Growth and davalopmant of folk zoological lift‐forms in tha Mayan languaga family

Abstract

This paper examines the growth of folk zoological life‐form categories (e.g., “fish,” “bird,” “snake”) in the Mayan language family of Mesoamerica. Lexical reconstruction indicates the addition of zoological lite‐forms over time. Proto‐Mayan, spoken 4000 years ago, possessed only one life‐form, “snake,” while all contemporary Mayan languages have at least three terms—“snake,” “bird,” and “fish.” The findings of this study support a zoological life‐form encoding sequence proposed on the basis of synchronic language evidence (Brown 1979a). Positive correlation of the encoding sequence with societal complexity implies (1) that the sequence is basically additive or cumulative in nature, and (2) that earlier language states generally had fewer animal life‐forms than later states. Both of these implications are supported by the present investigation. This paper also treats systematic ways in which Mayan languages have acquired folk zoological life‐forms, continuing the investigation of principles of biological nomenclatural development begun by Berlin (1972). [cognitive anthropology, ethnozoology, folk classification, language change, language universals, Mayan languages]