The Massachusett language is an Algonquian language of the Algic language family that was historically spoken by several peoples of eastern coastal and southeastern Massachusetts. The language went out of use in the late 19th century, but in 1993, a project was launched to revive the language, and as of 2014, there were five native speakers and over 500 second-language learners. In its revived form, it is spoken in four Wampanoag communities. The language is also known as or (Wampanoag), and historically as , Indian or .Costa, D. J. (2007). 'The Dialectology of Southern New England Algonquian'. Wolfart, H. C. (Eds.), Papers of the 38th Algonquian Conference. (pp. 81–127). Winnipeg, Manitoba. Winnipeg, Manitoba: University of Manitoba Press.
The language is most notable for its community of literate Native Americans and for the number of translations of religious texts into the language. John Eliot's translation of the Christian Bible in 1663 using the Natick dialect, known as Mamusse Wunneetupanatamwe Up-Biblum God, was the first printed in the Americas, the first Bible translated by a non-native speaker, and one of the earliest examples of a Bible translation into a previously unwritten language. Literate Native American ministers and teachers taught literacy to the elites and other members of their communities, influencing a widespread acceptance. This is attested in the numerous court petitions, church records, praying town administrative records, notes on book margins, personal letters, and widespread distribution of other translations of religious tracts throughout the colonial period.Ricky, D. B. (1999). Encyclopedia of Massachusetts Indians. Hamburg, MI: North American Book Dist LLC. p. 142.
The dialects of the language were formerly spoken by several peoples of southern New England, including all the coastal and insular areas of eastern Massachusetts, as well as southeastern New Hampshire, the southernmost tip of Maine and eastern Rhode Island, and it was also a common second or third language across most of New England and portions of Long Island. The use of the language in the intertribal communities of Christian converts, called praying towns, resulted in its adoption by some groups of Nipmuc and Pennacook.Connole, D. A. (2007). Indians of the Nipmuck Country in Southern New England 1630–1750: An Historical Geography. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co. pp. 41, 90–120.Shannon, T. J. (2005). "Puritan Conversion Attempts", Gettysburg College
The revitalization of the language began in 1993 when Jessie Little Doe Baird (Mashpee Wampanoag) launched the Wôpanâak Language Reclamation Project (WLRP). It has successfully reintroduced the revived Wampanoag dialect to the Mashpee, Aquinnah, Assonet, and Herring Pond communities of the Wampanoag of Cape Cod and the Islands, with a handful of children who are growing up as the first native speakers in more than a century.Doane, S. (Correspondent) (2012). 'Wampanoag: Reviving the language' [Television news feature]. In CBS News. New York, NY: CBS Broadcast Inc. Retrieved from http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=50135817nBaird, J. L. D. (2013). Wôpanâak Language Reclamation Project. Retrieved from http://www.wlrp.org/.
Classification Position of Massachusett within the Algic languages
Massachusett is in the Eastern branch of Algonquian languages, which comprises all the known Algonquian languages spoken from the Canadian Maritimes southward to the Carolinas. Within the Eastern divisions, Massachusett clusters with the Southern New England Algonquian (SNEA) languages. If considered a dialect of SNEA, it is an SNEA 'N-dialect'. Other Eastern language divisions include the Abenakian languages spoken to the immediate north and the Delawaran languages to the west and southwest of the SNEA region. South of the Delawaran languages are the Nanticokan languages of the Chesapeake Bay and Potomac River watershed, the Powhatan languages of coastal Virginia and the Carolina Algonquian languages of the Carolinas. The Eastern languages are the only genetic grouping to have emerged from Algonquian, as all the languages descend from Proto-Eastern Algonquian (PEA), which differentiated likely due to isolation from other Algonquian speakers due to the presence of large pockets of Iroquoian and Siouan languages and the Appalachian Mountains. The Central and Plains, however, are groupings based on areal features and geographical proximity.
Relationship within SNEA The SNEA languages were all mutually intelligible to some extent, existing in a dialect chain or linkage, with the boundaries between quite distinct dialects blurred by a series of transitional varieties. All the SNEA languages, including Massachusett, can be differentiated from other Eastern branch languages by several shared innovations including the merger of PEA *hr and *hx into *hš, palatization of PEA *k to SNEA *ty where it occurs after PEA *ē and some instances of PA *i, palatization of PEA *sk in similar environments to *hč and word-final PEA *r merging into *š.Costa, D. J. (2007). pp. 84-101.
Within SNEA, Massachusett shares the most similarity to Narragansett and Nipmuc, its immediate neighbors, with a handful of lexical items indicating an east-west division. For example, the word 'fish' is () in Massachusett, In Nipmuc and Narragansett , all likely pronounced similarly to from Proto-Algonquian *, contrasting with Mohegan-Pequot and Quiripi which derives from a local stem * and an ancient alternative stem for 'fish', *, likely Proto-Western SNEA * . Although Nipmuc is close to Massachusett, it is conservative in that it retains more noun and verb finals that are truncated in most environments in other SNEA languages.Costa, D. J. (2007). pp. 103-106.
