NAME
Name:  Ah-Ni-Yv-Wi-Ya  (syllabary spelling)
             Ah-Knee-Yuh-Wee-YaH  (English spelling)

AhNiYvWiYa means "the human people," not the "principle people" OR "THE REAL PEOPLE."  In our ancient language, it translates as follows:
               "ah" makes it human as apposed to plant or animal.
               "in" makes the word plural as apposed to singular.
               "yv-wi" means a human singular as in only one person.
               "ya" translates into "this is, these are" or "the area, place, region of what you are talking about."
               The literal translation is "These are the human people."

There are other spellings taken from James Mooney's book about the Cherokee. The ancient spelling of our name is as written above. When the language began to digress toward correlating it with English or lazy pronunciations, sounds were divided or dropped. What was called a "silent symbol" came into existence but what was a spoken language only, a silent sound did not or could not exist.