IV.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTES ON AMERICAN LINGUISTICS.

_By the Editor._

IT cannot be said that the study of American linguistics has advanced to a position wholly satisfactory. It is beset with all the difficulties belonging to a subject that has not been embraced in written records for long periods, and it is open to the hazards of articulation and hearing, acting without entire mutual confidence. And yet we may not dispute Max Müller’s belief,[1851] that it is the science of language which has given the first comprehensive impulse to the study of mankind.

Out of the twenty distinct sounds which it is said the voice of man can produce,[1852] there have been built up from roots and combinations a great diversity of vocabularies. Comparisons of these, as well as of the methods of forming sentences, have been much used in investigations of ethnical relations. Of these opposing methods, neither is sufficiently strong, it is probable, to be pressed without the aid of the other, though the belief of the Bureau of Ethnology at Washington, under the influence of Major Powell, practically discards all tests but the vocabulary, in tracing ethnological relations. It is held that this one test of words satisfies, as to customs, myths, and other ethnological traits, more demands of classifications than any other. Granted that it does, there are questions yet unsolvable by it; and many ethnologists hold that there are still other tests, physiological, for instance,[1853] which cannot safely be neglected in settling such complex questions. The favorite claim of the Bureau is that its officers are studying man as a human being, and not as an animal; but it is by no means sure that the physical qualities of man are so disconnected with his mind and soul as to be unnecessary to his interpretation. Even if language be given the chief place in such studies, there is still the doubt if the vocabulary can in all ways be safely followed to the exclusion of the structure of the language; and it is not to be forgotten, as Haven recognized thirty years ago, that “one of the greatest obstacles to a successful and satisfactory comparison of Indian vocabularies is caused by the capricious and ever-varying orthography applied by writers of different nations.” This is a chance of error that cannot be eliminated when we have to deal with lists of words made in the past, by persons not to be communicated with, in whom both national and personal peculiarities of ear and vocal organs may exist to perplex. A part of the difficulty is of course removed by trained assistants acting in concert, though in different fields; but the individual sharpness or dulness of ear and purity and obscurity of articulation will still cause diversity of results,—to say nothing of corresponding differences in the persons questioned. There is still the problem, broader than all these divisionary tests, whether language is at all a safe test of race, and on this point there is room for different opinions, as is shown in the discussions of Sayce, Whitney, and others.[1854] “Any attempt,” says Max Müller, “at squaring the classification of races and tongues must necessarily fail.”[1855] On the other hand, George Bancroft (Final revision, ii. 90) says that “the aspect of the red men was so uniform that there is no method of grouping them into families but by their languages.”

It is the wide margin for error, already indicated, that vitiates much that has already been done in philological comparisons, and the over-eager recognition at all times of what is thought to be the word-shunting of “Grimm’s Law” has doubtless been responsible for other confusions.[1856]

Most of the general philological treatises touch more or less intimately the question of language as a test of race,[1857] and all of them engage in tracing affinities, each with confidence in a method that others with equal assurance may belittle.[1858] Thus Bancroft,[1859] reflecting an opinion long prevalent, says that “positive grammatical rules carry with them much more weight than mere word likenesses,”[1860] while, on the contrary, Dawson[1861] says that “grammar is, after all, only the clothing of language. The science consists in its root-words; and multitudes of root-words are identical in the American languages over vast areas.” This last proposition is, as we have seen, the principle on which this inquiry is now conducted with governmental patronage. “Each American language,” says George Bancroft, in his chapter on the dialects of North America, “was competent of itself, without improvement of scholars, to exemplify every rule of the logician and give utterance to every passion.” In accordance with such perhaps extreme views, it has been usually said that the American languages are in development in advance of aboriginal progress in other respects. It is another common observation that while a certain resemblance runs through all the native tongues,[1862] there is no such general resemblance to the old-world languages;[1863] but at the same time the linguistic proof of the unity of the American race is not irrefragable,[1864] and it would take tens of thousands of years, as Brinton holds, if there had been a single source, for the eighty stocks of the North American and for the hundred South American speeches to have developed themselves in all their varieties.[1865] Proceeding beyond stocks to dialects, and counting varieties, Ludewig, in his _Literature of the American Languages_, gave 1,100 different American languages; but an alphabetical list given by H. W. Bates in his _Central America, West Indies and South America_ (London, 1882, 2d ed.)[1866] affords 1,700 names of such. The number, of course, depends on how exclusive we are in grouping dialects. Squier, for instance, gives only 400 tongues for both North and South America; for, as Nadaillac says, “philology has no precise definition of what constitutes a language.”[1867]

