Etymology
From Proto-Polynesian *muri (“behind, after, following, last” – compare with Tahitian muri, Tongan mui, Samoan muli),[1] from Proto-Oceanic *muri (compare with Fijian muri “behind”) from Proto-Malayo-Polynesian *ma-udəhi (compare with Malay mudi “behind” and kemudian “later”) affixing *udəhi (“last, late, behind, future” – compare with Javanese udhik “upstream”, Iban udi “following after”, Tagalog hulí “last, late”).[2][3]
References
Tregear, Edward (1891) Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary, Wellington, New Zealand: Lyon and Blair, page 259
Ross Clark and Simon J. Greenhill, editors (2011), “muri.1a”, in POLLEX-Online: The Polynesian Lexicon Project Online
Ross, Malcolm D., Pawley, Andrew, Osmond, Meredith (2016) The lexicon of Proto-Oceanic, volumes 5: People, body and mind, Canberra: Australian National University, →ISBN, pages 421-2
Further reading
- Williams, Herbert William (1917) “muri”, in A Dictionary of the Maori Language, page 249
- “muri” in John C. Moorfield, Te Aka: Maori–English, English–Maori Dictionary and Index, 3rd edition, Longman/Pearson Education New Zealand, 2011, →ISBN.