PREFACE 



The following grammar is the result of the joint work of the authors. While the under- 

 signed is alone responsible for the presentation and arrangement of the material, the detailed 

 information was given by Miss Deloria, a graduate of Teachers College, New York City, whose 

 family name is des Lauriers. Her parents were Yankton but she has grown up among the Teton 

 of Standing Rock. It is due to her quick grasp of the importance of minute details and her 

 perfect control of idiomatic usage and of an extensive vocabulary that the many apparent 

 irregularities, the significance of the minute accentual peculiarities, and the emotional tone 

 connected with particles could be at least partly presented, although many details may have 

 escaped us. Where there was any doubt in regard to special points, Miss Deloria corroborated 

 them by questioning other Tetons. 



There are slight dialectic differences in Teton. Particularly the south-western Ogalala of 

 Pine Ridge and Rosebud have some peculiarities of their own. Along the Missouri there is 

 Yankton influence upon vocabulary and syntax while the phonetics are pure Teton. 



In the text a number of abbreviations has been used. T stands for Teton, Y for Yankton, 

 S for San tee. References to Stephen Return Riggs, A Dakota-English Dictionary, Washington, 

 1890 (Vol. VII Contributions to North American Ethnology) are given as "Riggs"; those to 

 the same author's Dakota Grammar, Texts and Ethnography, edited by James Owen Dorsey, 

 Washington, 1893 (Vol. IX Contributions to North American Ethnology) as "Riggs, Grammar." 

 Most of the examples are taken from Ella Deloria, Dakota Texts, Publications of the American 

 Ethnological Society, Vol. XIV, New York, 1932. References like 105.10 refer to page 105, 

 line 10, of that publication, etc. No references have been made to "A Grammar of Lakota" 

 by Eugene Buechel, S. J., St. Francis Mission, South Dakota, which appeared while the present 

 grammar was being set up. The analysis of Dakota in Buechel's Grammar is based on the theory 

 that every syllable has a meaning. The arrangement is that of an English Grammar with Dakota 

 equivalents. Since much of the material is based on Bible translations and prayers, many un- 

 idiomatic forms occur. Still, it contains much valuable material in an improved orthography. 

 The distinctions between medials and aspirates have been made properly, except for c and c', 

 which are not regularly distinguished. Accents are not always reliable. 



Franz Boas. 



Columbia University, 

 April, 1939. 



vn 