The most comprehensive survey of the bibliography of American linguistics, excluding South America, is in Pilling’s _Proof-sheets of a bibliography of the languages of the North American Indians_ (Washington, 1885), a tentative issue of the Bureau of Ethnology, already mentioned. Pilling also earlier catalogued the linguistic MSS. in the library of the Bureau of Ethnology, in Powell’s _First Report_ of that Bureau (p. 553), in which that bibliographer also gave a sketch of the history of gathering such collections. A section of the _Bibliotheca Americana_ of Charles Leclerc (Paris, 1878) is given to linguistics, and it affords by groups one of the best keys to the literature of the aboriginal languages which we yet have, and it has been supplemented by additional lists issued since by Maisonneuve of Paris. Ludewig’s _Literature of American Aboriginal Languages, with additions by W. Turner_ (London, 1858), was up to date, thirty years ago, a good list of grammars and dictionaries, but the increase has been considerable in this field since then (Pilling’s _Eskimo Languages_, p. 62). The libraries of collectors of Spanish-American history, as enumerated elsewhere,[1868] have usually included much on the linguistic history, and the most important of the printed lists for Mexico and Central America is that of Brasseur de Bourbourg’s _Bibliothèque Mexico-Guatémalienne, précédée d’un coup d’œil sur les études américaines dans leurs rapports avec les études classiques, et suivi du tableau, par ordre alphabétique, des ouvrages de linguistique américaine contenus dans le même volume_ (Paris, 1871). This list is repeated with additions in the _Catalogue de Alphonse L. Pinart et ... de Brasseur de Bourbourg_ (Paris, 1883). Field’s _Indian Bibliography_ characterizes some of the leading books up to 1873; but the best source up to about the same date for a large part of North America is found in the notes in that section of Bancroft’s _Native Races_, vol. iii., given to linguistics.[1869] The several _Comptes Rendus_ of the Congrès des Américanistes have sections on the same subject, and the second volume of the _Contributions to North American Ethnology_, published by the U. S. Geological Survey (Powell’s), has been kept back for the completion of the linguistic studies of the government officials, which will ultimately, under the care of A. S. Gatschet, compose that belated volume. Major Powell, in his conduct of ethnological investigations for the United States government, has found efficient helpers in James C. Pilling, J. Owen Dorsey, S. R. Riggs, A. S. Gatschet, not to name others. Powell outlined some of his own views in an address on the evolution of language before the Anthropological Society of Washington, of which there is an abstract in their _Transactions_ (1881), while the paper can be found in perfected shape as “The evolution of language from a study of the Indian languages,” in the _First Report of the Bureau of Ethnology_.

Among the earliest of the students of the native languages in the north were the Catholic missionaries in Canada and in the northwest, and there is much of interest in their observations as recorded in the _Jesuit Relations_. We find a _Dictionnaire de la langue huronne_ in the _Grand Voyage du Pays des Hurons_ (Paris, 1632, etc.).

The most conspicuous of the English publications of the seventeenth century was the Natick rendering of the _Bible_ for the Massachusetts Indians, undertaken by the Apostle John Eliot, as he was called, at the expense of the London Society for the Propagation of the Gospel. Eliot also published a _Grammar of the Massachusetts Indian Language_ (Cambridge, 1666), which, with notes by Peter S. Duponceau and an introduction by John Pickering, was printed for the Mass. Hist. Society in 1822, as was John Cotton’s _Vocabulary of the Massachusetts Indian Language_ (Cambridge, 1830). Roger Williams’ _Key into the language of America_ has been elsewhere referred to.[1870] The Rev. Jonathan Edwards wrote a paper on the language of the Mohegan Indians, which, with annotations by Pickering, was printed in the _Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll._ in 1823, and is called by Haven (_Archæol. U. S._, 29) the earliest exposition of the radical connection of the American languages. Dr. James Hammond Trumbull, the most learned of the students of these eastern languages, has furnished various papers on them in the publications of the American Philological Association and of the American Antiquarian Society,[1871] and has summarized the literature of the subject, with references, in the _Memorial Hist. of Boston_ (vol. i.).

In the eighteenth century there were several philological recorders among the missionaries. Sebastian Rasle made a _Dictionary of the Abnake Language_, now preserved in MS. in Harvard College library, which, edited by John Pickering, was published as a volume of the _Memoirs_ of the Amer. Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1833. A grammatical sketch of the Abnake as outlined in Rasle’s _Dictionary_ is given by M. C. O’Brien in the _Maine Hist. Soc. Coll._, vol. ix. The publications of the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia have preserved for us the vocabularies and grammars of the Delaware language, collected and arranged by John Heckewelder[1872] and David Zeisberger, while the latter Moravian missionary collected a considerable MS. store of linguistic traces of the Indian tongues, a part of which is now preserved in Harvard College library.[1873] One of this last collection, an _Indian Dictionary; English, German, Iroquois_ (_the Onondaga_), _and Algonquin_ (_the Delaware_) (Cambridge, 1887,) has been carefully edited for the press by Eben Norton Horsford. Dr. John G. Shea published a _Dictionnaire Français-Onontagué, édité d’après un manuscrit du 17^e siècle_ (N. Y., 1859), which is preserved in the Mazarin library in Paris.

