“The Berber Languages of Norther Africa, as I shall yet demonstrate, are Celtic at base, although they contain Arabic words, more or less changed by their peculiar genius as wehn the Arabic midina, a town, becomes the Berber thamdint. Among these Berbers are tribes called Zimuhr and Aimor, names that link the Cymir and the Aymaras. But more important is the fact that the Peruvian pronouns, which are neither Celtic (that is Cymric proper and Gaelic) nor Basque, are Berber. Here is evidence of no common order that Peru was colonized by the Berber stock in conjunction with an Iberic people, of which there is no present trace in Africa…..When Columbus landed on the islands of whence he took sailors and animals, he found there a living tradition of a new world in the west. He sailed by the island Gomera, which retains the Cymric name, and has a port Amirri, linking the Zimurh and Aimor of Barbary with the Aymaras of Peru.” (208)
“The Berber and the Celtic agree in prepositional structure, in pronominal suffixes, in the verb substantive, in the adventitious prefix and even affix of the letter t, and in medial vowel changes as puzzling as the Welsh. As for the vocabulary, I append a list of a hundred and forty different Berber words with their Celtic equivalents. Of these thirty-two are Guanche. The others, Berber, Shelluh, Siwahan, Showiah, Tuarick and Tibboo, I have denoted by B., S., Si., Sh., T. and Ti., and the Guanche by G. They are the remains of the ancient Numidians, who were identical with the Nemedians of Irish history.” (235)
“The Cymric element was strong in the Berber stock. Leo Africanus called them Gumeri, which Pegot Ogier compares with Gomera, the name of one of the Canary islands. Jackson in his account of Timbuctoo and Housa, etc., says of the Zimurh Shelluhs: “They are a fine race of men, well grown, and good figures; they have a noble prescence and their physiognomy resembles the ancient Romans.” He also speaks of another clan, the Ait Amor, as of a warlike spirit, the English of Barbary. “When the Sultan Muhamed began a campaign, he never entered the field without a warlike Ait Amor, who marched in the rear of the army; these people received no pay, but were satisfied with what plunder they got after a battle; and accordingly, this principle stimulating them, they were always foremost in any contest, dispute or battle.” (235)
“Otherwise the vocabularies have little in common. Nevertheless, I have added a comparative table of Adaize words with possible equivalents, not only Celtic, Berber, and Peruvian, but also Yuman, Pujunan and Kulanapan, for the benefit of those who are interested in matters philological. In so small a vocabulary, consisting in all of sixty-eight words, it is contrary to the doctrine of chances to find over ten Beber coincidences, if the vocabularies have no vital relation to each other. The Adaizan okhapin, bread, gasing, brother, caput, earth, anuack, face, housing, flesh, ganie, heaven, ahasuck, leg, amanie, mother, tlola, mount, and toucat, snow, answer to the Berber gofio, ygooma, tamouts, enguddi, aksoume, ginna, ighas, mamma, athraar, and edifil.” (258)
“The Berber word for the number ten is markoum, but the Pujunan markum denotes five. The explanation of the difference is found in an old Celtic root, the Erse mear, meirceann, which denotes a finger or the fingers.” (256)
Source: Proceedings of the Royal Society of Canada: Délibérations de la Société … By Royal Society of Canada