Henry's followup: Early linguists using CJ w/native people?(fwd)

[David Robertson]

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---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 14:27:26 -0800 (PST)
From: Henry Zenk <psu18009 at pdx.edu>
To: David Robertson <drobert at TINCAN.TINCAN.ORG>
Subject: Re: Henry's followup:  Early linguists using CJ w/native              people?(fwd)

>
> Was Pe're Blanchet part of that diocese, not one of the Oblates?  Don't
> know the history so exactly.  I'd tried contacting the Oblates about any
> Jargon-era records and whatnot a couple of times; the one response I got
> was from a fairly friendly and somewhat interested priest in Alaska who
> referred me to the Mother House back East; no answer.

 Nor do I know the history so exactly, just that Blanchet and Demers
arrived together at Ft. Vancouver in 1839 as missionaries, and both ended
up as bishops--Blanchet in Portland, Demers in Victoria.  Demers was known
for his CJ fluency, and of the two was more involved with
Indians.  Blanchet was associated more with the Canadians and later
arriving Catholics, and outlived Demers by many years.  Correspondence
both of Blanchet and Demers is in the archdiocese archives in Portland.  I
have not studied it myself.  As I say, it's mostly in French.  Robert Boyd
has gone through Demers's correspondence there, and passed along to me a
couple of xeroxes with some Jargon scattered amidst the
French.  Demers's French, I must tell you, is very difficult to make
out:  Bob, who reads French (I don't), struggled mightily with it.


>
> Could you reproduce some of the 'h' and 'r' words you're talking about,
> please?  Interesting to see.
>
> Mike C.
>
> PS I gather the French document is only in the archive you mention.  I
> can read the French; it's the old handwriting that's scary ;-)  Don't
> suppose it's digitized and sendable?  Natch, of course not.
>

Note I was alluding only to the possibility that there might be some
documentation in the archdiocese archives in Portland, ASSUMING that the
1853 S.J. McCormick dictionary (reproduced by Oregon Historical Society as
an appendix in PAUL KANE: THE COLMUBIA WANDERER, published 1971) was
indeed the work of (or in some measure the work of) Blanchet.  Here's
some examples of entries there with "h" and "r":

	
	Itsruth  black bear
	Aiqua    haikwa (missing h)
	hokook klaxta  he who, they who (silent h)
	Irpoeh  to shut
	Hilep  before, forward, in front

It is also interesting that in addition to "kl" appearing where Indian
pronunciations show a voiceless lateral fricative or affricative (as in
klaxta above), "tl" (more characteristic of other French sources, notably
Demers) also appears, e.g.:

	Tleelh  black
	Tlakall  broad
	Tlahane  outside

--Henry