Footprints of the Red Men / Indian geographical names in the valley of Hudson's river, the valley of the Mohawk, and on the Delaware: their location and the probable meaning of some of them.

Hudson's River on the West.

Neversink, now so written as the name of the hills on the south side of the lower or Raritan Bay, is written Neuversin by Van der Donck, Neyswesinck by Van Tienhoven, Newasons by Ogilby, 1671, and more generally in early records Naver, Neuver, Newe, and Naoshink. The original was no doubt the Lenape Newas-ink, "At the point, comer, or promontory." The root Ne (English NÂÏ), means, "To come to a point," "To form a point," or, as rendered by Dr. Trumbull, "A corner, angle or point," NÂÏag. Dr. Schoolcraft's translation, "Between waters," and Dr. O'Callaghan's "A stream between hills," are incorrect, as can be abundantly proved. (See Nyack.)

Perth Amboy, at the mouth of Raritan River, is in part, from James, Earl of Perth, Lord High Chancellor of Scotland, who founded a settlement there, and part from Amboy (English Ambo), meaning any rising or stage, a hill or any elevation. A writer in 1684 notes: "Where the town of Perth is now building is on a shelf of land rising twenty, thirty and forty feet." Smith (Hist. of New Jersey) wrote: "Ambo, in Indian, 'A point;'" but there is no such word as Ambo, meaning "A point," in any Indian dialect. Heckewelder's interpretation: "Ompoge, from which Amboy is derived, and also Emboli, means 'A bottle,' or a place resembling a bottle," is equally erroneous, although Emboli may easily have been an Indian pronunciation of Amboy. The Indian deed of 1651 reads, "From the Raritan Point, called Ompoge," which may be read from OmpaÉ, Alg. generic, "Standing or upright," of which Amboy, English, is a fair interpretation.

Raritangs (Van Tienhoven), Rariton (Van der Donck), Raretans, Raritanoos, Nanakans, etc., a stream flowing to tide-water west of Staten Island, extended to the Indian sub-tribal organization which occupied the Raritan Valley, is from the radical NÂÏ, "A point," as in Naragan, Naraticon, Narrangansett, Nanakan, Nahican, etc., fairly traced by Dr. Trumbull in an analysis of Narragansett, and apparently conclusively established in Nanakan and Narratschoen on the Hudson, the Verdrietig Hoek, or "Tedious Point," of Dutch notation, where, after several forms it culminates in Navish. Lindstrom's Naratic-on, on the lower Delaware, was probably Cape May, and an equivalent substantially of the New England Nayantukq-ut, "A point on a tidal river," and Raritan was the point of the peninsula which the clan occupied terminating on Raritan Bay, where, probably, the name was first met by Dutch navigators. The dialectic exchange of N and R, and of the surd mutes k and t are clear in comparing Nanakan on the Hudson, Naratic-on on the Delaware, and Raritan on the Raritan. Van der Donck's map locates the clan bearing the name in four villages at and above the junction of a branch of the stream at New Brunswick, N.J., where there is a certain point as well as on Raritan Bay. The clan was conspicuous in the early days of Dutch New Netherland. Van Tienhoven wrote that it had been compelled to remove further inland on account of freshets, but mainly from its inability to resist the raids of the southern Indians; that the lands which they left unoccupied was between "two high mountains far distant from one to the other;" that it was "the handsomest and pleasantest country that man can behold." The great southern trunk-line Indian path led through this valley, and was then, as it is now, the great route of travel between the northern and the southern coast. (See Nanakan, Nyack-on-the-Hudson, and Orange.)

Orange, a familiar name in eastern New Jersey and supposed to refer to the two mountains that bound the Raritan Valley, may have been from the name of a sachem or place or both. In Breeden Raedt it is written: "The delegates from all the savage tribes, such as the Raritans, whose chiefs called themselves Oringkes from Orange." Oringkes seems to be a form of Owinickes, from Owini, N.J. (Inini, Chip., Lenni, Del.), meaning "Original, pure," etc., and -ke, "country"—literally, "First or original people of the country," an interpretation which agrees with the claim of the Indians generally when speaking of themselves. [FN] Orange is Oranje, Dutch, pure and simple, but evidently introduced to represent the sound of an Indian word. What that word was may, probably, be traced from the name given as that of the sachem, Auronge (Treaty of 1645), which seems to be an apheresis of W'scha-jÁ-won-ge, "On the hill side," or "On the side of a hill." (Zeisb.) Awonge, Auronge, Oranje, Orange, is an intelligible progression, and, in connection with "from Orange," indicates the location of a village or the side of a hill, which the chiefs represented.

[FN] Dr. D. G. Brinton wrote me "I believe you are right in identifying Oringkes with Owine—possibly with locative k."

Succasunna, Morris County, N.J., is probably from SÛkeu, "Black," and -achsÜn, "Stone," with substantive verbal affix -ni. It seems to describe a place where there were black stones, but whether there are black stones there or not has not been ascertained.

Aquackanonck, Aquenonga, Aquainnuck, etc.. is probably from Achquam'kan-ong, "Bushnet fishing place." Zeisberger wrote "Achquanican, a fish dam." The locative was a point of land formed by a bend in Pasaeck River on the east side, now included in the City of Paterson. Jasper Bankers and Peter Sluyter wrote, in 1679-80: "Acquakenon: on one side is the kil, on the other is a small stream by which it (the point) is almost surrounded." The Dutch wrote here, Slooterdam, i.e. a dam with a gate or sluiceway in it, probably constructed of stone, the sluiceway being left open to enable shad to run up the stream, and closed by bushes to prevent their return to the sea. (Nelson.)

Watchung (Wacht-unk, Del.) is from Wachtschu (Zeisb.), "Hill or mountain," and -unk, locative, "at" or "on." WachtsÛnk, "On the mountain" (Zeisb.); otherwise written Wakhunk. The original application was to a hill some twelve miles west of the Hudson. The first deed (1667) placed the boundmark of the tract "At the foot of the great mountain," and the second deed (1677) extended the limit "To the top of the mountain called Watchung."

Achkinckeshacky; Hackinkeshacky, 1645; Hackinghsackin, Hackinkesack (1660); Hackensack (1685); Ackinsack, Hockquindachque; Hackquinsack, are early record forms of the name of primary application to the stream now known as the Hackensack, from which it was extended to the adjacent district, to an Indian settlement, and to an Indian sachem, or, as Van Tienhoven wrote, "A certain savage chief, named Haickquinsacq." (Breeden Raedt.) The most satisfactory interpretation of the name is that suggested by the late Dr. Trumbull: "From Huckquan, Mass., HÓcquaan, Len., 'Hook,' and sauk, 'mouth of a river'—literally, 'Hook-shaped mouth,' descriptive of the course of the stream around Bergen Point, by the Kil van Kull, [FN-1] to New York Bay." Campanus wrote HÓckÜng, "Hook," and Zeisberger, HÓcquaan. [FN-2] The German Hacken, now Hackensack, means "Hook," as in German Russel Hacken, "Pot-hook," a hook incurved at both ends, as the letter S; in Lenape HÓcquoan (Zeisb.). Probably simply a substitution.

[FN-1] Before entering New York Harbor, Hudson anchored his ship below the Narrows and sent out an exploring party in a boat, who entered the Narrows and ascended as far as Bergen Point, where they encountered a second channel which they explored as far as Newark Bay. The place where the second channel was met they called "The Kils," or channels, and so it has remained—incorrectly "Kills." The Narrows they called Col, a pass or defile, or mountain-pass, hence Kil van Col, channel of the Narrow Pass, and hence Achter Col, a place behind the narrow channel. "Those [Indians] of Hackingsack, otherwise called Achter Col." (Journal of New Neth., 1641-47, Doc. Hist. N.Y., iv, 9.) . . . "Whether the Indians would sell us the hook of land behind the Kil van Col." (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 280.) Achter Col became a general name for all that section of New Jersey. Kul and Kull are corruptions of Col. Arthur Kull is now applied to Newark Bay.

[FN-2] Heckewelder wrote "OkhÚcquan, WoÂkhucquoan, or short HÚcquan for the modern Occoquan, the name of a river in Virginia, and remarked, 'All these names signify a hook.'" (Trumbull.) Rev. Thomas Campanus (Holm), who was chaplain to the Swedish settlements on the Delaware, 1642-9, and who collected a vocabulary, wrote HÓckÜng (ueug), "Hook." This sound of the word may have led the Dutch to adopt Hackingh as an orthography—modern Haking, "Hooking," incurved as a hook.

