Though written characters are generally associated with speech, they
are shown, by successful employment in hieroglyphs and by educated
deaf-mutes to be representative of ideas without the intervention
of sounds, and so also are the outlines of signs. This will be
more apparent if the motions expressing the most prominent feature,
attribute, or function of an object are made, or supposed to be made,
so as to leave a luminous track impressible upon the eye separate from
the members producing it. The actual result is an immateriate graphic
representation of visible objects and qualities which, invested with
substance, has become familiar to us as the _rebus_, and also appears
in the form of heraldic blazonry styled punning or "canting."
Gesture language is, in fact, not only a picture language, but
is actual writing, though dissolving and sympathetic, and neither
alphabetic nor phonetic.
Dalgarno aptly says: "_Qui enim caput nutat, oculo connivet, digitum
movet in aere, &c., (ad mentis cogitata exprimendum); is non minus
vere scribit, quam qui Literas pingit in Charta, Marmore, vel aere._"
It is neither necessary nor proper to enter now upon any prolonged
account of the origin, of alphabetic writing. There is, however,
propriety, if not necessity, for the present writer, when making
any remarks under this heading and under some others in this paper
indicating special lines of research, to disclaim all pretension
to being a Sinologue or Egyptologist, or even profoundly versed in
Mexican antiquities. His partial and recently commenced studies only
enable him to present suggestions for the examination of scholars.
These suggestions may safely be introduced by the statement that the
common modern alphabetic characters, coming directly from the Romans,
were obtained by them from the Greeks, and by the latter from the
Phoenicians, whose alphabet was connected with that of the old Hebrew.
It has also been of late the general opinion that the whole family of
alphabets to which the Greek, Latin, Gothic, Runic, and others belong,
appearing earlier in the Phoenician, Moabite, and Hebrew, had its
beginning in the ideographic pictures of the Egyptians, afterwards
used by them to express sounds. That the Chinese, though in a
different manner from the Egyptians, passed from picture writing to
phonetic writing, is established by delineations still extant among
them, called _ku-w[)a]n_, or "ancient pictures," with which some of
the modern written characters can be identified. The ancient Mexicans
also, to some extent, developed phonetic expressions out of a very
elaborate system of ideographic picture writing. Assuming that
ideographic pictures made by ancient peoples would be likely to
contain representations of gesture signs, which subject is treated of
below, it is proper to examine if traces of such gesture signs may not
be found in the Egyptian, Chinese, and Aztec characters. Only a few
presumptive examples, selected from a considerable number, are now
presented in which the signs of the North American Indians appear to
be included, with the hope that further investigation by collaborators
will establish many more instances not confined to Indian signs.
A typical sign made by the Indians for _no_, _negation_, is as
follows: The hand extended or slightly curved is held in front of the
body, a little to the right of the median line; it is then carried
with a rapid sweep a foot or more farther to the right. (_Mandan and
Hidatsa_ I.)
One for _none_, _nothing_, sometimes used for simple negation, is also
given: Throw both hands outward toward their respective sides from the
breast. (_Wyandot_ I.)
With these compare the two forms of the Egyptian character for _no_,
_negation_, Fig. 118, taken from Champollion, _Grammaire Egyptienne_,
_Paris_, 1836, p. 519.
[Illustration: Fig. 118.]
No vivid fancy is needed to see the hands indicated at the extremities
of arms extended symmetrically from the body on each side.
[Illustration: Fig. 119.]
Also compare the Maya character for the same idea of negation, Fig.
119, found in Landa, _Relation des Choses de Yucatan_, _Paris_, 1864,
316. The Maya word for negation is "_ma_," and the word "_mak_,"
a six-foot measuring rod, given by Brasseur de Bourbourg in his
dictionary, apparently having connection with this character, would
in use separate the hands as illustrated, giving the same form as the
gesture made without the rod.
Another sign for _nothing_, _none_, made by the Comanches, is: Flat
hand thrown forward, back to the ground, fingers pointing forward
and downward. Frequently the right hand is brushed over the left thus
thrown out.
[Illustration: Fig. 120.]
Compare the Chinese character for the same meaning, Fig. 120. This
will not be recognized as a hand without study of similar characters,
which generally have a cross-line cutting off the wrist. Here the
wrist bones follow under the cross cut, then the metacarpal bones, and
last the fingers, pointing forward and downward.
[Illustration: Fig. 121.]
