Date: Fri, 26 Jul 2002 19:22:59 -0400
From: "Fernando Q. Gouvea" 
Subject: Re: (urth) inhuma in brazil


I'm 100% sure that the common name is a coincidence. Not only is the
derivation of inhumo/inhuma/inhumi pretty clearly from in+human, but also
the Brazilian bird is i-nhu-ma, with the "nh" getting pronounced like the
spanish n with a tilde. The completely different sound is the reason why I
never made the connection even though I'm sure I had heard about the bird.
(The name is presumably from some native language; it doesn't sound like
Portuguese.) 

Fernando

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Fernando Q. Gouvea                      
Department of Mathematics          Editor, FOCUS and MAA Online
Colby College                      Mathematical Association of America
Waterville, ME 04901               http://www.maa.org
fqgouvea@colby.edu                      
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