Daily national Democrat., 1859-10-25
Invention of the Cherokee Alphabet, and
creation of Written Language.


Gle, under the above caption, by John f.
Wheeler, one of the editors of that paper
He is correct in all his observations, with one
exception. Unless we are very much mis-.
taken, George Guess, or sequoyah, was
full. blooded Indian.
An account of this extraordinary savage
may be found in the works of the renowned
Metaphysician, Upham in his article on the
Origin of Language. Upham pronounces
him one of the greatest men that either con-
tineat has ever produced.
The following is the article from the Ar
kansas Times:
George Guess. the inventor, [of the Chero.
kee alphabet and therefore the creator of the
whole written language of that people was
half-blood Cherokee. He could not speak
the English language, and, of course, was an
uneducated man, without even the KNOWLEDGE
OF letters, or characters of any language what.
ever. He was. in every respect, the same as
a ful-blood Indian. 1t appears that the fret
idea he ever had about writing, was when he
was young man, engaged in war If we
recolect right at ST. Clair's defeat, he. and
some of his Cherokee companions were to-
gether, when one of them picked up piece
ofpaper, with writing on it, aud looked at it
awhile, remarked that it was very strange
the white people could put down talk on a
piece of paper, and send it to another pers on
at distance, and that person could under
stand the talk on that paper. To this Guess
replied, that it was not very hard to do the
like. and took up fiat stone and with a
smaller stone made few marks, and then
pretended to read it to the Others
After this, the matter passed off from his
thoughts for many years. but the subject
presented itself again to his mind after oh
serving the advantages the white people de.
rived from books He therefore, without
consulting any of his friends, put him up
log cabin, some distance from the cabin in
which his family lived, and set about study
ing out an alphabet for the Cherokee Ian
guage. His house was then in wins Valley.
in the then limits of Alabama, but at that
time occupied as the old Cherokee Nation.
We have seen the spot many times, and have
been upon it; the cabin was gone. and the.
place grown up with bushes. In this retreat.
Guess secluded himself from his family and
friends, and neglected his corn fields and all
of his matters, and so much was he occupied
in the invention, and so engrossed was his
mind on the subject, that he was supposed to
be bewitched by his Cherokee neighbors.-
What made it appear more like something
was the matter with him, was the fact that
no one knew what he was doing, and thew
supposed that he was engaged with evil
spirits or witches. In oil of his studies, he
had no books, but an old spelling book of
Noah Websters, and he did not know a let
ter or word in it. For two years he con
tinued his studies, and tried in every manner
to fall upon some plan to represent sounds.
lie attempted by the whistling of birds, but
that did not aid him much.
All this time he did not fag or appear to
be discouraged His fields grew Nd in grass
and weeds, and his family had to subsist
without his aid. No one visited him in his
studies, except a little daughter and all were
wondering what he was doing His wife be
came tired of his conduct, and upbraided
him; but he continued his course, and after
he had satisfied himself that he had succeed
ed, he learned his little daughter the charac
ters, so she could read. The characters con-
sisted OF sc in number, when first invented,
but one of them has since been dropped, and
now there are only SO, all of them syllubles
except one, which is a Kissing sound, and
may be properly called 5. If we had an al.
phabet, we would give it to our readers but
not having any Cherokee type, will only con-
tinue the narrative of its invention and pro-
mitigation among the Cherokee Indians.
Guess as before stated, had no book ex-
cept Webster's spelling book out of which he
took several letters to represent sounds, or
syllables in his alphabet, as for instance, the
letter A. is called go, and the letter j. is call
ed gu, etc. Several others of the English al
phabet are used, but the greater part he in
vented himself, and are unlike anything we
ever saw before.
After he had finished his alphabet he tried
to get some of his people to learn it, but
they would have nothing to do with it. His
little daughter would read anything her IA.
ther would write to their people, but they
could not he induced to learn the alphabet,
believing there was witchcraft in it, and after
trying long time to induce his people to
learn it, he found he could do nothing with
them. So he came to Arkansas, and among
them he found those who were willing to
learn the alphabet. After he had been in
Arkansas some time, he procured the writing
of several letters in his new alphabet ad-
dressed to his old friends in the Cherokee Ma
ton east. lie returned home, if our memory
serves u.s. and after producing them, he pre-
vailed on those to whom the letters were
written to learn the alphabet, and they read
the letters. From that time the knowledge
began to spread of putting talk on paper
throughout the nation, and crude alphabets
were written on paper, sometimes on boards,
or the side of II tree was hewn smooth and
the alphabet written on it with charcoal. We
recollect when we first entered the nation,
on riding along the road, of seeing Cherokee
characters written on the trees, and names
cut in the bark oft beech.
We do not reeollect the year that the al
phabet was invented, but presume it was
about 1924 or '25. We would here remark
that as the characters are syllable, it is only
necessary to learn them to be able to read at
once. without going through the tedious pro-
cess of learning to spell as in the English and
other languages. There are six vowels, and
to these six vOwels are attached eonsonants
or sounds, like our ba, be, hi, DO, bu, by, etc,
though with the Cherokees there is no sound
of b, {, p, or V, in the whole language, and
full-blood Indian cannot artcuate these
sounds. We mean those who speak only the
Cherokee language The lips are seldom
u ed except in the use of the m, and that is
only used in reference to the name of water,
or salt as one word, anna, is used for both.
The characters were placed in the alphabet,
by Guess, as they were invented; but otter
wards systematized by the late Rev, Mr..
Worcester, in a table like our ba, be, etc.
The consonants used in the alphabet are G,
h, !, m, n, q, :, t, W, y-the G, in some in
stances approaching the sound of k, and the
t, to that of d. We would here remark, that
we give the consonants as used by the Gee
too wa gee dialect, which is the principal dia-
lect The Gee too'wa-gees cannot pronounce
r, but, in an effort to pronounce that letter,
they always use the |, and the Overhills in