Records Relating to Personal Names

Object Details

See more items in: John Peabody Harrington papers; John Peabody Harrington papers / Series 8: Notes and Writings on Special Linguistic Studies

Collection Citation: John Peabody Harrington papers, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution; The preferred citation for the Harrington Papers will reference the actual location within the collection, i.e. Box 172, Alaska/Northwest Coast, Papers of John Peabody Harrington, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution. However, as the NAA understands the need to cite phrases or vocabulary on specific pages, a citation referencing the microfilmed papers is acceptable. Please note that the page numbering of the PDF version of the Harrington microfilm does not directly correlate to the analog microfilm frame numbers. If it is necessary to cite the microfilmed papers, please refer to the specific page number of the PDF version, as in: Papers of John Peabody Harrington, Microfilm: MF 7, R34 page 42.

Existence and Location of Copies: Microfilm and digital surrogates of microfilm are available. See Volume 8, reel 12, which also contains materials from other subseries. Only original documents created by Harrington, his collaborators and field assistants, or notes given to him were microfilmed.

Scope and Contents: This subseries of the Notes and writings on special linguistic studies series contains several small files which Harrington compiled while employed as a teacher at Santa Ana High School during the period 1907 to 1909. One set of notes deals with the origin of children's nicknames. It includes a sheet of instructions which Harrington circulated among other teachers requesting participation in his survey. This is followed by the slips of paper returned to him by students in the 5th through 8th grade, providing their sex, any nicknames, and brief explanations of their derivation. One slip is dated December 14, 1908. There is also an alphabetical slip file which Harrington made of some of the names. An Acoma term is on the reverse side of one of the slips. A second set of notes labeled "Patronymics" is a file of American surnames arranged into ten categories according to etymology (occupations, towns and estates, nature, and so forth). The similarity of the paper suggests that this file was prepared at about the same time as that on nicknames. There are also an alphabetical list of names--probably a class list--and a note on placenames used as surnames.