Commoenapa, written in several forms, was the name of the most southern of the six early Dutch settlements on the west side of Hudson's River, known in their order as Commoenapa, Aresseck, Bergen, Ahasimus, Hoboken-Hackingh, and Awiehacken. Commoenapa is now preserved as the name of the upland between Communipaw Avenue and Walnut Street, Jersey City, but was primarily applied to the arm of the main land beginning at Konstabel's Hoek, and later to the site of the ancient Dutch village of Gamoenapa, as written by De Vries in 1640, and by the local scribes, Gamoenapaen. [FN] (Col. Hist. N.Y. xiii, 36, 37.) Dunlap (Hist. N.Y., i, 50) claimed the name as Dutch from Gemeente, "Commons, public property," and Paen, "Soft land," or in combination, "Tillable land and marsh belonging to the community," a relation which the lands certainly sustained. (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 234.) The lands were purchased by Michael Pauw in 1630, and sold by him to the Dutch government in 1638. Although clearly a Dutch name it has been claimed as Indian, from Lenape Gamenowinink (Zeisb.), "England, on the other side of the sea." Gamoenapaug, one of the forms of the name, is quoted as the basis of this claim; also, Acomunipag, "On the other side of the bay." The Dutch did substitute paen for paug in some cases, but it is very doubtful if they did here.

[FN] Jasper Dankers and Peter Sluyter wrote in their Journal: "Gamaenapaen is an arm of the main land on the west side of the North River, beginning at Constable's Hook, directly opposite to Staten Island, from which it is separated by the Kil van Kol. It is almost an hour broad, but has large salt meadows or marshes on the Kil van Kol. It is everywhere accessible by water from the city."

Ahasimus—Achassemus in deed to Michael Pauw, 1630—now preserved in Harsimus, was a place lying west of the "Little Island, Aressick;" later described as "The corn-land of the Indians," indicating that the name was from Lenape Chasqummes (Zeisb.), "Small corn." Ashki'muis, "Sea maize." [FN] (See Arisheck.)

[FN] "The aforesaid land Ahasimus and Aressick, by us called the Whore's Corner, extending along the river Maurites and the Island Manhates on the east side, and the Island Hobokan-Hackingh on the north side, surrounded by swamps, which are sufficiently distinct for boundaries." (Pauw Deed, Nov. 22, 1630; Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 3.) Mr. Winfield located Ahasimus "At that portion of Jersey City which lies east of Union Hill, excepting Paulus' Hoeck (Areisheck), . . . generally from Warren to near Grove Street."

Bergen, the name of the third settlement, is met in Scandinavian and in German dialects. "Bergen, the Flemish for Mons (Latin), 'a hill,' a town of Belgium." (Lippincott.) "Bergen, op. Zoom, 18 miles north of Antwerp, 'a hill at (or near) the bank,' or border." The original settlement was on what is now known as Jersey City Heights.

Arisheck—"The Little Island Aressick" (See Ahasimus), called by the Dutch Aresseck Houck, Hoeren Houck, and Paulus Houck—now the eastern point of Jersey City—was purchased from the Indians by Michael Pauw, Nov. 22, 1630, with "the land called Ahasimus," and, with the "Island Hobokan-Hackingh," purchased by him in July of the same year, was included in his plantation under the general name of Pavonia, a Latinized form of his own name, from Pavo, "Peacock" (Dutch Pauw), which is retained in the name of the Erie R. R. Ferry. Primarily, Arisseck was a low neck of land divided by a marsh, the eastern end forming what was called an island. The West India Company had a trading post there conducted by one Michael Paulis, from whom it was called Paulus' Hook, which it retains, Pauw also established a trading post there which, as it lay directly in the line of the great Indian trunk-path (see Saponickan), so seriously interfered with the trade of the Dutch post that the Company purchased the land from him in 1638, and in the same year sold the island to one Abraham Planck. In the deed to Planck the description reads: "A certain parcel of land called Pauwels Hoek, situated westward of the Island Manhates and eastward of Ahasimus, extending from the North River into the valley which runs around it there." (Col. Hist. N, Y., xiii, 3.) The Indian name, Arisheck or Aresseck, is so badly corrupted that the original cannot be satisfactorily detected, but, by exchanging n for r, and adding the initial K, we would have Kaniskeck, "A long grassy marsh or meadow."

Hoboken, now so written—Hobocan-Hacking, July, 1630; Hobokan-Hacking, Nov. 1630; Hobokina, 1635; Hobocken, 1643; Hoboken, 1647; Hobuck and Harboken, 1655-6—appears of record first in the Indian deed to Michael Pauw, July 12, 1630, negotiated by the Director-general and Council of New Netherland, and therein by them stated, "By us called Hobocan-Hacking." Primarily it was applied to the low promontory [FN-1] below Castle Point, [FN-2] bounded, recites the deed, on the south by the "land Ahasimus and Aressick." On ancient charts Aressick and Hoboken-Hacking are represented as two long necks of land or points separated by a cove on the river front now filled in, both points being called hooks. In records it was called an island, and later as "A neck of land almost an island, called Hobuk, . . . extending on the south side to Ahasimus; eastward to the river Mauritus, and on the west side surrounded by a valley or morass through which the boundary can be seen with sufficient clearness." (Winfield's Hist. Hudson Co.; Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 2, 3, 4.) In "Freedoms and Exemptions," 1635; "But every one is notified that the Company reserves, unto itself the Island Manhates; Fort Orange, with the lands and islands appertaining thereto; Staten Island; the land of Achassemes, Arassick and Hobokina." The West India Company purchased the latter lands from Michael Pauw in 1638-9, and leased and sold in three parcels as stated in the Pauw deeds. The first settlement of the parcel called by the Dutch Hobocan-Hacking is located by Whitehead (Hist. East N.J.) immediately north of Hobokan Kill and called Hobuk. Smith, in his "History of New Jersey," wrote Hobuck, and stated that it was a plantation "owned by a Dutch merchant who in the Indian wars, had his wife, children and servants murdered by the Indians." In a narrative of events occurring in 1655, it is written: "Presently we saw the house on Harboken in flames. This done the whole Pavonia was immediately in flames." [FN-3] (Col. Hist. N.Y., xii, 98.) The deed statement, "By us named," is explicit, and obviously implies that the terms in the name were Dutch and not Indian, and Dutch they surely were. Dr. A. S. Gatschet, of the Bureau of Ethnology, wrote me: "Hoboken, called after a village on the river Scheldt, a few miles below Antwerp, [FN-4] and after a high elevation on its north side. Ho-, hoh-, is the radical of 'high' in all German dialects, and Buck is 'elevation' in most of them. Buckel (Germ.), Bochel (Dutch), means 'hump,' 'hump-back.' Hump (Low German) is 'heap,' 'hill.' Ho-bok-an locates a place that is distinguished by a hill, or by a hill in some way associated with it." Presumably from the ancient village of Hoboken came to Manhattan, about 1655, one Harmon van Hobocoon, a schoolmaster, who evidently was given his family name from the village from whence he came. He certainly did not give his family name to Hoboken twenty years prior to his landing at Manhattan.

Hacking and Haken are unquestionably Dutch from the radical Haak, "hook." The first is a participle, meaning Hooking, "incurved as a hook," by metonymie, "a hook." It was used in that sense by the early Dutch as a substitute for Lenape HÓcquan, "hook," in Hackingsack, and Zeisberger used it in "Ressel Hacken, pot-hook." No doubt Stuyvesant used it in the same sense in writing Hobokan-Hacking, describing thereby both a hill and a hook, corresponding with the topography, to distinguish it from its twin-hook Arisheck. Had there been an Indian name given him for it, he would have written it as surely as he wrote Arisheck. When he wrote, "By us called," he meant just what he said and what he understood the terms to mean. To assume that he wrote the terms as a substitute for Lenape Hopoakan-hacki-ug, "At (or on) the smoking-pipe land." or place where materials were obtained for making smoking-pipes, has no warrant in the record narrative. Hacking was dropped from the name in 1635.

[FN-1] An ancient view of the shore-line represents it as a considerable elevation—a hill.

[FN-2] Castle Point is just below Wehawken Cove in which Hudson is supposed to have anchored his ship in 1609. In Juet's Journal this land is described as "beautiful" and the cliff as of "the color of white green, as though it was either a copper or silver mine." It has long been a noted resort for mineralogists.

[FN-3] Teunissed van Putten was the first white resident of Hoboken. He leased the land for twelve years from Jan. 1, 1641. The West India Company was to erect a small house for him. Presumably this house is referred to in the narrative. It was north of Hoboken Kill.

[FN-4] Now a commercial village of Belgium. The prevailing dialect spoken there was Flemish, usually classed as Low German. The Low German dialects of three centuries ago are imperfectly represented in modern orthographies. In and around Manhattan eighteen different European dialects were spoken, as noted of record—Dutch, Flemish, German, Scandinavian, Walloon, etc.

