Lenape people

Jennie Bobb and her daughter, Nellie Longhat (both Delaware), Oklahoma, 1915[1]
Total population
Estimated 16,000[2]
Regions with significant populations
United States ( Oklahoma) 11,1951 (2010) [3]  United States ( Wisconsin)  Canada ( Ontario)
Languages
English, Munsee, and Unami[2]
Religion
Christianity, Native American Church, traditional tribal religion
Related ethnic groups
Other Lenape and Algonquian peoples

The Lenape ( /ˈlɛnəpiː/ or /ləˈnɑːpi/) are Native American people in Canada and the United States. They are also called Delaware Indians.^[4] As a result of the American Revolutionary War and later Indian removals from the eastern United States, the main groups now live in Ontario (Canada), Oklahoma, and Wisconsin. In Canada, they are enrolled in the Munsee-Delaware Nation 1, the Moravian of the Thames First Nation, and the Delaware of Six Nations; in the United States, they are enrolled in three federally recognized tribes, that is, the Delaware Nation and the Delaware Tribe of Indians, both located in Oklahoma, and the Stockbridge-Munsee Community, located in Wisconsin.

At the time of European contact in the 16th and 17th centuries, the Lenape inhabited a region on the North Atlantic coast in what anthropologists call the Northeastern Woodlands. Although never politically unified, it is frequently referred to as Lenapehoking ("Lenape country"). It roughly comprised the area around and between the Delaware and lower Hudson rivers.^[5] Lenapehoking hosted over two dozen Lenape polities. Some of their names, such as Manhattan, Raritan, and Tappan, remain inscribed on the landscape. Based on the historical record of the mid-seventeenth century, it has been estimated that most Lenape polities consisted of several hundred people.^[6] It is conceivable that some had been considerably larger prior to contact. Even regions at a distance from European settlement, such as Iroquoia, had been devastated by smallpox by the 1640s.^[7]

Most modern Lenape are native English speakers. In the seventeenth century, the Lenape spoke several closely related languages or dialects, such as Unami and Munsee, that are collectively known as the Delaware languages and have been classified by linguists as belonging to the Eastern Algonquian language group. The term "Algonquian" is occasionally used as a shorthand for people who spoke languages of this group, but they had otherwise little in common. Due to aggressive European expansion and the resulting migrations, population losses, and political reorganization, Lenape languages had converged by the mid-eighteenth century. Unami and Munsee were now the most dominant.^[8] Another hundred years of forced migrations left the languages vulnerable.^[9] They hardly survived the U.S. Indian policies of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.^[10] Various people made efforts to revive or at least document Unami and Munsee in the late twentieth century.^[11]

Lenape society is organized into clans determined by matrilineal descent. That is, children belong to the mother's clan, where they gain their status and identity. The mother's eldest brother was more significant as a mentor to the boy children than was their father, who was of another clan. Hereditary leadership passed through the maternal line, and women elders could remove leaders of whom they disapproved. Traditionally, the Lenape had no concept of landed property. But clans had use rights. Agricultural land was managed by women and allotted according to the subsistence needs of their extended families. Matrilocal residence further enhanced the position of women in society. A young married couple would live with the woman's family, where her mother and sisters could also assist her with her growing family.

At the time of European contact, the Lenape practiced agriculture, mostly companion planting. The women cultivated many varieties of the "Three Sisters:" corn, beans and squash. The men also practiced hunting and the harvesting of seafood. They were primarily sedentary and moved to seasonal campsites for particular purposes such as fishing and hunting. After the arrival of settlers and traders to the seventeenth-century colonies of New Netherland and New Sweden, Lenapes provided agricultural products, mainly maize, in exchange for iron tools. Lenapes also arranged contacts between Minquas or Northern Iroquoians and the Dutch and Swedish West India companies to promote the fur trade. Lenapes were major producers of wampum or shell beads, which they traditionally used for ritual purposes and as ornaments. After the Dutch arrival, they began to exchange wampum for beaver furs provided by Iroquoian-speaking Susquehannocks and other Minquas. They then exchanged these furs for Dutch and, from the late 1630s, also Swedish imports. Relations between some Lenape and Minqua polities briefly turned sore in the late 1620s and early 1630s, but were relatively peaceful most of the time.^[12]

Most Lenapes were pushed out of their homeland by expanding European colonies during the next century. Lenape polities were weakened by newly introduced diseases, mainly smallpox, and European violence. Iroquoian polities occasionally contributed to the process. The surviving Lenapes reorganized their polities and moved west into the upper Ohio River basin. The American Revolutionary War and U.S. independence pushed them further west. In the 1860s, most Lenapes remaining in the eastern United States were sent to the Oklahoma Territory under Indian removal policy. In the 21st century, most Lenape now reside in the U.S. state of Oklahoma, with some communities living also in Kansas, Wisconsin, Ontario (Canada), and in their traditional homelands.

Name[link]

Lenni Lenape means "Human Beings" or the "Real People" in the Unami language.^[2] Their (autonym) is also spelled Lennape or Lenapi, meaning "the people." The term "Delaware" was used by the English, who named the people for their territory by the Delaware River. They named the river in honor of Lord De La Warr, the governor of the colony at Jamestown, Virginia.^[2] The English colonists used the exonym "Delaware" for almost all the Lenape people living along this river and its tributaries.

Society[link]

Map depicting Lenapehoking the historic homeland of the Lenape. In the north were the Munsee language group, the center the Unami and in the south the Unalichtigo, a subdivision of the Unami.^[13][14]

Susie Elkhair (d. 1926-age 77) of the Delaware Tribe of Indians (Lenape) based in Bartlesville, Oklahoma shown wearing traditional Lenape clothing.

The area of Lenape settlement, which they called Scheyichbi (see: Unami language), encompassed the lower Hudson River Valley and the Delaware Valley, with the area in between—what are now known as the U.S. state of New Jersey; eastern Pennsylvania around the Delaware and Lehigh valleys; the north shore of Delaware; and much of southeastern New York, particularly the lower Hudson Valley, Upper New York Bay, Staten Island and western Long Island. Bands or tribes often identified themselves by their geographic locations. The Lenape spoke two related languages in the Algonquian subfamily, collectively known as the Delaware languages: Munsee in the northern areas and Unami and a variation in the southern areas.^[5]

Early Indian "tribes" are better understood as language groups, rather than as "nations". At the time of first European contact, a Lenape individual would likely have identified primarily with his or her immediate family and clan, friends, and/or village unit; then with surrounding and familiar village units; next with more distant neighbors who spoke the same dialect; and ultimately, with all those in the surrounding area who spoke mutually comprehensible languages, including the Mahican. Among other Algonquian peoples on the East Coast, the Lenape were considered the "grandfathers" from whom all the other Algonquian peoples originated. Consequently, in inter-tribal councils, the Lenape were given respect as one would to elders.

Those of a different language stock – such as the Iroquois (or, in the Lenape language, the Minqua) – were regarded as foreign. As in the case of the Iroquois, the animosity of difference and competition spanned many generations, and different language tribes became traditional enemies. Ethnicity seems to have mattered little to the Lenape and many other "tribes". Archaeological excavations have found Lenape burials that included identifiably ethnic Iroquois remains interred along with those of Lenape. The two groups were bitter enemies since before recorded history, but intermarriage occurred. In addition, both tribes practiced adopting young captives from warfare into their tribes and assimilating them as full tribal members.

Overlaying these relationships was a phratry system, a division into clans. Clan membership was matrilineal; children inherited membership in a clan from their mother. On reaching adulthood, a Lenape traditionally married outside the clan, a practice known by ethnographers as, "exogamy". The practice effectively prevented inbreeding, even among individuals whose kinship was obscure or unknown.

