A Dictionary of the Biloxi and Ofo Languages/Introduction

by James Owen Dorsey and John R. Swanton

A DICTIONARY OF THE BILOXI AND OFO LANGUAGES (Accompagnied with thirty-one Biloxi texts and numerous Biloxi phrases)

By James Owen Dorsey and John R. Swanton

INTRODUCTION

The Biloxi material contained in this bulletin, along with a vast amount of similar character, was left in an unfinished condition by the untimely death of the Rev. James Owen Dorsey, by whom the most of it was collected. The care and thoroughness of Mr. Dorsey’s work have rendered that of his scientific editor comparatively trifling. He had already incorporated into his Biloxi dictionary all of the separate words and phrases, and had added all of the words in the first twenty or thirty pages of text. The texts were already provided with interlinear and connected translations and notes. Had Mr. Dorsey’s plan for publication been carried out it would have been necessary merely to finish extracting words from the texts and to add a few corrections to the notes accompanying them. The present method of arranging dictionaries of Indian tribes, however, has rendered it necessary to bring together Mr. Dorsey’s cards under various stems, and to convert the English-Biloxi part into a directory for finding the stem under which any given word is listed. This rearrangement and the historical account of the Biloxi are nearly everything in this material to which the scientific editor can lay claim.

The following list of Biloxi phonetics is substantially the same as that given by Mr. Dorsey himself in his vice-presidential address on Biloxi before Section H of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, at Madison, Wisconsin, August, 1893. Since that time, however, the usage of students of Indian languages regarding the application of certain signs has changed, and in addition it has seemed advisable to make changes in some of the other signs.

a as in father.
ạ as in final (Dorsey’s ă).
â as aw in law.

ă as a in cat (Dorsey’s ä).
b occurs only once, in a proper name.
c as sh in she.
d rarely used (see t and ṭ).
dȼ as d followed by a barely audible dh sound approximating the Sanskrit ddh.
dj as j in judge.
e as in they; ē, the same lengthened.
ĕ as in get.
ê like the French ê orè.
f rarely used, and then owing probably to faulty hearing.
g as in go, seldom heard.
h as in he.
i as in machine; ī, the same lengthened.
ĭ as in it.
j as in French, or as English z in azure.
k as in kick.
x = kh, or ch as in German ach (Dorsey’s q,.
x̣ a sound heard at the end of certain syllables; barely audible and nearer h than x(kh)^[1]—Dorsey’s ɥ.
ḳ a medial sound, between g and k (Dorsey’s ʞ).
l occurs only in two modern names.
m as in me.
n as in no.
ñ before a k-mute, ng as in sing, singer, but not as ng in finger.
ⁿ a vanishing n, barely audible, as in the French bon, vin, etc., occurring after certain vowels.
o as in no; ō, the same lengthened.
p as in pen.
p̣ a medial sound, between b and p (Dorsey’s d).
r occurs in one proper name.
s as in so.
t as in to.
ṭ a medial t, between d and t (Dorsey’s ʇ).
tc as tch in catch.
tç as t followed by a slightly audible th (as in thin, the surd of dȼ).
u as in rule; ū, the same lengthened.
û as oo in foot (Dorsey’s ŭ).
ŭ as u in but (Dorsey’s û).
ụ a sound between o in no and u in rule.
ü like German ü and French u.
w as in we.
y as in you.

The characters ñ and ⁿ really indicate a difference in the quality of

the preceding vowel. They differ between themselves only by reason of differences in sounds following.

In the vice-presidential address before cited may be found also a short sketch of the grammar of this language, probably the only one in existence. In the material left by Mr. Dorsey was a number of cards containing short grammatic notes, but none of these were in condition suitable for publication except two, on which were set forth the Biloxi imperatives in tabulated form, as follows:

	Sit!	Stand!	Walk!	Run!	Recline!
To a child	xahaˊ	siⁿˊhiⁿˊ	ni	taⁿhiⁿˊ	ṭohoˊ
Male to male	xiheˊ-kañḳoˊ	siⁿˊx-kañḳoˊ	niˊ-ṭaktaˊ	taⁿhiⁿˊ-ṭaktaˊ	ṭohoˊ-ṭaktaˊ
Male to female	xihe-tki	siⁿ-tki	niˊ-tki	taⁿˊhiⁿˊ-tkiˊ	ṭohoˊ-tki
Female to male	xihe-ṭe	siⁿ-dakṭeˊ	niˊ-taṭeˊ	taⁿhiⁿˊ-tạṭeˊ	ṭohoˊ-ṭeˊ
Female to female	xihe-tki	siⁿ-tki	niˊ-tkiˊ	taⁿˊhiⁿˊ-tkiˊ	ṭohoˊ-tkiˊ

