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== Introduction == | |||
Several people asked me for a translation of the Iroquois Opening Address to Creation, Ohenton Karihwatehkwen (The Words that Come Before All Else) that Frances had asked me to do last Friday. | |||
To learn the Opening was one of my learning objectives, and I was happy to do it; it was good practice. | |||
As I mentioned, the Opening has a frozen form, but free words. Everyone says it differently, even the same speaker on different occasions. | |||
That being said, I prefer to provide a variety of samples, all of which can be found on the internet as follows: | |||
== Very short version == | |||
http://www.tyendinaga.net/ohenton/ | |||
== Super short version == | |||
http://dream-turtle.blogspot.com/2007/08/tyendinaga-powwow-ohenton.html | |||
== Very Short version with graphics == | |||
http://www.northcountrypublicradio.org/arts/hoi5/page1.html | |||
== Short version == | |||
http://www.peace4turtleisland.org/pages/thanksgiving.htm | |||
The version I did was slightly longer than the longest above; however, it was still a short version. | |||
For several longer versions see "From the earth to beyond the sky : an ethnographic approach to four Longhouse Iroquois speech events" by Michael K Foster (1974). It's in the Webster Library. Note however these versions are quite Christianized, reflecting the times (19th and 20th centuries) | |||
and place (Ontario). | |||
For a discussion about the Opening, see "Spoken here : travels among threatened languages" written by Mark Abley (2003), the Montreal Gazette reporter. This book contains a chapter on the Mohawk language entitled "The words that come before all else." This chapter reveals a significant number of interviews and explains some of the difficulties translating Mohawk into English. | |||
Another source that explains this difficulty is the film series "Milennium" which Jonathon has in his possession at the moment. | |||
My favorite source is my old classmate Jimmy Gilbert who describes the difference as that between color TV and black & white. He also compares listening to Mohawk being like eating three-flavored ice-cream, while listening to English is like eating vanilla. | |||
At a later time, should the occasion arise, I would like to take the risk of saying a few words about the last Friday's version. | |||