Wehawken and Weehawken, as now written, is written Awiehaken in deed by Director Stuyvesant, 1658-9. Other orthographies are Wiehacken, Whehockan, Weehacken, Wehauk, obvious corruptions of the original, but all retaining a resemblance in sound. The name is preserved as that of a village, a ferry, and a railroad station about three miles north of Jersey City, and is historically noted for its association with the ancient custom of dueling, the particular resort for that purpose being a rough shelf of the cliff about two and one-half miles north of Hoboken and about opposite 28th Street, Manhattan. The locative of the name is described in a grant by Director Stuyvesant, in 1647, to one Maryn Adriaensen, of "A piece of land called Awiehaken, situate on the west side of the North River, bounded on the south by Hoboken Kil, and running thence north to the next kil, and towards the woods with the same breadth, altogether fifty morgens of land." [FN] (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 22.) The "next kil" is presumed to have been that flowing to the Hudson in a wild ravine just south of the dueling ground, now called the Awiehackan. A later description (1710) reads: "Between the southernmost cliffs of Tappaen and Ahasimus, at a place called Wiehake." (Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 98.) The petition was by Samuel Bayard, who then owned the land on both sides of Wiehacken Creek, for a ferry charter covering the passage "Between the southernmost cliffs of Tappaen and New York Island, at a place called Wiehake," the landing-place of which was established at or near the mouth of Awiehacken Creek just below what is now known as King's Point. Of the location generally Winfield (Hist.. Hudson Co., N.J.) wrote: "Before the iconoclastic hand of enterprise had touched it the whole region about was charming beyond description. Just south of the dueling ground was the wild ravine down which leaped and laughed the Awiehacken. Immediately above the dueling ground was King's Point looking boldly down upon the Hudson. From this height still opens as fair, as varied, as beautiful a scene as one could wish to see. The rocks rise almost perpendicularly to one hundred and fifty feet above the river. Under these heights, about twenty feet above the water, on a shelf about six feet wide and eleven paces long, reached by an almost inaccessible flight of steps, was the dueling ground." South of King's Point were the famed Elysian Fields, at the southern extremity of which, under Castle Point, was Sibyl's Cave, a rocky cavern containing a fine spring of water.

The place to which the name was applied in the deed of 1658 seems to have been an open tract between the streams named, presumably a field lying along the Hudson, from the description, "running back towards the woods," suggesting that it was from the Lenape radical Tauwa, as written by Zeisberger in Tauwi-Échen, "Open;" as a noun, "Open or unobstructed space, clear land, without trees." Dropping the initial we have Auwi, Awie, of the early orthography; dropping A we have Wie and Wee, and from -Échen we have -Ákan, -haken, -hawking, etc. As the name stands now it has no meaning in itself, although a Hollander might read Wie as Wei, "A meadow," and Hacken as "Hooking," incurved as a hook, which would fairly describe Weehawking Cove as it was.

Submitted to him in one of its modern forms, the late Dr. Trumbull wrote that Wehawing "Seemed" to him as "most probably from Wehoak, Mohegan, and -ing, Lenape, locative, 'At the end (of the Palisades)'" and in his interpretation violated his own rules of interpretation which require that translation of Indian names must be sought in the dialect spoken in the district where the name appears. The word for "End," in the dialect spoken here, was Wiqui. Zeisberger wrote Wiquiechung, "End, point," which certainly does not appear in any form of the name. The Dr.'s translation is simply worthless, as are several others that have been suggested. It is surprising that the Dr. should quote a Mohegan adjectival and attach to it a Lenape locative suffix.

[FN] A Dutch "morgen"' was about two English acres.

Espating (Hespating, Staten Island deed) is claimed to have been the Indian name of what is now known as Union Hill, in Jersey City, where, it is presumed, there was an Indian village. The name is from the root Ashp (Usp, Mass.; Esp, Lenape; Ishp, Chip.), "High," and -ink, locative, "At or on a high place." From the same root Ishpat-ink, Hespating. (O'Callaghan.) See Ashpetong.

Siskakes, now Secaucus, is written as the name of a tract on Hackensack meadows, from which it was extended to Snake Hill. It is from SikkÂkÂskeg, meaning "Salt sedge marsh." (Gerard.) The Dutch found snakes on Snake Hill and called it Slangberg, literally, "Snake Hill."

Passaic is a modern orthography of Pasaeck (Unami-Lenape), German notation, signifying "Vale or valley." Zeisberger wrote PachsÓjeck in the Minsi dialect. The valley gave name to the stream. In Rockland County it has been corrupted to Paskack, Pasqueck, etc.

Paquapick is entered on Pownal's map as the name of Passaic Falls. It is from Poqui, "Divided, broken," and -Ápuchk, "Rock." Jasper Dankers and Peter Sluyter, who visited the falls in 1679-80, wrote in their Journal that the falls were "formed by a rock stretching obliquely across the river, the top dry, with a chasm in the center about ten feet wide into which the water rushed and fell about eighty feet." It is this rock and chasm to which the name refers—"Divided rock," or an open place in a rock.

Pequannock, now so written, is the name of a stream flowing across the Highlands from Hamburgh, N.J. to Pompton, written Pachquak'onck by Van der Donck (1656); Paquan-nock or Pasqueck, in 1694; Paqunneck, Indian deed of 1709, and in other forms, was the name of a certain field, from which it was extended to the stream. Dr. Trumbull recognized it as the equivalent of Mass. Paquan'noc, Pequan'nuc, Pohqu'un-auke, etc., "A name common to all cleared land, i.e. land from which the trees and bushes had been removed to fit it for cultivation." Zeisberger wrote, Pachqu (Paghqu), as in Pachqu-Échen, "Meadow;" Pachquak'onck, "At (or on) the open land."

Peram-sepus, Paramp-seapus, record forms of the name of Saddle River, [FN] Bergen County, N.J., and adopted in Paramus as the name of an early Dutch village, of which one reads in Revolutionary history as the headquarters of General George Clinton's Brigade, appears in deed for a tract of land the survey of which reads: "Beginning at a spring called Assinmayk-apahaka, being the northeastern most head-spring of a river called by the Indians Peram-sepus, and by the Christians Saddle River." Nelson (Hist. Ind. of New Jersey) quoted from a deed of 1671: "Warepeake, a run of water so called by the Indians, but the right name is Rerakanes, by the English called Saddle River." Peram-sepus also appears as Wieramius, suggesting that Pera, Para, Wara, and Wiera were written as equivalent sounds, from the root Wil (Willi, Winne, Wirri, Waure), meaning, "Good, fine, pleasant," etc. The suffix varies, Sepus meaning "Brook"; Peake (-peÉk), "Water-place," and Anes, "Small stream," or, substantially, Sepus, which, by the prefix Ware, was pronounced "A fine stream," or place of water.

[FN] Called "Saddle River," probably, from Richard Saddler, a purchaser of lands from the Indians in 1674. (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 478.)

Monsey, a village in Rockland County, takes that name from an Indian resident who was known by his tribal name, Monsey—"the Monseys, Minsis, or Minisinks."

Mahway, Mawayway, Mawawier, etc., a stream and place now Mahway, N.J., was primarily applied to a place described: "An Indian field called Maywayway, just over the north side of a small red hill called Mainatanung." The stream, on an old survey, is marked as flowing south to the Ramapo from a point west of Cheesekook Mountain. The name is probably from MawÉwi (Zeisb.), "Assembly," where streams or paths, or boundaries, meet or come together. (See Mahequa.)

Mainaitanung, Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, and Mainating in N.J. Records, given as the name of "A small red hill" (see Mahway), does not describe a "Red hill," but a place "at" a small hill—Min-attinuey-unk. The suffixed locative, -unk, seems to have been generally used in connection with the names of hills.

Pompton—Ponton, East N.J. Records, 1695; Pompeton, Pumpton, Pompeton, N.Y. Records—now preserved in Pompton as the name of a village at the junction of the Pequannock, the Wynokie, and the Ramapo, and continued as the name of the united stream south of Pompton Village to its junction with the Passaic, and also as the name of a town in Passaic County, N.J., as well as in Pompton Falls, Pompton Plains, etc., and historically as the name of an Indian clan, appears primarily as the name of the Ramapo River as now known. It is not met in early New York Records, but in English Records, in 1694, a tract of land is described as being "On a river called Paquannock, or Pasqueck, near the falls of Pampeton," and in 1695, in application to lands described as lying "On Pompton Creek, about twenty miles above ye mouth of said creek where it falls into Paquanneck River," the particular place referred to being known as Ramopuch, and now as Ramapo. (See Ramapo.) Rev. Heckewelder located the name at the mouth of the Pompton (as now known) where it falls into the Passaic, and interpreted it from Pihm (root PimÉ), "Crooked mouth," an interpretation now rejected by Algonquian students from the fact that the mouth of the stream is not crooked. A reasonable suggestion is that the original was Pomoten, a representative town, or a combination of towns. [FN-1] which would readily be converted to Pompton. In 1710, "Memerescum, 'sole sachem of all the nations (towns or families) of Indians on Remopuck River, and on the east and west branches thereof, on Saddle River, Pasqueck River, Narranshunk River and Tappan,' gave title to all the lands in upper or northwestern Bergen and Passaic counties." (Nelson, "Indians of New Jersey," 111), indicating a combination of clans. Fifty years later the tribal title is entered in the treaty of Easton (1758) as the "Wappings, Opings or Pomptons," [FN-2] as claimants of an interest in lands in northern New Jersey, [FN-3] subordinately to the "Minsis, Monseys or Minisinks," with whom the treaty was made. The clan was then living at Otsiningo as ward's of the Senecas, and seems to have been composed of representatives of several historic northern New Jersey families. It has been inferred that their designation as "Wappings" classed them as immigrants from the clans on the east side of the Hudson. Obviously, however, the term described them as of the most eastern family of the Minsis or Minisinks, which they were.