[Illustration: Fig. 122.]
[Illustration: Fig. 123.]
The Arapaho sign for _child_, _baby_, is the forefinger in the mouth,
i.e., a nursing child, and a natural sign of a deaf-mute is the same.
The Egyptian figurative character for the same is seen in Fig.
121. Its linear form is Fig. 122, and its hieratic is Fig. 123
(Champollion, _Dictionnaire Egyptien_, _Paris_, 1841, p. 31.)
[Illustration: Fig. 124.]
[Illustration: Fig. 125.]
[Illustration: Fig. 126.]
[Illustration: Fig. 127.]
These afford an interpretation to the ancient Chinese form for _son_,
Fig. 124, given in _Journ. Royal Asiatic Society_, I, 1834, p. 219,
as belonging to the Shang dynasty, 1756, 1112 B.C., and the modern
Chinese form, Fig. 125, which, without the comparison, would not be
supposed to have any pictured reference to an infant with hand
or finger at or approaching the mouth, denoting the taking of
nourishment. Having now suggested this, the Chinese character for
_birth_, Fig. 126, is understood as the expression of a common gesture
among the Indians, particularly reported from the Dakota, for _born_,
_to be born_, viz: Place the left hand in front of the body, a little
to the right, the palm downward and slightly arched, then pass the
extended right hand downward, forward, and upward, forming a short
curve underneath the left, as in Fig. 127 (_Dakota_ V). This is based
upon the curve followed by the head of the child during birth, and is
used generically. The same curve, when made with one hand, appears in
Fig. 128.
[Illustration: Fig. 128.]
It may be of interest to compare with the Chinese _child_ the Mexican
abbreviated character for _man_, Fig. 129, found in Pipart in _Compte
Rendu Cong. Inter. des Americanistes, 2me Session_, _Luxembourg_,
1877, 1878, II, 359. The figure on the right is called the abbreviated
form of that by its side, yet its origin may be different.
[Illustration: Fig. 129.]
[Illustration: Fig. 130.]
The Chinese character for _man_, is Fig. 130, and may have the same
obvious conception as a Dakota sign for the same signification: "Place
the extended index, pointing upward and forward before the lower
portion of the abdomen."
The Chinese specific character for _woman_ is Fig. 131, the cross mark
denoting the wrist, and if the remainder be considered the hand,
the fingers may be imagined in the position made by many tribes, and
especially the Utes, as depicting the _pudendum muliebre_, Fig. 132.
[Illustration: Fig. 131.]
[Illustration: Fig. 132.]
The Egyptian generic character for _female_ is [Symbol: semicircle]
(Champollion, _Dict._,) believed to represent the curve of the mammae
supposed to be cut off or separated from the chest, and the gesture
with the same meaning was made by the Cheyenne Titchkematski, and
photographed, as in Fig. 133. It forms the same figure as the Egyptian
character as well as can be done by a position of the human hand.
[Illustration: Fig. 133.]
The Chinese character for _to give water_ is Fig. 134, which may be
compared with the common Indian gesture _to drink_, _to give water_,
viz: "Hand held with tips of fingers brought together and passed to
the mouth, as if scooping up water", Fig. 135, obviously from the
primitive custom, as with Mojaves, who still drink with scooped hands.
[Illustration: Fig. 134.]
[Illustration: Fig. 135.]
Another common Indian gesture sign for _water to drink_, _I want
to drink_, is: "Hand brought downward past the mouth with loosely
extended fingers, palm toward the face." This appears in the Mexican
character for _drink_, Fig. 136, taken from Pipart, _loc. cit._, p.
351. _Water_, i.e., the pouring out of water with the drops falling
or about to fall, is shown in Fig. 137, taken from the same author (p.
349), being the same arrangement of them as in the sign for _rain_,
Fig. 114, p. 344, the hand, however, being inverted. _Rain_ in the
Mexican picture writing is shown by small circles inclosing a dot,
as in the last two figures, but not connected together, each having a
short line upward marking the line of descent.
[Illustration: Fig. 136.]
[Illustration: Fig. 137.]
With the gesture for drink may be compared Fig. 138, the Egyptian
Goddess Nu in the sacred sycamore tree, pouring out the water of life
to the Osirian and his soul, represented as a bird, in Amenti (Sharpe,
from a funereal stele in the British Museum, in _Cooper's Serpent
Myths_, p. 43).
[Illustration: Fig. 138.]
