
tion of a phrase to explain continuance, "north" or "east" or "that way"
rather than "left" and "right" when turns are indicated. Proverbial advice
is given not to go and return by the same route, but rather to travel in a
"circle," a suggestion rooted in notions of the sacred, protective quality
of circles and a practical concern about being tracked or ambushed.
Routes of travel, distances, landmarks, and stopping places are all
covered in a familiar pattern of casual conversation. Soon after arriving
in a Comanche household, a traveler from any distance will have all the
details of the trip reviewed, and it is likely that at least one of the hosts
knows the way as well as the visitor. Journeys of the past are recalled
with equal enthusiasm and attention to detail. Thus, in 1989 a woman
in her seventies recounted for me a trip from Oklahoma to Jemez
Pueblo that she made some fifteen years earlier to search out a man
who had befriended her family long before that. She painstakingly
described her route to the village, the topography of the village site, the
position of several dwellings, and her avenue of approach to the man's
house through the pueblo alleyways. There was an almost epic tone to
her account, well justified in view of the antiquity of Comanche-Jemez
trade relations.
On another occasion this same woman told how she used to accom-
pany her father on peyote-gathering trips when she was a teenager. Her
father had permission to collect the sacramental cactus on a ranch a
few hours south of San Antonio. Though she had forgotten the ranch-
er's name, she felt confident that she could find the peyote grounds
again, and talked about making the journey once more out of nostalgia.
When describing her first plane trip, from Oklahoma City to New York
The following terms for surface features give some indication of the clarity of expression
possible in Comanche: bank, tipdna?; cave, kahni tas, tazna; clearing, pzhibirazn; cliff, tzbanaa?;
creek or creek channel, hunu?bi, okwetz; forest, soo huuhpi; grove, huutamn, toponikan; hill or hill-
side, keno, kenu; hill, single, andabi, anabz; hill standing alone ku?ebi, kuekari, nookann; hills going
up, not quite mountains, tinenoyiyzkwnut; hills, high, yiyikwznut;, hills, low rolling, tfrienopi; island,
paa tipinaati?, sokobi paa tzpinaat?; lake, pond (from rainwater), imahpaa?; mountain, toya;
prairie, nimiwahti, pzhiwahti; rock formations in a line, yananzki; rock formations in the moun-
tains, yananzki toyapi; rocky ground, tipi sokoobi; sand, pasiwaapi; sand dune, pasiwanoo?; slope,
naya; soft ground, mayaba; spring, paritsohpe? spring, abandoned, upantsohpe?; summit, ku?e, val-
ley, haapane; valley, swampy, pa?isohaapane;, streambank, ekatotsa, ti'pdna?; swamp, pamzpitso?ni;
thicket, huukonotf; tributary, atahunubi, nabatai; river or river channel, okweet; river crossing,
nagwee; water, clear running, pahtss okwe, pahtsokwheti; water impoundment, pagcwihtimapi; woods,
huukabati soo huuhpi.2000
275
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 103, July 1999 - April, 2000, periodical, 2000; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101220/m1/321/: accessed April 30, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.