Language name and locationː Pumé, Apure state, Venezuela [Refer to Ethnologue]

语言名称和分布地区: 普梅语, 委内瑞拉西南部阿普雷州, 波利瓦尔州和中部瓜里科州阿普雷河, 梅塔河, 奥里诺科河和西纳鲁科河流域

1. kʰãrɛ-̃mẽ    

2. yõarĩ       

3. tʰararĩ      

4. hadɔ-čia-mĩ  

5. hĩrãrĩ=literally "many", also kʰarẽ iči="one hand"

10. iči čʰʊnã-ĩ =literally "all /both hands", also=hĩrãrĩ=literally "many"

20. taɔ čʰʊnã-ĩ =literally "all /both hands /feet", also=hĩrãrĩ = literally "many"

Linguist providing data and dateː Dr. Russell D. Greaves, Adjunct Associate Professor
Department of Anthropology , University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT, USA. February 28, 2020.

提供资料的语言学家: Dr. Russell D. Greaves, 2020 年 2 月 28 日.

Other commentsː Pumé is spoken by approximately 7,900 speakers out of 9,480 ethnic population mainly in eastern Apure state; Bolívar and Guárico states: Apure, Meta, Orinoco, and Sinaruco rivers, Venezuela.

The Savanna Pumé (nomadic hunters & gatherers located between the major drainages of the Venezuelan llanos, please do not use “Yaruro”, this is a pejorative term.) use a base 5 system, naturally derived from the number of digits on the hands & feet. This is especially common among many hunter-gatherer groups in many parts of the world (perhaps the best known example being derived from some ethnographic work in the early-mid 20^th century with desert Australian Aborigines because of their relative fluency in a pidgin English counting 1, 2, 3, 4, “big mob”), especially among tropical foraging populations. As noted, the word for “5” in Pumé is “many”, less commonly spoken of as “1 hand”. I have not heard the Savanna Pumé employ other words that the River Pumé use to extend the base 5 counting system from 6-9 (kʰaĩ-tãrã-ri kʰarɛ̃-mẽ = literally “my limb-one” =6; kʰaĩ-tãrã-ri yõarĩ = my limb-two=7; kʰaĩ-tãrã-ri tʰararĩ = my limb-three=8; & kʰaĩ-tãrã-ri hadɔ-čia-mĩ = my limb-four=9). The Savanna Pumé will sometimes extend a vague count or list beyond one hand (>~5 “a lot”) by moving along the fingers of a second hand, occasionally identifying the same finger more than once, but not necessarily counting those numbers. The Savanna Pumé will visually demonstrate all the hand digits together to identify a “large number” that is not necessarily “10”, but “a lot”. They will hold their fingertips to their toes to demonstrate “a whole lot” that is not necessarily “20”, and except in contrast to using all the hand digits, is not necessarily “more than” a demonstration of 10 hand digits. Precise cardinal numbers are not a critical part of speaking about multiple things in Pumé. Sometimes the Savanna Pumé do have a need for more precise accounting, which is done through technical aids, not verbal numbers. For example: during very infrequent wage labor they may wish to keep track of the number of days worked for a local criollo (mixed ethnicity Venezuelan citizens who do not identify as indigenous) or to tally the number of items obtained that would be the basis of their compensation (never in money but in market goods). Under these circumstances I have seen the Savanna Pumé use notches on a small stick to keep track of such a tally. When travelling away from their home community, the Savanna Pumé often leave a moriche palm (Mauritia flexuosa) leaf fiber string with knots tied into it that represent the anticipated number of nights they expect to be away. This tally is rarely accurate, but is an estimate. Individuals cut off one knot each day to have a visual reminder/tally of when the person is likely to return. I was given a moriche palm leaf fiber string tied with knots once by a woman who wanted to send a message to my wife identifying the number of women in the camp who wanted her to remember them and be certain to return some day and visit. That string contained an accurate number of knots for the women she considered to be adult and have a relationship with my wife. The Savanna Pumé are monolingual, and only a couple men know a very minimal amount of Spanish. The River Pumé, formerly semi-nomadic horticulturalists who are now principally sedentary horticulturalist/agriculturalists who also raise some animals (mostly chickens and pigs, and very infrequently a small number of cattle), do wage labor for local criollos, sell fish or game to criollos, and continue to fish, hunt, and gather some plant foods, have much higher frequency of bilingual abilities in Spanish. Many men speak at least some Spanish, and a few women do as well. The River Pumé will use Spanish numbers, have adopted some Pumé terms to numbers between 10 and 20 that I have never heard used among the Savanna Pumé. Although some researchers have identified a zero ordinal number concept (dɛ-kʰia), it is probably not equivalent to 0. This term, and a wide variety of other individual words and phrases, is used in an endless set of contexts to express not having something, having used it all up, or to express “poverty” in relation to the perceived abundance of possessions and food that the local criollos have. The Savanna and River Pumé do use an abbreviated ordinal numeric system based in the identification of someone or an event being “first” (yabɔ-ĩ), and others following, for example in the recitation of birth order of their children or siblings. Although some River Pumé do appear to use a term for second (tʰo-ro) and last (duri tʰamõ = literally “following truly”), the Savanna Pumé will identify “first” and then list following individuals as “next” (duri-a), and may qualify that after identifying the last person in a birth order list, for example, by saying “duri mõ”, meaning “none follow” (the mõ suffix or statement is used in many contexts to indicate exhaustion of a particular resource to nothing, or nearly nothing. As noted, Pumé has a very rich vocabulary for expressing the lack of things!). In that Savanna Pumé usage, the last born, or last event, would be included in the listing, but would not be referred to as “duri mõ”, that would be a qualifier that “none follow” after the listed individuals or events. 

Language name and locationː Pumé, Apure state, Venezuela [Refer to Ethnologue]

语言名称和分布地区: 普梅语 (雅鲁罗语 Yaruro), 委内瑞拉西南部阿普雷州, 波利瓦尔州和中部瓜里科州阿普雷河, 梅塔河, 奥里诺科河和西纳鲁科河流域