The common Indian gesture for _river_ or _stream_, _water_, is made by
passing the horizontal flat hand, palm down, forward and to the left
from the right side in a serpentine manner.
[Illustration: Fig. 139.]
The Egyptian character for the same is Fig. 139 (Champollion, _Dict._,
p. 429). The broken line is held to represent the movement of the
water on the surface of the stream. When made with one line less
angular and more waving it means _water_. It is interesting to compare
with this the identical character in the syllabary invented by a West
African negro, Mormoru Doalu Bukere, for _water_, [Symbol: water,
represented by a wavy line], mentioned by TYLOR in his _Early History
of Mankind_, p. 103.
The abbreviated Egyptian sign for _water_ as a stream is Fig. 140
(Champollion, _loc. cit._), and the Chinese for the same is as in Fig.
141.
[Illustration: Fig. 140.]
[Illustration: Fig. 141.]
In the picture-writing of the Ojibwa the Egyptian abbreviated
character, with two lines instead of three, appears with the same
signification.
The Egyptian character for _weep_, Fig. 142, an eye, with tears
falling, is also found in the pictographs of the Ojibwa (Schoolcraft,
I, pl. 54, Fig. 27), and is also made by the Indian gesture of drawing
lines by the index repeatedly downward from the eye, though perhaps
more frequently made by the full sign for _rain_, described on page
344, made with the back of the hand downward from the eye--"eye rain."
[Illustration: Fig. 142.]
The Egyptian character for _to be strong_ is Fig. 143 (Champollion,
_Dict._, p. 91), which is sufficiently obvious, but may be compared
with the sign for _strong_, made by some tribes as follows: Hold the
clinched fist in front of the right side, a little higher than the
elbow, then throw it forcibly about six inches toward the ground.
[Illustration: Fig. 143.]
A typical gesture for _night_ is as follows: Place the flat hands,
horizontally, about two feet apart, move them quickly in an upward
curve toward one another until the right lies across the left.
"Darkness covers all." See Fig. 312, page 489.
The conception of covering executed by delineating the object covered
beneath the middle point of an arch or curve, appears also clearly in
the Egyptian characters for _night_, Fig. 144 (Champollion, _Dict._,
p. 3).
[Illustration: Fig. 144.]
The upper part of the character is taken separately to form that for
sky (see page 372, _infra_).
[Illustration: Fig. 145.]
The Egyptian figurative and linear characters, Figs. 145 and 146
(Champollion, _Dict._, p. 28), for _calling upon_ and _invocation_,
also used as an interjection, scarcely require the quotation of an
Indian sign, being common all over the world.
[Illustration: Fig. 146.]
The gesture sign made by several tribes for _many_ is as follows: Both
hands, with spread and slightly curved fingers, are held pendent about
two feet apart before the thighs; then bring them toward one another,
horizontally, drawing them upward as they come together. (_Absaroka_
I; _Shoshoni and Banak_ I; _Kaiowa_ I; _Comanche_ III; _Apache_ II;
_Wichita_ II.) "An accumulation of objects." This may be the same
motion indicated by the Egyptian character, Fig. 147, meaning to
_gather together_ (Champollion, _Dict._, p. 459).
[Illustration: Fig. 147.]
[Illustration: Fig. 148.]
[Illustration: Fig. 149.]
The Egyptian character, Fig. 148, which in its linear form is
represented in Fig. 149, and meaning to _go_, to _come_, _locomotion_,
is presented to show readers unfamiliar with hieroglyphics how a
corporeal action may be included in a linear character without
being obvious or at least certain, unless it should be made clear
by comparison with the full figurative form or by other means. This
linear form might be noticed many times without certainty or perhaps
suspicion that it represented the human legs and feet in the act of
walking. The same difficulty, of course, as also the same prospect of
success by careful research, attends the tracing of other corporeal
motions which more properly come under the head of gesture signs.
_SIGN LANGUAGE WITH REFERENCE TO GRAMMAR._
Apart from the more material and substantive relations between signs
and language, it is to be expected that analogies can by proper
research be ascertained between their several developments in the
manner of their use, that is, in their grammatic mechanism, and in the
genesis of the sentence. The science of language, ever henceforward to
be studied historically, must take account of the similar early mental
processes in which the phrase or sentence originated, both in sign and
oral utterance. In this respect, as in many others, the North American
Indians may be considered to be living representatives of prehistoric
man.