[FN-1] Pomoteneyu, "There are towns." (Zeisb.) Pompotowwut-Muhheakan-neau, was the name of the capital town of the Mahicans.

[FN-2] So recognized in the treaty of Easton.

[FN-3] The territory in which the Pomptons claimed an interest included northern New Jersey as bounded on the north by a line drawn from Cochecton, Sullivan County, to the mouth of Tappan Creek on the Hudson, thence south to Sandy Hook, thence west to the Delaware, and thence north to Cochecton, lat. 41 deg. 40 min., as appears by treaty deed in Smith's hist, of New Jersey.

Ramapo, now so written and applied to a village and a town in Rockland County, and also to a valley, a stream of water and adjacent hills, is written Ramepog in N.Y. Records, 1695; Ramepogh, 1711, and Ramapog in 1775. In New Jersey Records the orthographies are Ramopock, Romopock and Remopuck, and on Smith's map Ramopough. The earliest description of the locative of the name appears in N.Y. Records, 1695: "A certain tract of land in Orange County called Ramepogh, being upon Pompton Creek, about twenty miles above ye mouth of said creek where it falls into Pequanneck River, being a piece of low land lying at ye forks on ye west side of ye creek, and going down the said creek for ye space of six or seven miles to a small run running into said creek out of a small lake, several pieces of land lying on both sides of said creek, computed in all about ninety or one hundred acres, with upland adjoining thereto to ye quantity of twelve hundred acres." In other words: "A piece of low land lying at the forks of said river, about twenty miles above the mouth of the stream where it falls into the Pequannock, with upland adjoining." The Pompton, so called then, is now the Ramapo, and the place described in the deed has been known as Remapuck, Romapuck, Ramopuck, Ramapock, Pemerpuck, and Ramapo, since the era of first settlement. The somewhat poetic interpretation of the name, "Many ponds," is without warrant, nor does the name belong to a "Round pond," or to the stream, now the Ramapo except by extension to it. Apparently, by dialectic exchange of initials L and R, Reme, Rama, or Romo becomes LamÓ from LomÓwo (Zeisb.), "Downward, slanting, oblique," and -pogh, -puck, etc., is a compression of -apughk (-puchk, German notation), meaning—"Rock." LamÓw-Ápuchk, by contraction and pronunciation, RamÁpuck, meaning "Slanting rock," an equivalent of PimÁpuchk, met in the district in Pemerpock, in 1674, denoting "Place or country of the slanting rock." [FN] Ramapo River is supposed to have its head in Round Pond, in the northwest part of the town of Monroe, Orange County. It also received the overflow of eight other ponds. Ramapo Pass, beginning about a mile below Pierson's, is fourteen miles long. (See Pompton.)

[FN] Dr. John C. Smock, late State Geologist of New Jersey, wrote me of the location of the name at Suffern: "There is the name of the stream and the name of the settlement (in Rockland County, near the New Jersey line), and the land is low-lying, and along the creek, and above a forks, i.e. above the forks at Suffern. On the 1774 map in my possession, Romapock is certainly the present Ramapo. The term 'Slanting rock' is eminently applicable to that vicinity." The Ramapock Patent of 1704 covered 42,500 acres, and, with the name, followed the mountains as its western boundary.

Wynokie, now so written as the name of a stream flowing to the Pequannock at Pompton, takes that name from a beautiful valley through which it passes, about thirteen miles northwest of Paterson. The stream is the outlet of Greenwood Lake and is entered on old maps as the Ringwood. The name is in several orthographies—Wanaque, Wynogkee, Wynachkee, etc. It is from the root Win, "Good, fine, pleasant," and -aki, land or place. (See Wynogkee.)

Pamerpock, 1674, now preserved in Pamrepo as the name of a village in the northwest part of the city of Bayonne, N.J., is probably another form of PemÉ-apuchk, "Slanting rock." [FN] (See Ramapo.) The name seems to have been widely distributed.

[FN] PemÉ is Pemi in the Massachusetts dialect. "It may generally be translated by 'sloping' or 'aslant.' In Abnaki PemadenÉ (Pemi-adenÉ) denotes a sloping mountain side," wrote Dr. Trumbull. The affix, -Ápuchk, changes the meaning to sloping rock, or "slanting rock," as Zeisberger wrote.

Hohokus, the name of a village and of a railroad station, is probably from MehokhÓkus (Zeisb.), "Red cedar." It was, presumably, primarily at least, a place where red cedar abounded. The Indian name of the stream here is written Raighkawack, an orthography of Lechauwaak, "Fork" (Zeisb.), which, by the way, is also the name of a place.

Tuxedo, now a familiar name, is a corruption of P'tuck-sepo, meaning, "A crooked river or creek." Its equivalent is P'tuck-hannÉ (Len. Eng. Dic.), "A bend in the river"—"Winding in the creek or river"—"A bend in a river." The earliest form of the original appears in 1754—Tuxcito, 1768; Tuxetough, Tugseto, Duckcedar, Ducksider, etc., are later. Zeisberger wrote Pduk, from which probably Duckcedar. The name seems to have been that of a bend in the river at some point in the vicinity of Tuxedo Pond to which it was extended from a certain bend or bends in the stream. A modern interpretation from P'tuksit, "Round foot," is of no merit except in its first word. It was the metaphorical name, among the Delawares, of the wolf. It would be a misnomer applied to either a river or a pond. Sepo is generic for a long river. (See Esopus.)

Mombasha, Mombashes, etc., the name of a small lake in Southfield, Orange County, is presumed to be a corruption of M'biÌsses (Zeisb.), "Small lake or pond," "Small water-place." The apostrophe indicates a sound produced with the lips closed, readily pronouncing o (Mom). Charles Clinton, in his survey of the Cheesec-ook Patent in 1735, wrote Mount-Basha. Mombasa is an Arabic name for a coral island on the east coast of Africa. It may have been introduced here as the sound of the Indian name.

Wesegrorap, Wesegroraep, Wassagroras, given as the name of "A barren plain," in the Kakiate Patent, is probably from Wisachgan, "Bitter," sad, distressing, pitiable. Ziesberger wrote, "Wisachgak, Black oak," the bark of which is bitter and astringent. A black oak tree on "the west-southwest side" of the plain may have given name to the plain.

Narranshaw, Nanaschunck, etc., a place so called in the Kakiate Patent boundary, is probably a corruption of Van der Donck's NarratschÆn, "A promontory" or high point. (See Nyack-on-the-Hudson.)

Kakiate, the name of patented lands in Rockland County, is from Dutch Kijkuit, meaning "Look out," or "Place of observation, as a tower, hill," etc. The highest hill in Westchester County bears the same name in Kakcout, and Kaykuit is the name of a hill in Kingston, Ulster County. The tract to which the name was extended in Rockland County is described, "Commonly called by the Indians Kackyachteweke, on a neck of land which runs under a great hill, bounded on the north by a creek called Sheamaweck or Peasqua." Hackyackawack is another orthography. The name seems to be from Schach-achgeu-ackey, meaning "Straight land," "Straight along," (Zeisb.); i.e. direct, as "A neck of land"—"A pass between mountains," or, as the description reads, "A neck of land which runs under a great hill." Compare Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 48, 183, etc.

Torne, the name of a high hill which forms a conspicuous object in the Ramapo Valley, is from Dutch Torenherg, "A tower or turret, a high pointed hill, a pinnacle." (Prov. Eng.) The hill is claimed to have been the northwest boundmark of the Haverstraw Patent. In recent times it has been applied to two elevations, the Little Torne, west of the Hudson, and the Great Torne, near the Hudson, south of Haverstraw. (Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 46.)

Cheesek-ook, Cheesek-okes, Cheesec-oks, Cheesquaki, are forms of the name given as that of a tract of "Upland and meadow," so described in Indian deed, 1702, and included in the Cheesek-ook Patent, covering parts of the present counties of Rockland and Orange. It is now preserved as the name of a hill, to which it was assigned at an early date, and is also quoted as the name of adjacent lands in New Jersey. The suffix -ook, -oke, -aki, etc., shows that it was the name of land or place (N.J., -ahke; Len. -aki). It is probably met in Cheshek-ohke, Ct., translated by Dr. Trumbull from Kussukoe, Moh., "High," and -ohke, "Land or place"—literally, high land or upland. The final s in some forms, is an English plural: it does not belong to the root. (See Coxackie.) In pronunciation the accent should not be thrown on the letter k; that letter belongs to the first word. There is no Kook about it.

