Language

The bases for definite knowledge of the Seri tongue are the five vocabularies described on other pages (13, 95, 97, 102, and 107).

The earliest of these vocabularies, comprising eleven terms, was collected in Hermosillo in 1850 by Señor Lavandera, presumably from the tribal outlaw Kolusio, and transmitted to Señor Ramirez for discussion. This pioneer vocabulary is superseded by those of later date.

The second Seri word-collection was made by Commissioner Bartlett at Hermosillo in 1852; it was obtained from Kolusio, and comprises some two hundred words.

The third vocabulary was obtained at Hermosillo during or about 1860, doubtless from Kolusio, by Señor Tenochio; it comprises about one hundred terms; it was discussed and published by Señor Pimentel, and served as a basis for the first scientific classification of the tribe and their collinguals.

The fourth Seri vocabulary was that obtained by M Pinart at Hermosillo in 1879, almost certainly from Kolusio; it comprises over six hundred words, with a few short phrases.

The latest word-collection is the Bureau (or McGee) vocabulary, obtained on the Seri frontier in 1894 through Mashém, subchief of the tribe; it comprises some three hundred vocables with a few short phrases, accompanied by explanatory notes.

The several collections are entirely independent: Lavandera’s record was made in Spanish, at the request of Ramirez; Bartlett was not aware of the earlier record, and wrote in English; Tenochio knew nothing of Bartlett’s work, was probably not aware of Lavandera’s, and wrote in Spanish; Pinart, though French in blood and mother-tongue, was fully conversant with Spanish, in which his record was made, and apparently knew nothing of the earlier vocabularies; while the Bureau recorder had not seen any of the earlier records and had shadowy knowledge of the existence of two of them only at the time of making his own.

Naturally the several vocabularies overlap to a considerable extent, and thus afford means of verification. Those of Bartlett, Tenochio, and Pinart, all obtained from the same informant, are notably consistent, despite the diversity in language on the part of the recorders; and their correspondence with the Bureau vocabulary is hardly less close (except for the comparative absence of terms for alien concepts in the latter record) than their agreement among each other. Accordingly, the linguistic collections, although far less full than would be desirable, are fairly satisfactory so far as vocables are concerned; but unhappily the few short phrases in the Pinart and Bureau collections are quite too meager to elucidate the grammatic structure of the language.

The aggregate number of vocables in the several records is some seven hundred. Of these over 97 per cent are apparently distinctive, presenting no resemblance whatever to any other known tongue. The remaining eighteen or twenty terms reveal resemblances to Aryan, Piman, Cochimi, or other alien languages; but of these the majority express Caucasian concepts, familiar enough to the outlaw informant, Kolusio, though generally unfamiliar to Mashém and to other actual inhabitants of Seriland.

A critical census brings out six vocables presenting phonetic correspondences with those of one or more Yuman dialects, viz., the terms for tongue, tooth, eye, head, blood, and wood or tree. Now, examination of these terms indicates that the first two probably, and the third and fourth possibly, are associative demonstratives rather of mechanical than of vocalic character—e. g., the terms for tooth and tongue are merely directive sounds accompanying the exhibition of the organs, so that while the terms may not be onomatopoetic in ordinary sense, they are instinctively mimetic or directive, in such wise as to indicate that they may well have arisen spontaneously and independently among different primitive peoples; also that they might easily pass from tribe to tribe as an adjunct of gesture-speech. The term for blood is still more decidedly mimetic of the sound of the vital fluid gashing from a severed artery, or of normal pulsation, so that it, too, must be classed as a term of spontaneous development. The Seri term for wood or tree has an apparent analogue, with somewhat different meaning, in the Cochimi alone; but since the knifeless Seri made practically no use of wood in their aboriginal condition, and since the early Jesuit records show that they sometimes transnavigated the gulf and came in contact with the wood-using Cochimi, it seems fair to assume that material and word were borrowed together. A similar suggestion arises in connection with the term for dog; although the Seri have lived from time immemorial in that initial stage of cotoleration with the coyote in which the adult animals are permitted to scavenger the rancherias, they were without domestic dogs until these animals were introduced into northwestern Mexico by the Spaniards, when they apparently absorbed the animal and its name at once from their eastern neighbors of the Piman stock—presumably the Opata, or possibly the Papago, with both of whom the Seri converts and spies were in frequent contact during the Jesuits’ régime at Opodepe, Populo, and Pitic.

In weighing the linguistic relations, it is to be remembered that the Seri are distinctive in practically every somatic and demotic character, that they are bitterly antipathetic to aliens, and that their race-sense is perhaps the strongest known. It is also to be remembered that they are zoosematic in esthetic, largely zoomimic in their primitive industries, putatively zoocratic in government, and overweeningly zootheistic in belief; that nearly all observers and recorders of their characteristics have been impressed by both the distinctiveness and the primitiveness of their speech; that this speech abounds in associative demonstratives and instinctive onomatopes to exceptional degree; that they class themselves as much more nearly akin to their bestial associates than to any alien tribe or people; and hence that their speech is necessarily zooglossic in considerable, if not unequaled, measure. It is to be remembered, too, that the law of activital coincidences finds fullest exemplification in lowest culture, as has been already shown, and as the zooglossic character of the Seri speech would imply; so that a considerable proportion of fortuitous resemblances might be anticipated. Finally, it is to be remembered that despite the extreme provinciality connected with their unparalleled race-sense, the folk have been in known contact with Caucasian and Amerind aliens for nearly four centuries, and have been steadily, albeit with exceeding slowness, absorbing alien activities and activital products.

