The Miskito Phrasebook Project

About the Language

Miskito is a mixture of at least three, probably four, different languages. English and Spanish speakers will find lots of familiar-sounding nouns, generally describing more recently introduced items, such as truk for car, or keiso for cheese. There are some interesting side effects of this linguistic overlap, for instance “bicho,” a Spanish word for “small insect,” is used in Miskito as a racy term for female genetalia, probably because of its similarily to the English word “bitch.”

Most Miskito words, however, are in a very different language, assumed to be the original indigenous tongue. Almost certainly, given the number of Africans slaves settled here, some words are African in origin. Moreover, Miskito doesn’t resemble Spanish or English grammatically at all, relying instead on a variety of suffixes to perform jobs we assign to modifiers, pronouns and adjectives. Miskito also eschews Latin conventions such as sexes for inanimate objects and the submissive/dominant forms of  “you” (tu/usted in Spanish).

Pronunciation

A, as in “aunt,” “tia,” and “lala” (money) 
Ai, pronounce like the long i in “kite,” the ay in “hay” or “aisaba” (adios, goodbye)
Ei, as in “freight,” the first e in “español,” or “teim” (tiempo, time)
I, as in “mini,” “listo” or “miriki” (gringo, tourist)
O, as in “toe,” “dedo” or “rom” (habitacion, room)
U, as in “blue,” “azul” or “kupia” (corazón, heart)

B is very similar in pronunciation to P
C is used only when I forgot to use K, and represents a hard “k” sound
K, when at the end of the word, may be pronounced very quickly, like a hard stop
P is very similar to B
S is very close to “z” sometimes
T can sometimes be very close to K
W doesn’t really have a equivalent in Spanish or English; there’s a soft, often inaudible “o” in front of it, similar to “owl.” Thus “wan” (querer, want”) can sound more like “owan,” which can be confusing. “Ow” (si, yes) should probably be written as just a “w” using my transliteration, but that looked weird.
X is pronounced rather like “ksh”

Suffixes & Prefixes

Although I’m still not clear on exactly how all the suffixes and prefixes work, they are grammatically much more important in Miskito than in either Spanish or English. Here are a few of observations.

Suffixes

-aba (esta [cosa], this [thing]) Added when you want a specific item. “Buk bribal” is simply “Traigame un libro,” or “Bring me a book.”  “Baha bukaba bribal,” on the other hand, becomes “Traigame este libro alla,” or “Bring me that book there.”

-cam/ -cana (suyo; yours or theirs) This is added to something to indicate that it belongs to someone else. “Naha bookumcana,” “Esto es su libro,” “this is your book.” I’m not sure when the different variations are used.

-ka (mas que una [cosa], more than one [thing]) This is analogous to the -s added on to plurals in both Spanish and English. Kapika (cafés, coffees) and sapka (tiendas, shops) illustrate the rule.

-kei (mio, mine) Indicates possession: romkei “mi habitación,” “my room.” If this doesn’t sound nice, you can add the synonym, -tei

-plika (lo quien hace algo; one who does something) This is tacked onto the end of a noun to indicate the person doing it. Wak (trabajo; work) becomes wakplika, trabajador or worker. 

-ra (algo que quiere, something desireable) This is used when you want something specific, and you want it a lot. “Yan wanschna bot,” translates as “Quiero encontrar barco,” or “I’d like to take a boat.” “Yan Wanschna botra” is more like “Necesito ESTE barco” or “I need THAT boat!”

-sa (algo que esta aqui, pero no esta alla, something that’s here, and not there)

-taki (salir, to leave) This is tacked onto something that’s in motion, or about to be. “Man nu apo dia teim bustaki sapa?,”  “A que hora sale el bus?” or “What time does the bus leave?” This works with duritaki (barco saliendo, boat that’s leaving) or pleemtaki (avion saliendo, plane that’s leaving), but it seems to need the modifier sapa (donde esta algo, where something is).

-tei (mio, mine) Indicates possession: Kapitei “mi café,” “my coffee.” If this doesn’t sound nice, you can add the synonym, -kei

-um (esta  [cosa], specific thing) This also helps stress that you’re talking about a specific item: “Yan bukum daokisna miriki uplicanani,” “Estoy trabajando en una guia por viajeros” or “I’m working on a guidebook.” Bukum (este libro, that book) indicates that it’s specifically a book for tourists (literally “the people of the Americans,” which I think is funny).

-ya (mio, mine) This indicates ownership (at least most of the time), not only literally as with “duriya” (mi barco, my boat) but also metaphorically, as in “wapawaya” (mi caminata, my walk). Other interesting possessives include bili/bila (mi/su boca, my/your mouth);  kaigma/utenkaigma (mi/su nariz, my/your mouth); naipa/nampa (mi/su dientes, my/your teeth). Also see wuten.

Note that the location where an action takes place can be tacked onto a verb. “Naha kabukanara sipsna esta baya,” “podria nadar aqui en el mar?” or “may I swim here, in the ocean?” is a compound of kabu (mar, ocean) and kanara (nadar, to swim). “Nahalagunkanara sipsna esta baya?” for example, means “podria nadar aqui, en el lago?” or “may I swim here, in the lake?”

Prefixes

Baha- (esta [cosa], that [one]) This is a very common signifier, and seems to be the most polite one to use with people, such as bahamerca (esta mujer, ella; that woman, her) and bahawetnika (este hombre, el; that man, him).

Uba- (mucho, muy; lots, very) When this is added to a noun, it signifies that it is having an affect on a larger environment. For example lapta (sol, sun) becomes ubalapta (claro, sunny); payaska (viento, wind) becomes ubapayaska (ventoso, windy); and damnei (dulce, sweet) ubadamnei (muy dulce, very sweet).

Wuten- (de el/ella, his/hers) Indicates ownership by a third party: kupia/wutenkupia (mi/su corazón, my/their heart), klukia/wutenklukia (mi/su estomago, my/your stomach).

Possession

Several suffixes and prefixes indicate possession, including –cam/-cana (de tu/usted/ustedes, your/their), -ya/-tei/-kei (mio, mine) and the prefix wuten- (suyo, his/theirs). Spanish speakers should note that Miskito doesn’t use a single verb (tener) to indicate both possession of objects and feelings (tengo sed). Instead, brisna (tengo, I have) is used for physical objects, while aidoksa (tengo/siento, I feel) covers the ephemerals. Here are some examples:

Forming negatives

The easiest way to form a simple negative is by stating the positive subject with one or several of negative words, including apia (no, no), apu (nunca, none), saura (mal, bad), sip (no se puede, can’t) or crabas (no se puede, can’t). A more advanced way to make a negative is by changing verb endings. Here are some examples using kaikisma (conocer, to know):

Verb Conjugation

I am not a linguist, and therefore hav no skill set for pulling apart grammatical structures and identifying rules. Regardless, here are some conjugations of useful verbs in simple past, present and future tenses. Verbs aparently have three forms for each tense, which I have abbreviated to Y/Y, M/M and M/W:
           
Yan (I; yo) and Yananei (we; nosotros), often ends with -na
            Man (you; tu, usted); Mananei (y’all, ustedes), often ends with -ma
            Bahamerca/Bahawetnika/Bahatuktika; Mercananei/Werinanei (she/he/it, ella/el; ellas/ellos, they)

Here are some verbs:

You can form another future tense, apparently indicating a level of uncertainty, by simply indicating a future time, for example yowka (mañana, tomorrow) or wikwala (semana proxima, next week) in front of the the verb: