Chapter 2.5 Meteorological phenomena

Malcolm Ross

1. Introduction⇫

The reconstruction of any terminology brings its own peculiar problems. In this case, the challenge was associated with the fact that meteorological conditions are not the same throughout the Austronesian speaking area. It is a necessary inference that as Austronesian speakers settled the regions they now occupy, they encountered new conditions which required adaptations in their terminology. Thus the meanings of the terms in a given language need to be related to the weather conditions which occur where the language is spoken. For this reason, §2 gives a short account of Pacific wind systems, while in §3 the weather patterns that Austronesian speakers encountered during their (largely eastward) migrations are described. Less trivially, a hypothesis about the semantic structure of POc speakers’ weather terminology must rest on a hypothesis about where POc was spoken — and the same is true of any protolanguage for which weather terms are reconstructed. My assumption here that POc was spoken in the Bismarck Archipelago. I return to this matter in the concluding section.¹

2. Pacific wind systems⇫

The main planetary surface wind system affecting tropical regions consists of the trade winds. The trades blow from the sub-tropical high-pressure zones of both hemispheres to the equatorial low-pressure zone, but are deflected by the earth’s rotation (the Coriolis effect) so that they blow from the southeast in the southern hemisphere and from the northeast in the northern. The equatorial low-pressure zone where the southeast and northeast trade winds meet is known as the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), colloquially ‘the Doldrums’.

Meteorological phenomena 121

The trade winds and the ITCZ are two of the major ingredients of the weather in the region inhabited by Austronesian speakers. Map 10 provides a general overview for the period from (roughly) April to October.²

The trades are noted for their consistency and force, especially over the eastern side of the ocean (Hawaii has quite consistent trade wind flow, bringing sunshine with sporadic cumulus and some humidity). Over the western Pacific (e.g. in the Bismarck Archipelago), they are less consistent because of monsoonal and other disturbances. Near their high-pressure source the trade winds are quite dry, but as they blow over the ocean towards the Equator they pick up moisture which they deposit as orographic rain when they hit high islands. Orographic rainfall occurs when air is forced to ascend the side of a mountain range, and is particularly common where mountains lie parallel to the coast over which blow moist winds from the sea. This is the situation on the large islands of the Philippines; in Papua New Guinea on Manus Island, the tip of Papua, the Huon Peninsula and the island of New Britain; in the New Georgia group and on Guadalcanal in the Solomons; and on the high islands of Fiji. All of these experience heavy rain on their windward coasts during the trades, whilst areas in the lee of their mountain ranges remain relatively dry. In these areas the trades are therefore associated with rain (and sometimes with the rainiest season), whereas in most Pacific locations they bring the dry season.

The ITCZ has weather effects of a different kind. It is a low-pressure belt with relatively little wind but various local perturbations. Incoming airflow has nowhere to go but up — in large numbers of isolated columns. Each island becomes capped with a cloud build-up resulting from evaporation due to the sun’s heat and there is thundery convectional rain, but little lee effect. Thus the ITCZ is characterised by frequent, more or less windless rainfall.

On non-monsoonal Pacific islands (i.e. islands well away from the land masses of Australia and mainland Asia) the main determinant of seasonal variation is the annual movement of the ITCZ. Because most of the languages I am concerned with in this paper are spoken in places south of the Equator, I will refer to the seasons as the southern hemisphere ‘winter’ (SHW) and the southern hemisphere ‘summer’ (SHS), using these terms also to refer to the northern hemisphere ‘summer’ and ‘winter’ respectively.

The movement of the ITCZ roughly tracks the zenith sun southward in the SHS, northward in the SHW. This movement is visible if one compares Maps 10 and 11. But because the northern hemisphere has larger land masses than the south, forming the areas of greatest heating, the mean annual position of the ITCZ generally lies well north of the Equator. On the leading edge of the ITCZ (the south in the SHS, the north in the SHW), tropical cyclones — ‘typhoons’ in the northwest Pacific — sometimes arise. They are small intense low-pressure systems. The wind whirls around them, often with torrential rainfall, as they move away from the ITCZ. The movement of the ITCZ of course means that the trades system also moves with the seasons: the southeast trades blow further north in the SHW, the northeast trades further south in the SHS.

Among non-monsoonal Pacific islands there are just a few inhabited locations which lie more or less constantly within the ITCZ despite its movement and hence have little seasonal variation in temperature or rainfall. These include the northern islands of Kiribati and the southern Marshall Islands between about 2˚N and 6˚N.

On other non-monsoonal islands there are two asymmetric seasons — a ‘wet’ and stormy season of about four months when the more intense effects of the ITCZ are felt, and a ‘dry’ and stormfree season during the rest of the year when the trade winds blow more or less without interruption. However, the terms ‘wet’ and ‘dry’ are merely relative in many Pacific locations, and exceptions to this pattern in any case occur where the trades bring heavy orographic rain.

In the southern hemisphere, when the ITCZ moves south in the SHS bringing the ‘wet’, islands closer to the Equator (easternmost parts of the island of New Guinea and the Bismarck Archipelago, the northern Solomons, Tuvalu, Tokelau) are directly within the ITCZ and receive relatively windless convectional rains. When the wind does blow, it is generally from the northwest. Islands further south (the southern Solomons, Vanuatu, Fiji, Tonga, Samoa) experience variable weather as the southeast trades are sporadically disrupted by westerly and northwesterly winds and tropical cyclones caused by perturbations in the ITCZ.

Non-monsoonal islands in the northern hemisphere experience the converse seasonal regime. When the ITCZ moves north in the SHW, the northeast trades are interrupted by wet weather with westerly and southwesterly winds and typhoons.

The main disruptions to the regime described above are the seasonal reversals of pressure and wind over the land masses and neighbouring oceans which are known as monsoons, which affect the weather on the islands close to the land masses of Australia and mainland Asia. Monsoons are caused by the summer heating of the land, which effectively causes an extension of the equatorial low-pressure zone well north into Asia in July and south into northern and central Australia in January.³ The Asiatic low-pressure area centring on northwestern India is so intense that it supersedes the equatorial low in the SHW, so that the southeast trades cross the Equator and become the southwest monsoon in peninsular India, whilst Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, China and Japan experience winds from the south, varying to southeast and southwest as they blow in towards the heated continent. This phenomenon can be seen in Map 10. The extension of the equatorial low into Australia in the SHS is less intense, but is sufficient to draw the northeast trades across the Equator, where they become the northwest monsoon, bringing cloudy and rainy weather to Indonesia and western and southern parts of the island of New Guinea (see Map 11). From the perspective of this paper, the most important effect of the monsoon is that it brings a marked seasonal reversal. Whereas the wet on non-monsoonal islands either consists of the windless rain of the ITCZ or of variable, stormy weather, the monsoon draws the trade winds across the Equator into the opposite hemisphere, eliminating the doldrums and giving a clear reversal of wind direction.

3. The Austronesian weather experience⁴⇫

It is clear from this account of wind systems in Austronesian speaking areas that people in different parts of the area experience somewhat different configurations of wind and season. It follows from this that during their spread through the region, Austronesian speakers encountered new weather conditions and had either to adapt old terms to new conditions or to add new terms to their vocabularies.

Table 3 summarises the seasonal conditions pertaining in various Austronesian speaking areas. It is at best a crude summary, as local conditions may change considerably from one side of an island to the other, especially where orographic rain occurs. The locations are set out in very roughly the sequence in which I assume them (on the basis of Figure 1) to have been occupied by Austronesian speakers.

I assume that Proto Malayo-Polynesian was spoken in the northerly part of the Philippines. Here the northeast trades prevail in the SHS, but are replaced by monsoonal southerlies in the SHW. On the larger islands this means that east-facing slopes receive orographic rain during the trades and convectional rains in the monsoon, whilst west-facing slopes get orographic rain during the monsoon and have drought during the trades (Alip & Borlaza 1984). During the monsoon typhoons often strike the northern and central islands, but Benedek (1991:13) reports for the islands between the Philippines and Taiwan that there is sometimes a period when the sea is becalmed and the heat becomes intolerable.

As Austronesian speakers moved south into Mindanao and then Borneo, Sulawesi and perhaps Halmahera, they left the trade winds behind and entered the equatorial region with two monsoon seasons where rain falls all the year round. North of the equator, the accustomed monsoonal southerlies or southwesterlies continued in the SHW, but in the SHS the northeast trades became the northeast monsoon as they accumulated moisture prior to crossing the Equator. When our travellers crossed the Equator, they experienced a reorientation of wind directions: the southerly monsoon of the SHW became decidedly southeasterly or easterly, whilst the northeast monsoon of the SHS veered to the northwest or west.

Even in the equatorial zone, there is some seasonal variation in rainfall, the peak occurring in the SHS when the airflow is from Asia to Australia. This difference became more pronounced the further south and east (i.e. the closer to Australia) Austronesian speakers moved, and Sumba and Timor are quite dry during the SHW when the easterly monsoon brings dry air from Australia. By the time it reaches western Indonesia or moves north of the Equator and becomes the southwest monsoon, its winds have become humid and a source of rain, so that Sumatra and Borneo have no dry season, whilst Java divides into a wet west (from orographic rain) and a dry east (McDivitt 1984).

When Austronesian speakers travelled eastwards, probably from Halmahera, and moved along the north coast of the island of New Guinea, they gradually experienced a lessening of the effects of the southeast monsoon, as the central cordillera provided an increasingly large obstacle to it. The northwest monsoon of the SHS continued to provide the rainy season, however.

As the migrants emerged from the lee of the cordillera onto the Huon Peninsula and crossed to New Britain, two things occurred which presumably came to be reflected in POc terminology. First, they had left the monsoonal region behind them, and during the SHS they experienced the fairly windless rainy season of the ITCZ, with some sporadic northwesterly winds. Secondly they encountered for the first time the southeast trades of the SHW, during which the north coasts of the Huon Peninsula and of New Britain have their dry season, whilst their south coasts suffer torrential orographic rain (Howlett 1967:36–38). As they later spread around the coasts and offshore islands of Papua New Guinea and into the Bismarck Archipelago and then the New Georgia group of the northwest Solomons, they continued to encounter this and other kinds of local variation, but the southeast trades always continued to be the prevailing winds.

