Chapter 12

The Dakota word _Sha[n]te-suta_--from _sha[n]te_, heart, and _suta_, strong--_brave_, not cowardly, literally strong-hearted, is made by several tribes of that stock, and particularly by the Brule Sioux, in gestures by collecting the tips of the fingers and thumb of the right hand to a point, and then placing the radial side of the hand over the heart, finger tips pointing downward--_heart_; then place the left fist, palm inward, horizontally before the lower portion of the breast, the right fist back of the left, then raise the right and throw it forcibly over and downward in front of the left--_brave_, _strong_. See Fig. 242, page 415.

The Arikaras make the sign for _brave_ by striking the clinched fist forcibly toward the ground in front of and near the breast.

Brave, or "strong-hearted," is made by the Absaroka, Shoshoni, and Banak Indians by merely placing the clinched fist to the breast, the latter having allusion to the heart, the clinching of the hand to strength, vigor, or force.

An Ojibwa sign for _death, to die_, is as follows:

Place the palm of the hand at a short distance from the side of the head, then withdraw it gently in an oblique downward direction, inclining the head and upper part of the body in the same direction.

The same authority, The Very Rev. E. Jacker, who contributes it, notes that there is an apparent connection between this conception and execution and the etymology of the corresponding terms in Ojibwa. "He dies," is _nibo_; "he sleeps," is _niba_. The common idea expressed by the gesture is a sinking to rest. The original significance of the root _nib_ seems to be "leaning;" _anibeia_, "it is leaning"; _anibekweni_, "he inclines the head sidewards." The word _niba_ or _nibe_ (only in compounds) conveys the idea of "night," perhaps as the falling over, the going to rest, or the death of the day.

_Ogima_, the Ojibwa term for _chief_, is derived from a root which signifies "above" (_Ogidjaii_, upon; _ogidjina_, above; _ogidaki_, on a hill or mountain, etc.). _Ogitchida_, a brave, a hero (Otawa, _ogida_), is probably from the same root.

_Sagima_, the Ojibwa form of sachem, is from the root _sag_, which implies a coming forth, or stretching out. These roots are to be considered in connection with several gestures described under the head of _Chief_, in EXTRACTS FROM DICTIONARY, _infra_.

_Onijishin_, it is _good_ (_Ojibwa_), originally signifies "it lies level." This may be compared with the sign for _good_, in the Tendoy-Huerito Dialogue, Fig. 309, page 487, and also that for _happy_, _contentment_, in the Speech of Kin Ch[=e]-[)e]ss, page 523.

In Klamath the radix _lam_ designates a whirling motion, and appears in the word _lama_, "to be crazy, mad," readily correlated with the common gesture for _madman_ and _fool_, in which the hand is rotated above and near the head.

_Evening_, in Klamath, is _litkhi_, from _luta_, to hang down, meaning the time when the sun hangs down, the gesture for which, described elsewhere in this paper (see Natci's Narrative, page 503), is executive of the same conception, which is allied to the etymology usually given for _eve_, _even_, "the decline of the day." These Klamath etymologies have been kindly contributed by Mr. A.S. Gatschet.

The Very Rev. E. Jacker also communicates a suggestive _excursus exegeticus_ upon the probable gestural origin of the Ojibwa word _tibishko_, "opposite in space; just so; likewise:"

"The adverb _tibishko_ (or _dibishko_) is an offshoot of the root _tib_ (or _dib_), which in most cases conveys the idea of measuring or weighing, as appears from the following samples: _dibaige_, he measures; _dibowe_, he settles matters by his speech or word, e.g., as a juryman; _dibaamage_, he pays out; _dibakonige_, he judges; _dibabishkodjige_, he weighs; _dibamenimo_, he restricts himself, e.g., to a certain quantity of food; _dibissitchige_, he fulfills a promise; _dibijigan_, a pattern for cutting clothes.

