This subseries of the Northeast/Southeast series contains John P. Harrington's Algonquian research. It consists primarily of material he collected; there is very little original data, most of which are undated. The topics covered are Cheyenne grammar, Fox linguistic notes, Menominee grammar, Miami-Peoria grammar, Mohegan-Pequot-Montauk vocabulary, Montagnais miscellaneous notes, Nanticoke-Conoy-Unalachtigo linguistic notes, Ojibwa linguistic notes, Potawatomi linguistic notes, and comparative and miscellaneous notes.
The Cheyenne material consist of two pages of grammatical excerpts from Rodolphe Petter's English-Cheyenne Dictionary (1915).
The Fox notes stem from conversations which Harrington had with Truman Michelson on the Fox syllabary and grammar. One note is dated September 24, 1924; others are undated. One page gives the etymology of the word Chicago and a Potawatomi equivalent. Phonetic material (former B.A.E. MS 6021 pt. and 6025pt.) is based on William Jones's "Algonquian (Fox)" (1911). A bibliography is included, mainly on Michelson's publications and manuscripts which he submitted to the B.A.E.
The Menominee files contain a phonetic key from Leonard Bloomfield's Menomini Texts (1928), a short report on a conversation with Michelson (former B.A.E. MS 6025pt. and 6030), and a brief description of Menominee tentshaking was excerpted from W. J. Hoffman's The Menomini Indians (1896).
Miami-Peoria vocabulary were copied from Albert Gatschet's B.A.E. manuscripts 3025 and 3026b. (Those entries marked 3026b are no longer listed as part of that B.A.E. manuscript.)
An 1890 copy of a 1798 Montauk vocabulary taken by John Lyon Gardiner was loaned to Harrington by Foster H. Saville. There are also a three-page typescript of this manuscript and several pages of a Mohegan-Pequot bibliography.
For Montagnais, there are three bibliographical notes. Two placenames came from J.N.B. Hewitt in November 1926.
Reading notes on Nanticoke, Conoy, and Unalachtigo were taken principally from Speck's The Nanticoke and Conoy Indians . .. (1927) and from Hodge's "Handbook" (1907). Some linguistic and ethnohistoric material is included and there is a brief bibliography.
Ojibwa forms the largest portion of this subseries. It includes notes from a joint interview conducted most likely in 1940 with C. F. Voegelin and his informant, Gregor McGregor, who was technically considered a speaker of Ottawa. There are also notes Harrington took of Voegelin's lecture at the University of Michigan on June 25, 1940 (former B.A.E. MS 6020pt.). There is a slight emphasis on placenames in an otherwise random vocabulary. From James Hammond Trumbull's Notes on Forty Algonkin Versions of the Lord's Prayer (1873), Harrington copied the Southern Chippeway version (pp. 74 -75) and penciled in a slightly different English translation. A final potpourri of undated notes includes a miscellaneous vocabulary from secondary sources and a few pages of grammatical material. The etymologies of several Ojibwa words are briefly developed. Frederic Baraga's A Dictionary of the Otchipwe Language is the most frequently cited source (former B.A.E. MS 6020pt. and 6025pt.).
The Potawatomi files contain material from Harrington's interview with Chief Simon Kahquados in Blackwell, Wisconsin (n.d.) with whom he recorded general ethnographic information, particularly regarding the loss of Potawatomi lands due to Indian Office policies and illegal acts of the Menominee. A brief vocabulary is included. Unrelated to this interview is a Potawatomi phoneme chart.
Comparative material includes reading notes regarding the earliest appearances of certain Algonquian phonetic sounds. Harrington consulted primarily the works of Sir Isaac Pitman, Jean Claude Mathevet (Nipissing, Abnaki), and Silas Tertius Rand (Micmac). Additional peripheral bibliographical information is identified in the notes. The only date recorded is March 26, 1951. There are other scattered reading notes with Menominee, Cree, Fox, and Ojibwa phonetic comparisons, based mainly on Leonard Bloomfield's Menomini Texts (1938) and Plains Cree Texts (1934). One page of Arapaho terms was copied from Kroeber.
In the category of general linguistic and ethnographic notes (former B.A.E. ms. 6025pt.), information results from various conversations with fellow linguists: Truman Michelson and J.N.B. Hewitt on September 24, 1924; Hewitt in November 1924 and November 1926; Michelson in October 1930; and Michelson and Frank G. Speck in May 1934. Under the heading "The Southern Delawares," Harrington arranged random information on the Virginia Indians, touching briefly on history and ethnography. He included some Abnaki, Cree, and Cherokee linguistic terms, as well as a general bibliography. Vocabulary material in this series (former B.A.E. MS 6025pt.) consists of terms from various Algonquian languages, most probably taken from unidentified printed sources. One note gives "The Chief from Mass[achusetts]" as an informant. One group of terms is compared with Natick words and with a vocabulary recorded by Roger Williams.
