Kin Terms in the Polynesian Protolanguages

Abstract

Kin terms are reconstructed for Proto-Polynesian, Proto-Tongic, Proto-Nuclear Polynesian, Proto-Ellicean, Proto-Ellicean Outlier, Proto-Eastern Polynesian, Proto-Central Eastern Polynesian, Proto-Marquesic, and Proto-Tahitic. The Proto-Polynesian system seems to have contained about as many distinctive terms as some of the more complex systems of today, such as those found in Tongan, Rennellese, Taumako, and Eastern Polynesian languages, where complex refers to a language that names more distinctions. It is suggested that languages with fewer distinctions, such as Samoan and the Ellicean Outliers, have simplified over time. Some of the reconstructions are questionable, especially at the Proto-Polynesian level, because of distributions that are limited to Tongic and languages that have clearly or potentially borrowed from Tongic (East Uvean, Anutan, Tikopian, and, to a lesser extent, East Futunan). Rennellese seems particularly conservative among the Outliers and has a number of agreements with Tongic not known from Nuclear Polynesian-other than languages that have borrowed from Tongic. At least two explanations are possible for the conservatism of Rennellese: the larger scale of its society in terms of numbers of people and in terms of named roles or relations of importance, and (2) it may include undetected borrowings from Tongic or languages that have borrowed from Tongic. Hawaiian kin terms are exclusively Marquesic where such matters are determinate. Hawaiian shares a number of demonstrable sporadic sound changes in kin terms with its Marquesic relatives (Marquesan and Mangarevan). It may share some such changes with Tahitic, but all such cases are indeterminate because the forms concerned are lacking in Marquesan and Mangarevan. This is consistent with comparisons of general vocabulary that suggest that, despite the prominence of Tahiti in the oral history of Hawai'i, Hawaiian remained a language dominated by its Marquesic roots