Koyukon Place Names

Koyukon Place Names

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Note: The Koyukon place name list is currently under review and not completely displayed here

The Koyukon Dene language is associated with the middle Yukon River and the Koyukuk River. The data being displayed here is mainly from a current project (2015-2018) "The Geographical Research of Jules Jetté” sponsored by Tanana Chiefs Conference and BIA-ANSCA. Names and locations are from a dated database report that is being circulated to our study group. As of early October 2017 there are nearly 2500 named features in our database. Initial place name georeferencing is being done by Gerad Smith with contributions from others. The purpose of this web map display is to circulate our draft list of Koyukon names and to facilitate refinement of the place names inventory (adding names, noting variant spellings, etymologies and locations). The mapping and location accuracy is in current review.

The primary source and the starting point for this project is Jetté's 1910 place names manuscript: On the Geographical Names of the Ten’a. Microfilm AL 17:132-353. JOPA, Foley Library, Gonzaga University. 207 pp. We intend to present all of the geographic names Fr. Jetté recorded in his Alaska career; many published and unpublished writings and sketch maps by Jetté are being reviewed. Various names recorded by other Jesuits such as Aloysius Ragaru and John Lucchesi will also be included. The Koyukuk River materials currently being developed by Eliza Jones and Susan Paskvan are not presented on this webmap.

Please cite this page as:

Kari, James and Gerad Smith

2017 Koyukon Place Names. The Web Atlas of Alaskan Dene Place Names, Version 1.2. February 1

Smith, Gerad M.

2020. Historical Linguistic and Ethno-Geographic Perspectives of the Alaskan Dene. In Ethnoarchaeology of the Middle Tanana Valley, Alaska. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks.

Bibliography:

Jetté, Jules. 1910. On the geographical names of the Ten'a. Ms.

Kari, James, 1999. Draft Final Report. Native Place Names in Denali National Park and Preserve. Report prepared for the National Park Service. Pdf Ms. ANLA.

Kari, James, and Adeline Peter Raboff, 2011. Compilation of Yukon Flats Athabascan Place Names for Stevens Village, Beaver, Birch Creek and Fort Yukon. Fairbanks, Alaska. Dena'inaq' Titaztunt and Arivahan. Pdf Ms. ANLA.

also see:

Andrews, Elizabeth F. 1977. Report on the Cultural Resources of the Doyon Region of Central Alaska. Fairbanks: Cooperative Parks Study Unit, University of Alaska, Fairbanks, Occasional Paper No. 5. Two vols.

de Laguna, Frederica. 1947. The Prehistory of Northern North America as Seen From the Yukon. Memoirs of the Society for American Archaeology No. 3. Menasha, Wisconsin: Society for American Archaeology.

Gudgel-Holmes, Dianne, 1991. Native Placenames of the Kantishna Drainage, Alaska: Kantishna Oral History Project. Report prepared for the National Park Service. Pdf Ms.

Jones, Eliza. 1986. Koyukon Ethnogeography. Alaska Historical Commission Studies in History No. 171. Ms.

Jones, Eliza, 2008. Middle Koyukuk River of Alaska: An Atlas of Fishing Places and Traditional Place Names. Yukon River Drainage Fisheries Association Anchorage, Alaska.

Matthew, Margaret, Dave Lacey, James Kari and Randy Mayo. 1999. Stevens Village Land Use Plan, Ethnogeography of Traditional Lands, and Integrated Resource Management Plan. Stevens Village Council.

McCloskey, Sarah, and Benjamin Jones, 2014. Mapping Traditional Place Names along the Koyukuk River-Koyukuk, Huslia, and Hughes, Western Interior Alaska. Fact Sheet 2014-3105.

Michael, Henry N., ed. 1967. Lieutenant Zagoskin’s Travels in Russian America, 1842-1844. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Nelson, Richard, Kathleen Mautner, and G. Ray Banel, 1982. Tracks in the Wildland: A Portrayal of Koyukon and Nunamiut Subsistence. Anthropology and Historic Preservation Cooperative Park Studies Unit, University of Alaska, Fairbanks.

Robert, Michel. 1984. Trapping Patterns in the Vicinity of the Kaiyuh Flats, West-Central Alaska. Alaska Department of Fish and Game, Subsistence Division, Technical Paper 89.

Yukon River Drainage Fisheries Association. 2008. Middle Koyukuk River of Alaska, an Atlas of Fishing Places and Traditional Place Names. Anchorage.