Early Europeans who first wrote about Indians found matrilineal social organization to be unfamiliar and perplexing. Because of this, Europeans often tried to interpret Lenape society through more familiar European arrangements. As a result, the early records are full of clues about early Lenape society, but were usually written by observers who did not fully understand what they were seeing. For example, a man's maternal uncle (his mother's brother), and not his father, was usually considered to be his closest male ancestor, since his father belonged to a different clan. The maternal uncle played a more prominent role in the lives of his sister's children than did the father. Early European chroniclers did not understand this concept.

Land was assigned to a particular clan for hunting, fishing, and cultivation. Individual private ownership of land was unknown, as the land belonged to the clan collectively while they inhabited it, but women often had rights to traditional areas for cultivation.^[15] Clans lived in fixed settlements, using the surrounding areas for communal hunting and planting until the land was exhausted. In a common practice known as "agricultural shifting", the group then moved to found a new settlement within their territory.

The Lenape practiced large-scale agriculture to augment a mobile hunter-gatherer society in the region around the Delaware River, the lower Hudson River, and western Long Island Sound. The Lenape were largely a sedentary people who occupied campsites seasonally, which gave them relatively easy access to the small game that inhabited the region: fish, birds, shellfish and deer. They developed sophisticated techniques of hunting and managing their resources.

By the time of the arrival of Europeans, the Lenape were cultivating fields of vegetation through the slash and burn technique. This extended the productive life of planted fields.^{[16][17][18][19][20][21]} They also harvested vast quantities of fish and shellfish from the bays of the area,^[22] and, in southern New Jersey, harvested clams year-round.^[23] The success of these methods allowed the tribe to maintain a larger population than nomadic hunter-gatherers could support. Scholars have estimated that at the time of European settlement, there may have been about 15,000 Lenape total in approximately 80 settlement sites around much of the New York City area, alone.^[24] In 1524 Lenape in canoes met Giovanni da Verrazzano, the first European explorer to enter New York Harbor.

The early European settlers, especially the Dutch and Swedes, were surprised at the Lenape's skill in fashioning beautiful articles of clothing from natural materials.^{[citation needed]} In hot weather both men and women wore only loin cloth and skirt respectively, while they used beaver pelts or bear skins to serve as winter mantles. Additionally, both sexes might wear buckskin leggings and moccasins in cold weather.^[25] Deer hair, dyed a deep scarlet, was a favorite component of headdresses and breast ornaments for males.^[26] The Lenape also adorned themselves with various ornaments made of stone, shell, animal teeth, and claws. The women often wore headbands of dyed deer hair or wampum. They painted their skin skirts or decorated them with porcupine quills. These skirts were so elaborately appointed that, when seen from a distance, they reminded Dutch settlers of fine European lace.^[27] The winter cloaks of the women were striking, fashioned entirely from the iridescent body feathers of wild turkeys.^[28]

History[link]

European contact[link]

The first recorded contact with Europeans and people presumed to have been the Lenape was in 1524. The explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano was greeted by local Lenape who came by canoe, after his ship entered what is now called Lower New York Bay.

The early interaction between the Lenape and Dutch traders in the 17th century was primarily through the fur trade, specifically, the Lenape trapped and traded beaver pelts for European-made goods. According to Dutch settler Isaac de Rasieres, who observed the Lenape in 1628, the Lenape's primary crop was maize, which they planted in March. They quickly adopted European metal tools for this task.

In May, the Lenape planted kidney beans near the maize plants; the latter served as props for the climbing bean vines. They also planted squash, whose broad leaves cut down on weeds and conserved moisture in the soil. The women devoted their summers to field work and harvested the crops in August. Women cultivated varieties of maize, squash and beans, and did most of the field work, processing and cooking of food.

The men limited their agricultural labor to clearing the field and breaking the soil. They primarily hunted and fished during the rest of the year. Dutch settler David de Vries, who stayed in the area from 1634 to 1644, described a Lenape hunt in the valley of the Achinigeu-hach (or "Ackingsah-sack," the Hackensack River), in which one hundred or more men stood in a line many paces from each other, beating thigh bones on their palms to drive animals to the river, where they could be killed easily. Other methods of hunting included lassoing and drowning deer, as well as forming a circle around prey and setting the brush on fire.

17th century[link]

New Amsterdam was founded by the Dutch in what would later become New York City in 1624. Dutch settlers founded a colony at present-day Lewes, Delaware on June 3, 1631 and named it Zwaanendael (Swan Valley).^[29] The colony had a short life, as in 1632 a local band of Lenape killed the 32 Dutch settlers after a misunderstanding escalated over Lenape defacement of the insignia of the Dutch West India Company.^[30] In 1634, the Iroquoian-speaking Susquehannock went to war with the Lenape over access to trade with the Dutch at New Amsterdam. They defeated the Lenape, and some scholars believe that the Lenape may have become tributaries to the Susquehannock.^[31] After the warfare, the Lenape referred to the Susquehannock as "uncles." The Lenape were added to the Covenant Chain by the Iroquois in 1676, remaining tributary to the Five (later Six) Nations until 1753.

The Lenape's quick adoption of trade goods, and their need to trap furs to meet high European demand, resulted in their disastrous over-harvesting of the beaver population in the lower Hudson Valley. With the fur sources exhausted, the Dutch shifted their operations to present-day upstate New York. The Lenape who produced wampum in the vicinity of Manhattan Island temporarily forestalled the negative effects of this decline in trade.^[32] Lenape population fell sharply during this period, due to high fatalities from epidemics of infectious diseases carried by Europeans, such as measles and smallpox, to which they had no natural immunity.

The Lenape had a culture in which the clan and family controlled property. Europeans often tried to contract for land with the tribal chiefs, confusing their culture with that of neighboring tribes such as the Iroquois. The Lenape would petition for grievances on the basis that not all their families had been recognized in the transaction (not that they wanted to "share" the land).^[33] After the Dutch arrival in the 1620s, the Lenape were successful in restricting Dutch settlement until the 1660s to Pavonia in present-day Jersey City along the Hudson. The Dutch finally established a garrison at Bergen, which allowed settlement west of the Hudson within the province of New Netherland. This land was purchased from the Lenape after the fact.^[33]

Benjamin West's painting (in 1771) of William Penn's 1682 treaty with the Lenape

In the early 1680s, William Penn and Quaker colonists created the English colony of Pennsylvania beginning at the lower Delaware River. A peace treaty was negotiated between the newly arriving English and Lenape at what is now known as Penn Treaty Park. In the decades immediately following, some 20,000 new colonists arrived in the region, putting pressure on Lenape settlements and hunting grounds. Although Penn endeavored to live peaceably with the Lenape and to create a colony that would do the same, he also expected his authority and that of the colonial government to take precedence. His new colony effectively displaced the Lenape and forced others to adapt to new cultural demands. Penn gained a reputation for benevolence and tolerance, but his efforts resulted in more effective colonization of the ancestral Lenape homeland than previous ones.^[34]

18th century[link]

Lapowinsa, Chief of the Lenape, Lappawinsoe painted by Gustavus Hesselius in 1735.

