PETITOT: INDIENS, ORIGINES ASIATIQUE/ARCTIC CANADA/1880

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PETITOT: INDIENS, ORIGINES ASIATIQUE/ARCTIC CANADA/1880 ASIAN ORIGINS OF CANADIAN INDIANS/ATHABASKAN YUKON/RARE DE L'ORIGINE ASIATIQUE DES INDIENS DE L'AMERIQUE ARCTIQUE. BY LE R. P. EMILE PETITOT. Paris, 1880. First Edition. Text in French. Very Rare. A nice First Edition of this rare and fascinating set of notes on the Indians of northern Canada. This slender book contains a work that was evidently printed in a journal, and has been separately bound. The author, �mile-Fortun� Petitot [1838-1916] was a missionary to the Canadian North-West, serving in remote missions in Indian settlements in the North-West Territories for 12 years. A noted linguist and geographer, he wrote a number of valuable works dealing with the geography, anthropology and linguistics of the region. This book comes from the collection of Cornelius Osgood, a distinguished scholar and Curator of Anthropology at the Yale Peabody Museum from 1934 to 1973. Osgood made research expeditions to the Canadian and Alaskan Arctic in the 1930s through the 1950s, and he wrote a number of monographs on Athabaskan peoples. Osgood compiled a collection of Petitot's books and had them uniformly bound- I will be offering his copies of other Petitot books this week on ebay. Thre is a handwritten note inside the book signed by Cornelius Osgood giving instructions to the bookbinder. Published 130 years ago, this work is now exceedingly rare, as I have not seen any other copies listed for sale on the internet, at any price. This book is in excellent condition and it should be quite valuable. Such a nice copy is not likely to come up for sale again on ebay. From the text: "Je prends la liberte de vous envoyer les quelques notes qui suivent, a titre de supplement a ma derniere etude ethnographique sur l'origine asiatique des indiens de l'Amerique arctique, que vous me fites l'honneur d'inserer l'annee derniere, dans le Bulletin des Annales..."From the text: "La generalite des Denes, disais-je quelque part, ont la tete droite, petite, etroite et un peu conique, la boite osseuse ronde;... ce qui parait les rapprocher du type qui a ete attribue au pretendu age de la pierre. A peu de chose pres, cette forme et ce module de cranes, sont les memes chez les Cris et lees Sioux...."According to wikipedia: "The Dene ( Den� ) are an aboriginal group of First Nations who live in the northern boreal and Arctic regions of Canada . Dene is a compound of two words: De means "flow" and Ne meaning "Mother Earth". [1 ] Dene homeland is referred to as Denendeh , meaning "the Creator's Spirit flows through this Land". [1 ] The Dene speak Athabaskan languages . Dene are spread through a wide region. They live in the Mackenzie Valley (south of the Inuvialuit ), and can be found west of Nunavut . Their homeland reaches to western Yukon , and the northern part of British Columbia , Alberta , Saskatchewan , Manitoba , Alaska and the southwestern United States .[ 2] Dene were the first people to settle in what is now the Northwest Territories . In northern Canada, historically there were ethnic feuds between the Dene and the Inuit .Behchoko, Northwest Territories is the largest Dene community in Canada. The Dene include five main groups: Chipewyan ( Denesuline ), living east of Great Slave Lake , and including the Sayisi Dene living at Tadoule Lake, Manitoba; Tlicho ( Dogrib ), living between Great Slave and Great Bear Lakes; Yellowknives ( T'atsaot'ine ), formerly living north of Great Slave Lake, and now absorbed into the Chipewyan; Slavey ( Deh Gah Got'ine or Deh Cho ), living along the Mackenzie River (Deh Cho) southwest of Great Slave Lake; Sahtu ( Saht�ot�ine ), including the Locheux, Nahanni, and Bear Lake peoples, in the central NWT..." According to wikipedia: "Father �mile-Fortun� Petitot [1 ] (also known as �mile-Fortun�-Stanislas-Joseph Petitot ) ( Inuk name, Mitchi Pitchitork Tchikraynarm iyoy� , meaning "Mr. Petitot, son of the Sun") (December 3, 1838-May 13, 1916), a French Missionary Oblate , was a notable Canadian northwest cartographer ,... read more

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