Tappans, Carte Figurative of date (presumed) 1614-16, is entered thereon as the name of an Indian village in Lat. 41° 15', claimed, traditionally, to have been at or near the site of the later Dutch village known as Tappan, in Rockland County. In the triangulation of the locative on the ancient map is inscribed, "En effen veldt" (a flat field), the general character of which probably gave name to the Indian village. Primarily, it was a district of low, soft land, abounding in marshes and long grasses, with little variation from level, extending along the Hudson from Tappan to Bergen Point, a distance of twenty-seven miles. Wassenaer wrote, in 1621-25, Tapants; DeLaet wrote, in 1624, Tappaans; in Breeden Raedt, Tappanders; Tappaen, De Vries, 1639; Tappaen, Van der Horst deed, 1651: Tappaens, official Dutch; "Savages of Tappaen"; Tappaans, Van der Donck, are the early orthographies of the name and establish it as having been written by the Dutch with the long sound of a in the last word—paan (-paen)—which may be read pan, as a pan of any kind, natural or artificial—a stratum of earth lying below the soil—the pan of a tap into which water flows—a mortar pit. [FN-1] The compound word Tap-pan is not found in modern Dutch dictionaries, but it evidently existed in some of the German dialects, as it is certainly met in Tappan-ooli (uli) on the west coast of Summatra, in application, to a low district lying between the mountains and the sea, opposite a fine bay, in Dutch possession as early as 1618, and also in Tappan-huacanga, a Dutch possession in Brazil of contemporary date. It is difficult to believe that Tappan was transferred to those distant parts from an Indian name on Hudson's River; on the contrary its presence in those parts forces the conclusion that it was conferred by the Dutch from their own, or from some dialect with which they were familiar, precisely as it was on Hudson's River and was descriptive of a district of country the features of which supply the meaning. DeLaet wrote in his "New World" (Leyden Edition, 1625-6) of the general locative of the name on the Hudson: "Within the first reach, on the west side of the river, where the land is low, dwells a nation of savages named Tappaans," presumably so named by the Dutch from the place where they had jurisdiction, i.e. the low lands. Specifically, De Vries wrote in 1639, Tappaen as the name of a place where he found and purchased, "A beautiful valley of clay land, some three or four feet above the water, lying under the mountains, along the river," presumed to have been in the meadows south of Piermont, into which flows from the mountains Tappan Creek, now called Spar Kill, [FN-2] as well as the overflow of Tappan Zee, of which he wrote without other name than "bay": "There flows here a strong flood and ebb, but the ebb is not more than four feet on account of the great quantity of water that flows from above, overflowing the low lands in the spring," converting them into veritable soft lands. GamÆnapaen, now a district in Jersey City, was interpreted by the late Judge Benson, "Tillable land and marsh." Dr. Trumbull wrote: "Petuckquapaugh, Dumpling Pond (round pond) gave name to part of the township of Greenwich, Ct. The Dutch called this tract Petuck-quapaen." The tract is now known as Strickland Plain, [FN-3] and is described as "Plain and water-land"—"A valley but little above tidewater; on the southwest an extended marsh now reclaimed in part." The same general features were met in Petuckquapaen, now Greenbath, opposite Albany, N.Y. Dr. Trumbull also wrote, "The Dutch met on Long Island the word Seaump as the name of corn boiled to a pap. The root is SaupÁe (Eliot), 'soft,' i.e. 'made soft by water,' as SaupÁe manoosh, 'mortar,' literally 'softened clay.' Hence the Dutch word Sappaen—adopted by Webster Se-pawn." Other examples could be quoted but are not necessary to establish the meaning of Dutch Tappaan, or Tappaen. An interpretation by Rev. Heckewelder, quoted by Yates & Moulton, and adopted by Brodhead presumably without examination: "From Thuhaune (Del.), cold stream," is worthless. No Delaware Indian would have given it as the name of Tappan Creek, and no Hollander would have converted it into Tappaan or Tappaen.

The Palisade Range, which enters the State from New Jersey, and borders the Hudson on the west, terminates abruptly at Piermont. Classed by geologists as Trap Rock, or rock of volcanic origin, adds interest to their general appearance as calumnar masses. The aboriginal owners were not versed in geologic terms. To them the Palisades were simply -ompsk, "Standing or upright rock."

[FN-1] Paen, old French, meaning Pagan, a heathen or resident of a heath, from Pagus, Latin, a heath, a district of waste land.

[FN-2] Tappan Creek is now known as the Spar Kill, and ancient Tappan Landing as Tappan Slote. Slote is from Dutch Sloot. "Dutch, trench, moat." "Sloops could enter the mouth of the creek, if lightly laden, at high tide, through what, from its resemblance to a ditch, was called the Slote." (Hist. Rockl. Co.) The man or men who changed the name of the creek to Spar Kill cannot be credited with a very large volume of appreciation for the historic. The cove and mouth of the creek was no doubt the landing-place from which the Indian village was approached, and the latter was accepted for many years as the boundmark on the Hudson of the jurisdiction of New Jersey.

[FN-3] Strickland Plain was the site of the terrible massacre of Indians by English and Dutch troops under Capt. Underhill, in March, 1645. (Broadhead, Hist. N.Y., i, 390.) About eight hundred Indians were killed by fire and sword, and a considerable number of prisoners taken and sold into slavery. The Indian fort here was in a retreat of difficult access.

Mattasink, Mattaconga and Mattaconck, forms of names given to certain boundmarks "of the land or island called Mattasink, or Welch's Island," Rockland County, describe two different features. Mattaconck was "a swampy or hassocky meadow," lying on the west side of Quaspeck Pond, from whence the line ran north, 72 degrees east, "to the south side of the rock on the top of the hill," called Mattasinck. In the surveyor's notes the rock is described as "a certain rock in the form of a sugar loaf." The name is probably an equivalent of Mat-assin-ink, "At (or to) a bad rock," or a rock of unusual form. Mattac-onck seems to be an orthography of MaskÉk-onck, "At a swamp or hassocky meadow." Surd mutes and linguals are so frequently exchanged in this district that locatives must be relied upon to identify names. Mattac has no meaning in itself. The sound is that of MaskÉk.

Nyack, Rockland County, does not take that name from Kestaub-niuk, a place-name on the east side of the Hudson, as stated by Schoolcraft, nor was the name imported from Long Island, as stated by a local historian; on the contrary, it is a generic Algonquian term applicable to any point. It was met in place here at the earliest period of settlement in application to the south end of Verdrietig Hoek Mountain, as noted in "The Cove or Nyack Patent," near or on which the present village of Nyack has its habitations. It means "Land or place at the angle, point or corner," from NÉÏak (Del.), "Where there is a point." (See Nyack, L. I.) The root appears in many forms in record orthographies, due largely to the efforts of European scribes to express the sound in either the German or the English alphabet. Adriaen Block wrote, in 1614-16, Nahicans as the name of the people on Montauk Point; Eliot wrote Naiyag (-ag formative); Roger Williams wrote Nanhigan and Narragan; Van der Donck wrote Narratschoan on the Verdrietig Hoek Mountain on the Hudson; Naraticon appears on the lower Delaware, and Narraoch and Njack (Nyack) are met on Long Island. The root is the same in all cases, Van der Donck's Narratschoan on the Hudson, and Narraticon on the Delaware, meaning "The point of a mountain which has the character of a promontory," kindred to NÉwas (Del.), "A promontory," or a high point. [FN] The Indian name of Verdrietig Hoek, or Tedious Point, is of record Newas-ink in the De Hart Patent, and in several other forms of record—Navish, Navoash-ink, Naurasonk, Navisonk, Newasons, etc., and Neiak takes the forms of Narratsch, Narrich, Narrock, Nyack, etc. Verdrietig Hoek, the northeastern promontory of Hook Mountain, is a rocky precipitous bluff forming the angle of the range. It rises six hundred and sixty-eight feet above the level of the Hudson into which it projects like a buttress. Its Dutch-English name "Tedious Point," has been spoken of in connection with Pocantico, which see.

[FN] Dr. Trumbull wrote: "NÁÏ, 'Having corners'; NÁÏyag, 'A corner or angle'; NÁÏg-an-eag, 'The people about the point.'" William R. Gerard wrote: "The Algonquian root Ne (written by the English NÁÏ) means 'To come to a point,' or 'To form a point.' From this came Ojibwe NaiÁ-shi, 'Point of land in a body of water.' The Lenape NewÁs, with the locative affix, makes NewÁs-ing, 'At the promontory.' The Lenape had another word for 'Point of land.' This was NÉÏak (corrupted to Nyack). It is the participial form of NÉÏan, 'It is a point.' The participle means, 'Where there is a point,' or literally, 'There being a point.'"

