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Re: My daughter's name is Kiona
in reply to a message by KateN
Kiona is a place name in Washington state, and it may be from the Yakima for "brown hills", though George R. Stewart in American Place-Names says that's "possible", not definite. It may not matter to you, but I really doubt if there were any girls or women in the ancient Yakima culture named "brown hills." The idea of turning place names into given names is a modern one, and it wouldn't be part of most Native American cultures. Of course, people in European-American culture didn't name children things like Brittany and Savannah until the last couple of centuries, either.
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