PREFACE. EVERY book is more or less a confession of egotism, but when the work contains little beside a schedule of the author's personal property, it needs something more than the usual prefatory apology, for his exculpation. Few readers will be interested in his plea for condonement of his offense, and fewer still will care to learn, that his work had its origin, in motives more honorable than ostentatious display. A general catalogue of works illustrative of the history, literature, and archæology of the Aborigines of both Americas, had been in progress of composition for several years, as a guide to the author's collection of that class of books. As it grew in proportions, by the slow accretions which study and experience furnished, the author's vanity was easily flattered into the design of producing a work of more general utility. The material collected at length covered so wide a range, that it embraced not only transcripts of the titles of such printed works as were personally examined, or were to be found in catalogues of public and private libraries, with a collation of their pages, and synopses of their contents, but also the titles of articles upon the same subjects, printed in reviews, historical collections, magazines, and other ephemera. More than two thousand five hundred separate works, and twelve hundred essays, had been catalogued, with their topical range noted, before the vast extent of the unexplored territory to be examined, began to exhibit some of its formidable proportions. It was plainly demonstrated, that the projected task must be either abandoned or greatly abridged. That portion of the task which could be most readily detached and wrought into unity, was the catalogue of works on the American Aborigines, in the author's possession. To determine the selection of works which should be included in that category, they have been subjected to a few simple rules of classification. All works which purported in their titles to contain historic, narrative, or literary material, relating to the American Indians. Books in which any distinct portion, chapter, or appendix claimed by its heading, or table of contents to be devoted to that subject. Works containing engravings, illustrative of the manners and peculiarities of the aborigines, when derived from actual observation. All treatises, or essays, upon their origin, or the pre-Columbian discovery of America, as affecting the source of its population. Those works of fiction or poetry founded on Indian life, to which were appended historical notes, incidents of personal experience, or traditions and legends, of the Indians. All works containing grammatical analyses, or vocabularies of their language, as well as translations, into or from them, would of course form a part of the collection. In a limited number of cases, marked with a star (*), books not actually in the author's collection have been admitted to the catalogue. This exceptional adoption has been made to complete the bibliographical history of those series of works of which the library contained only a portion, and thus afford the collector a full view of such treatises as complete any section of the subject. In a few cases, the titles have been much abbreviated, but only when they formed a complete table of contents to the work, or a feeble prolixity of matters foreign to the subject of the catalogue. Indian Bibliography. ABBILDUNG. Nordamericanischer. Lander und Eingebohrner Wilden dabey die Erd-Beschreybung und Natur Seltenheiten der dortigen Gegenden, auch die son derbahren Gebrauche des Landes Einwohner, die Handlung, Policey and Regiments. Verfassung... Erfurt. Folding plate, pp. xii+360. J. H. Nonnens. 1787. 1 [A picture of North America and the Aboriginal Savages inhabiting it.] The viiith Atheilung is entitled: "Of the North American Wildmen" (Indians), and occupies pp. 220-262. The folding plate has in the foreground a view of a battle between two tribes of savages. ABBOTT (John S. C.) History of King Philip (Sovereign Chief of the Wampanoags). Including the early history of the Settlers of New England. With engravings. 12° 410 pp. New York, 1857. 2 Frontispiece, Engraved Title, Full Title, Contents, Table of Illustrations, each leaf; pages 12 to 410 including eleven engravings with reverse of each blank. ABBOTT (Jacob). American History, by Jacob Abbott, illustrated with numerous maps and engravings. Vol. I. Aboriginal America. New York, n. d. (1860.) ABERT (J. W.) 12° 3 Report of the Secretary of War communicating in answer to a resolution of the Senate, a Report and Map of the Examination of New Mexico, made by Lieutenant J. W. Abert. 8° 132 pp. Map and 23 plates. Washington, 1848. 4 The accounts of the author's visits to the Pueblos or fortified Indian villages of Northern Mexico, with several portraits of the chiefs and their families, form the principal interest of this volume. ABSARAKA. See Carrington, M. J. ACCOUNT 5 Of the proceedings of the Illinois and Ouabache Land Companies. See Smith, William. ACCOUNTS 6 Of Two Attempts towards the Civilization of Some Indian Natives. 8° London, n. d. (1806.) 1 7 ACOSTA (Joseph). 8 Father Acosta, a native of Medina del Campo, entered the Society of Jesus at the age of fourteen, and in 1571 when thirty-one years old, became the deputy provincial of Peru. He died at Salamanca in 1600, having passed the greater part of the intervening years in America. His work has been justly esteemed for its intrinsic merit, indubitable evidence of which is found in the fact that it has been translated into almost every language of Europe having a literature. Books V., VI., and VII. pp. 327 to 590, are entirely devoted to a relation of the history, customs and warres of the Indians. This portion of the work is replete with the most curious details of the Aborigines, before their peculiar customs had become modified by contact with the whites. Although he was one of the earliest, yet he was one of the most curious and accurate observers of the customs and peculiarities of the Aborigines who have attempted to describe them. Scarcely a trait which has excited the attention of the historian or the narrator in the three centuries which have elapsed, has escaped his observation and description. Perfect copies of the English edition are quite rare, but the others are often sold at very low rates. ACOSTA (Joseph de). Iosephi | Acosta | societatis | Iesv | de Natvra Novi Orbis | libri duo. Et De Promvlgatione | evangelii apud | Barbaros sine de pro cvranda Indorvm | salute Libri Sex. | Coloniae Agrippinae, In officiana Birckmannica, Sumptibus Arnoldi Mylii 1596. Cum gratia, & Priuilegio S. Cas Maiest. 12° xvi. prelim. pp. 581. 9 ["Joseph Acosta of the Society of Jesus. Natural History of the New World, in two books, And of the Promulgation of the Gospel among the Savages; with the method of securing the salvation of the Indians; In Six Books."] This is an entirely distinct work from the Historia Natural printed at Seville in 1590, and translated into almost every language of Europe. Books one and two were subsequently enlarged to the Natural History, but at page 99 the title "De Procuranda Salvte Indorum" announces another work which has never been printed in English. All the remainder of the volume is devoted to a description of the methods by which the Indians of the New World were to be brought into the dominion of the Christian Church. All the difficulties are investigated. Their idolatries, their superstitions, their rites, their customs, their love of warfare, and the chase, their licentionsness, and their savage habits, are all described, and the various means by which the rites of the Christian discipline can be made to control them discussed. Pinelo claims that this portion of Acosta's work was taken from the MSS. of a Dominican monk named Diego Duran. This is the second edition, the first having been printed at Salamanca the year previous. The six books relating to the Indians are divided into 130 chapters with subject headings. |