William Penn died in 1718. His heirs, John Penn and Thomas Penn, and their agents were running the colony, and had abandoned many of the elder Penn's practices. They were used to an expensive life-style, but had no money. In their desperation, they contemplated ways to sell Lenape land to colonial settlers. The resulting scheme culminated in the so-called Walking Purchase. In the mid-1730s, colonial administrators produced a draft of a land deed dating to the 1680s. William Penn had approached several leaders of Lenape polities in the lower Delaware to discuss land sales further north. Since the land in question did not belong to their polities, the talks came to nothing. But colonial administrators had prepared the draft that resurfaced in the 1730s. The Penns and their supporters tried to present this draft as an actual deed. Unsurprisingly, Lenape leaders in the lower Delaware refused to accept it. What followed was a convoluted sequence of deception, fraud, and extortion orchestrated by the Pennsylvania government that is commonly known as the Walking Purchase. In the end, all Lenapes who still lived on the Delaware were driven off the remnants of their homeland under threats of violence. Some Lenape polities eventually retaliated by attacking Pennsylvania settlements. When they fought British colonial expansion to a standstill at the height of the Seven Years' War, the British government actually bothered to investigate the causes of Lenape resentment. But the outcome was predictable. The British asked a colonial official from New York, William Johnson, to take charge of the investigation. Johnson made himself a fortune by selling Iroquois land.^[35]

Beginning in the 18th century, the Moravian Church established missions among the Lenape.^[36] The Moravians required the Christian converts to share their pacifism, as well as to live in a structured and European-style mission village.^[37] Moravian pacifism and unwillingness to take loyalty oaths caused conflicts with British authorities, who were seeking aid against the French and their Native American allies during the French and Indian War (Seven Years War). The Moravians' insistence on Christian Lenapes' abandoning traditional warfare practices also alienated mission populations from other Lenape and Native American groups. The Moravians accompanied Lenape relocations to Ohio and Canada, continuing their missionary work. The Moravian Lenape who settled permanently in Ontario after the American Revolutionary War were sometimes referred to as "Christian Munsee", as they mostly spoke the Munsee branch of the Delaware language.

The Treaty of Easton, signed in 1758 between the Lenape and the Anglo-American colonists, required the Lenape to move westward, out of present-day New York and New Jersey and into Pennsylvania, then Ohio and beyond. Sporadically they continued to raid European-American settlers from far outside the area.

During the French and Indian War, the Lenape initially sided with the French. But, such leaders as Teedyuscung in the east and Tamaqua in the vicinity of modern Pittsburgh shifted to building alliances with the English. After the end of the war, however, Anglo-American settlers continued to kill Lenape, often to such an extent that the historian Amy Schutt writes the dead since the wars outnumbered those killed during the war.^[38]

In 1763 Bill Hickman, Lenape, warned English colonists in the Juniata River region of an impending attack. Many Lenape joined in Pontiac's War, and were numerous among those Native Americans who besieged Pittsburgh.^[39] In April 1763 Teedyuscung was killed when his home was burned. His son Captain Bull responded by attacking settlers from New England who had migrated to the Wyoming Valley of Pennsylvania. The settlers had been sponsored by the Susquehanna Company.^[40]

The Lenape were the first Indian tribe to enter into a treaty with the new United States government, with the Treaty of Fort Pitt signed in 1778 during the American Revolutionary War. By then living mostly in the Ohio Country, the Lenape supplied the Continental Army with warriors and scouts in exchange for food supplies and security.

Ohio: 1750s to 1812 (American Revolution and War of 1812)[link]

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After the signing of the Treaty of Easton in 1758, the Lenape were forced to move west out of their native lands into what is today known as Ohio.^[41]

During the American Revolution, the Munsee-speaking Lenape (then called Delaware) bands of the Ohio Country were deeply divided over which side, if any, to take in the conflict. Years earlier, many Lenape had migrated west to Ohio from their territory on the mid-Atlantic coast to try to escape colonial encroachment, as well as pressure from Iroquois tribes from the north. They resettled, with bands in numerous villages around their main village of Coshocton.^[42] By the time of the Revolutionary War, the Lenape found their villages lay between the western frontier strongholds of the war's opponents: the American colonists' military outpost at Fort Pitt (present-day Pittsburgh) and the British with Indian allies around Fort Detroit (in present-day Michigan).

Some Lenape decided to take up arms against the American colonials and moved to the west, closer to Detroit, where they settled on the Scioto and Sandusky rivers. Those Lenape sympathetic to the United States remained at Coshocton, and leaders signed the Treaty of Fort Pitt (1778) with the Americans. Through this, the Lenape hoped to establish the Ohio Country as a state inhabited exclusively by Native Americans, as part of the new United States. A third group of Lenape, many of them converted Christian Munsees, lived in several mission villages run by Moravians. (They spoke the Munsee branch of Delaware, an Algonquian language.)

White Eyes, the Lenape chief who had negotiated the treaty, died in 1778. Many Lenape at Coshocton eventually joined the war against the Americans. In response, Colonel Daniel Brodhead led an expedition out of Fort Pitt and on 19 April 1781 destroyed Coshocton. Surviving residents fled to the north. Colonel Brodhead convinced the militia to leave the Lenape at the Moravian mission villages unmolested, since they were unarmed non-combatants.

Brodhead's having to restrain the militia from attacking the Moravian villages was a reflection of the brutal nature of frontier warfare. Violence had escalated on both sides. Relations between regular Continental Army officers from the East (such as Brodhead) and western militia were frequently strained. The tensions were worsened by the American government's policy of recruiting some Indian tribes as allies in the war. Western militiamen, many of whom had lost friends and family in Indian raids against settlers' encroachment, blamed all Indians for the acts of some.

During the early 1770s, missionaries, including David Zeisberger and John Heckewelder, arrived in the Ohio Country near the Delaware villages. The Moravian Church sent these men to convert the natives to Christianity. The missionaries established several missions, including Gnadenhutten, Lichtenau, and Schoenbrunn. The missionaries asked that the natives forsake all of their traditional customs and ways of life. Many Delaware did adopt Christianity, but others refused to do so. The Delaware became a divided people during the 1770s, including in Killbuck's family. Killbuck resented his grandfather for allowing the Moravians to remain in the Ohio Country. The Moravians believed in pacifism, and Killbuck believed that every convert to the Moravians deprived the Delaware of a warrior to stop further white settlement of their land.

During the French and Indian War, Killbuck assisted the English against their French enemy. In 1761, Killbuck led an English supply train from Fort Pitt to Fort Sandusky. The British paid him one dollar per day. Later Killbuck became a leader in a very dangerous time for the Delaware. The American Revolution had just begun, and Killbuck found his people caught between the English in the West and the Americans in the East. At the war's beginning, Killbuck and many Delaware claimed to be neutral. In 1778, Killbuck permitted American soldiers to traverse Delaware territory so that the soldiers could attack Fort Detroit. In return, Killbuck requested that the Americans build a fort near the natives' major village of Coshocton to provide the Delaware with protection from English attacks. The Americans agreed and built Fort Laurens, which they garrisoned.

Other Indian groups, especially the Wyandot, the Mingo, the Munsee, the Shawnee, and the Wolf Clan of the Delaware, favored the British. They believed that by their proclamation of 1763, restricting Anglo-American settlement to east of the Appalachian Mountains, that the British would help them preserve a Native American territory. The British planned to attack Fort Laurens in early 1779 and demanded that the neutral Delawares formally side with the British. Killbuck warned the Americans of the planned attack. His actions helped save the fort, but the Americans abandoned it in August 1779. The Delaware had lost their protectors and, in theory, faced attacks from the British, their native allies, and the American settlers who flooded into the area in the late 1770s and early 1780s after the war. Most Delaware formally joined the British after the American withdrawal from Fort Laurens.

Facing pressure from the British, the Americans, and even his fellow natives, Killbuck hoped a policy of neutrality would save his people from destruction. It did not.

