-HAI
Navajo
Etymology
From Proto-Athabaskan *x̣αy (“winter”).
In Navajo, the initial fricative *x̣ of Proto-Athabaskan did not sonorize to gh, so in verbal stems and in the nominal stem hai (“winter”) the initial voiceless fricative h is maintained (with the exception of the adverbial derivative díí ghaaí or dííghaaí (“this winter”), which shows a later sonorization). See also -ZHĮ́ (“summer”) for a similar situation.
Root
-HAI
| Theme | Category | Bases | Reversionary (+ná) | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ∅ | motion |
a winter or a year passes
|
a winter or a year returns |
Stem set
| Aspect | Imperfective | Perfective | Future | Iterative | Optative |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Momentaneous | -hááh | -hai | -hah | -hah | -hááh |
See also Appendix: Roots and stems derivation.
Antonyms
Derived terms
Navajo terms belonging to the root -HAI (winter passes)
References
- Young, Robert; Morgan, William; Midgette, Sally (1992), Analytical lexicon of Navajo, Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, →ISBN, page 237