Chinook Trade Jargon

Indian Sign Language

Hudson's Bay Company

Ac ko mok ki's Map, 1801

Vancouver's Voyage

Crossing the Rockies

Trade Negotiations

Chinook Trade Jargon

Across the Pacific Northwest, active trading among dozens of small tribal groups produced an informal language know as the Chinook trade jargon. It was named for the Columbia River trading people but incorporated words from several sources. The jargon incorporated a number of words of English origin; it also borrowed words from French and Spanish.

English explorer James Cook recorded several Chinook terms at Nootka, British Columbia in 1778. By 1805, Lewis and Clark found use of the jargon was a common feature of Indian trade along the Pacific coast. This book, published in 1891, illustrates the endurance of the Chinook trade jargon into the nineteenth century.

S. F. Coombs. Dictionary of Chinook Jargon, 1891.