Another version of the “Seattle Illahee” song!
Thanks to indefatigable anthropologist Jay Powell, a famous Pacific Northwest folk song that uses Chinook Jargon shows up in another version…
…Which is what folk songs do!
Roll boys roll, let’s travel,
To the place they call Seattle,
Seattle Ilahee.
There’ll be hiyu tenas klootchman by the way ,
There’ll be hiyu tenas moosum
’til the daylight fades away!
— from page 140 of “Chinook Jargon Vocabulary and the Lexicographers” by J. V. Powell, International Journal of American Linguistics 56(1): 134-151, Jan., 1990
It’s really interesting to compare the known versions of the “Seattle Illahee” song. Click this link to see the ones I’ve collected on this website.
Bonus fact:
There’s an excellent chance that someone reading this remembers — or someone they know remembers — some version of the “Seattle Illahee” song.
(Maybe some other Jargon song too.)
Care to share it here?
