

PREFACE. 



Tlie series of bibliograpbies of wliicli this forms the sixth number 

 was started in 1887 with tlie Eskimauan as the first issue. They are 

 all based ui)Ou the "Proot Sheets of a Bibliography of the Xorth Amer- 

 ican Languages," by the same author, printed in 1885, in an edition of 

 110 ('oi)ies. Titles and collations of these works will be found on a 

 j)revious page. 



The next in order of i)ublication are to be the Chinookan (including 

 the Chinook Jargon), the Salishan. and the Wakashan, all of which are 

 well under way. 



Tlie name adopted by the Bureau of Ethnology for this family of 

 languages (Athapascan) is that used by Gallatin in the American An- 

 tiquarian Society's Transactions, vol. ii, 18:3<>. It has been objected to 

 by a number of missionaries — students of various dialects of this family 

 in the iSTorthwest — but priority demanded that Gallatin's name should 

 be retained. It is derived from the lake of the same name, which, ac- 

 cording to Father Lacond)e, signifies "place of hay and reeds." 



The following account of the distribution of the Athapascan people 

 is taken from Powell's "Indian Linguistic Families," in the Seventh 

 Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology: 



The bomidaries of tlie Atbapascnn family, as now nnderstood, are best given under 

 three primary groups: Nortbern, Pacific, and Southern. 



yorthern group. — This includes all the Athapascan tribes of British North America 

 and Alaska. In the former region the Athapascans occupy most of the western 

 interior, being bounded on the north by the Arctic Eskimo, who inhabit a narrow 

 strip of coast; on the east by the Eskimo of Hudson's Bay as far south as Churchill 

 Eiver, south of wbich river tbe country is occupied by Algonijuian tribes. On the 

 south the Athapascan tribes extended to the main ridge between tbe Athapasca and 

 Snskatchewan rivers, where they in«'t Algonquian tribes; west of this area they 

 were bounded on the south by Salishan tribes, the limits of whose territory on Era- 

 ser Eiver and its tributaries appear im Tohnie and Dawson's map of 18S4. On the 

 west, in British Columbia, the Athapascan tribes nowhere reach the coast, being cut 

 olf by the Wakashan, .Salishan, and Chimmesyan families. 



The interior of Alaska is chiefly occupied by tribes of this family. Eskimo tribes 

 have encroached somewhat upon the interior along the Yukon, Kuskokwim, Kowak, 

 and Noatak rivers, reaching on the Yukon to somewhat below Shageluk Island and 

 on the Kuskokwim nearly or quite to Kolmakoflf Redoubt. Upon tbe two latter 

 they reach quite to their heads. A few Kutchin tribes are (or have ))een) north of 

 the Porcupine and Yukon rivers, but until recently it has not been known that they 

 extended north beyond the Yukon and Romanzotf mountains. Explorations of 



