Keywords

Snohomish, story, seal hunters

Abstract

Oral-based indigenous cultures have stories that persist over time, though some variation may exist in various details and in overall context. Related cultures in particular have similar stories, and assessing the similarities and differences across their tellings of these stories provides valuable historical and cultural background. In the case of endangered languages and cultures, every telling of every story provides important insight. This article presents a recently discovered archived account of a Snohomish version of “The Seal Hunters”, a captivating story that has many variant forms across Salish cultures. The story was written down in the nineteenth century by an intrepid French globetrotting explorer and anthropologist, Alphonse Pinart. This article begins with some background on Pinart, on the Snohomish language and culture, and on the manuscript itself. Then I give a transcription of the Pinart’s French account of the story and a translation into English, followed by a comparative analysis.

Original Publication Citation

Deryle Lonsdale (2015). A Snohomish telling of ‘The Seal Hunters’. In: Natalie Weber, ErinGuntly, Zoe Lam, and Sihwei Chen (Eds.) Papers for the Fiftieth International Conference onSalish and Neighbouring Languages (ICSNL-50), University of British Columbia Working Papers in Linguistics, Volume 40; pp. 363-372.