"The original, meaning of _tib_, however, must be supposed to have been more comprehensive, if we would explain other (apparent) derivatives, such as: _tibi_, 'I don't know where, where to, where from,' &c.; _tibik_, night; _dibendjige_, he is master or owner; _titibisse_, it rolls (as a ball), it turns (as a wheel); _dibaboweigan_, the cover of a kettle. The notion of measuring does not very naturally enter into the ideas expressed by these terms.

"The difficulty disappears if we assume the root _tib_ or _dib_ to have been originally the phonetic equivalent of a _gesture_ expressive of the notion of covering as well as of that of measuring. This gesture would seem to be the holding of one hand above the other, horizontally, at some distance, palms opposite or both downwards. This, or some similar gesture would most naturally accompany the above terms. As for _tibik_, night, compare (_Dunbar_): 'The two hands open and extended, crossing one another horizontally.' The idea of covering evidently enters into this conception. The strange adverb _tibi_ ('I don't know where,' &c., or 'in a place unknown to me'), if derived from the same root, would originally signify 'covered.' In _titibisse_, or _didibisse_ (it rolls, it turns), the reduplication of the radical syllable indicates the repetition of the gesture, by holding the hands alternately above one another, palms downwards, and thus producing a rotary motion.

"In German, the clasping of the hands in a horizontal position, expressive of a promise or the conclusion of a bargain, is frequently accompanied by the interjection _top!_ the same radical consonants as in _tib_. Compare also the English _tap_, the French _tape_, the Greek, [Greek: tupto] the Sanscrit _tup_ and _tub_, &c."

GESTURES CONNECTED WITH THE ORIGIN OF WRITING.

Though written characters are generally associated with speech, they are shown, by successful employment in hieroglyphs and by educated deaf-mutes to be representative of ideas without the intervention of sounds, and so also are the outlines of signs. This will be more apparent if the motions expressing the most prominent feature, attribute, or function of an object are made, or supposed to be made, so as to leave a luminous track impressible upon the eye separate from the members producing it. The actual result is an immateriate graphic representation of visible objects and qualities which, invested with substance, has become familiar to us as the _rebus_, and also appears in the form of heraldic blazonry styled punning or "canting."

Gesture language is, in fact, not only a picture language, but is actual writing, though dissolving and sympathetic, and neither alphabetic nor phonetic.

Dalgarno aptly says: "_Qui enim caput nutat, oculo connivet, digitum movet in aere, &c., (ad mentis cogitata exprimendum); is non minus vere scribit, quam qui Literas pingit in Charta, Marmore, vel aere._"

It is neither necessary nor proper to enter now upon any prolonged account of the origin, of alphabetic writing. There is, however, propriety, if not necessity, for the present writer, when making any remarks under this heading and under some others in this paper indicating special lines of research, to disclaim all pretension to being a Sinologue or Egyptologist, or even profoundly versed in Mexican antiquities. His partial and recently commenced studies only enable him to present suggestions for the examination of scholars. These suggestions may safely be introduced by the statement that the common modern alphabetic characters, coming directly from the Romans, were obtained by them from the Greeks, and by the latter from the Phoenicians, whose alphabet was connected with that of the old Hebrew. It has also been of late the general opinion that the whole family of alphabets to which the Greek, Latin, Gothic, Runic, and others belong, appearing earlier in the Phoenician, Moabite, and Hebrew, had its beginning in the ideographic pictures of the Egyptians, afterwards used by them to express sounds. That the Chinese, though in a different manner from the Egyptians, passed from picture writing to phonetic writing, is established by delineations still extant among them, called _ku-w[)a]n_, or "ancient pictures," with which some of the modern written characters can be identified. The ancient Mexicans also, to some extent, developed phonetic expressions out of a very elaborate system of ideographic picture writing. Assuming that ideographic pictures made by ancient peoples would be likely to contain representations of gesture signs, which subject is treated of below, it is proper to examine if traces of such gesture signs may not be found in the Egyptian, Chinese, and Aztec characters. Only a few presumptive examples, selected from a considerable number, are now presented in which the signs of the North American Indians appear to be included, with the hope that further investigation by collaborators will establish many more instances not confined to Indian signs.

