As a researcher of Cajun French (and other, early varieties of
Louisiana French), I learned that quite a few loan words were derived
from Choctaw-based Mobilian. A pertintent quote follows that will shed
some light on the importance of Mobilian to the Southeast generally:
"From the Choctaw language the French borrowed more words directly than
from any other Indian source, a fact that may be ascribed partly to the
numerical superiority of the Choctaws over other Southern tribes, and
partly to the close kinship of Choctaw with the Mobilian dialect. The
_Mobilienne_, thus named by the French after Mobile, the great trading post
of the Colonial Period, served as a medium of communication for all the
tribes of the Lower Mississippi Valley, and extended its influence as far
north even as the mouth of the Ohio. It was as important to the Indians and
white traders of the Colonial Period as French is today to the diplomatic
circles of Europe. To British traders it became known as the Chickasaw
trade jargon, because of the close resemblance between the Chickasaw and
the Choctaw or Mobilian vocabulary. Now the Mobilian is based chiefly
on Choctaw, and contains indeed so much of the Choctaw vocabulary that
this circumstance proved to be decisive in rendering the influence of
Choctaw greater on the French language than that of any other Indian
dialect. |...| It should be borne in mind, furthermore, that the Mobilian
was enriched by loans from the dialects of Algonquian tribes who inhabited
the region lying to the north |...|." William A. Read, _Louisiana-French_,
Baton Rouge, Louisiana State Univ. Press, 1931, pp. 76-77.
The French name `Mobile' corresponds to the Choctaw name `Moilla'.
Mike Picone
Univ. of Alabama