ATHAPASCAN 

 (HUPA) 



By Pliny Earlk Goddard 



§ 1. DISTRIBUTION OF THE ATHAPASCAN FAMILY 



The Athapascan stock is one of the largest and most widely dis- 

 tributed families of speech in North America. Geographicall}^ it 

 consists of three divisions, the northern, the Pacific coast, and the 

 southern. 



The northern division ^ occupies much of the northwestern portion 

 of the continent. East of the Rocky mountains the southern boundary 

 is the Churchill river at the southeast, and the watershed between 

 Athabasca and Peace rivers at the southwest. South of them are 

 peoples of the Algonquian stock. The Eskimo hold a narrow strip of 

 continuous coast-line along the Arctic ocean and Hudson l)ay to the 

 north and east. West of the Rocky mountains the Athapascan ter- 

 ritory begins at the fifty-first parallel of north latitude, and includes 

 all of the country except the coast and islands. Only near the 

 boundary of Alaska and British Columbia did they reach the coast. 

 In the extreme north the coast is in the possession of the Eskimo. 

 To the south the shore-lands are in the possession of the Haida, 

 Tlingit, Tsimshian, and Wakashan. Their southern neighbors are 

 members of the Salishan stock. 



iThe principal works which treat particularly of the Athapascans of the north are the following: 



Sir Alexander Mackenzie. Voyages from Montreal, on the River St. Laurence, through the Con- 

 tinent of North America, to the Frozen and Pacific Oceans: in the Years 1789 and 1793. 

 London, 1801. 



Sir John Richardson. Arctic Searching Expedition: a Journal of a Boat Voyage through Ruperts 

 Land to the Arctic Sea, in Search of the Discovery Ships under Command of Sir John 

 Franklin. London, 1851. 



J. C. E. BuscHMANN. Der Athapaskische Sprachstamm. KiJnigliche Akci'l. der M'iss. su Berlin, Abhand- 

 lungen aus dem Jahre 1855, 144-319. 



Le R. p. E. Petitot. Dictionaire de la langue D^n(5-Dindjie. Paris, 1876. 



Rev. Father A. G. Morice. The Western Dend, their Manners and Customs. Proceedings of the 

 Canadian Institute, 3d ser., vii, 109-174. Toronto, 1890. 



. The D6ne Languages. Transactions of the Canadian Institute, i, 170-212. Toronto, 1891. 



. The History of the Northern Interior of British Columbia. Toronto, 1904. 



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