N-dialect The most defining feature of Massachusett in comparison to other SNEA languages is the outcome of in reflexes of PEA *r, itself a merger of Proto-Algonquian *r and *θ. Massachusett and its dialects always have and thus its classification as an SNEA N-dialect. This becomes in the Y-dialects of Narragansett, Eastern and Western Niantic and Mohegan-Pequot, in the R-dialects of Quiripi and in the L-dialect Nipmuc language.Costa, D. J. (2007). pp. 91-96.
+ Reflexes of PEA *r in SNEA Proto-Algonquian MassachusettN-dialect /n/ NarragansettY-dialect /j/ NipmucL-dialect /l/ Mohegan-PequotY-dialect /j/ QuiripiR-dialect /r/ English * () dog * () star * (PEA) () fire Only appears with diminutive as 'puppy', more common word is . Possibly Williams' recording of the Coweset dialect.
Lack of syncope 'Abenakian syncope' was an areal feature that had spread from the Abenakian languages to Mahican, a Delawarean language, and was beginning to spread into SNEA during the early colonial period. The feature was obligatory in the Quiripi, Unquachoag, Montauk, Mohegan and Pequot dialects of the Long Island sound, frequent in Nipmuc and mostly absent in Massachusett and Narragansett. For example the 'Fox Sachem' of the Pequot was known to late-stage speakers as whereas the English name 'Uncas' likely preserves an older dialectal and pre-syncopated stage pronunciation of , cf. Massachusett () , indicating that the transition was not complete in New England when the English colonists arrived. When it appears in Massachusett documents, it seems to be indicative of dialectal features or in forced situations, such as sung versions of the Massachusett translations of the Psalms of David in the Massachusee Psalter.Costa, D. J. (2007). pp. 96–99.
In dialects that permitted syncopation, it generally involved the deletion of , and occasionally , usually at the end of a word, after a long vowel, or metrical factors such as the Algonquian stress rules which deleted these vowels in weakly stressed positions. In Massachusett, there are some syncopated forms such as , 'cormorant', and , 'his/her blood', but these are rare instances compared to the more common () and () , respectively, that also appear in Eliot's translations. Although a clear dialectal feature, unfortunately, the majority of documents are of unknown authorship and geographic origin.
+Abenaki-influenced vowel syncope in SNEA English Massachusett Narragansett Nipmuc Mohegan-Pequot Quiripi God gun sea
Locative vs. The locative suffix, as in 'Massachusett' with prevails in a three-to-one ratio over the older variant in the Massachusett-language documents, indicating it was a dialectal feature. In place names of Algonquian origin in Massachusetts, the Massachusett innovation covers most of the Massachusett, Pawtucket, Wampanoag and Coweset areas and also seems to have spread into Narragansett and Nipmuc. However, the Nantucket and Nauset were historically , as were many dialects of Nipmuc and likely in Narragansett, although it is also very likely to have been interchangeable in some dialects. The majority of the people of Natick also mainly used the older variant despite Eliot using the alternate form in his translations. This may be explained by the fact that the original settlers of Natick were Massachusett people from Neponset, but after King Philip's War, the community attracted many Nipmuc whose dialects generally prefer .Costa, D. J. (2007). p. 100.
As Eliot employed the form in his translations, this form spread as the 'standard' in writing. Many instances seem to have been standardized by colonial mapmakers and Indian translators themselves. For instance, the colonists referred to a hill that once existed as Hassunek or Hassunet Hill, but the name survives today as Assonet Street in Worcester. Similarly, Asnacomet Pond, in a formerly Nipmuc-language area, was recorded as 'Asacancomic in the older colonial sources.Huden, J. C. (1962). Indian place names of new england. (pp. 15–385). New York, NY: Museum of the American Indian, Heyes Foundation.Nipmuc placenames of new england. (1995). Historical Series I ed. #III. Thompson, CT: Nipmuc Indian Association of Connecticut. This 'correction' stops at the Connecticut River, as most place names from areas associated with Mahican, such as Hoosic, Housatonic, Mahkeenak, Quassuck and Mananosick and Pocomtuc examples such as Podatuck, Pocumtuck, Sunsick, Norwottuck and Pachassic noticeably lack this feature. Nevertheless, because of the wide dialectal variation, the alone is not diagnostic of Massachusett.
Names Endonyms The traditional method of referring to the language was simply Trumbull, J. H. (1903). p. 27. () , 'that which they [can] speak to each other'Hicks, N. (2006). A list of initials and finals in wôpanâak. (Master's thesis). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. p. 41. From (), 'to speak together' and () [nominalizing suffix]. Dialects or languages that were harder to understand were Trumbull, J. H. (1903). pp. 173, 285. () ,Hicks, N. (2006). p. 37. From , 'difficult' and (), 'language.' 'difficult language', contrasting with () ,Hicks, N. (2006). p. 31. From (), 'strange.' 'foreign' or 'strange language'.