Table 3: Approximate summary of seasons in some Pacific locations

	Southern Hemisphere Winter	Southern Hemisphere Summer
Philippines	southwest monsoon, wet season; in centre and north some cyclones	northeast trades, dry season, orographic rain
Sumatra, Borneo	in north, southwest monsoon; in south, southeast monsoon; humid wind and rain	in north, northeast monsoon; in south, northwest monsoon, clouds and rain
rest of Indonesia	southeast monsoon, dry season; in west, some orographic rain	northwest monsoon, clouds and rain
Manus Island, New Britain, Huon Peninsula, tip of Papua	southeast trades, heavy orographic rain	ITCZ, convectional rain
Papua New Guinea rest	southeast trades, dry season	ITCZ, convectional rain
New Georgia group	southeast trades, heavy orographic rain	ITCZ, convectional rain
rest of northwest Solomon Islands	southeast trades, dry season	ITCZ, convectional rain
southeast Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, New Caledonia	southeast trades, dry season	variable stormy weather, some cyclones
Fiji	southeast trades, dry season, heavy orographic rain	variable stormy weather, some cyclones
Tonga, Samoa, Wallis, Futuna, Cooks, Tahiti, Tuamotus	southeast trades, dry season	variable stormy weather, some cyclones
Tuvalu, Tokelau, southern Gilberts, Nauru	southeast trades, humid wind, some rain	ITCZ, convectional rain
northern Gilberts, southern Marshalls	ITCZ, convectional rain	ITCZ, convectional rain
northern Marshalls, Carolines	variable stormy weather	northeast trades, some rain
Hawaii	northeast trades, some orographic rain	northeast trades, some orographic rain

As Oceanic speakers moved further into the Pacific, the lie of the islands ensured that they first also moved further south as well as east. In the southeast Solomons, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji and Samoa this took them right out of the ITCZ into the southern tropical zone where the rainy season of the SHS is relatively short (around four months) and the winds are variable: sometimes the southeast trades continue to penetrate, but often they are disrupted by stormy northwesterlies and sometimes by cyclones. There is a long dry season when the southeast trades blow consistently, except when they deposit orographic rain on high islands, particularly in Fiji.

It was from somewhere in this zone that Oceanic speakers moved northwards into Micronesia. In Tuvalu and the southern Gilberts⁵ they encountered a climate similar to that of the smaller islands in the Bismarcks: the southeast trades continue to predominate, but become more moist nearer to the Equator, and the northwesterlies and cyclones give way again to the much less windy wet season of the ITCZ. Further north, in the northern Gilberts and southern Marshalls, they found themselves permanently in the ITCZ, with relatively little wind and a good measure of convectional rain. Finally, in the scattered archipelagoes of the northern tropical zone — the northern Marshalls, the Carolines and the Marianas — they left the ITCZ to their south and entered a region in which the climate is the converse of that in the southern tropical zone. Here in nuclear Micronesia there is a long dry season when the northeast trades prevail in the SHS and a short rainy season with variable winds and storms in the SHW.

In the sections below I set out my reconstructions of POc terms referring to and associated with winds and the weather.

4. Winds⇫

4.1. Wind and wind strengths⇫

Winds seem to have been classified in two ways in POc. In this section I will present generic terms for wind and wind strengths, in the next section terms for seasonal winds and wind directions.

The generic term for ‘wind’ in POc was *aŋin, which continues PMP *haŋin.

PMP		*haŋin	‘air, wind’ (Dempwolff 1938)
POc		*aŋin	‘wind’
NNG	Mangap	yaŋ	‘rain’
NNG	Bing	yaŋ	‘wind’
PT	Minaveha	yagina	‘wind’
PT	Wedau	ðaɣina	‘wind’
PT	Balawaia	aɣi	‘wind’
PT	Motu	lai	‘wind’
MM	Konomala	yaŋin	‘wind’
NCV	Port Sandwich	n-ean	‘wind’
Mic	Kiribati	aŋ	‘wind’
Mic	Woleaian	yaŋ	‘wind’
Fij	Bauan	ðaŋi	‘wind’
Pn	Tongan	aŋi	‘(wind, breeze) blow’
Pn	Samoan	aŋi	‘(wind, breeze) blow’

Three terms for winds of differing strengths are reconstructable. POc *jaŋi referred to a strong wind, *sau/*sau-ŋ(a) and *mur[i,e] to breezes. It seems that *sau was a verb (‘blow freshly’), and *sau-ŋ(a) a nominalisation referring to the breeze itself. I cannot reconstruct a difference in meaning between *sau and *mur[i,e].

POc		*jaŋi	[N] ‘strong wind’; [V] ‘be windy’
NNG	Bing	sāŋ	‘wind strong directly against’
NNG	Mapos Buang	saŋ	‘strong winds which blow up the valley around November’
SES	Arosi	daŋi	‘wind’
SES	Sa’a	deŋi	‘wind’
NCal	Nemi	dān	‘wind’
Pn	Tongan	(ma)taŋi	[N] ‘wind’; [V] ‘be windy’
Pn	Samoan	(ma)taŋi	[N] ‘wind’; [V] ‘be windy, stormy’

POc		*sau	[V] ‘(breeze) blow’; [N] ‘breeze’
POc		*sau-ŋ(a)	[N] ‘breeze’
Adm	Lou	soso	‘wind, breeze’
Adm	Titan	só-soú-n	‘wind from a particular direction’
NNG	Kilenge	-sou	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Bilibil	sau	‘rain’
NNG	Mengen	saū	‘wind; large, damaging with black, foreboding sky’
MM	Solos	seou-ŋ	‘wind’
SES	Gela	sau(toŋa)	‘north wind’
Fij	Wayan	ðau-ðau	‘light to moderate wind, of early mornings and early evenings’
Fij	Bauan	ðau-ðau	‘land breeze’
Pn	Rapanui	hau	‘breeze, wind; blow freshly; cool’
Pn	Hawaiian	hau	‘cool breeze’
Pn	Māori	hau	‘wind, breeze’
Pn	West Futunan	sau	‘(wind) blow; sound of wind’

POc		*mur[i,e]	[N] ‘breeze’; [V] ‘blow gently’
NNG	Lukep	muru	‘breeze’
NNG	Mangap	mīri	‘wind’
NNG	Mangap	mir-mīri	‘little breeze’
NNG	Kilenge	na-mule	‘wind’
NNG	Yabem	mu	‘wind’
MM	Tabar	mur	‘wind’
Fij	Rotuman	mure	‘blow gently’
Fij	Bauan	mudre	[V] ‘(wind) blow gently’; [N] ‘cool breeze’; [ADJ] ‘cool, breezy’ (-dr- for expected *-r-)
Fij	Wayan	mure	‘(breeze) blow lightly’
Pn	Māori	muri-muri	‘breeze’
Pn	Tuamotuan	mure	‘fail (of breath)’

The terms below may also reflect POc *mur[i,e], but with a change in meaning.

NNG	Amara	o-mur	‘southeast trade’
NNG	Bing	mur-mōriy	‘wind which blows strongly from the west, often causing damage’
PT	Motu	miri(gini)	‘north wind’
PT	Mekeo	mili(kini)	‘north wind’

The Mangap, Motu and Mekeo terms have -i- where -u- is expected. This may reflect vowel assimilation.

Another term for wind was POc *mal(i,e)u, but it is not possible to determine its meaning precisely from its reflexes. In Proto Micronesian, it referred to a typhoon, but this was presumably its denotation after the ancestral Micronesians crossed out of the ITCZ into the northern hemisphere.

POc		*mal(i,e)u	‘wind’
SJ	Sobei	maro	‘wind’ (-o < *-ew)
PT	Tawala	malewa	‘favourable wind, wind from behind’6
MM	Lavongai	malu	‘(wind) blow’
MM	West Kara	maliu	‘wind’
MM	Nalik	maliu	‘wind’
MM	Notsi	mal	‘wind’
MM	Madak	man-man	‘wind’
MM	Maringe	maloa	‘air, open space’ (-oa < *-ewa)
Mic	Mokilese	mɛl-mɛl	‘storm, typhoon’
Mic	Ponapean	mɛli-mɛl	‘windstorm, typhoon’
Mic	Woleaian	marɨ-mer	‘storm, typhoon’

In Ross (1995c) I wrote:

my attempts to reconstruct POc terms for ‘typhoon’, ‘cyclone’ and ‘whirlwind’ have failed completely. On reflection, this is not surprising, as I have hypothesised that POc was spoken in the Bismarcks — too close to the Equator and to the ITCZ to be affected by winds of this kind.

Lynch (1997), however, points out that there is a South Vanuatu reflex of PAn *baRiuS ‘typhoon’, and that POc *paRiu ‘cyclone’ is therefore reconstructable. The lack of reflexes elsewhere is perhaps to be attributed, then, to their loss in languages whose speakers do not normally experience cyclones.

PAn		*baRiuS	‘typhoon’
POc		*paRiu	‘cyclone’
SV	Anejom̃	(n)eheyo	‘cyclone, hurricane’

Although a number of etyma referring to a wind seem to have been used both as a noun denoting that wind and as a verb expressing the action of the particular wind, there are also several reconstructable POc terms which seem to have been primarily used as verbs of blowing with reference to winds or people.

Three of these, *upi, *ipu and *i(p,pʷ)i, are clearly related to each other phonologically. The pair *upi and *ipu ‘blow’ are strikingly parallel to POc *ubi/*ibu ‘half coconut shell used as a drinking cup’, and it is possible that both pairs were generated at the same time by the application of a single rule (or similar wordplay) to the pre-existing member of each pair. In the case of POc *upi/*ipu ‘blow’, it seems likely that the pre-existing member was *ipu, since it can be traced back to PMP *ibut ‘breeze, draught of wind’, and that *upi was the late-generated form. However, its generation predates POc, as Blust has reconstructed PCEMP *upi ‘(wind, person) blow’ (1993).⁷ Similarly, the generation of the pair *ubi/*ibu ‘half coconut shell …’ also predates POc, as both forms are reconstructable in Proto Eastern Malayo-Polynesian (Blust 1978a).

