Where does “Tnelʼaay” come from?
Tnelʼaay (Ahtna) comes from Ahtna tnelʼaa, from Ahtna d-, from Proto-Athabaskan də-, from Proto-Athabaskan-Eyak-Tlingit *də-.
Ancestry of “Tnelʼaay”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ahtna | tnelʼaa | he/she/it is standing still, is motionless |
| 2 | Ahtna | d- | The d-classifier, one of four classifiers which obligatorily appear in every Ahtna verb with a variety of purposes. The d-classifier has the following uses |
| 3 | Proto-Athabaskan | də- | the *də- classifier or valence-change prefix, a [[transitivize |
| 4 | Proto-Athabaskan-Eyak-Tlingit | *də- | — |