A typical sign made by the Indians for _no_, _negation_, is as follows: The hand extended or slightly curved is held in front of the body, a little to the right of the median line; it is then carried with a rapid sweep a foot or more farther to the right. (_Mandan and Hidatsa_ I.)

One for _none_, _nothing_, sometimes used for simple negation, is also given: Throw both hands outward toward their respective sides from the breast. (_Wyandot_ I.)

With these compare the two forms of the Egyptian character for _no_, _negation_, Fig. 118, taken from Champollion, _Grammaire Egyptienne_, _Paris_, 1836, p. 519.

No vivid fancy is needed to see the hands indicated at the extremities of arms extended symmetrically from the body on each side.

Also compare the Maya character for the same idea of negation, Fig. 119, found in Landa, _Relation des Choses de Yucatan_, _Paris_, 1864, 316. The Maya word for negation is "_ma_," and the word "_mak_," a six-foot measuring rod, given by Brasseur de Bourbourg in his dictionary, apparently having connection with this character, would in use separate the hands as illustrated, giving the same form as the gesture made without the rod.

Another sign for _nothing_, _none_, made by the Comanches, is: Flat hand thrown forward, back to the ground, fingers pointing forward and downward. Frequently the right hand is brushed over the left thus thrown out.

Compare the Chinese character for the same meaning, Fig. 120. This will not be recognized as a hand without study of similar characters, which generally have a cross-line cutting off the wrist. Here the wrist bones follow under the cross cut, then the metacarpal bones, and last the fingers, pointing forward and downward.

The Arapaho sign for _child_, _baby_, is the forefinger in the mouth, i.e., a nursing child, and a natural sign of a deaf-mute is the same. The Egyptian figurative character for the same is seen in Fig. 121. Its linear form is Fig. 122, and its hieratic is Fig. 123 (Champollion, _Dictionnaire Egyptien_, _Paris_, 1841, p. 31.)

These afford an interpretation to the ancient Chinese form for _son_, Fig. 124, given in _Journ. Royal Asiatic Society_, I, 1834, p. 219, as belonging to the Shang dynasty, 1756, 1112 B.C., and the modern Chinese form, Fig. 125, which, without the comparison, would not be supposed to have any pictured reference to an infant with hand or finger at or approaching the mouth, denoting the taking of nourishment. Having now suggested this, the Chinese character for _birth_, Fig. 126, is understood as the expression of a common gesture among the Indians, particularly reported from the Dakota, for _born_, _to be born_, viz: Place the left hand in front of the body, a little to the right, the palm downward and slightly arched, then pass the extended right hand downward, forward, and upward, forming a short curve underneath the left, as in Fig. 127 (_Dakota_ V). This is based upon the curve followed by the head of the child during birth, and is used generically. The same curve, when made with one hand, appears in Fig. 128.

It may be of interest to compare with the Chinese _child_ the Mexican abbreviated character for _man_, Fig. 129, found in Pipart in _Compte Rendu Cong. Inter. des Americanistes, 2me Session_, _Luxembourg_, 1877, 1878, II, 359. The figure on the right is called the abbreviated form of that by its side, yet its origin may be different.

The Chinese character for _man_, is Fig. 130, and may have the same obvious conception as a Dakota sign for the same signification: "Place the extended index, pointing upward and forward before the lower portion of the abdomen."

The Chinese specific character for _woman_ is Fig. 131, the cross mark denoting the wrist, and if the remainder be considered the hand, the fingers may be imagined in the position made by many tribes, and especially the Utes, as depicting the _pudendum muliebre_, Fig. 132.

The Egyptian generic character for _female_ is [Symbol: semicircle] (Champollion, _Dict._,) believed to represent the curve of the mammae supposed to be cut off or separated from the chest, and the gesture with the same meaning was made by the Cheyenne Titchkematski, and photographed, as in Fig. 133. It forms the same figure as the Egyptian character as well as can be done by a position of the human hand.

