THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FOX INDIAN WOMAN. 
By Truman Micuetson. 
INTRODUCTION. 
The autobiography of a Fox Indian woman (whose name is with- 
held by agreement), written in the current syllabary, was obtained 
through Harry Lincoln in the summer of 1918. It was restored 
according to the phonetics of Dalottiwa, Harry Lincoln’s wife, in 
the summer of 1920; a few odd sentences are restored according to 
the phonetics of Harry Lincoln. No attempt was made to influence 
the informant in any way; so that the contents are the things which 
seemed of importance to herself. It may be noted that at times 
the original autobiography was too naive and frank for European 
aste; and so a few sentences have been deleted. 
As Dalottiwa read very well and for the most part avoided spelling- 
pronunciations (of which I have spoken on another occasion), the 
Indian text was dictated but a single time. A few patent errors 
detected by grammatical analysis have been corrected. 
I have previously spoken of the occurrence of homographs in Fox 
texts written in the current syllabary. An example occurring in the 
present memoir is anakanani. This may equally well represent 
anaganan™® “plates” or Ana’ kanan™ “mattings.”’ Dalottiwa and 
Harry Lincoln correctly took the homograph as ana’ kanan". The 
fact that in Fox wedding ceremonies mattings, but not dishes, are 
given shows that the homograph stands for ana’ kanan™’. 
The English translation is based on a paraphrase written by Horace 
Poweshiek, supplemented and corrected by a grammatical analysis 
of the text by myself. This task was materially lightened by some 
linguistic notes, based on the text, obtaimed from Harry Lincoln. 
The translation has been made as literal as possible without violence 
to English idiomatic usage. The list of verbal stems occurring in 
the text (p. 616) is nearly exhaustive; and some grammatical notes are 
given. Hence the student interested primarily in Indian linguistics 
will have no difficulty in working out the text. The ethnological 
notes are intended to make this paper also serviceable to students 
of American ethnology. It may be added that though autobiogra- 
phies of Indian men have previously been published, this autobiog- 
raphy of an Indian woman is nearly unique. ! 
See also Sarah Winnemucca Hopkins, Life Among the Paiutes, Boston, 1883. 
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