Note 435 — Chapter IX · [1831.]

Some curious and interesting remarks on the peculiarity of the Indian languages here mentioned by M. Libri, will be found in Du Ponceau’s “Memoire sur le Systeme Grammaticale des Langues Indiennes,” pp. 143, and foll. Some words in the Chippewa language contain thirteen or fourteen syllables; but they should be called phrases rather than words. M. Du Ponceau gives an example from the language of the Indians of Massachusetts—the word wutappesittukquissunnuhwehtunkquoh, “genuflecting!” p. 143. The same characteristic is found in the Mexican and Central American languages. In Mexican “a parish-priest” is “notlazomanitzteopitzkatatzins!”