Pioneers devised First Nations written language (fwd link)

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Pioneers devised First Nations written language

Provincial Archives tells story of missionaries' efforts to translate Bible

BY GAYLE SIMONSON, EDMONTON JOURNAL JUNE 18, 2011
Canada

When missionaries first arrived in North America, language was a
barrier when working with native peoples. All language was oral with
no written form. European missionaries felt a written form was
desirable, but many sounds weren't easily represented in the Roman
alphabet.

>From the earliest cave drawings, people have used symbols to tell
stories. When Methodist missionary James Evans worked among the
Ojibwa, he sought a simple system of symbolic writing to represent the
sounds of the native language.

This work continued after 1840 when Evans was transferred to Norway
House, a Hudson Bay trading post in northern Manitoba. In the native
village of Rossville, he completed the system now known as syllabics.

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