THE MORPHOLOGY OF THE PASSAMAQUODDY 

 LANGUAGE OF MAINE. 



By J. DYNELEY PRINCE. 



(Read April 25, 1914.) 



The Passamaquoddy Indians of Maine, together with the Mali- 

 seets (Milicetes) or St. John's River Indians of New Brunswick 

 form a single linguistic group of the eastern Algonquin family known 

 as Wahanaki' people of the dawnland,' or ' East.' It is estimated 

 that there are about three hundred and fifty people in each clan. The 

 other members of the group are the Micmacs of Nova Scotia, the 

 Abenakis (a corruption of Wabanaki) or St. Francis Indians of Que- 

 bec, and the Penobscots of Oldtown, Maine, the two latter clans also 

 forming a linguistic group similar to that of the Passamaquoddies 

 and Maliseets.^ The name " Passamaquoddy " is a corruption of 

 pestwno'kat, 'one who catches pollack fish' {Gadus PoUachiiis) = 

 peska'tuni. This term has been applied to the tribe only in com- 

 paratively recent times. The headquarters of the Passamaquoddies 

 are at Pleasant Point, Maine (Sipayik), where the remnants of the 

 tribal organization still exist. Here, for example, dwelt Sopiel Sel- 

 mo, the keeper of the Wampum Record, a mnemonic system of wam- 



1 For the Wabanaki group, cf. my articles : " Notes on the Language of 

 the Eastern Algonquin Tribes," Amcr. Jour. PhiloL, IX., pp. 310-316; "The 

 Wampum Record," Proc. Amer. Philos. Soc, 1897, pp. 479-495; "Forgotten 

 Indian Place-names in the Adirondacks," Jour. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1900, pp. 

 123-128; " Some Passamaquoddy Witchcraft Tales," Proc. Amer. Philos. Soc., 

 XXXVIII. , pp. 181-189; "Notes on Passamaquoddy Literature," /:/«»a/j'A^. F. 

 Academy of Sciences, XIIL, pp. 381-386; "The Modern Dialect of the Cana- 

 dian Abenakis," Miscellanea Linguistica in Onore di Graziodio Ascoli, 1901, 

 pp. 343-362 ; Leland and Prince, " Kuloskap the Master," Funk and Wagnalls, 

 New York, 1902; "The Algonquin Noun," Proceedings of the Congress of 

 Orientalists, Rome, 1904 ; " Algonquin Religion," Hastings, Dictionary of Re- 

 ligions, s. V. " God " ; "A Micmac Manuscript," Proceedings of the Congress 

 of Americanists, Quebec, 1908; "A Passamaquoddy Aviator," Amcr. Anthro- 

 pologist, XL 



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