The Chinese character for _to give water_ is Fig. 134, which may be compared with the common Indian gesture _to drink_, _to give water_, viz: "Hand held with tips of fingers brought together and passed to the mouth, as if scooping up water", Fig. 135, obviously from the primitive custom, as with Mojaves, who still drink with scooped hands.

Another common Indian gesture sign for _water to drink_, _I want to drink_, is: "Hand brought downward past the mouth with loosely extended fingers, palm toward the face." This appears in the Mexican character for _drink_, Fig. 136, taken from Pipart, _loc. cit._, p. 351. _Water_, i.e., the pouring out of water with the drops falling or about to fall, is shown in Fig. 137, taken from the same author (p. 349), being the same arrangement of them as in the sign for _rain_, Fig. 114, p. 344, the hand, however, being inverted. _Rain_ in the Mexican picture writing is shown by small circles inclosing a dot, as in the last two figures, but not connected together, each having a short line upward marking the line of descent.

With the gesture for drink may be compared Fig. 138, the Egyptian Goddess Nu in the sacred sycamore tree, pouring out the water of life to the Osirian and his soul, represented as a bird, in Amenti (Sharpe, from a funereal stele in the British Museum, in _Cooper's Serpent Myths_, p. 43).

The common Indian gesture for _river_ or _stream_, _water_, is made by passing the horizontal flat hand, palm down, forward and to the left from the right side in a serpentine manner.

The Egyptian character for the same is Fig. 139 (Champollion, _Dict._, p. 429). The broken line is held to represent the movement of the water on the surface of the stream. When made with one line less angular and more waving it means _water_. It is interesting to compare with this the identical character in the syllabary invented by a West African negro, Mormoru Doalu Bukere, for _water_, [Symbol: water, represented by a wavy line], mentioned by TYLOR in his _Early History of Mankind_, p. 103.

The abbreviated Egyptian sign for _water_ as a stream is Fig. 140 (Champollion, _loc. cit._), and the Chinese for the same is as in Fig. 141.

In the picture-writing of the Ojibwa the Egyptian abbreviated character, with two lines instead of three, appears with the same signification.

The Egyptian character for _weep_, Fig. 142, an eye, with tears falling, is also found in the pictographs of the Ojibwa (Schoolcraft, I, pl. 54, Fig. 27), and is also made by the Indian gesture of drawing lines by the index repeatedly downward from the eye, though perhaps more frequently made by the full sign for _rain_, described on page 344, made with the back of the hand downward from the eye--"eye rain."

The Egyptian character for _to be strong_ is Fig. 143 (Champollion, _Dict._, p. 91), which is sufficiently obvious, but may be compared with the sign for _strong_, made by some tribes as follows: Hold the clinched fist in front of the right side, a little higher than the elbow, then throw it forcibly about six inches toward the ground.

A typical gesture for _night_ is as follows: Place the flat hands, horizontally, about two feet apart, move them quickly in an upward curve toward one another until the right lies across the left. "Darkness covers all." See Fig. 312, page 489.

The conception of covering executed by delineating the object covered beneath the middle point of an arch or curve, appears also clearly in the Egyptian characters for _night_, Fig. 144 (Champollion, _Dict._, p. 3).

The upper part of the character is taken separately to form that for sky (see page 372, _infra_).

The Egyptian figurative and linear characters, Figs. 145 and 146 (Champollion, _Dict._, p. 28), for _calling upon_ and _invocation_, also used as an interjection, scarcely require the quotation of an Indian sign, being common all over the world.

The gesture sign made by several tribes for _many_ is as follows: Both hands, with spread and slightly curved fingers, are held pendent about two feet apart before the thighs; then bring them toward one another, horizontally, drawing them upward as they come together. (_Absaroka_ I; _Shoshoni and Banak_ I; _Kaiowa_ I; _Comanche_ III; _Apache_ II; _Wichita_ II.) "An accumulation of objects." This may be the same motion indicated by the Egyptian character, Fig. 147, meaning to _gather together_ (Champollion, _Dict._, p. 459).