PCEMP		*upi	‘(wind, person) blow’ (Blust 1993)
POc		*upi	‘(wind, person) blow’ (cf. vol. 1, pp.107–108)
Adm	Seimat	uhi	‘blow on the fire’
NNG	Mangap	-wi	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Apalik	uwi	‘northwest monsoon’
NNG	Takia	-wi	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Yabem	yu	‘(s.o.) blow’
NNG	Kaiwa	u	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Misim	yuv	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Vehes	vin	‘wind’
NNG	Mangga	va-vi	‘wind’
NNG	Medebur	-wi	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Tabar	uvi	‘(wind) blow’
SES	Gela	uvi-uvi	‘blow with the breath, play pipes’
SES	Lau	ufi	‘blow with the mouth; blow a conch or panpipes’
SES	Arosi	uhi	‘blow, breathe on’
NCV	Mota	uw	‘blow with the mouth, or of wind’
NCV	Raga	uvi	‘blow’
NCV	Paamese	uhi	‘blow’
Fij	Wayan	uvi, uvu	‘(fire, flute) be blown with the mouth, (ball, balloon) inflated, blown up’
Fij	Wayan	uvi	‘blow s.t. with the mouth’

In a number of NNG languages in the region of the Vitiaz Strait and the Huon Gulf, a nominalised form of *upi ‘blow’ has become the generic term for ‘wind’ (see vol.1,33–34 with regard to nominalising morphology):

PNNG		*upi-ŋ(a)	‘wind’
NNG	Atui	uvin	‘wind’
NNG	Kaiwa	(wa)vin	‘wind’
NNG	Duwet	fiŋ-fiŋ	‘wind’
NNG	Dangal	fiŋ	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Middle Watut	fiᵑg	‘wind’
NNG	Adzera	fi-fiŋ	‘strong, fierce wind’

PMP		*ibut	‘breeze, draught of wind’ (ACD)
POc		*ipu	‘(wind) blow’ (cf. vol. 1, pp.107–108)
NNG	Bing	yu	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Sissano	-iu	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Tinputz	viu	‘(wind) blow’ (metathesis)
MM	Mono	ihu	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Lungga	ivu	‘blow’
MM	Roviana	ivu-a	‘blow on (fire), blow into (conch)’
MM	Maringe	ifu	‘blow’
SES	Bugotu	ifu	‘blow (fire, pan-pipes)’

It seems likely that the form *i(p,pʷ)i is the result of an idiosyncratic change to *upi, *ipu or both. A couple of forms, NNG: Kaulong e-ip ‘the wind’ and MM: Nalik if ‘(wind) blow’, may reflect either *ipu or *i(p,pʷ)i.

POc		*i(p,pʷ)i	‘(wind, person) blow’
MM	Ramoaaina	ipi	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Tolai	ipi	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Teop	ivi	‘(wind) blow’
Pn	Tongan	ifi	‘blow with the mouth; blow or blow into or play (a whistle, or wind instrument)’
Pn	Samoan	ifi	‘blow smoke’
Pn	Māori	ihi	‘blow, of wind’

Two other forms meaning ‘blow’ are also reconstructable. These are also formally rather similar to each other, but this similarity evidently dates back to well before the genesis of POc. I know of no proper non-Oceanic cognates of POc *(p,pʷ)usi, but it appears to reflect the same monosyllabic root (*bus) as PMP *qembus ‘snort, pant’ (ACD) (with regard to monosyllabic roots, see vol.1,27–28).

POc		*(p,pʷ)usi	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Aria	-pu	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Sengseng	pe-puh	‘wind’
NNG	Numbami	pusie	‘(wind) blow’
NNG	Patep	plu	‘blow’
MM	Konomala	fus	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Minigir	vusu	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Tolai	vu	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Hahon	vus	‘wind’
MM	Tinputz	vuh	‘wind’
SV	Sye	o-vosi	‘wind’ (Lynch 1978b)
Pn	Rennellese	pusi	‘(wind) blow; blow (flute)’
Pn	Māori	pu-puhi	‘blow (as the wind, a whale); shoot (as a gun)’

The initial p- of the Pn items reflects POc *b- or *pʷ-: hence the suggestion that there was a POc alternant *pʷusi.

PAn		*pu+put	‘blow’ (Zorc 1994)
PMP		*putput	‘puff, blow suddenly and hard’
POc		*(pu)put	‘(wind) blow’
MM	West Kara	fifit	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Siar	fut	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Selau	wut	‘(wind) blow’
MM	Papapana	pute	‘wind’

4.2. Seasonal winds⇫

If POc speakers lived in the Bismarcks, then they encountered two seasons: the dry, when the southeast trades blew with reasonable consistency, and the wet, when there were sporadic northwesterly winds. The POc terms for the winds associated with these seasons were respectively *raki and *apaRat. They may also have referred to the seasons, with typical weather and wind direction as inevitable components of their meanings, as well as having associations with navigability and agriculture. Modern uses of wind terms suggest strongly that they also served as terms for cardinal directions in POc, and that the two major wind directions were perhaps the only cardinal directions for POc speakers (Ch. 8, §1).

POc *raki ‘southeast trades’ has no obvious non-Oceanic cognates. This is hardly surprising. When Austronesian speakers came out of the lee of the New Guinea cordillera into the Bismarcks and encountered the southeast trades of the SHW and the attendant dry season, they met what was for them a new phenomenon. The only part of Indonesia with a similar season is in the southeast in the area around Timor, where the southeast monsoon brings a dry season. But it is unlikely that people ancestral to Oceanic speakers migrated via that area.

POc *raki probably also denoted the dry season when the southeast trades blow. In the Admiralties its reflex refers to a northeasterly wind, in Micronesia to the southerly direction and to the summer season (SHW) when the breadfruit grow. In both cases, the seasonal conditions familiar to POc speakers do not occur. On Manus Island in the Admiralties, there is a double rainfall maximum and no true dry season. Micronesia lies north of the Equator and has seasons the converse of those of POc. In both cases, reflexes of *raki have been applied to a new referent. In the Admiralties it has retained its association with a cooler wind and now applies to a cool wind from the mountains of Manus Island. In Micronesia it refers to the same period of the year and roughly the same wind direction as in POc, but because of the northern tropical location it now refers to the wet season rather than the dry. It is noteworthy, however, that in both the Admiralties and Micronesia, *raki continues to have a referent which is considered to be pleasant — in the Admiralties because the wind is cool, in Micronesia because the season produces breadfruit.

A selection of data supporting the reconstruction of *raki follows.

POc		*raki	‘southeast trades’ (probably also ‘dry season when the southeast trades blow’)
Adm	Lou	ra	‘northeast, northeast wind’
Adm	Titan	ⁿray	‘wind from the mainland, mountain breeze, blows at night’
NNG	Kove	hai	‘southeast trade, year’
NNG	Bariai	rai	‘year’
NNG	Gitua	rak	‘southeast trade’
NNG	Lukep	rai	‘year’
NNG	Mangap	rak-rak	‘fresh morning (during windy season)’
NNG	Tami	lai	‘southeast trade’
NNG	Maleu	na-lai	‘southeast trade’
NNG	Ali	rai	‘southeast trade’
NNG	Tumleo	riei	‘southeast trade’
MM	Vitu	raɣi	‘southeast trade’
MM	Bulu	laɣi	‘southeast trade’
MM	Tigak	rei	‘wind’
NCV	Lewo	lagi(pesoi)	‘east wind’
Mic	Marshallese	ṛɯak	‘south, summer’
Mic	Ponapean	rāk	‘breadfruit season, season of plenty’
Mic	Woleaian	ẓaxi	‘year, age, summer season’
Fij	Wayan	draki	‘weather’
Fij	Bauan	draki	‘weather’
PPn		*laki	‘southwesterly quandrant, southwest wind and weather associated with it’
Pn	Niuean	laki	‘west’
Pn	East Uvean	laki	‘southeast or southwest wind’
Pn	Pukapukan	laki	‘southwest wind’
Pn	Samoan	laʔi	‘southwest veering to northwest’
Pn	Tokelauan	laki	‘hurricane season and westerly quarter winds that blow during it’
Pn	Anutan	laki	‘the whole southwestern quadrant; westerly or southwesterly wind; the period of the year when the wind is from that quarter’
Pn	Rennellese	gaki	[N] ‘west or southwest wind’; [V] ‘(of this wind) blow’
Pn	Takuu	laki	‘season of westerly winds’
Pn	Hawaiian	laʔi	‘calm, stillness, quiet (of sea, sky, wind)’
Pn	Tuamotuan	raki	‘wind from southwesterly quadrant’

Much of the data for the reconstruction of PPn wind directions is drawn from Biggs and Clark (1993), but the glosses of the protoforms are mine. For example, for PPn *laki Biggs and Clark give the gloss ‘the westerly quarter, wind from that quarter and weather associated with it’. If this were its denotation, we might expect reflexes to range in meaning between northwest and southwest, but no reflex denotes a direction north of west. From this I infer that it denoted the southwesterly quadrant. Similar argumentation applies to PPn *toŋa ‘southeasterly quadrant, southeast wind’ and PPn *tokelau ‘northwesterly quadrant, north-west winds’ below.

POc *apaRat ‘northwest wind’ has non-Oceanic cognates. It is descended from PMP *habaRat, and from the reflexes listed below, I infer that this meant ‘southwest monsoon, wet season’ in its homeland. However, in Mindanao, where Manobo is spoken, there are two monsoons, the southwest and the northeast. Because the northeast monsoon is a much moistened version of the northeast trades, it evidently blows harder than the southwest monsoon and has taken over the ‘monsoon/wet season’ label. When the northeast monsoon changes direction to northwest south of the Equator, it retains the same label right across Indonesia, and POc *apaRat ‘northwest wind’ is its natural continuation in the Bismarcks.