19th century[link]

The amateur anthropologist Silas Wood published a book claiming that there were several American Indian tribes that were distinct to Long Island, New York. He collectively called them the Metoac. Modern scientific scholarship has shown that two linguistic groups represented two Algonquian cultural identities on the island, not "13 individual tribes" as asserted by Wood. The bands to the west were Lenape. Those to the east were more related culturally to the Algonquian tribes of New England across Long Island Sound, such as the Pequot.^[43][44] Wood (and earlier settlers) often misinterpreted the Indian use of place names for identity as indicating their names for "tribes."

Over a period of 176 years, European settlers progressively crowded the Lenape out of the East Coast and Ohio, and pressed them to move further west. Most members of the Munsee-language branch of the Lenape left the United States after the British were defeated in the American Revolutionary War, and their descendants live on three Indian reserves in Western Ontario, Canada. They are descendants of those Lenape of Ohio Country who sided with the British during the Revolutionary War. The largest reserve is at Moraviantown, Ontario, where the Turtle Clan settled in 1792 following the war.

Indiana to Missouri[link]

By the Treaty of St. Mary’s, signed October 3, 1818 in St. Mary's Ohio, the Delaware ceded their lands in Indiana for lands west of the Mississippi and an annuity of $4,000. Over the next few years, the Delaware settled on the James River near its confluence with Wilson Creek, occupying eventually about 40,000 acres (160 km²) of the approximately 2,000,000 acres (8,100 km²) allotted to them.^[45] Anderson, Indiana is named after Chief William Anderson, whose father was Swedish. The Delaware Village in Indiana was called Anderson's Town while the Delaware Village in Missouri on the James River was often called Anderson’s Village. The tribes' cabins and cornfields were spread out along the James River and Wilson Creek.^[46]

Role in western history[link]

Many Delaware participated in exploration of the western United States, working as trappers with the mountain men, and as guides and hunters for wagon trains. They served as army guides and scouts in events such as the Second Seminole War, Frémont's expeditions, and the conquest of California during the Mexican-American War.^[47][48][49] Occasionally, they played surprising roles as Indian allies.^[50]

Sagundai accompanied one of Frémont's expeditions as one of his Delaware guides. From California, Fremont needed to communicate with Senator Benton. Sagundai volunteered to carry the message, through some 2,200 kilometres of hostile territory. He took many scalps in this adventure, including that of a Comanche with a particularly fine horse, who had outrun both Sagundai and the other Comanches. Sagundai was thrown when his horse stepped into a prairie-dog hole, avoided the Comanche's lance, shot him dead, and caught his horse by the trailing lariat to make good his own escape. Upon his arrival among his own people, the Delaware held the last war and scalp dances in their history. These were held "where Edwin Taylor now (in 1918) lives, on the hill", at Edwardsville, Kansas.^[51]

Kansas reservation[link]

By the terms of the "Treaty of the James Fork" made September 24, 1829 and ratified by the US Senate in 1830, the Delaware were granted lands west of the Missouri River in Indian Territory in exchange for lands on the James Fork on the White River in Missouri. These lands, in what is now Kansas, were west of the Missouri and north of the Kansas River. The main reserve consisted of about 1,000,000 acres (4,000 km²) with an additional "outlet" strip 10 miles (16 km) wide extending to the west.^[52][53][54] About 1,000 Delaware lived on the Delaware Reservation in Kansas, many in log cabins, but some in substantial farm houses with outbuildings.^[55] The center of activity was in what is now Muncie, Kansas, a neighborhood of Kansas City, Kansas north of Delaware Crossing on the Kansas River. The Delaware Indian agency, the blacksmith, and the Baptist and Methodist missions were located there.

White encroachment[link]

In 1854 Congress passed the Kansas–Nebraska Act, which created the Territory of Kansas and opened the area for white settlement. It also authorized negotiation with Indian tribes regarding removal. The Delaware were reluctant to negotiate for another relocation, but they feared serious trouble with white settlers, which developed.

As the Delaware were not considered citizens, they had no access to the courts, and no way to enforce their property rights. That was, theoretically, done by the United States Army after the Indian Agent had followed onerous procedures requiring both posting a public notice warning trespassers and serving written notice on them. Major B.F. Robinson, the Indian Agent appointed in 1855, did his best, but could not control the hundreds of white trespassers who stole stock, cut timber, and built houses and squatted on Delaware lands. By 1860 the Delaware had reached consensus to leave Kansas, which was in accord with the government's Indian removal policy.^[56]

Oklahoma[link]

The main body of Lenape arrived in the northeast region of Oklahoma in the 1860s.^{[citation needed]} Along the way many smaller groups left, or were told to stay where they were.^{[citation needed]} As a result of the multiple removals, each leaving some Delaware who chose to stay in place, today, from New Jersey to Wisconsin to southwest Oklahoma, there are groups who retain a sense of connection with ancestors who lived in the Delaware Valley in the 17th century and with cousins in the Lenape diaspora.

The two largest groups are the Delaware Nation (Anadarko, Oklahoma), and the Delaware Tribe of Indians (Bartlesville, Oklahoma), the only two federally recognized Lenape (Delaware) tribes in the United States.^[57] The Oklahoma branches were established in 1867. The Delaware were required to purchase land from the reservation of the Cherokee Nation; they made two payments totaling $438,000. A court dispute followed over whether the sale included rights for the Delaware as citizens within the Cherokee Nation.

While the dispute was unsettled, the Curtis Act of 1898 dissolved tribal governments and ordered the allotment of tribal lands to individual members of tribes. After the lands were allotted in 160 acre (650,000 m²) lots to tribal members in 1907, the government sold "surplus" land to non-Indians. The relatively arid land was not suitable for subsistence farming on such small plots.^{[citation needed]}

20th century[link]

In 1979, the United States Bureau of Indian Affairs revoked the tribal status of the Delaware living among Cherokee in Oklahoma. They began to count the Delaware as Cherokee. The Delaware had this decision overturned in 1996, when they were recognized by the federal government as a separate tribal nation.^{[citation needed]}

21st century[link]

The Cherokee Nation filed suit to overturn the independent federal recognition of the Delaware. The tribe lost federal recognition in a 2004 court ruling in favor of the Cherokee Nation, but regained it on 28 July 2009.^[58] After recognition, the tribe reorganized under the Oklahoma Indian Welfare Act. Members approved a constitution and bylaws in a May 26, 2009 vote. Jerry Douglas was elected as tribal chief.^[57]

In 2004, the Delaware Nation filed suit against Pennsylvania in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, seeking to reclaim 315 acres (1.27 km²) included in the 1737 Walking Purchase to build a casino. In the suit titled "The Deleware Nation v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania" the plaintiffs acting as the successor in interest and political continuation of the Lenni Lenape and of Lenape Chief “Moses” Tundy Tatamy, claimed aboriginal and fee title to the 315 acres of land located in Forks Township in Northampton County, near the town of Tatamy, Pennsylvania. After the Walking Purchase Chief Tatamy was granted legal permission for him and his family to remain on this parcel of land known as “Tatamy's Place. In addition to suing the state the tribe also sued the township, the county and elected officials, including Gov. Ed Rendell.

The court held that the justness of the extinguishment of aboriginal title is nonjusticiable, including in the case of fraud. Because the extinguishment occurred prior to the passage of the first Indian Nonintercourse Act in 1790, that Act did not avail the Delaware.

As a result the court granted the Commonwealth's motion to dismiss. In its conclusion the court stated: ... we find that the Delaware Nation's aboriginal rights to Tatamy's Place were extinguished in 1737 and that, later, fee title to the land was granted to Chief Tatamy-not to the tribe as a collectivity.^[59]

Contemporary tribes and organizations[link]

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Three Lenape tribes are federally recognized in the United States. They are as follows:

• Delaware Tribe of Indians, Bartlesville, Oklahoma
• Delaware Nation, Anadarko, Oklahoma
• Stockbridge-Munsee Community, Wisconsin.