Essawatene—"North by the top of a certain hill called Essawatene," so described in deed to Hermanus Dow, in 1677—means "A hill beyond," or on the other side of the speaker. It is from Awassi (Len.), "Beyond," and -achtenne, "Hill," or mountain. Oosadenighe (Abn.), "Above, beyond, the mountain," or "Over the mountain." We have the same derivative in Housaten-Ûk, now Housatonic.

Quaspeck, Quaspeek, Quaspeach, "Quaspeach or Pond Patent"—"A tract of land called in the Indian language Quaspeach, being bounded by the brook Kill-the-Beast, running out of a great pond." (Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 53, 56, 70, 82.) The land included in the patent was described as "A hassocky meadow on the west side of the lake." (See Mattasink.) The full meaning of the name is uncertain. The substantival -peÉk, or -peach, means "Lake, pond or body of still water." [FN] As the word stands its adjectival does not mean anything. The local interpretation "Black," is entirely without merit. The pond is now known as Rockland Lake. It lies west of the Verdrietig Hoek range, which intervenes between it and the Hudson. It is sheltered on its northeast shore by the range. The ridge intervening between it and the Hudson rises 640 feet. It is a beautiful lake of clear water reposing on a sandy bottom, 160 feet above the level of the Hudson.

[FN] The equivalent Mass. word is paug, "Where water is," or "Place of water." (Trumbull.) Quassa-paug or Quas-paug, is the largest lake in Woodbury, Ct. Dr. Trumbull failed to detect the derivative of Quas, but suggested, Kiche, "Great." Probably a satisfactory interpretation will be found in KussÛk, "High." (See Quassaick.)

Menisak-cungue, so written in Indian deed to De Hart in 1666, and also in deed from De Hart to Johannes Minnie in 1695, is written Amisconge on Pownal's map, as the name of a stream in the town of Haverstraw. As De Hart was the first purchaser of lands at Haverstraw, the name could not have been from that of a later owner, as locally supposed. Pownal's orthography suggests that the original was Ommissak-kontu, Mass., "Where Alewives or small fishes are abundant." The locative was at the mouth of the stream at Grassy Point. [FN] Minnie's Falls, a creek so known, no doubt, took that name from Johannes Minnie. On some maps it is called Florus' Falls, from Florus Crom, an early settler. An unlocated place on the stream was called "The Devil's Horse Race."

[FN] Kontu, an abundance verb, is sometimes written contee, easily corrupted to cungue. Dutch CongÉ means "Discharge," the tail-race of a mill, or a strong, swift current. Minnie's CongÉ, the tail-race of Minnie's mill.

Mahequa and Mawewier are forms of the name of a small stream which constitutes one of the boundaries of what is known as Welch's Island. They are from the root Mawe, "Meeting," Mawewi, "Assembly" (Zeisb.), i.e. "Brought together," as "Where paths or streams or boundaries come together." The reference may have been to the place where the stream unites with Demarest's Kill, as shown on a map of survey in "History of Rockland County." Welch's Island was so called from its enclosure by streams and a marsh. (See Mattaconga and Mahway.)

Skoonnenoghky is written as the name of a hill which formed the southwest boundmark of a district of country purchased from the Indians by Governor Dongan in 1685, and patented to Capt. John Evans by him in 1694, described in the Indian deed as beginning on the Hudson, "At about the place called the Dancing Chamber, thence south to the north side of the land called Haverstraw, thence northwest along the hill called Skoonnenoghky" to the bound of a previous purchase made by Dongan "Called Meretange pond." (See Pitkiskaker.) The hill was specifically located in a survey of part of the line of the Evans Patent, by Cadwallader Colden, in 1722, noted as "Beginning at Stony Point and running over a high hill, part of which makes the Stony Point, and is called Kunnoghky or Kunnoghkin." (Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 162.) The south side of Stony Point was then accepted as the "North side of the land called Haverstraw." The hills in immediate proximity, at varying points of compass, are the Bochberg (Dutch, Bochelberg, "Humpback hill"), and the Donderberg, neither of which, however, have connection with Stony Point, leaving the conclusion certain that from the fact that the line had its beginning at the extreme southeastern limit of the Point on the Hudson, the hill referred to in the survey must have been that on which the Stony Point fort of the Revolution was erected, "Part of which hill" certainly "makes the Stony Point." Colden's form of the name, "Kunnoghky or Kunnoghkin," is obviously an equivalent of Dongan's Schoonnenoghky. Both forms are from the generic root GÚn, Lenape (QÛn, Mass.), meaning "Long"—GÚnaquot, Lenape, "Long, tall, high, extending upwards"; QunnÚhqui (Mass.), "Tall, high, extending upwards"; QunnÚhqui-ohke or Kunn'oghky, "Land extending upwards," high land, gradual ascent. The name being generic was easily shifted about and so it was that in adjusting the northwest line of the Evans Patent it came to have permanent abode as that of the hill now known as Schunnemunk in the town of Cornwall, Orange County, to the advantage of the proprietors of the Minisink Patent. [FN] Reference to the old patent line will be met in other connections.

[FN] The patent to Capt. John Evans was granted by Gov. Dongan in 1694, and vacated by act of the Colonial Assembly in 1708, approved by the Queen in 1708. It included Gov. Dongan's two purchases of 1784-85. {sic} It was not surveyed; its southeast, or properly its northwest line was never satisfactorily determined, but was supposed to run from Stony Point to a certain pond called Maretanze in the present town of Greenville, Orange County. Following the vacation of the patent in 1708, several small patents were granted which were described in general terms as a part of the lands which it covered. In order to locate them the Surveyor-General of the Province in 1722, propounded an inquiry as to the bounds of the original grant; hence the survey by Cadwallader Colden. The line then established was called "The New Northwest Line." It was substantially the old line from Stony Point to Maretanze Pond (now Binnenwater), in Greenville, and cut off a portion of the territory which was supposed to have been included in the Wawayanda Patent. Another line was projected in 1765-6, by the proprietors of the Minisink Patent, running further northeast and the boundmark shifted to a pond north of Sam's Point, the name going with it. The transaction formed the well-known Minisink Angle, and netted the Minisink proprietors 56,000 acres of unoccupied lands. (Doc. Hist. N.Y., iii, 986.) Compare Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 164, 168, 171, 172, and Map of Patents in Hist. Orange Co., quarto edition.

Reckgawank, of record in 1645 as the name of Haverstraw, appears in several later forms. Dr. O'Callaghan (Hist. New Neth.) noted: "Sessegehout, chief of Rewechnong of Haverstraw." In Col. Hist. N.Y., "Keseshout [FN-1] chief of Rewechnough, or Haverstraw," "Curruppin, brother, and representative of the chief of Rumachnanck, alias Haverstraw." In the treaty of 1645: "Sesekemick and Willem, chiefs of Tappans and Reckgawank," which Brodhead found converted to "Kumachenack, or Haverstraw." [FN-2] The original is no doubt from Rekau, "Sand, gravel," with verb substantive wi, and locative -ng, or -ink; written by Zeisberger, Lekauwi. The same word appears in Rechqua-akie, now Rockaway, L. I. The general meaning, with the locative -nk or -ink, is "At the sandy place," and the reference to the sandy flats, at Haverstraw, where Sesegehout presumably resided. There is no reason for placing this clan on Long Island.

[FN-1] Sesehout seems to have been written to convey an idea of the rank of the sachem from the Dutch word Schout, "Sheriff." K'schi-sakima, "Chief, principal," or "greatest sachem." In Duchess County the latter is written t'see-saghamaugh.

[FN-2] Haverstraw is from Dutch Haverstroo. "Oat straw," presumably so named from the wild oats which grew abundantly on the flats.

Nawasink, Yan Dakah, Caquaney and Aquamack, are entered in the Indian deed to De Hart as names for lands purchased by him at Haverstraw in 1666. The deed reads: "A piece of land and meadow lying upon Hudson's River in several parcels, called by the Indians Nawasink, Yan Dakah, Caquaney, and Aquamack, within the limits of Averstraw, bounded on the east and north by Hudson's River, on the west by a creek called Menisakcungue, and on the south by the mountain." The mountain on the south could have been no other than Verdrietig Hoek, and the limit on the north the mouth of the creek in the cove formed by Grassy Point, which was long known as "The further neck." Further than is revealed by the names the places cannot be certainly identified. Taken in the order in the deed, Newasink located a place that was "At (or on) a point or promontory." It is a pure Lenape name. Yan Dakah is probably from Yu Undach, "On this side," i.e. on the side towards the speaker. Caquancy is so badly corrupted that its derivative is not recognizable. Aquamack seems to be the same word that we have in Accomack, Va., meaning, "On the Other side," or "Other side lands." In deed to Florus Crom is mentioned "Another parcel of upland and meadow known by the name of Ahequerenoy, lying north of the brook called Florus Falls and extending to Stony Point," the south line of which was the north line of the Haverstraw lands as later understood. The tract was known for years as "The end place."