PAn		*SabaRat	‘(?) south wind’ (ACD; Zorc 1994: ‘monsoon wind’)
PMP		*habaRat	‘west monsoon’ (ACD; Dempwolff 1938)
WMP	Belau	ŋəbarð	‘west wind’ (Josephs 1990)
WMP	Yami	kavalat-an	‘west or southwest wind’ (Benedek 1991)
WMP	Itbayat	havayat	‘west wind (blows from late July to September)’
WMP	Tagalog	habagat	‘west or southwest wind; monsoon’
WMP	Bikol	habagat	‘south wind’
WMP	Cebuano	habagat	‘strong wind that hits Cebu from the southwest, common from June to September’
WMP	Manobo	evaɣat	‘the strongest wind: the northeast monsoon’ (Elkins 1968)
WMP	Tiruray	barat	‘the rainy season’
WMP	Aceh	barat	‘west, westerly’
WMP	Old Javanese	barat	‘strong wind, storm; west’
WMP	Wolio	bara	‘west, west monsoon’
CMP	Manggarai	warat	‘rainy season (primarily in January and February); violent storm’
CMP	Buru	fahat	‘west monsoon’
SHWNG	Numfor	barek	‘west’
SHWNG	Numfor	(wam)barek	‘west wind or monsoon’

POc *apaRat probably also denoted the accompanying wet season (SHS). The glosses of a number of its reflexes denote the wind direction rather than the season, whereas we might expect a priori that the word would refer primarily to the season rather than to the wind, as the latter does not blow consistently. This may be a product of elicitation techniques which asked for wind names rather than for seasons. In any case, there is no serious competitor for ‘wet season’, and a sufficient spread of reflexes referring to the season, to rain, to rough seas and to storms to establish *apaRat as the word for the season as well as for the wind. In Central Pacific languages (Fijian and Polynesian) reflexes refer to the storms and cyclones associated with the wet in the southern tropical zone.

PMP		*habaRat	‘west monsoon’ (ACD; Dempwolff 1938)
POc		*apaRat	‘northwest wind; wet season when northwesterlies blow and sea is rough’
Adm	Mussau	apae	‘strong wind, storm wind’
Adm	Wuvulu	afā	‘northwest wind’
Adm	Drehet	yaha	‘stormy season, generally from November to March; strong wind and rough sea from the northwest’
NNG	Kove	awaha	‘rain’
NNG	Gitua	yavara	‘north wind’
NNG	Tami	yawal	‘northwest wind’
NNG	Kairiru	yavar	‘northwest wind, makes sea rough’
PT	Muyuw	yavat	‘west, west wind’
PT	Iduna	yavalata	‘rains with wind from the northwest in February and March’
PT	Tawala	yawalata	‘light rain from southwest during dry season’
PT	Motu	lahara	‘northwest wind, season of northwest wind’
MM	Bali	vurata	‘northwest wind’
MM	Nakanai	le-avala	‘year, wet season’
MM	East Kara	yefet	‘wet season’
MM	Barok	awat	‘year’
MM	Siar	yahrat	‘year’
MM	Tinputz	ivat	‘strong wind’
NCal	Nêlêmwa	(w)āvac	‘north wind’ (Lynch pers. comm.)
NCal	Pije	(y)avec	‘north wind’
NCal	Fwâi	(y)avec	‘north wind’
NCal	Nemi	(y)avec, (y)aec	‘north wind’
NCal	Jawe	(y)aec	‘north wind’
PCP		*avā	‘storm, gale, hurricane’
Fij	Wayan	ðavā	‘storm, strong wind bringing rain’
Pn	Tongan	afā	‘hurricane, gale or very severe storm’
Pn	Niuean	afā	‘storm, hurricane, gale’
Pn	Samoan	afā	‘storm, hurricane’
Pn	Tokelauan	afā	‘storm, hurricane’
Pn	East Futunan	afā	‘storm, hurricane’
Pn	East Uvean	afā	‘storm, hurricane’
Pn	Rennellese	ahā	‘storm, hurricane’
Pn	West Futunan	afa	‘gale, storm winds, hurricane winds’
Pn	Tuamotuan	āfā	‘(storm) break forth violently’
Pn	Māori	āfā	‘storm, hurricane’

Related forms also occur in Southeast Solomonic and Micronesian languages, but all appear to be borrowed rather than directly inherited. The Southeast Solomonic forms below reflect a (non-existent) POc **awaRosi rather than *apaRat. They are evidently the outcome of borrowing from a Western Oceanic language where POc final consonants were retained with paragogic *-i (the only group of languages which satisfy this criterion today are the Suauic languages of the Papuan Tip, and they are geographically somewhat unlikely candidates for the source).

SES	Arosi	worosi	‘northwest gale’
SES	’Are’are	awarosi	‘the northwest wind’
SES	Sa’a	awalosi	‘northwest wind’

The Micronesian forms are odd in two ways. Firstly, if sound correspondences are applied to infer their putative POc ancestor, the result is **barat[a], a form which is certainly not POc, but which is consistent with an early borrowing from a WMP language, perhaps a Philippine language. Its initial *b- and final *-t reflect the corresponding phonemes of PMP *habaRat. Certain Philippine languages also reflect PMP *habaRat-an with the locative suffix *-an, e.g. Cebuano habagatan ‘southwest’, and the suffix may be the source of the final -a of Trukic and Woleaian forms. Secondly, the forms mean ‘(northeast) trade wind’, not, as we might here expect, something like ‘southwest storm wind’:

Mic	Ponapean	(nan-)par	‘tradewind season’
Mic	Mortlockese	paras	‘rain that comes in due to wind’
Mic	Woleaian	paẓasa	‘tradewind’

Blust (ACD) takes it that PMP *habaRat ‘southwest monsoon season, wet season’ formed a pair with PMP *timuR, implying that the latter referred to the northeast trades and the dry season. However, such a pairing seems to have arisen among the WMP languages of Indonesia, where reflexes of *habaRat mean ‘west’ and of *timuR ‘east’. In Philippine languages, where we might expect the PMP sense to be retained, reflexes of *timuR refer to a south or east wind, but not a monsoonal wind. (The PMP term for northeast trades seems to have been *qamíh-an,⁸ lost when Austronesian speakers crossed into the southern hemisphere.) PMP *timuR also has reflexes in Oceanic languages, and POc *timu(R) seems to have meant ‘wind bringing light rain’. In Papuan Tip languages forms which appear to reflect *timu(R) have undergone a curious semantic shift and now mean ‘island’ (Ch. 3, §2.2). Relevant data are listed below.

PMP		*timuR	‘south or east wind’ (Dempwolff 1938: ‘wind bringing rain’; Zorc 1994: ‘rain wind from southeast’)
WMP	Belau	ðíməs	‘south wind’ (Josephs 1990)
WMP	Tagalog	tīmog	‘south’
WMP	Cebuano	tímug	‘wind that hits Cebu from the east’ (Wolff 1972)
WMP	Bilaan	timul	‘south’
WMP	Malagasy	a-tsimu	‘south’
WMP	Aceh	timu	‘east’
WMP	Indonesian	timur	‘east’
WMP	Sasak	timuq	‘east’
CMP	Buru	timo	‘east’

POc		*timu(R)	‘wind bringing light rain’
NNG	Takia	tim	‘wind’
NNG	Ali	tim	‘dew’
PT	Iduna	himula	‘island’
PT	Dobu	simula	‘island’
PT	Motu	si-simu	‘light shower’
MM	Ramoaaina	timtim	‘drizzle; of rain’
Pn	Samoan	timu	‘be rainy, rain’
Pn	Anutan	timu	‘light rain, drizzle’
Pn	Tongan	jimu-jimu	‘heavy blowing, almost a hurricane’

In Fijian and Polynesian languages the reflexes of POc *raki ‘southeast trades’ and *apaRat ‘northwest wind’ listed above reflect shifts in meaning. In Fijian languages, reflexes of *raki mean ‘weather’, whilst Polynesian reflexes point to PPn *laki ‘southwesterly quandrant, southwest wind and weather associated with it’ (Biggs & Clark 1993), i.e. a shift from southeast to southwest. In both Fijian and Polynesian languages, reflexes of POc *apaRat point to PCP *avā ‘storm, gale, hurricane’.

The closest functional equivalents to POc *raki and *apaRat in PPn were evidently PPn *toŋa ‘southeasterly quadrant, southeast wind’ and PPn *tokelau ‘northwesterly quadrant, northwest winds’. Whereas the POc terms evidently referred prototypically to seasonal winds, the central meanings of the PPn terms seem to have been winds from a certain portion—apparently a quadrant—of the compass, as the reflexes below indicate and as Åkerblom (1968:52) has observed. In Rarotongan, for example, toŋa refers to winds from south-by-west to south-southeast (but prototypically to south), tokerau to winds from northwest-by-north to west-northwest (prototypically to northwest); in Pukapukan toŋa refers to winds from south-by-east to southeast-by-south (but prototypically to south- southeast), tokelau to winds from north to northwest (Lewis 1972:74–75). Åkerblom goes a step further and suggests that neither term refers specifically to the trade wind. However, he recognises that throughout Polynesia a feature of the meaning of each is the prevailing wind and that they are often used with reference to the southeast trades and to northwest storm winds.

The ancestry of PPn *toŋa is unclear, and I return to this below. Data supporting its reconstruction are as follows:

PPn		*toŋa	‘southeasterly quadrant, southeast wind’
Pn	Niuean	toŋa	‘south wind’
Pn	Tongan	toŋa	[N] ‘south’; [V] ‘(wind) be south’
Pn	East Uvean	toŋa	‘south wind’
Pn	East Futunan	toŋa	‘south (wind)’
Pn	Pukapukan	toŋa	‘south-southeast wind’ (Lewis 1972: 75)
Pn	Rennellese	toŋa	‘east’
Pn	Samoan	toŋa	‘south wind’
Pn	Tuvalu	toŋa	‘south’
Pn	Tikopia	toŋa	‘east, east wind, trade wind; winter’
Pn	West Futunan	toŋa	‘south’
Pn	Rapanui	toŋa	‘autumn, winter’
Pn	Rarotongan	toŋa	‘one of the wind quarters, south or southerly’; ‘south wind’ (Lewis 1972: 74)
Pn	Mangarevan	toŋa	‘south wind’
Pn	Tahitian	toʔa	‘south wind’
Pn	Māori	toŋa	‘south’
Pn	Tuamotuan	toŋa	‘wind from southerly or easterly quarter’
Pn	Hawaiian	kona	‘leeward (i.e. south or southwest)’

PPn *tokelau ‘northwesterly quadrant, northwest winds’ reflects POc *tokalau(r), the precise denotation of which is unclear. It presumably did not mean ‘northwest wind’, as this was the meaning of POc *apaRat. The glosses of its reflexes below suggest that it denoted a northerly, or perhaps northeasterly, wind.

