Re: [tied] Re: Swat River.

It's a dialectal shibboleth (or khibboleth?). South Pashto dialects have "sh", "zh" (actually more like retroflex [s.], [z.]) and North Pashto has "kh" [x], "g" instead.

The ethnic name is correspondingly [pas.tun], pl. [pas.ta:n&'] in the south and [paxtun, paxta:n&'] in the north, and the language is called [pas.to':/paxto':]. The historical source of these names is probably *pars(u)w-a:na- 'Persian' (Iranian *-rs- seems to give -s^t-/-xt- regularly in the language)

Piotr

----- Original Message -----
From: markodegard@...

To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Tuesday, November 06, 2001 4:33 AM

Subject: [tied] Re: Swat River.

Pakhtoons. CNN says 'Pashtuns'. 'Pashtoons' sounds like animated features from Warner Bros. starring Bugs Bunny). (Humm. Mel Blanc doing CNN correspondant Kamal Hyder's accent in a cartoon; think of Speedy Gonzalez or Pepe LePew transplanted to Kandahar).