Sankapogh, Indian deed to Van Cortlandt, 1683—Sinkapogh, Songepogh, Tongapogh—is given as the name of a small stream flowing to the Hudson south of the stream called Assinapink, locally now known as Swamp Kill and Snake-hole Creek. The stream is the outlet of a pool or spring which forms a marsh at or near the foot of precipitous rocks. Probably an equivalent of Natick Sonkippog, "Cool water."

Poplopen's Creek, now so written, the name of the stream flowing to the Hudson between the sites of the Revolutionary forts Clinton and Montgomery, south of West Point, and also the name of one of the ponds of which the stream is the outlet, seems to be from English Pop-looping (Dutch Loopen), and to describe the stream as flowing out quickly—Pop, "To issue forth with a quick, sudden movement"; Looping, "To run," to flow, to stream. The flow of the stream was controlled by the rise and fall of the waters in the ponds on the hills, seven in number. The outlet of Poplopen Pond is now dammed back to retain a head of water for milling purposes. It is a curious name. The possessive 's does not belong to the original—Pop-looping Creek.

Assinapink, the name of a small stream of water flowing to the Hudson from a lake bearing the same name—colloquially Sinsapink—known in Revolutionary history as Bloody Pond—is of record, "A small rivulet of water called Assin-napa-ink" (Cal. N, Y. Land Papers, 99), from Assin, "stone"; Napa, "lake, pond," or place of water, and -ink, locative, literally, "Place of water at or on the stone." The current interpretation, "Water from the solid rock," is not specially inappropriate, as the lake is at the foot of the rocks of Bare Mountain. At a certain place in the course of the stream a legal description reads: "A whitewood tree standing near the southerly side of a ridge of rocks, lying on the south side of a brook there called by the Indians Sickbosten Kill, and by the Christians Stony Brook." [FN] The Indians never called the stream Sickbosten, unless they learned that word from the Dutch, for corrupted Dutch it is. The derivative is Boos, "Wicked, evil, angry"; Zich Boos Maken, "To grow angry," referring particularly to the character of the stream in freshets.

[FN] Adv. in Newburgh Mirror, June 18, 1798.

Prince's Falls, so called in description of survey of patent to Samuel Staats, 1712: "Beginning at ye mouth of a small rivulet called by the Indians Assin-napa-ink, then up the river (Hudson) as it runs, two hundred chains, which is about four chains north of Prince's Falls, including a small rocky isle and a small piece of boggy meadow called John Cantton Huck; also a small slip of land on each side of a fall of water just below ye meadow at ye said John Cantonhuck." (Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 99.) Long known as Buttermilk Falls and more recently as Highland Falls. In early days the falls were one of the most noted features on the lower Hudson. They were formed by the discharge over a precipice of the outlet waters of Bog-meadow Brook. They were called Prince's Falls in honor of Prince Maurice of Holland. The name was extended to the creek in the Staats survey—Prince's Kill.

Manahawaghin is of record as the name of what is now known as Iona Island, in connection with "A certain tract of land on the west side of Hudson's River, beginning on the south side of a creek called Assinapink, together with a certain island and parcel of meadow called Manahawaghin, and by the Christians Salisbury Island." The island lies about one mile south of directly opposite Anthony's Nose, and is divided from the main land by a narrow channel or marshy water-course. The tract of land lies immediately north of the Donderberg; it was the site of the settlement known as Doodletown in Revolutionary history. The name is probably from Mannahatin, the indefinite or diminutive form of Mannahata, "The Island"—literally, "Small island." The last word of the record form is badly mangled. (See Manhattan.)

Northern Gate of the Highlands

Manahan, meaning "Island"—indefinite -an—is a record name of what is now known as Constitution Island, the latter title from Fort Constitution which was erected thereon during the war of the Revolution. The early Dutch navigators called it Martelaer's Rack Eiland, from Martelaer, "Martyr," and Rack, a reach or sailing course—"the Martyr's Reach"—from the baffling winds and currents encountered in passing West Point. The effort of Judge Benson to convert "Martelaer's" to "Murderer's." and "Rack" to "Rock"—"the Murderer's Rock"—was unfortunate.

Pollepel Eiland, a small rocky island in the Hudson at the northern entrance to the Highlands, was given that name by an early Dutch navigator. It means, literally, "Pot-ladle Island," so called, presumably, from its fancied resemblance to a Dutch pot-ladle. Jasper Dankers and Peter Sluyter wrote the name in their Journal in 1679-80, indicating that the island was then well known by that title. On Van der Donck's map of 1656 the island is named Kaes Eiland. Dutch Kaas (cheese) Eiland. Dankers and Sluyter also wrote, "Boter-berg (Butter-hill), because it is like the rolls of butter which the farmers of Holland take to market." Read in connection the names are Butter Hill and Cheese Island. The same writers wrote, "Hays-berg (Hay-hill), because it is like a hay-stack in Holland," and "Donder-berg (Thunder-hill), so called from the echoes of thunder peals which culminated there." The latter retains its ancient Dutch title. It is eminently the Echo Hill of the Highlands. The oldest record name of any of the hills is Klinker-berg, which is written on the Carte Figurative of 1614-16 directly opposite a small island and apparently referred to Butter Hill. It means literally, "Stone Mountain." The passage between Butter Hill and Break Neck, on the east side of the river, was called "Wey-gat, or Wind-gate, because the wind often blowed through it with great force," wrote Dr. Dwight. The surviving name, however, is Warragat, from Dutch Warrelgat, "Wind-gate." It was at the northern entrance to this troublesome passage that Hudson anchored the Half-Moon, September 29th, 1609. Brodhead suggested (Note K, Vol. I) that Pollepel Island was that known in early Dutch history as Prince's Island, or Murderer's Creek Island, and that thereon was erected Fort Wilhelmus, referred to by Wassenaer in 1626. (Doc. Hist. N.Y., iii, 35.) The evidence is quite clear, however, that the island to which Wassenaer referred was in the vicinity of Schodac, where there was also a Murderer's Creek.

Hudson, on his exploration of the river which now bears his name, sailed into the bay immediately north of Butter Hill, now known as Newburgh Bay, on the morning of the 15th of September, 1709. After spending several days in the northern part of the river, he reached Newburgh Bay on his return voyage in the afternoon of September 29th, and cast anchor, or as stated in Juet's Journal, "Turned down to the edge of the mountains, or the northernmost of the mountains, and anchored, because the high lands hath many points, and a narrow channel, and hath many eddie winds. So we rode quietly all night." The hill or mountain long known as Breakneck, on the east side of the river, may be claimed as the northernmost, which would place his anchorage about midway between Newburgh and Pollepel Island.

Quassaick, now so written, is of record, Quasek, 1709; "Near to a place called Quasaik," 1709-10; Quasseck, 1713; "Quassaick Creek upon Hudson's River," 1714. It was employed to locate the place of settlement of the Palatine immigrants in 1709—"The Parish of Quassaick," later, "The Parish of Newburgh." It is now preserved as the name of the creek which bounds (in part) the city of Newburgh on the south. "Near to a place called Quasek," indicates that the place of settlement was located by the name of some other place which was near to it and generally known by the name. The late Dr. E. B. O'Callaghan read it, in 1856: "From Qussuk, 'Stone,' and -ick, 'Place where,' literally, 'A place of stone,'" the presumed reference being to the district through which the stream flows, which is remarkable for its deposit of glacial bowlders. The correctness of this interpretation has been questioned on very tenable grounds. Qusuk is not in the plural number and -uk does not stand for -ick. Eliot wrote: "Qussuk, a rock," and "Qussukquan-ash, rocks." Qussuk, as a substantive simply, would be accepted as the name of a place called "A rock," by metonymie, "A stone." No other meaning can be drawn from it. It does not belong to the dialect of the district, the local terms being -Ápuch, "Rock," and -assin, or -achsÛn, "Stone." Dr. O'Callaghan's interpretation may safely be rejected. William R. Gerard writes: "The worst corrupted name that I know of is Wequaskeg or Wequaskeek, meaning, 'At the end of the marsh.' It appears in innumerable forms—Weaxashuk, Wickerschriek, Weaquassic, etc. I think that Quassaick, changed from Quasek (1709), is one of these corruptions. The original word probably referred to some place at the end of a swamp. The word would easily become Quasekek, Quasek, and Quassaick. The formative -ek, in words meaning swamp, marsh, etc., was often dropped by both Dutch and English scribes." This conjecture would seem to locate the name as that of the end of Big Swamp, nearly five miles distant from the place of settlement. My conjecture is that the name is from Moh. Kussuhkoe, meaning "High;" with substantive Kussuhkohke, "High lands," the place of settlement being described as "Near the Highlands," which became the official designation of "The Precinct of the Highlands." Kussuhk is pretty certainly met in Cheesek-ook, the name of patented lands in the Highlands, described as "Uplands and meadows;" also in Quasigh-ook, Columbia County, which is described as "A high place on a high hill." The Palatine settlers at Quasek, wrote, in 1714, that their place was "all uplands," a description which will not be disputed at the present day. (See Cheesekook, Quissichkook, etc.)