In Ontario, Canada, there are three Lenape First Nations with four Indian reserves. They are:

• Munsee-Delaware Nation 1, Ontario, Canadian reserve.
• Moravian of the Thames First Nation, Canadian reserve.
• Delaware of Six Nations (at Six Nations of the Grand River), two Canadian reserves.

New Jersey has two state recognized tribes, who are in part Lenape: the Nanticoke Lenni-Lenape Indians of New Jersey and Ramapough Lenape Nation.^[60] Over a dozen unrecognized tribes claim Lenape descent. Unrecognized Lenape organizations in Colorado, Idaho, and Kansas have petitioned the US federal government for recognition.^[61]

Some Lenape or Delaware live in communities known as Urban Indians in their historic homeland in a number of states such as Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey and Virginia. They also live in the New England States; within the city of Tulsa, Oklahoma. New York City and Philadelphia are known to have some Lenape residents; and others live in diaspora across the country.^{[citation needed]}

Literature and popular culture[link]

The Delaware feature prominently in The Last of the Mohicans and the other Leatherstocking Tales of James Fenimore Cooper. The Boy Scouts of America honor society, Order of the Arrow was inspired by their interpretation of Lenape culture and language.^{[citation needed]}

The Walam Olum, which purported to be an account of the Delaware's migration to the lands around the Delaware River, emerged through the works of Constantine Samuel Rafinesque in the 19th century. For many decades, scholars believed it was genuine. In the 1980s and 1990s, newer textual analysis suggested it was a hoax.^[62][63]

In Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian, the group of American scalphunters are aided by an unspecified number of Delaware, who serve as scouts and guides through the western deserts. In The Light in the Forest, True Son is adopted by a band of Lenape.^{[citation needed]}

In Mark Raymond Harrington's 1938 novel, The Indians of New Jersey: Dickon among the Lenapes, a group of Lenape find a shipwrecked English boy. His gradual integration into the tribe provides a study of Lenape life, society, weaponry, and beliefs. The book includes a glossary for Lenape terms. Trouble's Daughter: The Story of Susanna Hutchinson, Indian Captive is a young adult novel of a fictional kidnapping by the Lenape Turtle Clan of a daughter of Anne Hutchinson, the religious reformer and founder of the Rhode Island colony. Moon of Two Dark Horses is a novel of the friendship between a white settler and a Lenape boy at the time of the Revolutionary War. Standing in the Light, The Captive Diary of Catherine Carey Logan, part of the Dear America series of fictional diaries, is a novel by Mary Pope Osborne. It tells the story of the capture of a teenage girl and her brother by a band of Lenape, and the youths' assimilation into Lenape culture.

Peter Lindestrom's Geographia America with an Account of the Delaware Indians is one of the few sympathetic contemporary accounts of Lenape life in the lower Delaware River valley during the 17th century.

Moravian missionary John Heckewelder published a sympathetic account of the Lenape in exile in the Ohio Valley. His account, published in 1818, provides some alternate Lenape tribal history disputing the tributary relationship with the Susquehannock. "Scouts of '76: a tale of the revolutionary war", a 1924 book by Charles E. Willis, contains an account of the contributions of the Lenni Lenape to the American Revolution when they lived in the area of Lake Wawayanda.

Notable Lenape people[link]

• Dan Barker, founder of the Freedom From Religion Foundation
• Black Beaver (1806–1880), Trapper, trader and scout; first inductee into the American Indian Hall of Fame.
• Buckongahelas, Wolf clan war leader
• Charles Journeycake, Chief of the Wolf Clan from 1855 and principal chief from 1861. Visited Washington, D.C. 24 times on his tribe's behalf.^[64]
• Killbuck (Gelelemend), Turtle clan leader^[65]
• Captain Jacobs, War Chief
• Oratam, sachem of the Hackensack
• Neolin, the Delaware Prophet
• Captain Pipe (Hopocan), (ca. 1725—ca. 1818), 18th Century chief and member of the Wolf Clan.
• Shingas, Turkey clan war leader
• Tamanend, leader who, according to tradition, negotiated treaty with William Penn, and who Tammany Hall was named for
• Tamaqua (King Bear), Turkey clan civil leader
• Teedyuscung, "King" of the eastern Delawares
• White Eyes (c. 1730–1778), Turtle clan civil leader and chief who negotiated the Treaty of Fort Pitt
• Chief Newcomer, founder the village of Gekelmukpechunk (Newcomerstown), Ohio in the 1760s

See also[link]

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Burrows, Edward G. and Wallace, Mike, Gotham: A History of New York City to 1989 Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999. ISBN 0-19-514049-4.
• Dreibelbis, Dana E., "The Use of Microstructural Growth Patterns of Mercenaria Mercenaria to Determine the Prehistoric Seasons of Harvest at Tuckerton Midden, Tuckerton, New Jersey," thesis, Princeton University, 1978.
• Jennings, Francis, The Ambiguous Iroquois Empire, 2000. ISBN 0-393-01719-2
• Kurlansky, Mark. The Big Oyster: History on the Half Shell. Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2007. ISBN 978-0-345-47639-5
• Mitchell, S. H. Internet Archive The Indian Chief, Journeycake. Philadelphia: American Baptist Publication Society, 1895.
• Pritzker, Barry M. A Native American Encyclopedia: History, Culture, and Peoples. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. ISBN 978-0-19-513877-1.
• Spady, James. "Colonialism and the Discursive Antecedents of Penn's Treaty with the Indians". Daniel K. Richter and William A. Pencak, eds. Friends and Enemies in Penn's Woods: Indians, Colonists, and the Racial Construction of Pennsylvania. University Park, PA: PSU Press, 2004: 18–40.
• Vansina, Jan. Oral Tradition as History. Oxford, James Currey (1985) ISBN 0-85255-007-3.
• Weslager, C.A. The Delaware Indians: A History. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1972. ISBN 0-8135-0702-2.

Further reading[link]

• Adams, Richard Calmit, The Delaware Indians, a brief history, Hope Farm Press (Saugerties, NY 1995) [originally published by Government Printing Office, (Washington, DC 1909)]
• Bierhorst, John. The White Deer and Other Stories Told by the Lenape. New York: W. Morrow, 1995. ISBN 0-688-12900-5
• Brown, James W. and Rita T. Kohn, eds. Long Journey Home ISBN 978-0-253-34968-2. Indiana University Press (2007).
• Grumet, Robert Steven (2009). The Munsee Indians: a history. Civilization of the American Indian. 262. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 978-0-8061-4062-9. OCLC 317361732. 
• Kraft, Herbert C., The Lenape: archaeology, history and ethnography, New Jersey Historical Society, (Newark, NJ 1986)
• Kraft, Herbert C. The Lenape-Delaware Indian Heritage: 10,000 B.C. to A.D. 2000. Stanhope, NJ: Lenape Books, 2001.
• O'Meara, John, Delaware-English / English-Delaware dictionary, University of Toronto Press (Toronto, 1996) ISBN 0-8020-0670-1.
• Otto, Paul, The Dutch-Munsee Encounter in America: The Struggle for Sovereignty in the Hudson Valley (New York: Berghahn Books, 2006). ISBN 1-57181-672-0
• Pritchard, Evan T., Native New Yorkers: The Legacy of the Algonquin People of New York. Council Oak Books: San Francisco, 2002, 2007. ISBN 1-57178-107-2.
• Richter, Conrad, The Light In The Forest, (New York, NY 1953).