	Make it!	Carry it!		Make it!	Carry it!
Singular.			Plural.
To a child	oⁿniˊ	ki	To children	oⁿtuˊ	kiyuˊ
Male to male	oⁿ-tạtaˊ	ki-kañkoˊ	Male to males	oⁿ-tkañkoˊ	ki-tạkañkoˊ
Male to female	oⁿ-tkiˊ	ki-tkiˊ	Male to females	oⁿ-tutkiˊ	ki-tạtŭkiˊ
Female to male	oⁿ-ṭateˊ	ki-tạteˊ	Female to males	oⁿ-tạṭeˊ	ki-tạtŭteˊ
Female to female	oⁿ-tkiˊ	ki-tkiˊ	Female to females	oⁿ-tạtkiˊ	ki-tạtŭkiˊ

Following is a list of the abbreviations made use of in this bulletin:

m., man, male; w., woman; masc., masculine; fem., feminine; sp., speaking; s. or sing., singular; du., dual; p. or pl., plural; coll., collective; cl., classifier; voc., vocative; st., sitting; std., standing; recl., reclining; cv., curvilinear; mv., moving; an., animate; intj., interjection; cf., compare; D., Dakota dialect; Ȼ., Omaha and Ponca dialect (Do1sey’s Ȼegiha); K., Kansa dialect; Os., Osage dialect; Kw., Quapaw dialect; Tc., Tciwere dialect (i. e., Iowa, Oto, and Missouri); H., Hidetsa dialect; G. indicates that the form to which it is appended was obtained through Dr. A. S. Gatschet; Bk. is placed after a word or sentence obtained from Banks or Bankston Johnson, one of Doxsey's Biloxi informants; Bj. indicates a word or sentence from Betsey Joe, another of Dorsey‘s informants; M. is placed after words or expressions obtained from Maria, daughter of the preceding; J. 0. D., James Owen Dorsey; J. R. S., John R. Swanton; + after a vowel indicates that it is lengthened, but between words in parentheses it shows that a word immediately preceding is compounded of them. ± is placed before syllables sometimes added to and sometimes omitted from a word immediately preceding. A grave accent is sometimes employed by Dorsey instead of the acute accent, and in almost all cases it is over an oral particle and indicates a falling tone.

In the Biloxi-English section it has been impossible to reduce all forms under stems which are constant and always consistent, and in some cases it has been found necessary to enter words or portions of words as principal headings, though they are evidently compounds. The classification must be understood as representing an analysis carried a considerable distance toward completion but not actually completed. The final analysis can take place only when all of the Siouan dialects have been recorded, analyzed, and mutually compared, a work still far in the future. Where stems have several different classes of derivatives an attempt has been made to separate these by dashes, but, as in the analysis, consistency throughout has not been possible. Figures refer to the number of the myth and the line in the text. Biloxi words in parentheses without an English translation or explanation are inflections of the verb or noun next preceding, and are given in the following order: Second person singular, first person singular, third person plural, second person plural, first person plural. Dorsey has inverted the usual English order for the reason that in most Siouan dialects the form for the third person singular is identical with the stem and therefore makes a better starting point than the first person. An English explanation in quotation marks is to be understood as a literal translation of the preceding Indian word, and where two or more forms of the same Indian word are given in succession, some accompanied and some unaccompanied by figures, the figures are to be understood as applying only to the form immediately preceding.

The material on Ofo was collected by the writer in November and December, 1908, from the last survivor of that tribe. In general the phonetics appear to be like those in Biloxi, but it has been impossible to make the same fine discriminations. On the other hand, the fol- lowing additional signs are used: ô like o in stop; ä like ai in hair; ˈ denotes a pause. Probably the consonants followed by h, which is here very distinct, correspond to the aspirated consonants of other Siouan dialects. John R. Swanton.

1. Nevertheless, probably the palatal spirant and so to be classed with x—J.R.S.