There was no attempt made to treat the study of the American languages in what would now be termed a scientific spirit by any English scholar till towards the end of the eighteenth century. The whole question of the origin of the Indians had for a long time been the subject of discussion, and it had of necessity taken more or less of a philological turn from the beginning; but the inquiry had been simply a theoretical one, with efforts to substantiate preconceived beliefs rather than to formulate inductive ones, as in such works as—not to name others—Adair’s _American Indians_ (London, 1775), where every trace was referable to the Jews, and Count de Gebelin’s _Monde Primitif_ (Paris, 1781), where a comparison of American and European vocabularies is given.[1874]

A much closer student appeared in Benjamin Smith Barton, of Philadelphia, though he was not wholly emancipated from these same prevalent notions of connecting the Indian tongues with the old-world speeches. He says that he was instigated to the study by Pallas’ _Linguarum totius orbis Vocabularia comparativa_ (Petropolis, 1786, 1789), and the result was his _New View of the Origin of the tribes and nations of America_ (Philad., 1797; again, 1798). He sets forth in his introduction his methods of study. Charlevoix had suggested that the linguistic test was the only one in studying the ethnological connections of these peoples; but Barton asserted that there were other manifestations, equally important, like the physical aspects, the modes of worship, and the myths. He examined forty different Indian languages, and thinks they show a common origin, and that remotely a connection existed between the old and new continents.

The most eminent American student[1875] of this field in the early half of this century was Albert Gallatin. He began his observations in 1823, at the instance of Humboldt, and two years later he took advantage of a representative convocation of Indian tribes, then held in Washington, to continue his studies of their speech. In 81 tribes brought under his notice he found what he thought to be 27 or 28 linguistic families. This was a wider survey than had before been made, and he regretted that he was not privileged to profit by the vocabularies collected by Lewis and Clark, which had unfortunately been lost. At the request of the Amer. Antiquarian Society, he wrote out and enlarged this study in the second volume of their _Collections_ in 1836, and advanced views that he never materially changed, believing in a very remote Asiatic origin of the tongues, and without excepting the Eskimos from his conclusions. In 1845, in his _Notes on the semi-civilized nations of Mexico_, his conclusions were much the same, but he made an exception in favor of the Otomis. At this time he counted more than a hundred languages, similar in structure but different in vocabularies, and he argued that a very long period was necessary thus to differentiate the tongues. At the age of eighty-seven Gallatin gave his final results in vol. ii. of the _Transactions of the American Ethnological Society_ (1848). Gallatin published a review[1876] of the volume on Ethnography and Philology, which had been prepared by Horatio Hale as the seventh volume of the _Publications of the Wilkes United States Exploring Expedition_ (1838-42), and Hale himself, then in the beginning of his reputation as a linguistic scholar,[1877] published some papers of his own in the same volume of the _Transactions_.[1878]

The two Americans who have done more than others, without the aid of the government, to organize aboriginal linguistic studies are Dr. John Gilmary Shea of Elizabeth, New Jersey, and Dr. Daniel Garrison Brinton of Philadelphia. Of _Shea’s Library of American Linguistics_ he has given an account in the _Smithsonian Rept._, 1861.[1879]

Dr. Brinton has set forth the purposes of his linguistic studies in an address before the Pennsylvania Historical Society, _American Aboriginal Languages and why we should study them_ (Philad., 1885,—from the _Pennsylvania Magazine of History_, 1885, p. 15). In starting his _Library of Aboriginal American Literature_, he announced his purpose to put within the reach of scholars authentic materials for the study of the languages and culture of the native races, each work to be the production of the native mind, and to be printed in the original tongue, with a translation and notes, and to have some intrinsic historical or ethnological importance.[1880]

The other considerable collections are both French. Alphonse L. Pinart published a _Bibliothèque de linguistique et d’ethnographie Américaines_ (Paris and San Francisco, 1875-82).[1881]

The publishing house of Maisonneuve et Compagnie of Paris, which has done more than any other business firm to advance these studies, has conducted a _Collection linguistique Américaine_, of much value to American philologists.[1882]

Other French studies have attracted attention. Pierre Etienne Duponceau published a _Mémoire sur le système grammatical des langues de quelques nations indiennes de l’Amérique du Nord_ (Paris, 1838).[1883] He conducted a correspondence with the Rev. John Heckewelder respecting the American tongues, which is published in the _Transactions of the Amer. Philosophical Society_ (Phil., 1819), and he translated Zeisberger’s _Delaware Grammar_.

