Language. Legemds, Amd Lore of the Carrier

SUBMITTED TO REV. H. POUPART. O.M.I., PH.D. in ii lusrgaccfc i n 11 gc—Majsmi ••• IIIIWHWII i ini DEAN OP THE FACULTY OF ARTS | LANGUAGE. LEGEMDS, AMD LORE OF THE , 1 : V CARRIER IKDIAHS ) By./ J-. B- . MUKRO\, M.S.A. Submitted as Thesis for the Ph.D. Degree, the University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada. UMI Number: DC53436 INFORMATION TO USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleed-through, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. UMI® UMI Microform DC53436 Copyright 2011 by ProQuest LLC All rights reserved. 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Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 TABLE OF CONTENTS Pages Foreword Chapter 1 A Difficult Language .... 1-16 Chapter 2 Pilakamulahuh--The Aboriginal Lecturer 17 - 32 Chapter 3 Lore of the Pacific Coast . 33-44 Chapter 4 Dene Tribes and Waterways ... 45-61 Chapter 5 Carriers or Navigators .... 62-71 Chapter 6 Invention of Dene Syllabics . 72-88 Chapter 7 Some Legends of Na'kaztli ... 89 - 108 Chapter 8 Lakes and Landmarks .... 109 - 117 Chapter 9 Nautley Village and Legend of Estas 118 - 128 Chapter 10 Ancient Babine Epitaph .... 129 - 139 Chapter 11 Gun-a-noot—A Babine Saga . 140 - 159 Chapter 12 Changed Place-Names .... 160 - 170 Chapter 13 Story with a Moral 171 - 182 Chapter 14 Communications in Aboriginal Surroundings ...... 183 - 197 Chapter 15 Aboriginal Conquests of •Kwah . 198 - 218 Chapter 16 The Smallpox Scourge .... 219 - 233 Chapter 17 Places and Pathfinders .... 234 - 250 Chapter 18 Peculiarity of Carrier Dialect . 251 - 261 Chapter 19 Lakes and Rivers 262 - 280 Chapter 20 Conversing in Carrier .... 281 - 292 - 2 Pages Bibliography 293 - 297 English—Carrier Vocabulary .... 298 - 319 Photographs and Map 320 - FOREWORD These observations regarding the aborigines of the Carrier tribe of the Dene race have been noted during twenty years of close association with members of the tribe. Two men have been responsible for providing most of the information included in these pages. One of these was the late Reverend A. G. Morice, O.M.I., who was always approachable and ever ready to assist any student who sincerely wished to improve his knowledge of the Carrier Indians. Through him knowledge of the language was obtained and his two-volume book entitled "The Carrier Language" reveals the intimate study he made during twenty years' residence among these aborigines. Father Morice died on July 21, 1938, at Winnipeg, Manitoba, before he was able to revisit the Carrier Indians who hoped to see their good friend again. A chance meeting with Chief Louie Billie Prince in 1926 gave an opportunity of acquiring further knowledge of the Indians of this tribe, particularly those belonging to the Na'kaztli*tenne sub-tribe. This man was long recognized as the Senior Counsellor of the Indians in the village of Fort St. James and unt:Ll recent years he served as Chief. He travelled widely in his younger days and his name may be found in the different pages of Test^es Nahwelnek as he moved - 2 - about within the Carrier territory. He visited Winnipeg when the Hudson's Bay Company celebrated the 250th Anniversary of their establishment, and he brought back to his native village much wisdom as a result of his trip. However, he regarded the native philosophy and the aboriginal sociological mode of life as being much superior to the white man's method of "living in a hurry-" He could not comprehend the electric lights. He wondered at their being wasted all night long in the cities while people walked aimlessly to and fro. The stores and office buildings were everywhere locked up but the windows were lighted brightly, while in the morning, with sunlight streaming down for as much as four or five hours daily before business commenced in June, the stores still remained unopen. To the Indian traveller this has remained a mystery that has not been logically explained. Through Father Morice and Chief Louie Billie Prince a kindly regard for the aborigines has been stimulated, and with their complete knowledge of the Indian language, they were both able to give the student of Indian lore an apprecia tion of the philosophy underlying many Indian traits and customs. The peculiarities of the aborigines are not at all strange to the natives but rather our manner of life is to them very mystifying. The game laws of the Province, which are frequently broken unintentionally, are beyond their under standing. They fail to realize that these laws are made and - 3 - enforced for the benefit of sportsmen who wish to shoot game and catch fish for sport rather than for use. They