Map of Linguistic Stocks of American Indians, chiefly within the present limits of the United States.

Rare linguistic map of the United States and Canada showing the geographical distribution of the languages spoken by the indigenous peoples of North America.



The base map itself is simple. It has been divided into states by dashed lines and the only real detail is that of the intricate river systems of the continent. There are a few major towns and cities marked and an inset map of the Aleutian Islands appears in the lower left.



This colourful map shows over fifty Native American languages and is based upon the research carried out by John Wesley Powell. The languages that cover larger areas of North America are easy to identify - Siouan shown in pink, Iroquoian in orange Algonquian in dark sage green, Shoshonean in green, Athapascan in grey, Kiowan in brown, Eskimauan outlined in yellow/brown - to name but a few. Some of the colours are used for more than one group of indigenous people, which suggests there was a common language used by these tribes.



The western coastline of the U. S. is densely packed with a wealth of different indigenous people speaking a broad range of native languages. In the Middle West and North East, in contrast, the areas in which specific languages are spoken are far larger alluding to the nomadic lifestyle of the tribes living in those regions.



The map was compiled under the direction of Henry Gannett, who established the geography program in the U.S. Census Office for the Tenth Census (1880), and this example was published as a supplement in the "Eleventh Census of the United States" released circa 1891. This is noted in the upper left margin of the map. The map appears to have originally been created and published in the "Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology" in 1891 to accompany a report on the subject. This is mentioned in the title of the map.



John Wesley Powell (1834-1902) was an explorer, geologist, soldier and anthropologist who is best known for his exploration of the Colorado River and Grand Canyon. Powell was a director at the United States Geological Survey (USGS) between 1881 and 1894 and was the founding director of "The Bureau of American Ethnology" (BAE).



The Bureau of American Ethnology was established in 1879 by an act of Congress in order to re-locate and re-organise research and materials relating to the indigenous people of North America and moved it to the Smithsonian Institute. This archive survives today as the National Anthropological Archives.

Printed colour. [AMER2183]