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Lenape

• Delaware Nation, Anadarko, Oklahoma, official website
• Delaware Tribe of Indians, Bartlesville, Oklahoma, official website
• Lenape/English dictionary
• Lenni Lenape Historical Society
• Lenape (Southern Unami) Talking Dictionary

Unami language test of Wikipedia at Wikimedia Incubator

Unami
Spoken in	Eastern United States
Region	Around the lower Delaware and Hudson rivers in the United States; some Unami groups in Oklahoma
Extinct	(date unknown)
Language family	Algic Algonquian Eastern Algonquian Delaware Unami
Language codes
ISO 639-3	unm
Map showing the aboriginal boundaries of Delaware territories, with Munsee territory and Unami dialectal divisions indicated. The territory of the poorly-known Unalachtigo dialect of Unami is not clearly indicated, but is presumed to be approximately in the area of "Sankhikan" on the map.
This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters.

Unami is an extinct Algonquian language formerly spoken by Lenape people in what is now the lower Hudson Valley area and New York Harbor area, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware, but later in Ontario and Oklahoma. It is one of the two Delaware languages, the other being Munsee. Speakers have shifted to English.^[1]

Lenape is from /lənaːpːe/, a word in the Unami dialect whose most literal translation into English would be "common person".^[2][3] The Lenape names for the areas they inhabited were Scheyichbi (i.e., New Jersey), which means, "water's edge", and Lenapehoking, meaning "in the land of the Delaware Indians", although the latter is a term coined by the Unami speaker, Nora Thompson Dean, in 1984, to describe the ancient homeland of all Delaware Indians, both Unami and Munsee.^[4][5] The English named the river running through much of the traditional range of the Lenape after the first governor of the Jamestown Colony, Lord De La Warr, and consequently referred to the people who lived around the river as "Delaware Indians."

History[link]

Unami is an Eastern Algonquian language. The hypothetical common ancestor language from which the Eastern Algonquian languages descend is Proto-Eastern Algonquian (PEA). An intermediate group Delawarean that is a descendant of Proto-Eastern Algonquian consists of Mahican and Common Delaware, the latter being a further subgroup comprising Munsee Delaware and Unami Delaware.^[6] The justification for Delawarean as an intermediate subgroup rests upon the high degree of similarity between Mahican and the two Delaware languages, but relatively little detailed argumentation in support of Delawarean has been adduced.^[6][7][8]

Compared to Munsee, Unami has undergone extensive phonological innovation, coupled with morphological regularization.^[9]

The PEA vowel system consisted of four long vowels *i·, *o·, *e·, *a·, and two short vowels *a and ə. The vowel history is as follows: *i· (from PEA merger of Proto-Algonquian (PA *i· and *i to PEA *i·), *o· (from PEA merger of PA *o· and *o ), *e· (from Proto-Algonquian *e·), and *a· (from Proto-Algonquian *a·; the short vowels are*ə (from Proto-Algonquian *e), and *a (from Proto-Algonquian *a). This system was continued down to Common Delaware,^[10] but Munsee and Unami have innovated separately with respect to the vowel systems.

Revival attempts[link]

The dominant modern version of the Southern Unami dialect called 'Lenape' was spoken and is taught by the Delaware Tribe of Indians, headquartered in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. The same dialect was spoken by the Delaware Indians in the western part of Oklahoma, around Anadarko. Both Oklahoma Delaware tribes have recorded native speakers and produced written lessons for instruction, which are available for sale. These efforts, in conjunction with other community efforts comprise an attempt to preserve the language. Some descriptions of the Northern Unami dialect as spoken during the 18th century are given by Moravian missionary John Heckewelder.^[11]

The Order of the Arrow, an affiliate of the Boy Scouts of America, attempts to preserve some legends and language elements of the Lenape tribe. Numerous local lodges of the Order of the Arrow do not emulate the customs of the Lenape alone, but mingle the Lenape customs with those of dissimilar tribes (e.g., the Cherokee).

Phonology[link]

Consonants[link]

Unami has been analyzed as having contrastive geminate and non-geminate obstruent consonants, although this contrast is relatively weak.^[12] A full analysis of the status of the geminates, also known as long consonants, is not available, and more than one analysis of Delaware consonants has been proposed. The long consonants are described as having low functional yield, that is they differentiate relatively few pairs of words but do occur in contrasting environments.^[13] Some examples of contrastive geminate pairs include: ná k·ə́ntka·n "then you (sg.) danced" versus ná kə́ntka·n "then there was dancing"; ní p·ɔ́·m "his thigh" versus ní pɔ́·m "the ham"; and nsa·s·a·k·ənə́mən "I stuck it out repeatedly" versus nsa·sa·k·ənə́mən "I stuck it out slowly". There are also rules that lengthen consonants in certain environments.^[14] The length mark (ː) is used to indicate gemination of a preceding consonant or vowel length, although in the literature on Unami the raised dot (·) is often used for these purposes, as other diacritics may be used above vowels (see below).^[15]

In the following chart, the usual transcription used in the sources is given with the IPA in brackets.

Vowels[link]

Unami vowels are presented as organized into contrasting long-short pairs.^[16] One asymmetry is that high short /u/ is paired with long /oː/, and the pairing of long and short /ə/ is noteworthy. It is worth noting that /ə/ and /o/ are not distinguishable before /w/, /m/, and /kw/. Additionally, vowels are classified as strong and weak, which plays an important role in determining stress (see below). Long vowels and vowels before consonant clusters are automatically strong. Certain short vowels, which are differentiated with a breve - /ǐ, ě, ǒ/ - are also strong vowels because they are treated morphophonemically as long vowels, even though they are pronounced as short. In a sequence of syllables containing a short vowel followed by a consonant (C) or consonant and /w/ (Cw), the odd-numbered vowels are weak, and the even numbered vowels are strong. Furthermore, some short vowels are strong even in a weakening environment; these exceptions are often marked with a grave accent. Additionally, some vowels which are unaffected by predicted vowel syncope are marked with an acute accent.^[17] There is a predictable tendency, additionally, to nasalize and lengthen a vowel before /ns/ and /nš/, so that /lowé·nso/ ("his name is [such]") is realized closer to /luwé̹·su/ from underlying /ələwe·nsəw/.^[18]

Syllable structure[link]

Syllable structure is diverse, permitting a certain amount of consonant clustering. The following consonant clusters can occur:^[19]

• /m, n/ (which are realized as homorganic nasals) + /p, t, k, s, č, š/
• /h/ + /p, t, č, k, m, l/
• /s/ + /p, k/
• /x/ + /p, k/
• /š/ + /k/

Additionally, certain consonants may combine with the semivowel /w/. Note that some underlying forms may also contain /sw/ and /šw/, but these are always removed by morphophonemic processes.^[20]

• /p, m, k, h/ + /w/

Stress[link]

Stress is generally predictable in Unami. The rightmost nonfinal strong vowel is stressed, or a strong vowel in final position if it is the only one in the word. Often when stress would be expected to fall on the antepenult it is shifted to the penult. This change is found in three conjunct endings: /-ak/, /-at/, and /-an/. In the last case, the accent shifts to the penultimate /-an/ only if it would otherwise fall on an antepenultimate short vowel, and if the consonant between them is voiced.^[21]

Phonological processes[link]

Unami phonology is extremely complex, with various morphophonological rules, which is to say, a theoretical form will undergo a set of predictable phonological processes to produce the true form found in speech (there are some exceptions to these rules, however.) There are about 17 such rules common to both Munsee and Unami, and another 28 unique to Unami, though this analysis ignores predictable exceptions, such as the class of static words which may skip many of these rules. These rules govern things such as consonant lengthening/shortening, vowel syncopation, metathesis, vowel coloring, etc.^[22]

A list of processes unique to Unami follow.^[23] Note that these are written in linguistic notation. Thus, {ə,a} → ∅ / _{h, x}V when {ə,a} are weak means that the sounds /ə/ and /a/ become null (disappear) in the context of when they are weak and appear before either /h/ or /x/ and another vowel. The slash means "in the context of", and the underscore _ indicates where the /ə/ or /a/ must occur. In some notations the pound symbol (#) appears, indicating word boundaries (either the beginning or end). Regular parenthesis indicate optional conditions when framing phonemes or additional information about phonemes (e.g., "C=stop"). The capital letters C, V, and N mean "consonant", "vowel", and "nasal" respectively.

