Gottlieb Mittelberger writes vividly of hardships and of lighter moments in Pennsylvania, revealing ingenuous humor and shrewd common sense. The new translation preserves the flavor of the German original. Lost in Translation: Reclaiming Lost Language. She argues that the struggle to remain connected to an ancestral language and culture is a site of common ground: people from all backgrounds can recognize the crucial role of language in forming a sense of self.
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Would you also like to submit a review for this item? You already recently rated this item. Your rating has been recorded. Write a review Rate this item: 1 2 3 4 5. Preview this item Preview this item. Gottlieb Mittelberger's journey to Pennsylvania in the year and return to Germany in the year : containing not only a description of the country according to its present condition, but also a detailed account of the sad and unfortunate circumstances of most of the Germans that have emigrated, or are emigrating to that country Author: Gottlieb Mittelberger ; Carl Theodor Eben Publisher: Philadelphia : John Jos.
McVey, Subjects Mittelberger, Gottlieb -- Travel -- Pennsylvania. Germans -- Pennsylvania -- History. Pennsylvania -- Description and travel -- Early works to View all subjects More like this Similar Items. Show all links. Allow this favorite library to be seen by others Keep this favorite library private. Save Cancel. The land of Pennsylvania is a healthy land; it has for the most part good soil, good air and water, many high mountains, and also much flat land; it is very rich in wood; where it is not inhabited a pure forest in which many small and large waters flow.
The land is also very fertile, and all sorts of grain grow well. It is quite populous, too, inhabited far and wide, and several new towns have been founded here and there, as Philadelphia, Germantown, Lancaster, Rittengstaun [Reading], Bethlehem, and NewFrankfurt [Frankford]. There are also many churches built in the country; but many people have to go a journey of 2, 3, 4, 5 to 10 hours to get to church; but all- people, men and women, ride to church on horseback, though they had only half an hour to walk, which is customary also at funerals and weddings.
Of the savages, or Indians, who hold intercourse with the English, there is a great multitude; they live even beyond the Ohio, and the Hudson River on which Albany lies; therefore on both sides to the right and left of Pennsylvania. These two waters, which are very large, are about hours' journey from Philadelphia. These savages live in the bush in huts, away from said waters, and so far inland that no one is able to find the end of the habitations of these savages.
The farther we get into the country, the more savages we see. They support themselves in various ways; some shoot game, others dig roots, some raise tobacco and Indian corn or maize, which they eat raw or boiled; besides, they deal also in all sort s of hides, in beaver-skins and costly furs. The savages that live on the borders of the Europeans are frequently seen; some of them understand a little English. These Indians, who walk about amid other people, wear instead of clothes, blankets, such as are usually used as covers for the horses; these they have hanging uncut and unsewed about their bare bodies.
They wear no coverings on their heads or on their feet. The form of their bodies does not differ from ours, except that they look dark yellow, which, however, is not their natural color, for they besmear and stain themselves thus; but at their birth they are born as white as we are.
Both men and women have long, smooth hair on their heads; the men do not tolerate beards; and when in their youth, the hairs begin to grow, they pull them out immediately; they have, therefore, smooth faces like the women. On account of the lacking beard and the sameness in dressing, it is not easy to distinguish the men from the women. When these savages wish to be goodlooking, they paint their cheeks and foreheads red, hang their ears with strings of false beads of an ell's length.
They wear neither shirts, nor breeches, nor coats beneath their blankets. In their wilderness where they live the young and old go about naked in the summer time.
Every autumn they come in large crowds to the city of Philadelphia, bringing with them all sorts of little baskets which they make quite neatly and beautifully, many skins and costly furs. Besides these things they trade off to the Governor, when they are assembled, a tract of land Of more than a thousand acres, which is yet all forest.
In the name of the country and the city they are annually presented with many things, such as blankets, guns, rum or brandy and the like; on which occasion they make merry with their own strange Indian songs, especially when they are drunk. No one understands their language; some of them who come much in contact with the English, can speak a little English. There are very strong, tall and courageous people among them. In their language they thou and thee everybody, even the Governor, and they can run as fast as the deer.
When you speak to them of the true and everlasting God, the Creator of heaven and earth, they do not understand it, but answer simply: They believe that there are two men, a good one and a bad one; that the good one had made everything good, and the bad one had made everything bad; that it was not necessary, therefore, to pray to the good one, as he was doing no one any harm; but the bad one should be prayed to that he might do no one any harm.
Of a resurrection of the dead, a salvation, heaven or hell, they know and understand nothing. They bury their dead where they die. I have often been told by truthful people that very old savages that can hardly move any longer, or break down on the way, are simply killed and buried.
But if a savage kills another, unless it be in war or on account of old age, whether the murdered was one of our or one of their own people, the murderer must surely die. They take him first to their Indian King to be tried, and thence to the place where the murder was committed, slay him suddenly, bury him on the spot, and cover his grave with much wood and stones.
On the other hand, they must likewise be given satisfaction in similar cases, otherwise they would treat an innocent person of our people in like manner. When the savages come to the city of Philadelphia and see the handsome and magnificent buildings there, they wonder and laugh at the Europeans for expending so much toil and cost on houses. They say that it is quite unnecessary, as one can live without such houses.
Still more they wonder at the garments of the Europeans and their costly finery; they will even spit out when they see it. Old savages have often been questioned about their descent and origin, and they have answered that all they knew or could say was this; that their great-grandparents had lived in these same wildernesses, and that it was not right that the Europeans came and took their lands away from them.
For this reason they must move farther and farther back in the wilderness to find game for their food. If a man in Pennsylvania is betrothed to a woman, and does not care to be married by an ordained preacher, he may be married by any Justice, wherever he will, without having the banns published, on payment of 6 florins.
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