Page:An Ainu-English-Japanese dictionary (including a grammar of the Ainu language).djvu/590

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32
PLACE-NAMES.

the whole 210 with more than a hundred others have been given below under the next division.

But lastly, one would imagine that if a race distinct from the Ainu once dwelt here some human remains would be forthcoming. I have made very careful inquiries on this point and find that no signs of any have yet been discovered. Old pits and graves have been dug into but the results have always been the same: that is to say, the skulls and bones exhumed have invariably proved to be Ainu. The skeletons of no dwarfs have as yet been found.

Should these graves yield any remains other than Ainu the fact would be at once apparent for in the Russische Revue, 10 Heft. III. Yahrgang, Materialien zur Anthropologie Ostasiens: Anutschin it is written:—“With reference to the anatomy (of the Ainu) it is remarkable that the humerous as well as the tibia have a very striking form; they are marked by an extraordinary flattening (ausserordentliche Abplattung) such as, up to the present, has never been noticed of these bones in any people at present in existence. On the other hand, this peculiarity of form has been observed in the bones of extinct people found in caves.”[1] Such were the people who gave names to many places ranging from the south of Japan to Kamschatha and other parts of Siberia. We will now proceed to consider some of these names briefly.




PART II.

A CRITICAL EXAMINATION INTO TOPOGRAPHICAL NOMENCLATURE.

In making my list of place-names I have partially followed Professor Chamberlain’s excellent plan. That is to say, I have first written the present Japanese pronunciation (omitting the Chinese idiographs with which they are written and their meanings as having nothing to do with Ainu), and then given the real Ainu; then I have parsed it and given its root meaning as well


  1. Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan, vol. x, Part I., page 196.