tigridia to cacomite

Adam Fikso irisman@ameritech.net
Sat, 13 Aug 2005 11:34:57 PDT
My Merriam -ebster (1935) gives cacomistle as derivd from the Nahuatl   word 
"tlacomiztli" for the animal we call cacomistle. This does not necessarily 
invalidate the other derivation pertaining to the ocelot. The Aztecs 
probably didn't classify animals as we do, lumping things together that we 
would separate, f. i. in Arabic there are few words for flower, and some 
authorities indicate only one word, i.e., susan, (soft "s" sounded as 
shushan) which can cover everything from irises  to snapdragons unless 
you're an Arabic botanist, or use a native non-Arabic dialect word. 



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