POc		*tokalau(r)	‘(?) northerly wind’
Adm	Baluan	tolaw	‘north wind’
Adm	Nyindrou	tolau	‘north’
NNG	Kairiru	tolau	‘non-seasonal south wind, makes sea rough’
NCV	Paamese	tōlau	‘northeast wind’
NCV	Atchin	tola	‘northwest wind’
NCV	Nguna	tokolau	‘northwest wind’
NCV	Namakir	tokolo	‘northwest wind’
Fij	Wayan	tokalau	‘easterly wind’
Fij	Bauan	tokalau	‘northeast wind; third of compass from N to roughly WSW’ (Neyret 1950)
PPn		*tokelau	‘northwesterly quadrant, northwest winds’ (Biggs and Clark 1993)
Pn	Tongan	tokelau	‘north’
Pn	East Futunan	tokelau	‘northerly wind’
Pn	Pukapukan	tokelau (iti)	‘north wind’ (Lewis 1972: 75)
Pn	Pukapukan	tokelau (matua)	‘northwest wind’ (Lewis 1972: 75)
Pn	Rennellese	tokegau	‘northwest wind’
Pn	Samoan	toʔelau	‘trade wind from northeast to east-southeast’
Pn	Tuvalu	tokelau	‘north, northerly wind’
Pn	Takuu	tokorau	‘north, northerly wind’
Pn	Sikaiana	tokelau	‘north’
Pn	Luangiua	koʔolau	‘north’
Pn	Tikopia	tokerau	‘north wind’
Pn	Rarotongan	tokerau	‘northwest wind’ (Lewis 1972: 74)
Pn	Hawaiian	koʔolau	‘windward (northeast) sides of Hawaiian islands.’
Pn	Marquesan	tokoʔau	‘north or northwest wind’
Pn	Anutan	tokerau	‘approximately north; northerly wind’

POc *tokalau(r) ‘(?) northerly wind’ reflects two PMP morphemes, as Dempwolff (1938:134) observed. The first appears to be PMP *tekas ‘come to rest in a place’ (ACD), the second PMP *lahud ‘downriver, towards the sea’. It is not clear how the POc meaning is derived from the glosses of these morphemes, and probable that POc *toka-lau(r) was a lexicalised unit.

POc may also have inherited a semantically related term *toŋa-laur, reflected in the items below and apparently denoting a northwesterly wind.⁹

MM	Roviana	toŋa-rauru	‘wind from direction of Lauru (approx north to northwest)’
NCV	Mota	toŋa-lau	‘northwest wind’
NCV	Raga	toŋa-lau	‘wind from direction of Ambae, i.e. northwest wind’

This term seems to contain the morpheme *toŋa (cf. PPn *toŋa ‘southeasterly quadrant, southeast wind’ above), implying its existence in POc, even though its POc meaning remains unknown. It is perhaps also reflected in Gela sau-toŋa ‘north wind’, where sau reflects POc *sau ‘breeze’. However, caution is necessary here: it is possible that the three terms above simply reflect a sporadic sound change in POc *tokalau(r) ‘(?) northerly wind’.

Other terms relating to a major wind direction or a season and reconstructable in POc or one of its more immediate daughters all refer to the southeast trades, not to the storm winds. This probably reflects the fact that the POc homeland lay within the ITCZ during the SHS, when the winds of the rainy season are fairly unpredictable and sporadic. The southeast trade wind of the SHW, on the other hand, blows consistently, and the various terms presumably reflect its nuances or refer to various aspects of its activity.

POc *karak(a) seems to have referred to a strong southeast trade wind. Some reflexes suggest **karag, but final voiced stops did not occur in POc. Some NNG reflexes imply a POc final vowel, but SES reflexes do not. Some of the SES reflexes lack an expected initial consonant (Gela ɣ-, Longgu, Lau, Kwaio ʔ-), and so does Woleaian (x-). However, the fact that these items have appropriate meanings and otherwise correspond formally suggests that they belong to this cognate set, even if the loss of the initial is unexplained.

POc		*karak(a)	‘(strong?) southeast trade’
NNG	Lukep	karaka	‘southeast trade’
NNG	Bing	karag	‘southeast trade, blows off the sea strongly in August and September’
NNG	Bilibil	karag	‘dry wind’
NNG	Gedaged	kìl̥ag	‘southeast trade’
NNG	Takia	karag-arag	‘a light southeast wind which appears as part of the initial development of the southeast trade in April’
PT	Gapapaiwa	kara-karata	‘east wind’
SES	Gela	ara	‘southeast wind’
SES	Talise	ɣara-ɣara	‘wind’
SES	Malango	hara-hara	‘wind’
SES	Birao	hara-hara	‘wind’
SES	Longgu	ara	‘a cool, pleasant wind from the southeast’
SES	Lau	āra	‘southeast trades, violent wind’
SES	Kwaio	ala	‘southeast wind’
Mic	Woleaian	aẓa	‘south wind’

Two other terms which apparently referred to the southeast trades are given below.

POc		*marau	‘southeast trade wind’
NNG	Kove	marau	‘light wind from the sea’
NNG	Bariai	marau	‘wind’
NNG	Bam	marau(lo)	‘southeast trade’
MM	Vitu	marau	‘north wind’
SES	’Are’are	marāu	‘southeast trades’
SES	Sa’a	marāu	‘southeast trades’
SES	Arosi	marāu	‘southeast trades’

PNGOc		*yawana	‘southerly wind’
NNG	Bing	yowan	‘wind, a cold easterly wind across the land which brings the rain’
NNG	Takia	yawan	‘a southerly wind associated with moderately heavy seas’
PT	Iduna	yawana	‘wind from the sea’
PT	Tawala	yawana	‘south wind, wind from the south’
PT	Suau	yawana	‘northwest monsoon’
PT	Misima	yavana	‘southerly wind’

One more term, *aqura, seems to have served both as a generic wind term and as a term for the ‘default’ wind, the southeast trade:

POc		*aqura	‘wind, possibly southeast trade’
Adm	Nauna	eul	‘wind’ (ACD)
Adm	Penchal	aul	‘wind’ (ACD)
Adm	Lou	our	‘wind’
Adm	Pak	ouh	‘wind’ (ACD)
NNG	Tuam	yawur	‘wind’
NNG	Mutu	yagur	‘wind’
NNG	Malai	yagur	‘wind’
NNG	Sio	wɔr̃a	‘northwest monsoon’
NNG	Numbami	aula	‘wind’
NNG	Takia	ur	‘air’
NNG	Ali	ur	‘wind’
PT	Motu	laura(bada)	‘southeast trade wind’ (bada ‘big’)
SES	Kwaio	au	‘southeast wind, wind from sea’
Mic	Kosraean	ɛir	‘north’
Mic	Ponapean	(pali)eir	‘south’
Mic	Carolinian	ə̄r	‘south’

The terms I have reconstructed above refer to wind directions and to seasons, sometimes prototypically to the wind, sometimes to the season. A further development is that one of the seasonal terms comes to mean ‘year’ (perhaps something like ‘the annual round’ would be more accurate). Relevant examples are repeated here, but this development also affects local seasonal/wind terms. Thus these items reflect POc *raki ‘southeast trades’ —

NNG	Kove	hai	‘southeast trade, year’
NNG	Bariai	rai	‘year’
NNG	Lukep	rai	‘year’
Mic	Woleaian	ẓaxi	‘year, age, summer season’

— whilst the two below reflect POc *apaRat ‘northwest wind’:

MM	Barok	awat	‘year’
MM	Siar	yahrat	‘year’

5. The weather⇫

5.5.1 ‘calm’

Four reconstructions with the meaning ‘calm’ (as applied to the weather) are given below. The first two, *malino and *[ma-[d]]rapu, are reconstructed for POc (and earlier stages). The multiple bracketing of *[ma-[d]]rapu does not reflect doubt about the reconstruction, but rather the fact that POc inherited several derivationally related forms: *rapu, *ma-rapu, *N-rapu, *maN-rapu (it is not clear in what measure these derivations were still productive in POc).

It is difficult to distinguish between the meanings of these two terms but the glosses for reflexes of *malino imply an emphasis on tranquility, whereas those of *[ma-[d]]rapu seem to refer to the stillness of the wind.

The cognate set below indicates that speakers of several daughter languages adopted one or other strategy to get rid of *-l- and *-n- in the onsets of consecutive syllables in POc *malino. The two sounds entail different manners of articulation at the same point of articulation, but it is not clear to me why this should have led to the avoidance of the sequence.

