From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 21367
Date: 2003-04-29
----- Original Message -----
From: "Andy Howey" <andyandmae_howey@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, April 29, 2003 7:21 PM
Subject: [tied] Tok Pisin "pikinini" (was Re: Was proto-romance a pidgin?)
> Just out of curiosity, does anyone know if the Tok Pisin term "pikinini" given below has any relationship to the derogatory English term "pickaninny"? They both seem to refer to offspring. Is "pikinini" just the word "pickaninny" filtered through Tok Pisin, or is it a case of accidental resemblance? Thanks a lot
<piccaninny> was borrowed from one of the pidgins of the West Indies, but it has the same etymology as Tok Pisin <pikinini> (found in the same or similar form in various Pacific Pidgin Englishes): from Portuguese <pequeninho> (dimin. of <pequeno> 'little'). It's an early pidgin word, carried by sailors round the globe.
Piotr