MS 2012 Three untitled Fox stories collected by Truman Michelson
odd: label: Local Numbers
content: NAA MS 2012
name: label: Collector
content: Michelson, Truman, 1879-1938
label: Creator
content: Peters, Sam, 1885-
label: Creator
content: Peters, Jim, 1866-
label: Translator
content: Poweshiek, Horace
topic: label: Topic
content: Fox language
label: Topic
content: Language and languages -- Documentation
label: Topic
content: Meskwaki; Sauk & Fox
label: Topic
content: Indians of North America -- Northeast
creator: label: Collector
content: Michelson, Truman, 1879-1938
label: Creator
content: Peters, Sam, 1885-
label: Creator
content: Peters, Jim, 1866-
label: Translator
content: Poweshiek, Horace
culture: label: Culture
content: Fox
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 138 Pages
unitdate: label: Date
content: undated
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Anthropological Archives
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NAA.MS2012
objectType: label: Type
content: Collection descriptions
label: Type
content: Archival materials
label: Type
content: Pages
label: Type
content: Folklore
label: Type
content: Narratives
label: Type
content: Manuscripts
processinfo: label: Processing Information
content: The description of this manuscript was updated in 2024 based on information provided by Dr. Patricia Afable, Research Assistant to the Linguistic Editor of the Handbook of North American Indians, and Dr. Lucy Thomason, National Museum of Natural History Museum Technician (linguistics).
altformavail: label: Existence and Location of Copies
content: Digital surrogates are available online.
genre_format: label: Genre/Form
content: Folklore
label: Genre/Form
content: Narratives
label: Genre/Form
content: Manuscripts
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: This collection contains four untitled stories by Sam Peters, handwritten in Meskwaki syllabary, with English translations by Horace Poweshiek. The texts were collected by Truman Michelson in Tama, Iowa. Although Jim Peters is identified as the source of the text, the handwriting matches that of his son, Sam Peters. The texts are a story about a man named Wêtônesiwa; a story about ten people who travel around the island Earth and encounter all kinds of strange folk, including game animals who at first glance look like humans; a story about two men who find a passage to a world under our Earth where corn and buffalo are plentiful; and a winter story involving a transformation flight, a tale which Truman Michelson glossed as "partially like [William] Jones' Daughters of Mesōswa; partially like last part of [William Jones'] Ojibwa Blue Garter (European)." See William Jones, Fox Texts (Late E. J. Brill, 1907), 195-201 and William Jones and Truman Michelson, ed., Ojibwa Texts collected by William Jones, Publications of the American Ethnological Society, vol. 7, part 2 (G. E. Stechert and Co., 1919), 23-43.