Guide to the Indigenous Materials at the American Philosophical Society

Description: This volume contains extracts of Benjamin Smith Barton's "New Views of the Origin of the Tribes and Nations of America" (Philadelphia, 1797), with additions by Peter S. Du Ponceau. The bulk of the volume is comprised of word list of 54 words with equivalents listed in a range of 50-70 languages. While Barton listed no authority, Du Ponceau cited sources. Languages with words listed include Chitimacha, Atakapa, Cherokee, Osage, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Nottoway, Kansa, Omaha, Dakota, Pawnee, Nanticoke, Gros Ventres, Miami, Mi'kmaq, Seminole, Quapaw, Yuchi, Delaware, Ojibwe, Shawnee, Seneca, Mohawk, Onondaga, Cayuga, Oneida, Tuscarora, Natches, Wyandot, Creek, Mahican, Mohegan, and many others. The word list includes the terms for God, heaven, and sky, as well as various terms relating to kinship, parts of the body, weather, and more. The volume also includes notes on sounds of the Otomi (Othomi) observations on declension; observations about the Omaha, Kansa, Oto, Arkansas, and Missouri languages; and notes on symbol and sound. Also includes a newspaper clipping of a review (in German) of Barton's "New Views" that appeared in "Göttingische Anzeigen von gelehrten Sachen," June 17, 1799.

Collection:A comparative vocabulary of Indian languages (Mss.497.B28)

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Iowa materials, ACLS collection

Culture:

Otoe includes: Oto, Jiwére

Iowa includes: Ioway, Báxoje, Bah-Kho-Je

Date:1936-1947

Type:Still Image | Text

Genre:Grammars | Photographs | Stories | Vocabularies

Extent:1,000+ pages, 18 photographs, 4,000 cards, 75 bluebooks (4-8 pages each)

Description: The Iowa materials in the ACLS collection consist primarily of materials collected by Gordon Marsh in the late 1930s, all located in the "Iowa" section of the finding aid. Marsh's materials (item X4a.2, "Materials for a study of the Iowa Indian language"), recorded with the assistance of Iowa speakers, especially Robert Small and Julia Small, include numerous texts on a variety of subjects, which are in the manuscripts in both initial handwritten form (in bluebooks) and in later typescript form, with both interlinear translations and free translations, of which some of the latter were made by Robert Small. This material is divided into 22 parts. This material also includes a draft version of a grammar of the Iowa extensive lexical files including Iowa-English, English-Iowa, and comparisons to related languages (Osage, Dakota, Lakota, Omaha-Ponca, Kansa, and Ho-chunk); and other linguistic notes, with related correspondence. There are also 18 photographs of Iowa people with whom Marsh worked. In this same section, there is also a brief descriptive grammar by William Whitman (item X4a.1) based on field work with an Iowa speaker and an Oto speaker.

Collection:ACLS Collection (American Council of Learned Societies Committee on Native American Languages, American Philosophical Society) (Mss.497.3.B63c)

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Kaw materials, Frank G. Speck Papers

Culture:

Omaha includes: Umoⁿhoⁿ

Kaw includes: Kansa, Kanza

Language:English | Kansa | Omaha-Ponca | Iowa-Oto | Choctaw

Date:1904

Contributor:Speck, Frank G. (Frank Gouldsmith), 1881-1950

Subject:Linguistics | Oklahoma--History

Type:Still Image | Text

Genre:Notes | Vocabularies

Extent:9 pages; 10 photographs

Description: In Subcollection I, Series I, see item V(22B6), which contains miscellaneous notes regarding the Kansa language, including a 3-page vocabulary with numerals, 1 page of conjugations, and a 2-page vocabulary list. Some Ponca, Osage, and Otoe forms are included. In Subcollection I, Series III, see "4-40(a-j). Kansa (Kaw)," which contains 10 photographs.

Collection:Frank G. Speck Papers (Mss.Ms.Coll.126)