A Chipewyan Ethnological Text

Abstract

0. Since the publication of the list of Chipewyan stems (Li 1933a) and the grammatical sketch (Li 1946), it has been my wish to prepare a volume of texts and a dictionary which will contain not only all the stems but also the various prefixes that go with the stems. It became increasingly clear to me that a thorough comparative study of the Athapaskan languages, phonologically and grammatically, cannot be achieved without taking into consideration the various processes which occur in the prefixes and the stems, and their mutual relationship. My preoccupation with the study of Sino-Tibetan languages unavoidably prevented me from preparing for publication either the texts or the dictionary. It is a great pleasure for me, on the occasion of honoring my friend Harry Hoijer, who has devoted many years to Athapaskan studies, to publish a short text which may help to illustrate the usage of the grammatical forms given in my sketch of Chipewyan. I retain the orthography used in my sketch. As the sketch is short and cannot treat all the forms, prefixes, postpositions, etc., even a short text such as the present one contains forms which need explanation beyond that already provided for. The text is divided into paragraphs (1.1.1, 1.2.1, 1.3.1, 1.4.1, 1.5.1, 1.6.1), somewhat arbitrarily for the sake of convenience. Each