‘Lewis River language’ is Cowlitz Métis Chinuk Wawa
The Tenino dialect of Upper Chehalis Salish, spoken between old Fort Nisqually and the current Oakville, Washington Chehalis reservation, tells us something really interesting…
Image credit: Google Maps
In M. Dale Kinkade’s superb 1991 dictionary of Upper Chehalis, I notice this word:
< K·yano kᵘ[-]q’ > ‘Lewis River language and Chinook Jargon’
This formulation ‘Lewis River language’ would at first blush appear to mean one of the tribal languages of the traditional northern Cowlitz Salish territory / southern Taidnapam Sahaptin territory on that river.
But, the < K·yano kᵘ > there is a very old pronunciation of “Chinook”.
(The < q’ > is the suffix -(a)q(’) ‘voice, talking, language, word’.)
And with this word being equated with Chinook Jargon, it is more likely that this gloss should be taken as a reference to the early- and long-established creole CJ-speaking, and Red River-related, Cowlitz Métis community, occupying the lands between old Forts Vancouver and Nisqually.
It makes plenty of sense that Native Salish elders thought of Chinuk Wawa as a ‘Lewis River language’.
This was the early- and thoroughly-settled area just north of historic Fort Vancouver, where Métis families turned CW from a pidgin into a creole language around 1825.
Wow, Dave, as much as I have consulted that dictionary, I never noticed that one. There is also this from one of Jacobs’s early Sahaptin notebooks:
Jacobs field notebook 15, p. 146 (Taytnapam [= Upper Cowlitz Sahaptin] data from Sam Eyley, Morton, WA, 6/3/1927): “Sam suggests that between Kelso and Toledo live some Injuns [sic] who talk a smattering of jargon and Fr Canadian – This dialect adaptation might be very interesting to study, I think.”
And I sure wish Jacobs had followed through on that, but no evidence that he ever did. Joe Peter’s lineage goes back to this area, and of course we have a huge drove of his Jargon, but if only there were other samples of the Jargon used in that region to compare (Joe Peter’s variety is kind of idiosyncratic by comparison with the Grand Ronde variety to the south, and we would like to know if that was due to dialectal vs ideolectal influence).
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hayu masi henli! It’s fascinating finding the indications that people surrounding the Cowlitz Métis recognized them as quite a distinct group, and identified them with Chinuk Wawa.
Dave R
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