think that their old way3 of protecting game are much superior to ours. In the following pages an effort has been made to show that the Salishan tribes - the Okanagan, Thompson, Lillooet, and Cowichan - living to the south of the Dene country have left legends and landmarks that are of interest to their neighbours in the north. Similarly the Coast Indians - including the Nootkan, Kwakiutl, Bella Coola, Haida, Tsimshian, Tlinkit - have histories and customs entirely different from their Dene neighbours. The Carrier Indians, who are the subject of this discourse, were misnamed by their eastern neighbours on account of their custom of having the widows carry the bones which remained about the funeral pyre of a departed Chief. This name "Carrier" or "Porteur" was given them by the Sekanais tribe; however, their real name indicated that they were "navigators." Their seven sub-tribes were assigned to distinct regions of the Carrier territory and their hereditary hunting- grounds included the area as far south as Alexandria, about 52 30* north, and they occupied the country north to beyond the 55th parallel. The region extended east to about meridian 121° and west to 125° and 30'. - 4 - Their neighbours on the south-east were the Shuswap tribe of the Salishan race. On the south were their congeners the Chilcotins, whose dialect was very different and whose people were warlike and had, on occasion, been troublesome. To the south-west were the small tribe of Bella Coola Indians who had strayed off from the main body of the Salishan race at an early period. Immediately to their west were the Babine Indians, - a very similar tribe to the Carriers. They spoke a slightly different dialect and acquired a number of strange customs from their Kwakiutl and Tsimshian neigh bours. On the north and east were the Sekanais Indians, who, like the Beaver, Nahanais, and Kaska tribes belonged also to the great Dene race. In fact it is believed that the Sekanais Indians were simply a branch of the Beaver tribe. The "Beaver" were known as the "Tsa'tenne," while the Sekanais were properly known as the "Tse'khe'ne" or "the people who lived in the Rocky Mountains." Very little has been said about the Indian villages belonging to the Carrier tribe. Such villages as Thalhtan and Tsechah were important to them but belonged to their western neighbours from whom they secured many utensils and weapons through trading with the coastal tribes. Their vil lages, such as Thache, Pinche, Yekutche. Tsaoche, Nakaztli, Chinlac, Nautli, Leitli, and others to the south were largely residential villages and were in no way commercial centres, - 5 - prior to the arrival of the white explorers and traders who followed Alexander Mackenzie. These villages have largely ceased to exist. Some were totally wiped out during the smallpox epidemics of the '60's, others have been practically absorbed by the modern cities which have grown up on the sites favoured by the aborigines, as in the case of Prince George, which absorbed tfeitli village. Among the outstanding relics of aboriginal times the "Dagger of 'Kwah" is the sole representative of the early Russian influence. The owner of the first iron axe obtained from the Russians and brought to the Carrier tribe by way of one of the trading villages was Na'kwoel. His iron implement has long since disappeared. *Kwah owned the first iron dagger ever to appear among this tribe. It has been in the possession of 'Kwah and his descendants for two hundred years and is now in safe-keeping in the Parliament Buildings at Victoria. For many years Chief Louie Billie Prince, a great grandson of 'Kwah, was the guardian of this famous weapon, but he found some difficulty in retaining it due to the eagerness of souvenir hunters. He worried over its safe-keeping when absent from his cabin on hunting and trapping expeditions. The dagger was regarded as the emblem or symbol of Chieftainship in the Carrier tribe, and since Louie Billie Prince has given up the weapon he is not now regarded as the Chief but he remains the Senior Counsellor of Na'kaztli. - 6 - In recent years this fine old Indian has been visited by troubles and deaths on several occasions, and after his wife died in 1930, he wrote saying that he was "low in spirit and dejected" as a result of his bereave ment. Later on he suffered the loss of a son who was drowned in the Stuart River not far from his dwelling. He spent many anxious days seeking for the remains, and after finding them he comforted himself by making a wooden cross, which he later set up on the river-bank to mark the place where the son's body was found.

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