PMP		*linaw	‘be clear’ (Dempwolff 1938)
POc		*ma-lino	‘calm’ (Grace 1969)
NNG	Kove	malilo	‘calm’ (consonant assimilation)
NNG	Atui	mullil	‘soft’ (consonant assimilation)
NNG	Takia	malin	‘calm’
NNG	Manam	malino	‘calm’
NNG	Bam	malin	‘calm’
PT	Balawaia	maino	‘calm’
PT	Gabadi	maino	‘calm’
MM	Vitu	manilo	‘calm’ (metathesis)
MM	Nakanai	malilo	‘calm’ (consonant assimilation)
MM	Lavongai	malila	‘calm’ (consonant assimilation)
MM	Minigir	malila	‘calm’ (consonant assimilation)
MM	Mono	malilo	‘calm’ (consonant assimilation)
Pn	Samoan	manino	‘transparent, clear’ (consonant assimilation)
Pn	Tongan	melino	‘at peace’
Pn	Tuamotuan	marino	‘calm’

PMP		*(d,r)apu	‘still, calm, quiet’ (Blust 1972b)
POc		*[ma-d,ma-]rapu	‘still, calm, windless’
Adm	Nyindrou	ⁿra-dah	‘breeze’
MM	Petats	marah	‘calm’
MM	Halia	maraha	‘calm’
MM	Taiof	madav	‘calm’
MM	Teop	mara	‘calm’
Fij	Bauan	maravu	[N] ‘a calm (at sea)’; [V, ADJ] ‘(sea) calm,’
Fij	Wayan	maravu	‘(sea) calm, still, windless’

The other two forms, PEOc *ma-lua(s) ‘soft, gentle, (weather) calm’ and PWOc *siwaRop/*niwaRop ‘(weather) calm, peaceful’, are reconstructable as weather terms in lower-order protolanguages.

PEOc *ma-lua(s) ‘soft, gentle, (weather) calm’ is descended from POc *ma-luas ‘soft’, but only the Eastern Oceanic reflexes refer to the calmness—or perhaps more accurately the gentleness—of the weather.

POc		*ma-luas	‘soft’
MM	Notsi	məlus	‘soft’
MM	Konomala	(ma)mlas	‘soft’
MM	Siar	(ma)maluas	‘soft’
MM	Ramoaaina	(mal)malua	‘soft’
MM	Nehan	(mal)malua(n)	‘soft’
PEOc		*ma-lua(s)	‘soft, gentle, (weather) calm’
SES	Gela	malua	‘soft’
SES	’Are’are	mārūrū	‘soft, gentle, flexible’
Mic	Ponapean	malu-n	‘calm, of the sea’
Mic	Mokilese	molu-n	‘calm or fine, of weather’
Mic	Mortlockese	maləwa-ləw	‘peaceful’
Mic	Puluwatese	malɨwa-lɨ	‘to be easy or slow, to be calm (as the sea), to be gentle’
Fij	Bauan	mālua	‘gently, slowly, quietly’

PWOc *siwaRop/*niwaRop ‘calm, peaceful’ may well have expressed a nuance of ‘peace’. Again we have two derivationally related forms, the first the base, the second the base prefixed by PMP *N- (originally ‘antipassive’) or perhaps PMP *‹in›/ni- ‘perfective, perfective nominaliser’.

PWOc		*siwaRop, *niwaRop	‘(weather) calm, peaceful’
PT	Dobu	siwalowa	‘calm’
PT	Molima	hiwalova, niwalova	‘calm’
PT	Iduna	niwalova	‘stillness, season without wind, calm, peace (no fighting)’
PT	Are	niworoa	‘calm’
PT	Kilivila	niwal	‘calm’
PT	Taboro	(a)siure-ure	‘calm’
MM	Sursurunga	siaroh	‘peaceful (as waves), calm’
MM	Siar	siarof	‘calm’
MM	Solos	sianoh	‘calm’
MM	Selau	sarowo	‘calm’
MM	Teop	hiarovo	‘good weather after a rain’

5.2. The sky and clouds⇫

The locus of much of the weather was of course POc *laŋit, the sky, and there are a few signs that this word also had something of the sense of English ‘weather’, in some languages coming to refer to a particular form of weather. The sky was also very important in the context of navigation (p.157). POc *laŋit was also used as a local noun meaning ‘up above’ (p.235).

PMP		*laŋiC	‘sky’ (Dempwolff 1938)
PMP		*laŋit	‘sky’
POc		*laŋit	‘sky, weather’
Adm	Tenis	raŋiti	‘rain’
Adm	Titan	laŋ	‘sky; heaven’
NNG	Malalamai	laŋ	‘cloud’
NNG	Buang	yagk	‘sky’
NNG	Manam	laŋ	‘sky, heavens’
NNG	Kaiep	laŋit	‘thunder’
MM	Bali	laŋiti	‘sky’
MM	Tigak	laŋit	‘rain’
MM	Tabar	raŋiti	‘sky’
MM	Siar	laŋit	‘sky’
MM	Nehan	laŋit	‘sky’
MM	Halia	laŋic	‘rain; sky’
MM	Alu	laiti	‘rain’
SES	Kwaio	laŋi	‘sky, heavens’
SES	Arosi	raŋi	‘rain’
NCV	Raga	laŋi	‘wind’
NCV	Paamese	alaŋ	‘wind’
NCV	Lewo	laŋi	‘wind’
Mic	Marshallese	laŋ	‘sky, heavens’
Mic	Woleaian	raŋi	‘sky; typhoon, rainstorm, wind’
Fij	Bauan	(vū-ni)-laŋi	‘horizon’ (lit. ‘base of sky’)
Fij	Bauan	(lewe-ni)-laŋi	‘full moon’ (lit. ‘flesh of sky’)
Pn	Tongan	laŋi	‘sky, heavens’
Pn	Samoan	laŋi	‘sky, heavens’

PNGOc *sabam ‘sky’ is also reconstructable. It is not clear how this contrasted with *laŋit.

PNGOc		*sabam	‘sky’
NNG	Malai	sabam	‘sky’
NNG	Sio	saba	‘sky’
NNG	Bing	sɔm	‘sky’
NNG	Dami	sa	‘sky’
NNG	Bilibil	sabat	‘sky’
PT	Ubir	safam	‘sky’
PT	Are	sapama	‘sky’
PT	Bwaidoga	ɣabama	‘sky’
PT	Kilivila	labuma	‘sky’

The generic term for ‘cloud’ in POc was *qaRoq.

POc		*qaRoq	‘cloud (generic)’
PT	Dobu	yaloa	‘cloud’
PT	Suau	yaloi	‘cloud’
PT	Misima	yalu-yalu	‘cloud’
MM	Maringe	maloa	‘sky’
SES	Bugotu	(ma)alo(a)	‘sky’
SES	Lau	salo	‘sky’
SES	Kwaio	lalo	‘sky’
SES	Sa’a	(mei)salo	‘cloud’
SES	Arosi	aro	‘sky’
Fij	Bauan	ō	‘cloud’
Fij	Wayan	(ka)ō	‘cloud’
Pn	Tongan	ʔao	‘cloud(s)’
Pn	Samoan	ao	‘cloud’
Pn	Hawaiian	ao	‘any kind of cloud’

The four terms below each possibly denoted a type of cloud. POc *rodo(ŋ) meant ‘rain cloud’. PNGOc *guba(r,R) may have denoted a storm cloud, but it is impossible to attribute more exact meanings to POc *ulu or POc *bala.

PMP		*rendeŋ	‘wet season’ (ACD)
POc		*rodo(ŋ)	‘rain cloud’
SES	Talise	ro-rodo	‘cloud’
SES	’Are’are	roto	‘cloudy, black cloud, squall’
SES	Arosi	ro-rodo	‘a cloud’
NCV	Kiai	koko	‘rain cloud’
NCV	Raga	dodo	‘rain cloud’

PNGOc		*guba(r,R)	‘k.o. cloud (possibly storm cloud)’
NNG	Mangap	gubur	‘dark cloud’
NNG	Sepa	kuba	‘rain’
PT	Are	guba	‘cloud’
PT	Gapapaiwa	guva	‘cloud’
PT	Maopa	kupa	‘rain’
PT	Motu	guba	‘sky; heavens; a northwest squall’
PT	Gabadi	upa	‘rain’
PT	Mekeo	ufa	‘sky, heavens’

POc		*ulu	‘k.o. cloud’
NNG	Uvol	ulu	‘cloud’
MM	Lavongai	ulu-l	‘fog’
SES	’Are’are	uru	‘cloud, heaven, sky, top’
SES	Arosi	uru	‘white clouds’
SES	Arosi	uru-uru	‘black rainclouds’
SES	Arosi	(bara)uru	‘evening bank of clouds; heavy masses of dark clouds’

POc		*bala	‘k.o. cloud’
Adm	Titan	pala	‘cloud, light white clouds’
MM	Tabar	bara-bara	‘cloud’
MM	Lihir	(lo)bal-bal	‘cloud’
MM	Tangga	bal-bal	‘cloud’
SES	Arosi	bara(uru)	‘evening bank of clouds; heavy masses of dark clouds’

There are a number of reconstructable POc terms some of whose reflexes mean ‘cloud’, others ‘mist’ or ‘fog’, and yet others have both meanings. It seems reasonable to infer that a mist was conceived as a cloud at sea — or ground — level.

PMP		*Ra(m)bun	‘haze’ (Blust 1972b)
POc		*Rapu(n)	‘haze, mist’
Adm	Drehet	kxɔ-kxɔh	‘cloud’
NNG	Bariai	lau-lau	‘cloud’
PT	Kilivila	loa-lova	‘cloud’
SES	Bugotu	lavo	‘haze, vapour; misty, hazy’
SES	Lengo	lavo	‘fog’
SES	Longgu	lavo	‘fog’
SES	Lau	lafo	‘cloud’
SES	Kwaio	lafo	‘cloud’
SES	’Are’are	raho	‘haze, mist, fog, cloud’
PNCV		*ma-Ravu	‘fog, mist’ (Clark 1996)
NCV	Mota	marav	‘dim, misty’
NCV	Raga	marav	‘mist’
NCV	Paamese	mahu-mahu	‘cloud’
NCV	Nguna	(na)mavu	‘fog, mist’

The meanings of the set below are intriguing: their common denominator seems to be misty rain which gives rise to a rainbow if the sun’s rays are refracted through it, but this gloss is somewhat speculative.

