Indian Languages Database

Histoire naturelle de l'islande, du Groenland, du détroit de Davis, et d’autres pays situés sous le nord, traduite de l'allemand.

Paris: Sebastien Jorry, 1750

Physical Description: 2 v. v.1: xl, 314 p., [4] leaves of plates, (3 folded); v.2: [2], iv, 391, [1] p., [5] folded leaves of plates): ill., map; 18 cm. (12mo)

Call number: J750/ A547h

Accession number: 09707

Notes: Includes "Supplément contenant un petit dictionnaire & quelques principes de la grammaire groenlandoise" (vol. 2, p. 295-386), comprising vocabulary, grammar, and Christian texts in French and the (Inuit?) language of Greenland Eskimos. Vocabulary (p. 297-337) lists approximately 700 terms in French with Inuit (?) equivalents, grouped by topic or part of speech: nouns (religious terms, fire, air, water, weather, geology, flora, animals, birds and insects, fish, body parts, tools and clothing, household terms, travel by sea and land, writing, kinship, trade items); adjectives, verbs, adverbs, pronouns, numbers 1-21, and over 100 conversational phrases. Grammar section (p. 338-364), in French with Inuit (?) examples, covers verb forms, nouns and possessives, and comparative adjectives. Followed by the Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, and other religious texts in Inuit (?) and French; and Genesis ch. 1, v.1-31 and the Annunciation from Luke 1.26ff in Inuit(?) only (p. 364-386). Translation into French, by Gottfried Sellius, from author’s Nachricten von Island Grõnland und der Strasse Davis, first published, Hamburg, 1746; translation wrongly attributed by Sabin to J.P. Russelot de Surgy.

Digital facsimile copy of book available. Volume 1 here. Volume 2 here.