Lakota letter from Leeds at the turn of the century

[Jan Ullrich]

Bruce,

In my experience with handwritten texts by early Lakota literates there are
very frequent confusions of letters.
So I think it is likely that

“takuna ota aciciya un kte s^ni”

stands for

“takuni ota echiciya un kte s^ni”

= “I won’t say much to you(pl.)”

where “echiciya un kte” could be the colloquial for “echiciyapi kte”

> Ito ate le anpetu kin wowapi cic'u kte lo na (eya) mis^ takuna ota aciciya
> uN kte s^ni tka itoptelyela wociciyakin kte lo.  Letuya wauN tka
> taku s^ica
> wauN s^ni yelo.  Lila taNyaN wauN welo.  Iho hecetu welo.

The translation then would be:

“My father, I am sending (‘giving’) you a letter today. I am not going to
tell you(pl.) much, but I will speak to you shortly. Here where I am I have
no troubles. I am doing very well. That is all (‘That is the way it is’).

Indeed, the switching between singular and plural in the three verbs of the
first sentence is weird (wowapi chic’u; echiciyapi; wochiciyakin kte). So
alternatively “un” is some sort of a stumbled word or part of a word,
perhaps “echiciya waun kte shni”.  Such cases are not uncommon in Lakota
manuscripts either.


> I wish I could send it as a photocopy.

With brief texts like this the option is to scan the page and send it as an
attachment in JPEG format.
Reading the actual handwriting sometimes allows multiple interpretations.


Jan




Jan Ullrich
American Indian Studies Research Institute
Indiana University, Bloomington
www.inext.cz/siouan