The Egyptian character, Fig. 148, which in its linear form is represented in Fig. 149, and meaning to _go_, to _come_, _locomotion_, is presented to show readers unfamiliar with hieroglyphics how a corporeal action may be included in a linear character without being obvious or at least certain, unless it should be made clear by comparison with the full figurative form or by other means. This linear form might be noticed many times without certainty or perhaps suspicion that it represented the human legs and feet in the act of walking. The same difficulty, of course, as also the same prospect of success by careful research, attends the tracing of other corporeal motions which more properly come under the head of gesture signs.

_SIGN LANGUAGE WITH REFERENCE TO GRAMMAR._

Apart from the more material and substantive relations between signs and language, it is to be expected that analogies can by proper research be ascertained between their several developments in the manner of their use, that is, in their grammatic mechanism, and in the genesis of the sentence. The science of language, ever henceforward to be studied historically, must take account of the similar early mental processes in which the phrase or sentence originated, both in sign and oral utterance. In this respect, as in many others, the North American Indians may be considered to be living representatives of prehistoric man.

SYNTAX.

The reader will understand without explanation that there is in the gesture speech no organized sentence such as is integrated in the languages of civilization, and that he must not look for articles or particles or passive voice or case or grammatic gender, or even what appears in those languages as a substantive or a verb, as a subject or a predicate, or as qualifiers or inflexions. The sign radicals, without being specifically any of our parts of speech, may be all of them in turn. There is, however, a grouping and sequence of the ideographic pictures, an arrangement of signs in connected succession, which may be classed under the scholastic head of syntax. This subject, with special reference to the order of deaf-mute signs as compared with oral speech, has been the theme of much discussion, some notes of which, condensed from the speculations of M. Remi Valade and others, follow in the next paragraph without further comment than may invite attention to the profound remark of LEIBNITZ.

In mimic construction there are to be considered both the order in which the signs succeed one another and the relative positions in which they are made, the latter remaining longer in the memory than the former, and spoken language may sometimes in its early infancy have reproduced the ideas of a sign picture without commencing from the same point. So the order, as in Greek and Latin, is very variable. In nations among whom the alphabet was introduced without the intermediary to any impressive degree of picture-writing, the order being (1) language of signs, almost superseded by (2) spoken language, and (3) alphabetic writing, men would write in the order in which they had been accustomed to speak. But if at a time when spoken language was still rudimentary, intercourse being mainly carried on by signs, figurative writing had been invented, the order of the figures would be the order of the signs, and the same order would pass into the spoken language. Hence LEIBNITZ says truly that "the writing of the Chinese might seem to have been invented by a deaf person." The oral language has not known the phases which have given to the Indo-European tongues their formation and grammatical parts. In the latter, signs were conquered by speech, while in the former, speech received the yoke.

Sign language cannot show by inflection the reciprocal dependence of words and sentences. Degrees of motion corresponding with vocal intonation are only used rhetorically or for degrees of comparison. The relations of ideas and objects are therefore expressed by placement, and their connection is established when necessary by the abstraction of ideas. The sign talker is an artist, grouping persons and things so as to show the relations between them, and the effect is that which is seen in a picture. But though the artist has the advantage in presenting in a permanent connected scene the result of several transient signs, he can only present it as it appears at a single moment. The sign talker has the succession of time at his disposal, and his scenes move and act, are localized and animated, and their arrangement is therefore more varied and significant.

It is not satisfactory to give the order of equivalent words as representative of the order of signs, because the pictorial arrangement is wholly lost; but adopting this expedient as a mere illustration of the sequence in the presentation of signs by deaf-mutes, the following is quoted from an essay by Rev. J.R. Keep, in _American Annals of the Deaf and Dumb_, vol. xvi, p. 223, as the order in which the parable of the Prodigal Son is translated into signs: