The third class would, of course, be that in which the principal parts of speech are formed by a synthetical operation of the mind, and in which several ideas are frequently expressed by one word. Such are what are called the Oriental languages, with the Latin, Greek, Slavonic, and others of the same description. These I would call synthetic.
The French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese, with their various dialects, in which conquest has in a great degree intermingled the modes of speech of the second and third class, would together form a fourth, which I would call “mixed.”
In these various classes I have not found a place for the Indian languages, which richly deserve to form one by themselves. They are “synthetic” in their forms, but to such a degree as is not equalled by any of the idioms which I have so denominated, and which are only such in comparison with others where analytic forms prevail. That they deserve to make a class by themselves cannot be doubted. They are the very opposite of the Chinese, of all languages the poorest in words, as well as in grammatical forms, while these are the richest in both. In fact, a great variety of forms, necessarily implies a great multiplicity of words; I mean, complex forms, like those of the Indians; compound words in which many ideas are included together, and are made to strike the mind in various ways by the simple addition or subtraction of a letter or syllable. In the Chinese much is understood or guessed at, little is expressed; in the Indian, on the contrary, the mind is awakened to each idea meant to be conveyed, by some one or other of the component parts of the word spoken. These two languages, therefore, as far as relates to their organisation, stand in direct opposition to each other; they are the top and bottom of the idiomatic scale, and as I have given to the Chinese, and its kindred dialects, the name of asyntactic, the opposite name, syntactic, appears to me that which is best suited to the languages of the American Indians. I find that instead of asking you questions, as I ought to do, I am wandering again in the field of metaphysical disquisitions. I shall try to be more careful in my next letter.
I am, &c.
LETTER XVII.
TO THE SAME.
Philadelphia, 3d August, 1816.
Dear Sir.—I now return to my proper station of a scholar asking questions of his master. In your letter of the 24th ult., you have fully satisfied me that the Indians have a great number of words derived from “roots,” much in the same manner as in the languages of Europe, but you have said at the same time “that the manner in which the Indians in general form their words, is different from that of the Europeans.” I am very anxious to have this manner[287] explained, and I shall be very much obliged to you for all the information that you can give me on the subject.
I have told you already that I thought I had reason to believe that all the American languages were formed on the same general plan. If I am correct in my supposition, I think I have found in the language of Greenland, the identical manner of compounding words which I am now calling upon you to explain. You will tell me whether I have judged right, and you will at once destroy or confirm my favourite hypothesis. According to the venerable Egede, words are formed in the Greenland language by taking and joining together a part of each of the radical words, the ideas of which are to be combined together in one compound locution. One or more syllables of each simple word are generally chosen for that purpose and combined together, often leaving out the harsh consonants for the sake of euphony. Thus from “agglekpok,” he writes, “pekipok,” he mends or does better, and “pinniarpok,” he endeavours, is formed the compound word “agglekiniaret,” which means, “endeavour to write better.” The first syllable “agl,” is taken from “aglekpok,” the second “ek” from the same word, and also from the first syllable of “pekipok,” leaving out the p to avoid harshness, and the third “inniar” from “Pinniarpok,” also leaving out the initial consonant for the same reason. It seems to me that I find something like it in the Delaware language. According to Zeisberger, wetoochwink signifies “father.” Now taking the second syllable ooch, and placing n before it, you have “nooch,” my father. To be sure, it is not the first syllable that is borrowed, as in the above example from the Greenlandish, but the principle appears, nevertheless, to be the same in both languages.
On the subject of this word “father” I observe a strange contradiction between two eminent writers on Indian languages, evidently derived from the stock of the Lenni Lenape or Delaware. One of them, Roger Williams, in his Key to the Language of the New England Indians, says “osh” (meaning probably och or ooch, as the English cannot pronounce the guttural ch) father; “nosh” my father; “kosh” thy father, &c. On the other hand, the Rev. Jonathan Edwards, in his observations on the language of the Muhhekanew (Mohican) Indians, speaks as follows: “A considerable part of the appellations is never used without a pronoun affixed. The Mohegans say, my father, ‘nogh’ (again noch or nooch) thy father ‘kogh,’ &c., but they cannot say absolutely 'father.’ There is no such word in their language. If you were to say ‘ogh,’ you would make a Mohegan both stare and smile.” (page 13.)
Which of these two professors is right? It seems that either Rogers invented the word osh for “father,” from analogy, or that Edwards is not correct when he says that ogh or ooch singly, mean nothing in the Indian language. Is he not mistaken when he says that there is no word whatever answering to “father,” or “the father,” in an abstract sense; and if an Indian would stare and smile when a white man says ooch, would he smile in the same manner if he said wetoochwink? Is it possible to suppose that this respectable author had only a partial knowledge of the language on which he wrote, and that he was not acquainted with the radical word from which nooch and kooch had been formed? Or is there no such radical word, and has Zeisberger himself committed a mistake?