IN STONE AGE.

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18488, 16 September 1925, Page 8

IN STONE AGE.

ORIGIN OF MAORIS. KIN TO AINUS. PROFESSOR MACMILLAN BROWN'S THEORIES. (SPECIAX, TO "thi miss.") AUCKLAND, September 15. If lie crosses tho Pacific many more times, Professor Macmillan Brown, Chancellor of tho New Zealand University, will l>e almost as well-known as tho Niagara herself. Liko the man in Kipling's poem, every time the summer v,~jnes, tho Professor feels compelled to "pull out on the old trail, the ouitrail, tho trail that is always new," and follow tho sun. Many years ago he found out that reading at night by artificial light was fatal to his eyes, and as the Professor must read, he hit on tho expedient of following the sun for the long daylight hours. *" Incidentally he goes poking into all sorts of odd places for trace* of Maoris and other Polynesians, and l ho scents out anything that seems to indicate, no matter how remotely, that it will help in unravelling that fascinating t>uzzle } "Whore -was their original home ? " ■ Professor Brown came back yesterday fty the Niagara from Honolulu, where he spent quite a lot of time analysing the vocabulary of tho Ainu language, which was supposed to be the original of Japaneso, comparing it with modern Japanese and Polynesian, and Indo-European languages. While he did not by any means finish the task ho sot himself, ho was very pleased! with tho result of his investigations. It might bo asked; What on earth has the Ainu language to do with tho whence of Maori or Polynesian ? Tho answer is quite 6implo. If affinities were found between the two languages, it would surely be a true indication of a common origin, for it must be remembered that the central and eastern Pacific, were isolated, and had l>een isolated, for a very long period of time, and had had no communication with that part of the Pacific from which tho Ainu language came. Common Origin. "My own impression," said the Professor, "is that iabotSt foair-fifths of the roots in Ainu are the same as in the Polynesian, and from 30 to 50 per cent, of the words are very much the same in-Ainu and Polynesian. In Japanese there is a small proportion of words that have come through Ainu words that resemble words in Polynesian. For instance, there is a Maori word, 'Potiki,' which means tho little child. The word in Ainu is, colloquially, 'Bo.' Take the Ainu word 'Rai,' which means tho under-world; in Maori it is 'lleinga.' "The author of the vocabulary that I was studying thinks Ainu is an IndoEuropoan language, and I have reached the same conclusion. In my opinion it came to tho Pacific thousands of years ago." Sanskrit Theory Wrong. Professor Brown went on to say that he was of opinion that the Polynesians left their Indo-European home at a very early stage in their development. In fact, before they had learned to count up to more than two. The similarity between one and two in Polynesian and Indo-European languages indicated a common origin, and marked the manner in which the Polynesians used singular and dual numbers, and then lumped the rest, as it were. This proved to lum that they must have left their original home at some very early age. In his opinion this migration took place in the Stone Age. Had the Polynesians got their language through Sanskrit, as some investigators eay they did. they would have come over with the whole ten numbers, instead of coming only with two. Another very significant fact which identified them with a Stone Age civilisation was the entire absence of pottery in the Central and Eastern Pacific, where the Polynesians were settled, while as soon as one got to the Western Pacific where the Melanesiaa stock came in, pottery was found all over the place. , The Professor said he was more than ever convinced that investigators who sought a Sanskrit origin for the Polynesian language were quite on the wrong track and that it would be found in the IndoEuropean group.