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małi. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
małi, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
małi in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
małi you have here. The definition of the word
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Choctaw
Noun
małi
- Misspelling of mahli.
Usage notes
This spelling (with 'ł') was adopted by the editors of Cyrus Byington's comprehensive A dictionary of the Choctaw language for Byington's original mahli. In this word, the 'hl' is not a digraph representing /ɬ/ but a consonant cluster /hl/. Byington had used 'hl' for /ɬ/ before vowels and 'lh' elsewhere, conflating /ɬ/ and /hl/. The editors were unaware Byington's 'hl' represented two distinct sounds as their express purpose for using 'ł' was so that "each consonant has but one sound" (page xi). This spelling is never used outside the dictionary.