In the light of the history and condition of the Seri, a summary of their vocabulary is of much interest. It is as follows:

Known vocables700±
Distinctive terms682±
Terms shared with other tongues18±
Terms connoting Caucasian concepts11±
Onomatopes and associative demonstratives5±
Term shared With the Cochimi1
Term borrowed from the Piman1
Total18±
Total700±

On weighing this tabulation, in which no allowance is made for coincidences, it becomes evident that the Seri tongue is essentially discrete. The tabulation, accordingly, justifies and establishes the classifications of Pimentel and Orozco y Berra, under which the Seri, with their collinguals, are erected into a distinct linguistic stock.

Pending further research and the completion of the linguistic collections, it is deemed inexpedient to publish the Seri vocabulary in full, though the material has been compared, analyzed, and arranged systematically as was practicable by Mr J. N. B. Hewitt; and his comparative tables and discussions, which comprise all the terms suggesting affinity with Yuman and other aboriginal languages, are appended. His morphologic analyses and comparisons are especially noteworthy in that they demonstrate that the Seri language is essentially different in structural relations—or in its genius—from the Yuman tongues of neighboring territory.

COMPARATIVE LEXICOLOGY
[By J. N. B. Hewitt]

Serian Material
A.Seri vocabulary, McGee, W J, entered in Powell’s Introduction to the Study of Indian Languages, second edition, in November, 1894.
B.Seri vocabulary, Bartlett, J. R., printed blank (180 terms), January 1, 1852.
C.Seri vocabulary, Pinart, A. L., MS. (16½ pp.), April, 1879.
D.Seri vocabulary, Tenochio, D. A., copied by Pimentel, Lenguas Indígenas de México, t. II, Mexico, 1875.
Yuman Material
I.Cochimi vocabulary, Gabb, W. M., printed blank (211 terms), April, 1867.
II.Cochimi vocabulary, Bartlett, J. R., printed blank (200 terms), English and Spanish, subsequent to June, 1852.
III.Cochimi terms in Clavijero, F. J., Historia de la Antigua ó Baja California, 1852.
IV.Cochimi vocabulary and texts in Buschmann, J. C. E., Die Spuren der Aztekischen Sprache, Berlin, 1859.
1.Avesupai vocabulary, Stevenson, Mrs T. E., MS., Oct., 1885.
2.Tonto vocabulary, White, J. B., and Loew, Oscar, MS., 1873-1875.
3.Cocopa vocabulary, Heintzelman, S. P., and Peabody, E. T., printed blank (180 terms).
4.Maricopa vocabulary, Bartlett, J. R., printed blank (180 terms).
5.Maricopa vocabulary, Ten Kate, Dr Herman, MS., May, 1888.
6.Mohave vocabulary, Loew, Oscar, printed in Report on United States Geological Surveys west of the One-Hundredth Meridian, Lieut. G. M. Wheeler in charge, vol. VII.
7.Mohave vocabulary, Mowry, Sylvester, and Gibbs, Geo., printed blank (180 terms), 1863.
8.Hummockhave vocabulary, Heintzelman, S. P., printed blank (180 terms).
9.Mohave vocabulary, Corbusier, W. H., entered in Powell’s Introduction, second edition, in 1885.
10.Hualapai vocabulary, Loew, Oscar, in Report on United States Geological Surveys west of the One-Hundredth Meridian, Lieut. G. M. Wheeler in charge, vol. VII.
11.Hualapai vocabulary, Renshawe, J. H., and Gilbert, G. K., entered in Powell’s Introduction, first edition, 2 copies, in 1878.
12.Kutchan vocabulary, Whipple, in Schoolcraft, Historical and Statistical Information Respecting the History, Condition, and Prospects of the Indians of the United States, pt. II, 118-121.
13.Kutchan vocabulary, Gabb, W. M., printed blank (211 terms), 1867.
14.Diegueño vocabulary, Loew, Oscar, in Report on United States Geological Surveys west of the One-Hundredth Meridian, Lieut. G. M. Wheeler in charge, vol. VII.
15.Diegueño vocabulary, Bartlett, J. R., printed blank (180 terms).
16.Diegueño vocabulary, Mowry, Sylvester, printed blank (180 terms), 1856.
17.H’taäm vocabulary, Gabb, W. M., printed blank (211 terms), 1867.
18.Yavapai vocabulary, Corbusier, W. H., entered in Powell’s Introduction, first edition, in 1873-1875.
19.Yavapai vocabulary, Gatschet, A. S., MS., 1883.
20.M’mat vocabulary, Helmsing, J. S., printed blank (211 terms), 1876.
21.Santa Catalina vocabulary, Henshaw, H. W., entered in Powell’s Introduction, second edition, in 1884.
22.Tulkepaya vocabulary, Ten Kate, Herman, in Gatschet, Der Yuma-Sprachstamm, Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, Band XVIII, 1886.
23.Kiliwee vocabulary, Gabb, W. M., printed blank (211 terms), 1867.
24.Diegueño vocabulary, Bartlett, J. R. (Los Angeles), printed blank (180 terms).
24a.Diegueño vocabulary, Henshaw, H. W., entered in Powell’s Introduction, second edition, in 1884.
25.Santa Isabella vocabulary, Henshaw, H. W., entered in Powell’s Introduction, second edition, in 1893.
26.Hawi Rancheria vocabulary,
27.Mesa Grande vocabulary,