The studies of the Abbé Jean André Cuoq have been upon the Algonquin dialects,[1884] and published mainly in the _Actes de la Société philologique_ (Paris, 1869 and later). His monographic _Etudes philologiques sur quelques langues sauvages de l’Amérique_ was printed at Montreal, 1866. It was the result of twenty years’ missionary work among the Iroquois and Algonquins, and besides a grammar contains a critical examination of the works of Duponceau and Schoolcraft. Lucien Adam has been very comprehensive in his researches, his studies being collected under the titles of _Etudes sur six langues Américaines_ (Paris, 1878) and _Examen grammatical comparé de seize langues Américaines_ (Paris, 1878).[1885]

The papers of the Count Hyacinthe de Charencey have been in the first instance for the most part printed in the _Revue de Linguistique_, the _Annales de Philosophie Chrétienne_, and the _Mémoires de l’Académie de Caen_, and have wholly pertained to the tongues south of New Mexico; but his principal studies are collected in his _Mélanges de philologie et de paléographie Américaines_ (Paris, 1883).[1886]

The most distinguished German worker in this field, if we except the incidental labors of Alexander and William von Humboldt,[1887] is J. C. E. Buschmann, whose various linguistic labors cover the wide field of the west coast of North America from Alaska to the Isthmus, with some of the regions adjacent on the east. He published his papers in Berlin between 1853 and 1864, and many of them in the _Mémoires de l’Académie de Berlin_.[1888]

Dr. Carl Hermann Berendt has published his papers in Spanish, English, and German, and some of them will be found in the _Smithsonian Reports_, in the Berlin _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, and in the _Revista de Mérida_. Under the auspices of the American Ethnological Society, a fac-simile reproduction of his graphic _Analytical Alphabet for the Mexican and Central American languages_ was published in 1869, the result of twelve years’ study in those countries.[1889]

* * * * *

The languages of what are called the civilized nations of the central regions of America deserve more particular attention.

In the Mexican empire the Aztec was largely predominant, but not exclusively spoken, for about twenty other tongues were more or less in vogue in different parts. Humboldt and others have found occasional traces in words of an earlier language than the Aztec or Nahua, but different from the Maya, which in Brasseur’s opinion was the language of the country in those pre-Nahua days. Bancroft, contrary to some recent philologists, holds the speech of the Toltec, Chichimec, and Aztec times to be one and the same.[1890] It was perhaps the most copious and most perfected of all the aboriginal tongues; and in proof of this are cited the opinions of the early Spanish scholars, the successes of the missionaries in the use of it in imparting the subtleties of their faith, and the literary use which was made of it by the native scholars, as soon as they had adapted the Roman alphabet to its vocabulary and forms.[1891]

The Maya has much the same prominence farther south that the Nahua has in the northerly parts of the territory of the Spanish conquest, and a dialect of it, the Tzendal, still spoken near Palenqué, is considered to be the oldest form of it, though probably this dialect was a departure from the original stock. It is one of the evidences that the early Mayas may have come by way of the West India islands that modern philologists say the native tongues of those islands were allied to the Maya. Bancroft (iii. 759, with other references, 760) refers to the list of spoken tongues given in Palacio’s _Carta al Rey de España_ (1576) as the best enumeration of the early Spanish writers.[1892] For its literary value we must consult some of the authorities like Orozco y Berra, mentioned in connection with the Aztec. Squier published a _Monograph of authors who have written on the languages of Central America, and collected vocabularies and composed works in the native dialects of that country_ (Albany, 1861,—100 copies), in which he mentions 110 such authors, and gives a list of their printed and MS. works. Those who have used these native tongues for written productions are named in Ludewig’s _Literature of the Amer. Aborig. Languages_ (London, 1858) and in Brinton’s _Aboriginal American Authors_ (Phila., 1883).[1893]

The philology of the South American peoples has not been so well compassed as that of the northern continent. The classified bibliographies show the range of it under such heads as Ande (or Campa), Araucanians (Chilena), Arrawak, Aymara, Brazil (the principal work being F. P. von Martius’s _Beiträge zur Ethnographie und Sprachenkunde Amerika’s, zumal Brasiliens_, Leipzig, 1867, with a second part called _Glossaria linguarum brasiliensium, Erlangen_, 1863), Chama, Chibcha (or Muysca, Mosca), Cumanagota, Galibi, Goajira, Guarani, Kiriri (Kariri), Lule, Moxa, Paez, Quichua, Tehuelhet, Tonocote, Tupi, etc.