John Peabody Harrington papers, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution
The preferred citation for the Harrington Papers will reference the actual location within the collection, i.e. Box 172, Alaska/Northwest Coast, Papers of John Peabody Harrington, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.
However, as the NAA understands the need to cite phrases or vocabulary on specific pages, a citation referencing the microfilmed papers is acceptable. Please note that the page numbering of the PDF version of the Harrington microfilm does not directly correlate to the analog microfilm frame numbers. If it is necessary to cite the microfilmed papers, please refer to the specific page number of the PDF version, as in: Papers of John Peabody Harrington, Microfilm: MF 7, R34 page 42.
This subseries of the Northeast/Southeast series contains Harrington's Mahican/Stockbridge research. The materials consist of comparative vocabulary, comparative grammar, comparative linguistic notes, and writings.
The vocabulary is arranged according to numerous semantic categories designated by Harrington. The basic source is Truman Michelson's Stockbridge Manuscript 2734, information from which was reheard with Mahican speakers, and compared with secondary sources and with Abenaki material rewritten or removed from his own field notes. Harrington interfiled Menominee information secured later in Washington from Al Dodge. The "Persons" category is quite rich in biographical information. Webb Miller apparently identified for Harrington the subjects of some of his old photographs, although the prints were not found with the notes. There are two pages taken from an old family record listing the names Pye, Bennett, Moon, and Turkey, the dates ranging from 1845 to 1865. Harrington evidently began another (possibly later) semantic organization of the Michelson notes. Other secondary sources used as a basis for comparison are Brinton and Anthony (1888), James Trumbull's Natick Dictionary (1903), and Frederic Baraga's A Dictionary of the Otchipwe Language (1853).
A set of grammatical notes is also based on MS 2734 but it is not as well developed as the vocabulary material. Only a few notes deal with phonetics. There is more information on verbs and numerals than on any other morphological category.
The comparative linguistic notes are from Harrington's two 1949 interviews with Bernice Robinson Huntington and encompass vocabulary, grammar, ethnography, ethnohistory, and some miscellaneous information on Stockbridge persons, including something of her own background. One group is arranged alphabetically by main entry in Mahican, with Delaware, St. Francis Abenaki, Natick, Ojibwa, and Cree equivalences (if any) placed immediately following the related Mahican term. The unmarked main entries are apparently Huntington's original terms; those in ink marked Brinton and Anthony are from their 1888 dictionary; the pencil notes are St. Francis Abenaki obtained in the field and are identified by informant "codes" Am. (Alfred Miller), Den. (George Dennis); Watso (John Watso); (Oliver Obomsawin). The significance of the numbered divider pages was not documented. Another group designated "B2" probably refers to the fall rehearing with Bernice Huntington and is confined chiefly to St. Francis Abenaki and Menominee equivalences. Some new information from Huntington, especially changes in orthography, may have been interfiled. A third group contains Huntington's comments on Mathew S. Henry's Vocabulary. ... It represents an attempt to organize Henry's material according to a semantically arranged vocabulary and a brief grammar touching on phonetics and morphology. Harrington crossed out St. Francis Abnaki comparisons and, according to a field note, copied them for use elsewhere. He also incorporated some of Huntington's (B2) terms.
This subseries also contains a draft and notes relating to his unpublished manuscript, "Seven Mahican Texts Recorded by Truman Michelson". Harrington excerpted the texts verbatim from the Michelson MS 2734, including Michelson's interlinear Mahican translations and free English versions. The draft contains a short vocabulary culled from the texts which Harrington arranged semantically. He provided some Mahican historical background and explained certain orthographic changes made to update Michelson's spelling and to facilitate pronunciation. An eighth text in English only was given to Michelson by Sterling Peters. There is informative bibliographical material both in the body of the draft and in the separate section devoted to this category.
Biographical / Historical:
The first evidence of John P. Harrington's interest in studying the Mahican language surfaced in January 1930 correspondence. (At this time, he used the names Mahican and Mohegan interchangeably.) In September 1930 he tried to interest Bernard Hoffmann of Santa Barbara, California, to fund a Wisconsin field trip in a search for Stockbridge vocabulary, legends, songs, placenames, tribenames, history, etc. He hoped to find native speakers who could rehear terms from early manuscripts and publications.
Between 1930 and 1949, Harrington secured copies of or made reading notes from some of these manuscripts, most of which are clearly identified in the field notes. The most exhaustively reheard and reorganized body of material consists of terms and text copied from the Stockbridge linguistic notes and texts recorded by Truman Michelson in 1914 (B.A.E. MS 2734). Harrington's notes and correspondence reveal a diligent search for those informants of Michelson who might still be living in the Stockbridge, Wisconsin, area in the hope that they would be willing to work with him.
