Collection ID: 0002 | Metadata type: TEI | TEI XML | Data

Title

Wallam-Olum

Authors

• Rafinesque, C. S. 1783-1840

Other related names

• Mayer, Brantz, 1809-1879, former owner
• Brinton, Daniel Garrison, 1837-1899, former owner

Call number

Ms. Coll. 700 Item 217
(3420 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-6206., University of Pennsylvania, Rare Book & Manuscript Library)

Alternate identifiers

• bibid: 9925714713503681
• http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/122492334
• http://hdl.library.upenn.edu/1017/d/medren/2571471

Publisher

University of Pennsylvania

Language

English and purported Delaware

Origin

Date

1833

Place

Philadelphia?

Summary

Two notebooks bound together containing supposed translations of poems about creation and arrival in America (first notebook, Part I, f. 1r-23v) and historical chronicles of events after arrival in America (second notebook, Part II, f. 24r-44v) in Delaware words and pictographs, made and later published by C. S. Rafinesque. This manuscript is now challenged as a hoax manufactured by Rafinesque.

Notes

• Ms. codex.
   
• Title from caption title for Part II (f. 24r); the caption title for Part I reads Wallamolum (f. 24r).
   

Extent

46 leaves : 199 x 160 mm. bound to 204 x 175 mm

Foliation

Paper, x (later 19th-century paper) + 46 + x (later 19th-century paper); modern foliation in pencil, lower right recto.

Support

Paper

Binding

19th-century half leather with marbled endpapers.

Layout

Beneath each verse in Delaware are 3 rough columns of Delaware words, English translations, and a numbered pictograph.

Script

Written in cursive script in the hand of C. S. Rafinesque.

Provenance

• Rafinesque supposedly purchased the "wooden original" of these texts in Kentucky in 1822 (note on title page, f. 2r).
   
• Formerly owned by Brantz Mayer, corresponding secretary of the Maryland Historical Society (note about the manuscript signed by him and dated 1876 is bound in at the end of the manuscript, f. 46r).
   
• Formerly owned by Daniel Garrison Brinton (ex libris stamp on verso of front endpaper, and on title page, f. 2r).
   

Subjects topical

• Delaware Indians--History
• Delaware Indians--Legends
• Delaware Indians--Writing
• Delaware language--Texts
• Indians of North America--Languages

Genres

• Drawings
• Histories
• Poems
• Translations
• Manuscripts, American--19th century

Licenses

• Text

  These images and the content of Rare Book & Manuscript Library Ms. Coll. 700 Item 217: Wallam-Olum are free of known copyright restrictions and in the public domain. See the Creative Commons Public Domain Mark page for usage details, http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/.

  URL

  http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

• Text

  Metadata is ©2019 University of Pennsylvania Libraries and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License version 4.0 (CC-BY-4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. For a description of the terms of use see the Creative Commons Deed https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

  URL

  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode

Table of contents

• fol. 3r — On the creation & ontogony, f. 3r
• fol. 10r — On the deluge etc., f. 10r
• fol. 15r — On the passage to America, f. 15r
• fol. 25r — From arrival in America to settlement in Ohio etc., f. 25r
• fol. 35r — From Ohio to Atlantic states and back to Missouri, f. 35r
• fol. 42r — Fragment on the history of the Linapis since about 1600 when the Wallamolum closes, f. 42r
• fol. 45r — Clipping about antiquities in Alabama and Mississippi, f. 45r
• fol. 46r — Fragment of mailing envelope with provenance note by Brantz Mayer, f. 46r