belo

[BURTON John]

Yes from "bell" is much more convincing. Mihalic had 'bellow' but we don't
have to believe in it.
On the subject of early pidgin, I am taking steps to flag entries that are
candidate Pacific Pidgin English (PPE) words dating to the 1840-1860 period.
There are plenty (exactly! - "planti"/"plenti") of easy ones but many more
that we will never know because of English's continued companionship of the
Pacific Pidgins ever since.

(Incidentally "early Melanesian Pidgin" would be a misnomer, would it not,
because most of its speakers were in fact from the central Pacific.)

John Burton

-----Original Message-----
From: Ross Clark (FOA DALSL) [mailto:r.clark at auckland.ac.nz]
Sent: Friday, 12 April 2002 3:09 PM
To: Multiple recipients of list
Subject: RE: belo


I agree that "bellow" is a red herring. It's from "bell", but where does the
"-o" come from?
I think the closest thing is "selo" (an exclamation to announce sight of a
ship, a plane or the new moon), from English "sail ho!". Both "belo" and
"selo" occur in Bislama, hence go back to early Melanesian Pidgin. Both have
to do with signs or signals seen or heard over long distances. The "o" may
function mainly to provide additional length and volume to the word. Note
Mihalic's o.2 "...added to the end of words...especially...when calling
another or giving information from a distance". The Australian National
Dictionary mentions "-oh" in street vendors' cries like "milk-oh!", and in
"rush-oh" (an exclamatory call announcing the discovery of a new gold
field).

Ross Clark