• U-1: Weak and strong vowel marking
• U-2: Weak short vowel loss before gutturals /h/ and /x/: /kənalhó·xwe/ ("you walk upstream") versus /nalahó·xwe·(w)/ ("he walks upstream")
  • {ə,a} when /ə,a/ are weak→ ∅ / _{h, x}V
• U-3: Vowel-coloring; underlying /ə/ may be color to /i/ /o/ or /a/ in various environments.
  • ə → o / _ {(k)w} -- although Goddard notes that this orthography may be imperfect because surface-phonemic /ə/ and /o/ are not distinct before /w/, /m/ and /kw/. Cf. /pko/ ("vegetable gum", underlying /pəkəw/) with /mpok·ó·yom/ ("my gum") but /mpək·ó·he/ ("I gather gum").
  • ə → i / _ {y}
  • ə → o / _ h{p, kw, m, w}
  • ə → i / _ h elsewhere
  • ə → o / _ {Np, Nkw} and // w_Nk
  • ə → i / _ Nk elsewhere
  • ə → o / _x{p, kw}
  • ə → a / _x elsewhere
• U-4: Vowel shortening before primary cluster of a nasal and another consonant
  • V̅ → V̌ / _ NC
• U-5: Semivowel assimilation
  • {w, y}h → hh / V̌_
• U-6: Stop lengthening
  • C^(vl≠h) → C· / V_(s, š, x) where V is strong
• U-7: /h/-metathesis
  • V̌hC → hV̌C except / VC_ where V is weak
• U-8: An adjustment in vowel length before /hC/ (i.e. an /h/ and another consonant)
  • V → V̌ / _hC (voiced C)
  • V → V̅ / _hC (voiceless C)
• U-9: /h/-loss before stop consonant
  • hC (C=stop) → C
• U-10: Nasal assimilation, part 1
  • NC (C=stop) → homorganic nasal + voiced stop
  • NC (C=continuant) → ⁿC / V_
• U-11: Vowel-weakening and syncope (with certain exceptions)
  • a → ah / CV (/a/ is weak; C=voiceless) except some a (a=weak) → ∅ / #n_CV (C=voiceless)
  • ə → ∅ / _CV (/ə/ is weak; C=voiceless) and / l_{n, l}, y_l, w_w, m_m and / #(n)_{n, l}V
• U-12: Nasal assimilation, part 2
  • nC (C=voiceless; C≠/x,h/) → homorganic nasal + C (C=voiced) / #_
  • VⁿC → Ṽ·C (most speakers)
• U-13: Voiced consonant assimilation
  • C(x)C(y) (C=voiced constituant) → CʸCʸ
• U-14: Vowel syncope before /xCV/, in which exceptions are marked with a grave accent
  • V̌ → ∅ / _{x, s, š}CV except / VC_ (where V=weak)
• U-15: /h/-loss in clusters
  • h → ∅ / _{CC, C#, Cah}
• U-16: Vowel shortening
  • V̅ → V̌ / _h(ə)CV and // _CC (C=voiced) and / _C·ah
• U-17: /mə/-loss
  • V́hməna· → V́hna·
• U-18: /ə/-insertion
  • ∅ → ə / h_{l, n, m} and / #{l, m}_C (C≠h)
• U-19: Metathesis of /w/. Does not affect the roots /wəl-/ 'well' and /wət-/ 'pull'.
  • w(ə)C¹(w) → Cw / #_V if C¹=/p, m, k, h/
  • w(ə)C → Cw / #_{ah, a, a·}
  • {/nəw/, /kəw/} → {nw, kw} / #_{ah, a, a·}
  • w{h, x} → {hw, xw} / C_
  • x → xw / o(·)_
  • (k)wx(k) → (k)x(k)w / #_
• U-20: /w/-coloring of /a/-vowels and /w/-loss
  • w{ah, a, a·} → {oh, ɔ, ɔ·} / {#,C,V}_ where C is not /w/ and V is not /o(·)/
  • w → ∅ / V¹_V² where V¹ is not /o(·)/ and V² is not /ə/
  • w → ∅ / (C)_o(·)
• U-21: /y/-adjustment
  • y → ∅ / V̄_V¹ where V¹ is not /ə/
  • ∅ → y / V¹_V² where V¹ is a front vowel and V² is a back vowel
  • w → y / _k (only in the suffixes ₁/-əkw/ and ₁/-əke·/)
• U-22: Final /l/-loss. The dropping of the /l/ is optional, but the option is exploited differently by the two morphemes it affects.
  • l → (l) / _#
• U-23: Final-vowel shortening
  • V̄ → V̆ / _#
• U-24: Final /h/-, /w/-, and /y/-loss
  • h → ∅ / _#
  • w → (w) / V̄_#
  • w → ∅ / o(·)_#
  • w → ∅ / #_tə{l, n}
  • y → ∅ / i_#
• U-25: Initial cluster and syllable loss. Initial clusters arising from morphophonemic rules U-11 and U-14 above are simplified; many initial weak-vowel syllables are lost. There are many exceptions, however, such that Goddard does not attempt to describe the pattern.
• U-26: Consonant-shortening
  • C·(w) → C(w) / _{ah, oh, C, #}
• U-27: Consonant-lengthening
  • C (C=stop) → C· / #(C)hV̆_V(C)#
• U-28: Negative vowel assimilation in forms with ₅/-(o·)w(i·)/, which was a recent innovation at the time Goddard was writing.
  • V̄ˣ(w)i → V̄ˣV̆ˣ / _#

Morphology[link]

Nouns[link]

Third person participants are marked for gender (animate versus inanimate), obviation (proximate versus obviative), and presence (nonabsentative versus absentative). Generally, the inanimate, obviative, and absentative categories are more marked than their opposites (i.e. animate, proximate, and nonabsentative), however it is not clear whether animacy or inanimacy is the more marked of the opposition. The first and second persons are not marked for presence or obviation, and are always animate.^[24]

Obviation[link]

The first mentioned and/or primary animate third person is proximate; all other third persons are obviative, unless they act in conjunction with the proximate participant. Verbs are also inflected to indicate whether the verbal action is proximate on obviate or obviate on proximate.

Presence[link]

Third person participants can be marked with a special set of endings indicating their absence from the general area of the focus of discourse. For example, absentative endings are used when speaking of the deceased (even if the corpse is physically present), as in the sentence no·lăčahko·ná·na nkahe·səná·na ("our (excl.) mother (abv.) treated us well"), in which both verb and noun are marked with the absentative /-a/ ending.