In 1949, Harrington arrived at the Stockbridge Reservation on April 16 and remained there until April 23. Mr. Arvid E. Miller drove him around the area and introduced him to numerous other Millers, most of whom supplied linguistic and ethnohistoric information. His first introduction to Bernice Metoxen Robinson Huntington (sometimes erroneously spelled Robertson) took place at this time. In 1914, at the age of about thirty-seven, she had been one of Michelson's informants. She had also worked with Frank T. Siebert,Jr., in 1935 and 1936. She was a black adopted by the Mahicans with whom she lived from earliest childhood; she learned Menominee in school. Harrington's first meeting with her was unsuccessful, the second more cordial and fruitful, and about the last week of October 1949, on a subsequent trip to Wisconsin, he was able to hear and rehear with her a substantial amount of Mahican linguistics. He found another excellent informant in Webb Miller. Most of the notes are of a comparative nature, particularly comparisons with the two Abenaki dialects and with Delaware. This fell into place rather easily as Harrington was in various cities of Maine, in Quebec, and in Albany, N.Y., between April 24 and October 24 taking notes from St. Francis and Penobscot Abenaki speakers. He extracted Delaware terms from Daniel G. Brinton and Albert S. Anthony's A Lenape-English Dictionary (1888), and from the unpublished manuscript of Mathew S. Henry, Vocabulary of Words in Various Indian Dialects of the United States (ca. 1861). In November and December while traveling between New York and Washington for other reasons, he carried most of these notes with him and began the work of sorting and rearranging, which continued on and off in Washington at least until 1952. Other equivalent terms are in Menominee and were supplied by interviews in Washington with Al Dodge, an employee of the Interior Department. Ojibwa and Pequot terms are mainly from secondary sources.
John Peabody Harrington papers, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution
The preferred citation for the Harrington Papers will reference the actual location within the collection, i.e. Box 172, Alaska/Northwest Coast, Papers of John Peabody Harrington, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.
However, as the NAA understands the need to cite phrases or vocabulary on specific pages, a citation referencing the microfilmed papers is acceptable. Please note that the page numbering of the PDF version of the Harrington microfilm does not directly correlate to the analog microfilm frame numbers. If it is necessary to cite the microfilmed papers, please refer to the specific page number of the PDF version, as in: Papers of John Peabody Harrington, Microfilm: MF 7, R34 page 42.
The collection consists of plates from Portraits of Distinguished Indians from Several Tribes Who Visited Washington in 1837. Baltimore: Edward Weber & Co., 1842. The complete work was issued in a large folio containing 5 lithographs depicting a total of 48 figures. The collection contains one complete set of all 5 plates (Plate V is in two parts) and duplicates of Plates I, III, and IV. The collection does not have the title page for the volume. The complete set of plates has been laminated.
Please note that the contents of the collection and the language and terminology used reflect the context and culture of the time of its creation. As an historical document, its contents may be at odds with contemporary views and terminology and considered offensive today. The information within this collection does not reflect the views of the Smithsonian Institution or National Anthropological Archives, but is available in its original form to facilitate research.
Biographical Note:
Ferdinand Pettrich grew up in the city of Dresden, Germany, and apprenticed to his father Franz Johann Pettrich, a court sculptor for the king of Saxony. When he was twenty-one, he traveled to Rome to study with the internationally known Danish sculptor and teacher Albert B. Thorvaldsen. In 1835, Pettrich traveled to America with his wife and settled in Washington, where he modeled portrait busts of political figures and visiting Native Americans. In 1842 he was stabbed in his Washington studio and to recuperate moved to Brazil's warmer climate. He became the court sculptor for Emperor Dom Pedro II and carved monumental statues of the monarch and his court officials before returning to Europe. Pettrich settled in Rome where, after he presented his sculptures of Native Americans to the Museum of St. John Lateran, the Vatican honored him with a life-term papal pension.
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 4886
Variant Title:
Lithographs of American Indians
Related Materials:
The National Anthropological Archives holds Lantern slides of Ferdinand Pettrich sculptures related to Native Americans (Photo Lot 20).
The Smithsonian American Art Museum holds sculptures by Pettrich.
Restrictions:
The collection is open for research.
Access to the collection requires an appointment.
Rights:
Contact the repository for terms of use.
Genre/Form:
Works of art
Lithographs
Citation:
MS 4886 Plates from Portraits of Distinguished Indians from Several Tribes Who Visited Washington in 1837, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution
Mathews was a Nehantic who married a Mohegan. She was one of Gladys Tantaquidgeon's herbal medicine mentors. Subject of photograph identified by Melissa Zobel, Mohegan historian, March 2008. (Photo was previously identified as that of Fidelia Fielding.)