POc		*bʷa(p)o	‘(?) misty rain’
Adm	Mussau	bao	‘rain’
SJ	Kayupulau	bʷau	‘cloud’
SJ	Ormu	wawu	‘cloud’
PT	Iduna	bowa	‘rainbow’
PT	Kilivila	bʷabʷau	‘rain clouds’
PT	Sudest	bʷao	‘rainbow’
SES	Lau	kʷafo	‘mist, cloud’
SES	Kwaio	gʷafo	‘mist’

The items below—POc *kapu(t)/*kopu ‘low cloud, mist, fog’ and POc *gapu(l) ‘mist’ — are intriguing because of their formal similarity to each other. It is eminently likely that *gapu(l) is derivationally related to *kapu(t). If we ignore their putative final consonants, the former appears to be derived from *N + kapu (see vol.1,29–30). But the final *-t of *kapu(t) is attested by non-Oceanic witnesses, the final *-l of *gapu(l) by its Minigir and Tolai reflexes, and I cannot see a way of resolving this conflict.

PMP		*kabut	‘mist’ (Dempwolff 1938)
POc		*kapu(t)	‘low cloud, mist, fog’
Adm	Titan	aúu	‘low lying clouds, mist, not raining’
NNG	Takia	kau-kau	‘fog’
NNG	Kairiru	qafu-f	‘fog’
NNG	Kove	ɣau-ɣau	‘misty’
PT	Motu	ɣahu	‘mist; fog at sea; haze’
PT	Roro	abu	‘fog’
PT	Mekeo	apu, apu-apu	‘fog, cloud’
MM	West Kara	kauf	‘fog’
SES	Talise	ɣavu	‘fog’

The Bali and Fijian forms below are problematic, as they reflect POc *kabu(t), not *kapu(t)

MM	Vitu	ɣabu-ɣabu	‘fog’
Fij	Bauan	kabu	‘mist’
Fij	Wayan	kabu	[N] ‘mist, haze, fog’; [V] ‘be covered in cloud, mist, fog’

It seems likely that *kopu already occurred in POc as a doublet of *kapu(t) resulting from assimilation of the rounding feature of the second vowel to that of the first. Such a change was once productive in both Rotuman and Tongan (Andrew Pawley, pers. comm.).

POc		*kopu	‘low cloud, mist, fog’
Adm	Lou	kɔp-kɔp	‘dust; fog, mist’
Adm	Drehet	kopʷ(ieh)	‘mist, fog’
PT	Molima	kʷau	‘cloud’
MM	Mono	(ma)kohu	‘fog’
MM	Laghu	kō	‘fog’
SES	Bauro	kʷahu	‘fog’
NCV	Raga	govu	‘clouded’
Fij	Bauan	govu	‘light clouds covering land’
Pn	Mangarevan	kou	‘clouds low on the peaks of the hills’
Pn	Tahitian	ohu	‘cloud settled on the mountain tops’
Pn	Marquesan	kohu	‘fog, haze’

POc		*gapu(l)	‘mist’
NNG	Malai	gafu-f	‘fog’
NNG	Amara	(a)gau-gau	‘fog’
NNG	Arove	gau-gau	‘fog’
PT	Tawala	gahu	‘fog’
MM	Minigir	gavulu	‘cloud’
MM	Tolai	gavul	‘fog, mist’
SES	Gela	gavu	‘mist, haze’
SES	Kwara’ae	goh	‘fog’
SES	Langalanga	gafu	‘fog’
SES	Arosi	gahu	‘mist, be misty’
Pn	Tongan	ka-kapu	‘mist’

As if this were not already complicated enough, a further curiosity is the reconstruction of Proto Nuclear Polynesian *kapuqa ‘cloud’ (Biggs & Clark 1993), which either entails the addition of *-qa to a reflex of POc *kapu(t) or *gapu(l) or is a derivative of the PPn verb *kaputi ‘cover over’.

PNPn		*kapuqa	‘cloud’
Pn	Rapanui	kapuʔa	‘fog, haze, mist’
Pn	Hawaiian	ʔōpua	‘puffy clouds, as banked up near the horizon’
Pn	Kapingamarangi	gabua	‘raincloud (sign of rain)’
Pn	Māori	kapua	‘cloud, mist’
Pn	Rarotongan	kāpua	‘cloud, mist’

5.3. Rain⇫

The most widely reflected POc word for ‘rain’ (both verb and noun) is *qusan. Also reconstructable are POc *[ka]dapuR ‘rain, rain cloud’ and PWOc *(rR)ugu ‘rain’. It is not known if *(rR)ugu differed in meaning from *qusan, but *[ka]dapuR seems to have referred both to a rain cloud and to the rain it deposits.

PAn		*quZaL	‘rain’ (Blust 1969; Dempwolff 1938)
PMP		*quZan	‘rain’
POc		*qusan	‘(N, V) rain’
NNG	Malasanga	kuya	‘rain’
NNG	Mengen	kue	‘rain’
NNG	Takia	ui	‘rain’
NNG	Numbami	usana	‘rain’
NNG	Kaiwa	ur	‘rain’
NNG	Manam	ura	‘rain’
PT	Are	kusana	‘rain’
PT	Balawaia	ɣura	‘rain’
MM	Bali	ɣuzaŋa	‘rain’
MM	Lihir	uos	‘rain’
MM	Teop	huan	‘rain’ (metathesis)
MM	Maringe	(na)uha	‘rain’
SES	Bugotu	uha	‘rain’
SES	Longgu	uta	‘rain’
SES	Lau	uta	‘rain’
NCV	Kiai	usa	‘rain’
Mic	Woleaian	uta	‘rain’
Fij	Bauan	uða	‘rain’
Pn	Tongan	ʔuha	‘rain.’
Pn	Samoan	ua	‘rain’

POc		*[ka]dapuR	‘rain, rain cloud’
Adm	Loniu	kaʔæh	‘cloud’
Adm	Lele	kanrah	‘cloud’
MM	Bulu	kadavu	‘rain’
MM	Meramera	adavu	‘rain’
MM	East Kara	rafui	‘rain’
MM	Nalik	dafur	‘rain’
MM	Konomala	daf	‘rain’
MM	Banoni	ɣarau	‘rain’
MM	Piva	ɣaravu	‘rain’
Mic	Kiribati	karau	‘rain, heaven, sky’
Mic	Kosraean	kʌṣao	‘sky, heaven’
Mic	Marshallese	keṛaw	‘cloud, overcast’
Mic	Ponapean	kec̣ew	‘rain, to rain’
Mic	Mokilese	kɔsɔw	‘cloud’
Mic	Chuukese	kuc̣ū-	‘cloud’
Mic	Puluwatese	woṛow	‘white cloud’
Mic	Carolinian	uṣow	‘rain’
Mic	Woleaian	xoṣou	‘rain’

PWOc		*(rR)ugu	‘rain’
NNG	Aria	rugu	‘rain’
NNG	Mangga	ruq	‘rain’
NNG	Kumaru	ruk	‘rain’
MM	Roviana	ruku	‘rain’
MM	Hoava	ruku	‘rain’

A semantically related term was POc *bata, which, to judge from a constellation of Meso-Melanesian and Polynesian reflexes, probably meant ‘raindrop’. However, a number of Western Oceanic languages also agree on the meaning ‘cloud’.

POc		*bata	‘(?) raindrop, (?) rain cloud’
NNG	Apalik	(e)vat	‘cloud’
NNG	Atui	vat	‘cloud, sky’
NNG	Akolet	(e)wat	‘cloud’
MM	West Kara	bata	‘cloud’
MM	Tabar	bata	‘rain’
MM	Sursurunga	bət	‘sky; cloud’
MM	Tolai	bata	‘rain, to rain’
MM	Siar	bat	‘rain’
PPn		*pata	‘raindrop’
Pn	Niuean	pata	‘raindrop’
Pn	Hawaiian	paka	‘raindrop’
Pn	Māori	pata	‘raindrop’
Pn	Marquesan	pata	‘raindrop’

POc *(d,dr)im(a)-(d,dr)im(a) evidently meant ‘drizzle, light rain’. I have yet to find a reflex which allows me to diagnose whether the initial consonant was POc *d or *dr.

POc		*(d,dr)im(a)-(d,dr)im(a)	‘drizzle, light rain’
Adm	Lou	rim-rim	‘light rain’
PT	Iduna	dima-dima	‘drizzle, rain of small drops that takes a long time to stop’
MM	Tolai	ri-rimi	‘drizzling rain’
MM	Ramoaaina	rim-rim	‘drizzle, sprinkle’

In search of other terms associated in one way or another with rain, I tried to reconstruct terms for ‘rainbow’ and ‘dew’. However, I could only reconstruct a Proto Eastern Oceanic term for the former (but see the note on POc *bʷa(p)o ‘misty rain (?)’ above, p.145).

PEOc		*nua-nua	‘rainbow’
NCV	Mota	nunua	‘change colour’
NCV	Araki	nuenue	‘rainbow’
NCV	Tamambo	nuenue	‘rainbow’
Pn	East Futunan	nuanua	‘rainbow’
Pn	East Uvean	nuanua	‘rainbow’
Pn	Pukapukan	nuanua	‘rainbow’
Pn	Tuvalu	nuanua	‘rainbow’
Pn	Samoan	nuanua	‘rainbow’
Pn	Tokelauan	nuanua	‘rainbow’
Pn	Tahitian	(ā)nuanua	‘rainbow’
Pn	Māori	(ā)niwaniwa	‘rainbow’
Pn	Tuamotuan	(a)nuanua	‘rainbow’
Pn	Hawaiian	(ā)nuenue	‘rainbow’
Pn	Marquesan	(ā)nuanua	‘rainbow’

For ‘dew’, a few reflexes of a PMP term occur.

PMP		*lamuR	‘dew’ (Dempwolff 1938)
POc		*lamuR	‘dew’
PT	Iduna	numura	‘dew’
PT	Kilivila	numla	‘fog’
PT	Lala	lamu	‘dew’
PT	Balawaia	amo	‘dew’

5.4. Thunder and lightning⇫

I have reconstructed five separate terms for ‘lightning’. POc *qu(s,j)ila(k) seems to be the generic term for lightning, inherited from Proto Malayo-Polynesian. The glosses of reflexes of PNGOc *lamaR imply that this item may have referred to lightning and thunder together. The other three reconstructions are *pilak ‘lightning’, *pitik ‘lightning’, *la(p,pʷ)a(r,R) ‘lightning, phosphorescence’. Whilst these may have referred to different kinds of lightning (e.g. sheet and forked) is also possible that they were descriptive or metaphorical terms. It is reasonably clear, for example, that PNNG *kila(m,p) ‘lightning’ was a reflex of PMP *kila(p,b) ‘flash, sparkle’, (and that POc *qu(s,j)ila(k) ‘lightning’ reflects PMP *silak ‘beam of light’; cf. Dempwolff 1938:153).