Gender[link]

Nouns in Unami are classified as either animate or inanimate, and this is reflected in verbal conjugation. Animate nouns denote human beings, animals, spirits, and trees, as well as certain fruits, tubers, root vegetables and other unpredictable exceptions like /ko·n/ ("snow") and /nhíkaš/ ("my fingernail"). (Note, however, that berries, nuts, and vegetables growing above ground are generally inanimate.) Thus, /té·hi·m/ ("strawberry"), /xáskwi·m/ ("corn"), /ke·skúnthak/ ("pumpkin"), /mpi/ ("water"), and /nhíka·t/ ("my leg") are inanimate, while /lə́nu/ ("man"), /xho·k/ ("snake"), /mahtán'tu/ ("Devil") and /hɔ́pəni·s/ ("potato") are animate. However, traditionally inanimate nouns which are directly addressed or personified are treated as animate. Thus, traditionally inanimate /ăsǝ́n/ ("stone") is treated as animate in the sentence šá·i a· ăsǝ́nak kǝnčí·mowak ("the stones would immediately cry out").^[25]

Verbs[link]

Unami is a highly agglutinative, polysynthetic language. Verbs in Unami are marked for person and number, and contain inflectional elements of order (independent, conjunct, and imperative), aspect, and the negative.^[26]

A table of the personal pronouns is given below. Note that the first person plural ("we") may be either inclusive - that is, including the addressee, - or exclusive.

Following are tables exemplifying verbal paradigms in Unami in the independent order, indicative mood and present tense.^[28]

Animate Intransitive (AI) Verbs[link]

Transitive Animate (TA) Verbs[link]

Inanimate Intransitive (II) Verbs[link]

Transitive Inanimate (TI) Verbs[link]

The TI themes have the same inflection as AI stems for all conjuncts (NB that indefinite subject forms of consonant-final themes are not attested, but the vowel-final themes follow the AI pattern.) Three forms are illustrated from each type.

Affixes[link]

Prefixes[link]

Verbal prefixes are used only in the independent order, although some forms of the independent order lack a prefix. There are three of them: /n-/ (first person), /k-/ (second person), and /w-/ (third person). If a stem has an underlying initial vowel, a /t/ is inserted after the prefix, and before this and other stem-initial consonants a /ə/ is inserted. Sometimes, this /ə/ contracts with a stem-initial /wə/ to /o·/ except when the /o·/ would be phonetically shortened via rule U-4a. Examples include: /ntá·mwi/ ("I get up from lying") versus /á·mwi·(w)/ ("he gets up"). Two roots with initial /t/ extend the syllable with /-ən/ when adding prefixes; these roots are /tal-/ ("there") and /tax-/ ("so many"), e.g. náni ntəntala·wsí·ne·n ("that is where we live [our lives]") from the animate intransitive stem /tala·wəsi·/.^[29]

Prefixes are mutually exclusive and are selected based on the following rule: if one of the participants is second person, the second person prefix is used; if not, if one of the participants is the first person, then the first person prefix is used; if none of these applies, other forms, if they take a prefix, take the third person prefix. This is the well-known Algonquian 2-1-3 precedence rule.^[30]

Suffixes[link]

Suffixes are grouped into eight positional classes. These are:^[31]

• Theme
  • 1. Theme signs
• Thematic affixes
  • 2. Diminutive and pejorative
  • 3. Obviative and plural
  • 4. Negative; imperative modes
• Desinences (inflectional suffixes)
  • 5. Central endings
  • 6. Aspect
  • 7. Peripheral endings
  • 8. Mode

• First position

The first position (theme signs) is filled only for transitive verbs - these help describe the relationship between the two participants, indicating which is the agent and which is the object. The direct and inverse theme signs indicate the direction of the verb along a spectrum what might be called distance. From least to most distant the participants are: (1) first or second; (2) indefinite (only as subject); (3) proximate third person; (4) obviative third person; (5) farther obviative third person; (6) inanimate (subject only). If the subject is less distant than the object, the direct theme is used; if the subject is more distant, the inverse signs are used. After transitive animate (TA) verb stems appear one of the four following theme signs:

• • Theme 1: ₁/-a·/ ~ ₁/-∅/; makes direct forms
  • Theme 2: ₁/-əkw/ ~ ₁/-əke·/; makes inverse forms
  • Theme 3: ₁/-i·/; makes first person object forms
  • Theme 4: ₁/-əl/; makes second person forms

For transitive inanimate (TI) verbs there appears the theme sign pertaining to the appropriate TI class:

• • Class 1a: ₁/-am/
  • Class 1b: ₁/-əm/
  • Class 2: ₁/-o·/ ~ ₁/-aw/
  • Class 3: no theme sign

NB that for Class 2 TI theme signs, in certain derivational categories, the theme sign is retained even when the thematic element is dropped. The contrast between the two categories is sharper in the Central Algonquian languages, in which the theme sign has a more complex series of alternants.^[32]

• Second position

The second position consists of diminutives in ₂/-tī/ and pejoratives in ₂/-šī/ (in both of these, the /-ī/ is unstable.) An example of a diminutive is /pé·t·o/ ("the little one comes"), contrasted with the pejorative /pé·šo/ ("the undesirable one came"). The use of /t/ in the formation of diminutives seems to be an innovation of Unami, as many other Algonquian languages use */s/ or */ʃ/ (in fact, the diminutive of Munsee is /-šī/).

• Third position

In position three are the affixes ₃/-lī/, which marks the obviative third person, and ₃/-h(ə)tī/, which marks the plural.

• Fourth position

Position four contains the negative affix ₄/-(ō)w(ī)/ and prohibitive imperative and future imperative forms, which have complex series of alternants.

• Fifth Position

Position five contains the central endings which index the central participant of each form, except those using TA theme signs ₁/-i·/ and ₁/-əl/;

• Sixth Position

Position six contains the affix endings: /-pan/ marks the preterite, and /sa/ ~ /shan/ mark the present.

• Seventh Position

Position seven contains peripheral endings, which are used to mark the nominal category of some 3rd person participants in forms in the independent and conjunct (but not imperative) orders.

• Eighth Position

Position eight reflects the subjunctive, prohibitive, and future modes.

Syntax[link]

Unami is, like many Algonquian languages, polysynthetic and highly agglutinative. This means that most of the information is encoded in the verb (sometimes with whole words being incorporated into the stem), making word order more fluid than in English. Unfortunately, syntax is one of the least studied aspects of the Unami language; there is much more data on morphology, because of an especial focus on reconstructing Proto-Algonquian.

Some examples of complex sentences in Unami include:^[33]

• • ta heč tɔllí·ksi·n ne·k ma·nšá·p·iyak? (what color are those beads?)
  • še· lah ni e·k·aɔ́·kwe [tali-]phɔkhakéhɔ·n ní·ša awé·ni·k (over there under the trees two people were buried)
  • mi·mə́nsak šokw təli-ahi-pe·nháto·n (but the children's footprints are numerous)
  • na hont náni tənnə́mən níkahke pi·lae·č·əč·ínka (then that's what those boys did)

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Ethnologue entry for Unami
• Goddard, Ives. 1979. Delaware Verbal Morphology. New York: Garland. [published version of 1979 Harvard University dissertation in linguistics] ISBN 978-0-8240-9685-4
• Goddard, Ives. 1997. "Pidgin Delaware.” Sarah G. Thomason, ed., Contact Languages: A Wider Perspective, pp. 43–98. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. ISBN 978-1-55619-172-5

External links[link]

• Delaware (Lenape) Tribe of Indians
• Delaware Nation of Oklahoma
• Lenape Talking Dictionary
• History of our lord and saviour Jesus Christ Translation of the Gospels into the Delaware language. Printed by Jotham Meeker, Shawnee Baptist Mission.

v t e Languages of Pennsylvania Italics indicate extinct languages Immigrant languages English Spanish Italian Pennsylvania Dutch Pennsylvania Dutch English Indigenous languages Delaware (Munsee, Unami) Erie Susquehannock Other languages American Sign Language

v t e Languages of Maryland Italics indicate extinct languages Immigrant languages English (Baltimore dialect, Tidewater dialect) Spanish French Italian German Korean Chinese Indigenous languages Siouan (Tutelo, Saponi) Nanticoke Piscataway Susquehannock Powhatan Unami Other languages American Sign Language