MF1323.1197 Reel 39_0558

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The Navajos, Apaches, Pueblo Indians, Yuman and Mohaves of New Mexico and the present Arizona have not had any grammar or dictionaries made of their [several?] languages. Only 200 word vocabularies are known of them, which are of little public or philological utility. Should therefore suggest the following points to accomplish this object, at little expense, through the agents and interpreters of the Indian Bureau among the different tribes of the territories mentioned.

1. That the Bureau have provided in blank in quarter form, 1000 to 1500 words in English with two or three pages of grammatical forms and the interpreters and agents of the different superintendencies be supplied with three or four copies for each language - the best interpreter in each to be employed - the forms may be of 20 to 50 pages.

2. These officers to be instructed to make them work or clean as possible, writing the Indian words very clearly - one copy of [illegible] to be kept in the Supts. off. as in New Mexico & Arizona and another copy sent to the Indian Bureau - The authors name, office and length evidence in the tribe, date etc. to be added & full name of [illegible]

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3. The localities and names of the camps or villages of the nation or tribe, with any vestiges of ruins or hyerologlyphics, to be detailed on a pen and ink map, with ^[illegible] [illegible] from a central point, in Indian geographical terms.

4. The writer to give as much an account of the traditions, religion, feasts, dances, war songs, and present history, habits customs, cultivation, mode of life & if Christianized and when, and if under Christian instruction now, their numbers etc - particularly as to the half civilized Pueblos - of which there seems to be two nations or general languages, and if any known part or present connections with the Toltec or Nahuatlac- Aztec tribes of Mexico, as they (the Pueblos) seem to be of the Pino stock or affiliations. A detailed account of the Moquis is very much wanted: The Indian terms of 12 womans and 12 men names also to be taken down.

5. A more particular account of the Apache tribes inhabiting the head nation of the Gila, and of its branches the Rios San Francisco, and Salado etc. of which very little is known - (c.c. of the latter two series -) since the visit of De Niza and Coronado in 1540.

6. A Biographical catalogue of the more important papers and documents relating to the Pueblo and other New Mexican tribes to be 263

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found in the Spanish archives in the Ter. Secretary's office at Santa Fe and at Tucson and if any works in their language, by the Catholic missionaries between 1580 and 1846 remain in the New Mexican & Arizona parishes either in manuscript or print, whether catechesis or dictionaries etc. or of histories of the country with their full titles. Many such works are still to be found in the missions and parish archives of Sonora, [illegible] and [illegible] as well as California.

7. The work of preparing a dictionary and grammar on the plan indicated is very simple to me who understand their language; of which is known to many Americans and New Mexicans; and at the furthest can be accomplished in a week - some of the Moqui villages cannot understand each other, and the differences should be noted. The learned world is very much interested in a fuller knowledge of the languages of the ante 1862 New Mexico, to show the affiliations between them and those of Central Mexico. Their neighbor the Pimas, extending on different dialects from western Chihuahua in the Sierra Madre to the Gulf of California, and from the Gila river to Calican in Sinaloa to wit the Pima, proper the Papayos, Opatos, Yarkis, Mayos, Coros, [Tarahumaras?] etc. [illegible] being about 100,000 [illegible]

8. It is suggested that when their manuscripts are received a the Indian Bureau, they be added to by the other accounts statistical, [b?] etc) -

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lately printed in the reports of the Indian Bureau and Government works from 1846 to 1864, and published by the Government in volumes similar to those on Commercial relations. It is believed that the series of such work would become extremely valuable to all public offices if distributed in the two territories

This plan, if approve might in time be [illegible] to all the tribes (or agencies) of the Pacific state and territories.

Alexr. S Taylor

Santa Barbara, California 17 September 1863

To the Hon. Wm. P. Dole Commissioner of Indian Affairs Washington D.C.

When these mgs. are read in Washington, of the little is given either in the Ind. Bureau reports or the Smithsonian reports, inquirers interested in Indian Affairs and [scientific?] persons will be informed of their receipt, so that if not printed by the Bureau, they will still confer a great honor on its library, influence and office.

A carefully drawn up and special account of the Pueblo Indian tribes is a very great [illegible] and any [illegible] in New Mexico competant to perform such a work and to make a map of their country with sets of its views ruins and heiroglyphics would confer a great honor in your name - no such work is known.

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Daily Evening Bulletin.

TUESDAY EVENING, SEPTEMBER 8, 1863.

New Works on the Indian Languages of California and Sonora.

Mr. Shea has lately issued two new numbers of his valuable series of the aboriginal languages relating to Indians of this coast, copies of which have just been received in California. The first is Grammar of the Pima, or Nevome–a language of Sonora, from a manuscript of the 18th century, (about 1785,) edited by Buckingham Smith, late Secretary of the United States legations to Spain and Mexico, 1 vol., 8vo. pp. 125. The work contains a catechism and confession in the Nevome language, of 31 pages, and a lengthy and well digested treatise on the grammatical structure of the aforesaid idiom. This curious and valuable essay was procured a few years ago by Mr. Smith, at Toledo, in old Spain. He assumes that it was made by one of the Jesuit missionaries, but this is evidently the work of one of their successors, a Franciscan, from its monastic motto. It seems to have been in use at the town of Movas or Mavis, in the Lower Pimeria, on the upper waters of the Rio Yaqui, not far from Ures, as appears from the 1855 map of Jacob Monk, of Baltimore. The Pima language, it seems from this work and other authorities of the Spaniards, extends from the northern parts of the State of Sinaloa to beyond and along the Gila river, to the river of [Tamo???] or Colorado, into South California (!) and west from the Sea of Cortes to the country of the Taraumaras, in the Sierra Madre of West Chihuauas. It included in its affiliations the Papagos, Opatas, Yaquis, Mayos, Pimas, Seris, Eudeves, Nevomes, Heves, and other less known populations, whose language is still recorded in the geographical terms of the States of Sonora and Sinaloa, and also of Arizona, and who are all assumed by later historians and philologists to have been intruders from more northern countries. The Moquis and Zunis seem to be related to them. At the present time they are wild [illegible] [illegible] [illegible] 70,000 souls ; but in 1750 they were estimated at double that number. This language covers one of the most extensive districts of North America, and its populations, when first known to the Spaniards, about 1535, were nearly all found to be cultivators of the soil, and living in scattered villages like the Pimas and Maricopas of the Gila in 1863. The history and character of the Pima nations, in connection with the Aztec chronicles of Mexico, has caused more discussion among the learned men of Europe and America than probably and other people on the continent.

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The second work of the series alluded to is A Volcabulary of the Language of the Mission of San Antonio in Alta California (sometimes called the Sextupays or Tetachoyas.) It is by Padre Buenaventura [Setjar?] of the Order of San Francisco with grammatical notes by the editor of the Series, who is one of the most distinguished of the Indian philologists. It occupies 72 octavo pages, and was compiled by the old Californian between 1772 and 1807, in which latter year he died at San Antonio Mission, in Monterey county. In 1823, this Mission, contained about 890 Indians ; but in 1863 you can hardly count a baker's dozen of them.

These two works are of great value in archaeological science, in showing the path of the ancient Indian invasions and migrations from north to south, and east to west. Though language is subject to great changes, it is yet permanent in its principles. The English language of to-day is widely different from the English language of the days of King Alfred, but still it is no other than the same Anglo-Saxon idiom, and by it, its speakers can be traced all through North Western Europe, and twisted up into all sorts of dialects in its shiftings and wanderings. Somer assert that the monks from Ireland first taught the Saxons and Britons the purer English, but this semms to be too much of bull to swallow without the horns. AST