A Dictionary of the Choctaw Language (1915) & Grammar of the Choctaw Language (1870) - Two Books in One Kindle Edition

by Cyrus Byington, Bureau of American Ethnology (Editor), John Reed Swanton (Editor)

This paperback edition includes both of Reverend Cyrus Byington's important works on the Choctaw Language. "A Dictionary of the Choctaw Language" is the complete 642-page Choctaw language dictionary, in black and white, scanned from the original of 1915. This dictionary provides a method for looking up the original Choctaw word to find the associated English meaning, as well as a reverse lookup for English to Choctaw, which is int he second half of the dictionary. "A Grammar of the Choctaw Language" is Byington's 62-page book that outlines and explains Choctaw grammar in great depth, with examples. Both are high quality, color scans of the original books, with sharp, bold text.

This edition is a good choice over the previous, lower quality editions currently available, and conveniently contains both Choctaw language resources in one book.

683 pages, Paperback

Published November 28, 2021

About the author

Cyrus Byington (March 11, 1793 – December 31, 1868) was a White Christian missionary from Massachusetts who began working with the Choctaw in Mississippi in 1821. Although he had been trained as a lawyer, he abandoned law as a career and became a minister affiliated with the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. During this period he learned the Choctaw language, which was then entirely unwritten. He also began to develop a Choctaw orthography.

After the U.S. government began enforcing its Indian Removal policy to relocate Native Americans from their lands in the Southeastern states to Indian Territory, later called Oklahoma, during the 19th century. In 1835, Byington and his family returned to the new Choctaw homeland and founded a mission near Eagletown. He sought to construct a lexicon and develop other linguistic tools for the Choctaw language to translate Christian prayers, hymns, and bible passages. Byington's work is considered one of the most complete lexicons for a Native American language. He worked nearly 50 years translating Choctaw as a written language.