PMP		*qusilak	‘lightning’ (Ross 1988)
POc		*qu(s,j)ila(k)	‘lightning’
Adm	Nauna	kocil	‘lightning’
Adm	Seimat	usil	‘lightning’
NNG	Malalamai	uzila	‘lightning’
NNG	Tami	kujil	‘lightning’
NNG	Yabem	osiʔ	‘lightning’
NNG	Bukawa	siʔ	‘lightning’
Pn	Tongan	ʔuhila	[N] ‘lightning’
Pn	East Uvean	ʔuhila	[N] ‘lightning’
Pn	Samoan	uila	[N] ‘lightning’

PMP		*bilak	‘lightning’ (Dempwolff 1925)
POc		*(p,pʷ)ilak	‘lightning’
NNG	Kove	pelaka	‘lightning’ (final consonant retained: borrowing from Bali?)
NNG	Bariai	pir	‘thunder’
NNG	Mangap	bil	‘flash, lightning’
NNG	Dami	fili	[V] ‘lightning’
NNG	Medebur	vilik	‘lightning’
MM	Bola	vila	‘lightning’
MM	Nalik	uilak	‘lightning’
MM	Sursurunga	pil	‘lightning’
MM	Nehan	pil	‘thunder’
MM	Solos	pina	‘thunder’
MM	Teop	pira	‘thunder’
MM	Banoni	pina	‘lightning’
MM	Maringe	fila	‘thunder’
SES	Talise	(pila)pila	‘lightning’
SES	Longgu	pila(ðia)	[N, V] ‘lightning’
SES	Arosi	hira(ia)	‘lightning’
NCV	Mota	vila	‘lightning’
NCV	Raga	vilehi	‘lightning’
NCV	Paamese	(a)hile	‘lightning’
NCV	Nguna	(na)vila	‘lightning’

PCEMP		*pitik	‘lightning’
CMP	Selaru	hitik	‘lightning’ (Coward)
POc		*pitik	‘lightning’
NNG	Manam	pitik(awa)	‘lightning’
NNG	Wogeo	fitik	‘lightning’
SES	Gela	viti	‘lightning’
SES	Malango	vitih(i-a)	[V] ‘lightning’

POc		*la(p,pʷ)a(r,R)	‘lightning, phosphorescence’
NNG	Sengseng	(pe)lap	‘lightning’
MM	Tigak	lapak	‘lightning’
MM	West Kara	lapai	‘lightning’
MM	Tomoip	lap	‘thunder’
MM	Halia	(ka)naha	‘lightning’
MM	Torau	(si)nava	‘lightning’
MM	Mono	(ilai)laha	‘lightning’
Pn	Pileni	lapa	‘deep phosphorescent light, distinct from surface phosphorescence, occurring at a depth of from about 1 to 6 feet’ (Lewis 1972: 208)
Pn	Niuean	lapa(sia)	‘dazzled by the sun.’
Pn	Tokelauan	lapa	‘flash of lightning’

Despite the formal variations in the cognate set above, its members are regular reflexes.

PNGOc		*lamaR	‘lightning’
NNG	Malalamai	lem	‘lightning’
NNG	Manam	lama-lama	‘thunder’
PT	Molima	namala	‘lightning’
PT	Tawala	nama-namala	‘lightning, bright, glitter’
PT	Misima	(pi)namal	‘lightning’
PT	Suau	nama-namali	‘lightning’
PT	Hula	rama-rama	‘lightning’

PMP		*kila(p,b)	‘flash, sparkle’ (ACD; Dempwolff 1925)
POc		*kilap	‘flash, sparkle’
PNNG		*kila(m,p)	‘lightning’
NNG	Gitua	kila-kila	‘lightning’
NNG	Lukep	kili	‘lightning’
NNG	Mengen	kilama	‘lightning’
NNG	Roinji	kirap	‘thunder’
NNG	Bing	kin	‘lightning’
NNG	Takia	-ki-kilawi	‘thunder and lightning’
Pn	Samoan	ʔi-ʔila	‘(of reflected light) shine, glisten, sparkle, twinkle’

POc appears to have had two basic roots for thunder, *kuru and *pʷaraq, both of which occur in apparent fossilised morphological variants. Firstly, alongside *kuru we find *guru. The latter may represent *N + kuru. Secondly, alongside *kuru, *guru and *pʷaraq we find forms with reduplication of the second syllable: *kururu, *gururu and *pʷararaq. This was not to my knowledge a widespread process in POc, and I take its appearance here to be associated with the onomatopaeic nature of the etyma. Thirdly, it seems that the foregoing forms were (at least sometimes) verbal, and we find apparent nominalisations: *guru-ŋ(a), *gururu-ŋ(a), and *para-ŋ(a).

PMP		*guruq	‘noise, tumult’ (ACD)
POc		*kuru, *kururu	‘thunder’
NNG	Kove	ku-kururu	‘thunder’
MM	Bola	kururu	‘thunder’
SES	Lau	kururu	‘thunder’
SES	Arosi	(a)kuru	[N, V] ‘thunder’
SES	Kahua	(ɣu)ɣuru(hia)	‘thunder’
Fij	Bauan	kuru	[N, V] ‘thunder’
Fij	Wayan	kuru-kuru	[N, V] ‘thunder’

PMP		*guruq	‘noise, tumult’ (ACD)
POc		*guru, *gururu	‘thunder, make loud noise’
Adm	Drehet	kuruh	‘thunder’
NNG	Takia	-gurur	‘noise rumbling, thunder, crackling’
NNG	Buang	klu	‘roar, thunder, explode; like falling or running water, – like a waterfall, or thunder’
NNG	Sukurum	(mu)ᵑkuru	‘thunder’
NNG	Ulau-Suain	gururu	‘thunder’
PT	Misima	gulu(mʷawa)	‘thunder’
PT	Motu	guru	‘noise, clamour’
PT	Balawaia	ɣulu	‘loud noise’
PT	Lala	ulu	‘thunder’
MM	Ramoaaina	(pa)guru	‘(thunder, wind in stomach) make a rumbling noise’
MM	Teop	guru	‘thunder’
MM	Halia	gururu	‘it thunders’
MM	Tinputz	guguruh	[V] ‘thunder’
MM	Maringe	gu-gulu	‘thunder’
SES	Gela	guru	‘(thunder) rumble’
SES	Lengo	gururu	‘thunder’
SES	Arosi	guru-guru	‘thunder’

POc		*guru-ŋ(a), *gururu-ŋ(a), *gururu-aŋ	‘thunder’
NNG	Gitua	gururuŋ	‘thunder’
NNG	Sengseng	kulu-ŋ	‘thunder’
NNG	Avau	ruŋ-ruŋ	‘thunder’
NNG	Akolet	ŋu-gruŋ	‘thunder’
NNG	Bebeli	gu-gurun	‘thunder’
NNG	Uvol	kuruŋ	‘thunder’
MM	Tigak	guŋ	‘thunder’
SES	Longgu	gururua	‘thunder, small thunder, clap of thunder heard in the late afternoon when you get late afternoon rain; a storm’

POc		*pʷaraq, *pʷararaq	‘thunder’
NNG	Gitua	palaki	‘thunder’
PT	Gumawana	(lo)pala-pala	[V] ‘thunder’
PT	Ubir	(wa)ferer	‘loud thunder’
PT	Tawala	palele	‘thunder’
PT	Muyuw	pala-pal	‘thunder’
MM	East Kara	(va)barak	‘thunder’
MM	Notsi	pal-pallek	‘thunder’
MM	Tabar	para-para	‘thunder’
MM	Lihir	palal	‘thunder’
MM	Sursurunga	pər	‘thunder’
MM	Patpatar	par-parara	‘thunder’
SES	Arosi	pʷararā	‘thunder’
Mic	Kiribati	pā	‘thunder’
Mic	Kosraean	pʌlæl	‘thunder’
Mic	Mokilese	palar	‘thunder’
Mic	Puluwatese	pac̣c̣	‘thunder’
Mic	Carolinian	pac̣c̣	‘thunder’

POc		*para-ŋ(a)	‘thunder’
Adm	Mussau	pala-palaŋa	‘thunder’
Adm	Drehet	palaŋ	‘thunder accompanied by lightning’

6. Concluding remarks⇫

It may seem to the reader that I have turned the Wörter und Sachen technique on its head. That is, instead of using reconstructed items to determine something of the culture and environment of POc speakers, I have used climatic information based on a hypothesis about Austronesian speakers’ directions of dispersal and about the location of the POc speech community to set up a hypothesised structure for a POc meteorological terminology, and then set out to fill in its semantic categories. This is a variation on the method of terminological reconstruction used in other contributions to this work. I have deliberately chosen to establish semantic categories on the basis of climatic information rather than of the terminologies of present-day languages because of the variation in these terminologies from one location to another due to climatic differences.

The final step in the method of terminological reconstruction is to examine the hypothesised terminology to see if it needs modification in the light of the reconstructions which have been made. If POc reconstructions can be made for unpredicted items (say for hurricanes and cyclones), or POc reconstuctions cannot be made for expected terms, then we must re-examine the initial hypothesis.

Meteorological terms (PAn *baRiuS ‘typhoon’ and *qamiS(-an) ‘north, cold season’) are among those that have been used as supporting evidence to locate the Proto Austronesian homeland (Blust 1984–85, Pawley & Ross 1993). In the present case, I have been able to reconstruct the POc terms I expected on the hypothesis that the POc speech community was located in the Bismarck Archipelago (except ‘rainbow’) and have not found that the data forced me to reconstruct unpredicted meteorological terms. So we can say that the hypothesis that POc was spoken in the Bismarck Archipelago has not been disconfirmed by this study.

Notes⇫