ひーじゃー : hiijaa | define meaning

Cognate with Amami (Amami, Setouchi, Ukejima) ひんじゃ hinja; Amami (Yuwan) へィんじゃー hïnjaa; Kunigami (Sesoko) ぴーじゃー piijaa; Kunigami (Oku) っぴーだー ppiidaa; Kunigami (Iejima) ってぃてぃじゃ ttitija [tˀitid͡ʒa]; Kunigami (Benoki) ふぃーらー fiiraa; Kunigami (Benoki) and Okinawan (Shuri) ふぃーじゃー fiijaa; Okinawan (Shuri, Kumejima, Yomitan) ひーじゃー hiijaa; Okinawan (Kumejima) へーじゃー heejaa, ひーざー hiizaa and ひーづぁー hiidzaa; Okinawan (Kudaka) ぴーぴじゃー piipijaa; Miyako (Yonaha, Nobaru, Irabu) ぴんざ pinza; Tarama ぴんだ pinda; Yaeyama (Hateruma) ぺィみざ pïmiza and ぴみざ pimiza; Yaeyama (Ishigaki: Miyara, Taketomi, Kohama, Komi) ぴびじゃ pibija; Yaeyama (Kohama) ぴびちゃ pibicha and ぴーちゃ piicha; Yaeyama (Ishigaki: Shiraho) っぴ～みじゃ ppĩmija [pˀĩ̥m̥id͡ʒa]; Yaeyama (Hatoma) ぴびざ pibiza; Yaeyama (Kuroshima) ぴすぃだ pisida and ぴしだ pishida; Yaeyama (Iriomote: Sonai) ぴーざ piiza and ぴぴざ pipiza; Yonaguni ひびだ hibida "goat".

Reconstructions

• Zachary Read (2024) reconstructs *pipizi+a ~ *pibizi+a for proto-Ryukyuan (with *a being a diminutive or pejorative commonly added to animal names) and connects it to Japanese *pituzi "sheep" (modern standard Japanese ひつじ【羊】 hitsuji "sheep").
• Kohei Nakazawa (2022) reconstructs *pepiza ~ *pipiza.
• Aleksandra Jarosz et al. (2022) reconstruct *pebeza for proto-Ryukyuan, *pebeza for proto-Sakishima, *pemiza for proto-Yaeyama, *penza for proto-Miyako, and connect them to Old Japanese *pi1tuzi.
• Wayne P. Lawrence (2019) reconstructs *pipiza for proto-Northern Ryukyuan and suggests the word was borrowed into southern Ryukyuan as *pibiza, which resolves the vowel discrepency between northern and southern Ryukyuan. Lawrence goes a step further proposing that the word ultimately comes from Japanese *pituzi "sheep", which underwent assimilation to *picizi and later reduplication of the first syllable to *pipizi. The term was later suffixed with the ending *-a.
• John R. Bentley (2008) reconstructs *peᵐbeza for proto-Sakishima, *peNza for proto-Miyako and *pibiza for proto-Yonaguni.

Historical attestations

• 混効験集 Konkoukenshuu (1711), "Words of the Royal Palace", records "「ひゝじや」羊之事" and "「ひじや」".
• Transcribed in Chinese sources as 匹托喳 [phiɁ.thɒɁ.tʂɑ], 非多只 [fui.tuɔ.tʂʅ] and 非都知 [fui.tu.tʂʅ], suggesting [ɸitotʃi ~ ɸitutʃi ~ pitotʃa] in Middle Okinawan (Source: Lin, Chihkai. A reconstruction of Old Okinawan: A corpus-based approach (2015), page 58).
• Vocabulary of the language spoken at the Great Loo-Choo island in the Japan Sea (1818), by Herbert John Clifford, records "Goat, feéja".
• The Asiatic Journal and Monthly Register for British India and Its Dependencies, Volume 5, Specimen of the Language of Lieu Kieu (1818), records "Sheep, piipintsha".
• Essay in Aid of a Grammmar and Dictionary of the Luchuan Language (1895), by Basil Hall Chamberlain, records
• 沖縄語典 Okinawa goten (Okinawan language dictionary) (1896), by Masayo Nakamoto, records "「やぢ、ひーじや」野羊、山羊（ヤギ）。ひーじやハびつじ〈羊〉ノ訛カ。".