Carolina Algonquian language

Carolina Algonquian (also known as Pamlico, Croatoan) was an Algonquian language of the Eastern Algonquian subgroup formerly spoken in North Carolina, United States.

Carolina Algonquian
Pamlico
Native to	United States
Region	North Carolina
Ethnicity	Carolina Algonquians (Croatan, Secotan, Pamlico, Machapunga, Roanoke, Weapemoc, Chowanoc)
Extinct	1790s
Language family	Algic Algonquian Eastern Algonquian Carolina Algonquian
Language codes
ISO 639-3	Either: crr – Carolina Algonquian pmk – Pamlico (deprecated)
Linguist List	crr Carolina Algonquian
	pmk Pamlico
Glottolog	caro1243
Tribal territories of the North Carolina Algonquins, Machapunga (previously known as Secotan) (subgroups Roanoke, Bear River), Chowanoke and Weapemeoc (subgroups Poteskeit and Paspatank), 1657-1795

Classification

Carolina Algonquian forms a part of the same language group as Powhatan or Virginia Algonquian, a similarly extinct language of the Eastern Algonquian subgroup of the Algonquian language family, itself a member of the Algic language family.

Translation into English

In 1584 Sir Walter Raleigh had dispatched the first of a number of expeditions to Roanoke Island to explore and eventually settle the New World. Early encounters with the natives were friendly, and, despite the difficulties in communication, the explorers were able to persuade "two of the savages, being lustie men, whose names were Wanchese and Manteo" to accompany them on the return voyage to London, in order for the English people to report both the conditions of the New World that they had explored and what the usefulness of the territory might be to the English.

Once safely delivered to England, the two Indians quickly made a sensation at court. Raleigh's priority, however, was not publicity but rather intelligence about his new land of Virginia. He restricted access to the exotic newcomers, assigning the scientist Thomas Harriot the job of deciphering and learning the Carolina Algonquian language, using a phonetic alphabet of his own invention in order to effect the translation.

Legacy

The Carolina Algonquian language is now extinct, and the communities in which it flourished are gone. However, a number of Eastern Algonquian loan words have survived by being absorbed into the English language. Among them are: moccasin, moose, opossum, papoose, pecan, raccoon, skunk, squash, squaw, and wigwam.^{[citation needed]}

See also

• Aquascogoc
• Dasamongueponke
• Powhatan language
• Pamlico
• Secotan

Notes

1. Raymond G. Gordon Jr., ed. 2005. Ethnologue: Languages of the World. 15th edition. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics.
2. Milton, p.63
3. Mancall, Peter C. Hakluyt's Promise: An Elizabethan's Obsession for an English America. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007. 159.
4. Vaughan, Alden T. "Sir Walter Raleigh's Indian Interpreters, 1584-1618." The William and Mary Quarterly 59.2 (2002): 346-347.
5. Milton, p.70