Much-Hattoos, a hill so called in petition of William Chambers and William Sutherland, in 1709, for a tract of land in what is now the town of New Windsor, and in patent to them in 1712, a boundmark described as "West by the hill called Much-Hattoes," is apparently from Match, "Evil, bad;" -adchu, "Hill" or mountain, and -es, "Small"—"A small hill bad," or a small hill that for some reason was not regarded with favor. [FN] The eastern face of the hill is a rugged wall of gneiss; the western face slopes gradually to a swamp not far from its base and to a small lake, the latter now utilized for supplying the city of Newburgh with water, with a primary outlet through a passage under a spur of the hill, which the Indians may have regarded as a mysterious or bad place. In local nomenclature the hill has long been known as Snake Hill, from the traditionary abundance of rattle-snakes on it, though few have been seen there in later years.

[FN] "I think your reading of Muchattoos as an orthography of original Matchatchu's, is very plausible. I think Massachusetts is the same word, plus a locative suffix and English sign of the plural. It was formerly spelled in many ways: Mattachusetts, Massutchet, Matetusses, etc. Dr. Trumbull read it as standing for Mass-adchu-set, 'At the big hills'; but I learn from history that Massachusetts was originally the name of a hillock situated in the midst of a salt marsh. It was a locality selected by the sachem of his tribe as one of his places of residence. He stood in fear of his enemies, the Penobscotts, and this hillock, from its situation was a 'bad,' or difficult place to reach. So Massachsat for Matsadchuset or Mat-adchu-set plainly means, 'On the bad hillock.'" (Wm. R. Gerard.)

Cronomer's Hill and Cronomer's Valley, about three miles west of the city of Newburgh, take their names from a traditionary Indian called Cronomer, the location of whose wigwam is said to be still known as "The hut lot." The name is probably a corruption of the original, which may have been Dutch Jeronimo.

Murderer's Creek, so called in English records for many years, and by the Dutch "den Moordenaars' Kil," is entered on map of 1666, "R. Tans Kamer," or River of the Dance Chamber, and the point immediately south of its mouth, "de Bedrieghlyke Hoek" (Dutch, Bedrieglijk), meaning "a deceitful, fraudulent hook," or corner, cape, or angle. Presumably the Dutch navigator was deceived by the pleasant appearance of the bay, sailed into it and found his vessel in the mouth of the Warrelgat. Tradition affirms in explanation of the Dutch Moordenaars that an early company of traders entered their vessel in the mouth of the stream; that they were enticed on shore at Sloop Hill and there murdered. Paulding, in his beautiful story, "Naoman," related the massacre of a pioneer family at the same place. The event, however, which probably gave the name to the stream occurred in August, 1643, when boats passing down the river from Fort Orange, laden with furs, were attacked by the Indians "above the Highlands" and "nine Christians, including two women were murdered, and one woman and two children carried away prisoners," (Doc. Hist. N.Y., iv, 12), the narrative locating the occurrence by the name "den Moordenaars' Kil," i.e. the kill from which the attacking party issued forth or on which the murderers resided. The first appearance of the name in English records is in a deed to Governor Dongan, in 1685, in which the lands purchased by him included "the lands of the Murderers' Creek Indians," the stream being then well known by the name. The present name, Moodna, was converted to that form, by N. P. Willis from the Dutch "Moordenaar," by dropping letters, an inexcusable emasculation from a historic standpoint, but made poetical by his interpretation, "Meeting of the waters."

Schunnemunk, now so written, the name of a detached hill in the town of Cornwall, Orange County, appears of record in that connection, first, in the Wilson and Aske Patent of 1709, in which the tract granted is described as lying "Between the hills at Scoonemoke." Skoonnemoghky, Skonanaky, Schunnemock, Schonmack Clove, Schunnemock Hill, are other forms. In 1750 Schunnamunk appears, and in 1774, on Sauthier's map (1776) Schunnamank is applied to the range of hills which have been described as "The High Hills to the west of the Highlands." 'In a legal brief in the controversy to determine finally the northwest line of the Evans Patent, the name is written Skonanake, and the claim made that it was the hill named Skoonnemoghky in the deed from the Indians to Governor Dongan, in 1685, and therein given as the southeast boundmark of the lands of "The Murderer's Creek Indians," and, later, the hill along which the northwest line of the Evans Patent ran, which it certainly was not, although the name is probably from the same generic. (See Schoonnenoghky.) The hill forms the west shoulder of Woodbury Valley. It is a somewhat remarkable elevation in geological formation and bears on its summit many glacial scratches. On its north spur stood the castle of Maringoman, one of the grantors of the deed to Governor Dongan, and who later removed to the north side of the Otter Kill where his wigwam became a boundmark in two patents. [FN] The traditionary word "castle," in early days of Indian history, was employed as the equivalent of town, whether palisaded or not. In this case we may read the name, "Maringoman's Town," which may or may not have been palisaded. It seems to have been the seat of the "Murderer's Creek Indians." The burial ground of the clan is marked on a map of the Wilson and Aske Patent, and has been located by Surveyor Fred J. McKnight (1898) on the north side of the Cornwall and Monroe line and very near the present road past the Houghton farm, near which the castle stood. The later "cabin" of the early sachem is plainly located.

[FN] Van Dam Patent (1709) and Mompesson Patent (1709-12). The late Hon. George W. Tuthill wrote me in 1858: "On the northwestern bank of Murderers' Creek, about half a mile below Washingtonville, stands the dwelling-house of Henry Page (a colored man), said to be the site of Maringoman's wigman, referred to in the Van Dam Patent of 1709. The southwesterly corner of that patent is in a southwesterly direction from said Page's house."

In the controversy in regard to the northwest line of the Evans Patent, one of the counsel said: "It is also remarkable that the Murderers' Creek extends to the hill Skonanaky, and that the Indian, Maringoman, who sold the lands, did live on the south side of Murderers' Creek, opposite the house where John McLean now (1756) dwells, near the said hill, and also lived on the north bank of Murderers' Creek, where Colonel Mathews lives. The first station of his boundaries is a stone set in the ground at Maringoman's castle."

Winegtekonck, 1709—Wenighkonck, 1726; Wienackonck, 1739—is quoted as the name of what is now known as Woodcock Mountain, in the town of Blooming-Grove, It is not so connected, however, in the record of 1709, which reads: "A certain tract of land by the Indians called Wineghtek-onck and parts adjacent, lying on both sides of Murderers' Kill" (Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 91), in which connection it seems to be another form of Mahican Wanun-ketukok, "At the winding of the river"—"A bend-of-the-river-place." Presumably the reference is to a place where the stream bends in the vicinity of the hill. The name appears in an abstract of an Indian deed to Sir Henry Ashurst, in 1709, for a tract of land of about sixteen square miles. The purchase was not patented, the place being included in the Governor Dongan purchase of 1685, and in the Evans Patent.

Sugar Loaf, the name of a conical hill in the town of Chester, Orange County, is not an Indian name of course, but it enters into an enumeration of Indian places, as in its vicinity were found by Charles Clinton, in his survey of the Cheesec-ock Patent in 1738, the unmistakable evidences of the site of an Indian village, then probably not long abandoned, and Mr. Eager (Hist. Orange Co.) quoted evidences showing that on a farm then (1846) owned by Jonathan Archer, was an Indian burying ground, the marks of which were still distinct prior to the Revolution.

Runbolt's Run, a spring and creek in the town of Goshen, are said to have taken that name from Rombout, one of the Indian grantors of the Wawayanda tract. It is probable, however, that the name is a corruption of Dutch Rondbocht, meaning, "A tortuous pool, puddle, marsh," at or near which the chief may have resided. Rombout (Dutch) means "Bull-fly." It could hardly have been the name of a run of water.

Mistucky, the name of a small stream in the town of Warwick, has lost some of its letters. Mishquawtucke (Nar.), would read, "Place of red cedars."

Pochuck, given as the name of "A wild, rugged and romantic region" in Sussex County, N.J., to a creek near Goshen, and, modernly, to a place in Newburgh lying under the shadow of Muchhattoes Hill, is no doubt from Putscheck (Len.), "A corner or repress," a retired or "out-of-the-way place." Eliot wrote Poochag, in the Natick dialect, and Zeisberger, in the Minsi-Lenape, Puts-cheek, which is certainly heard in Pochuck.

Chouckhass, one of the Indian grantors of the Wawayanda tract, left his name to what is now called Chouck's Hill, in the town of Warwick. The land on which he lived and in which he was buried came into possession of Daniel Burt, an early settler, who gave decent sepulture to the bones of the chief. [FN]

[FN] The traditional places of residence of several of the sachems who signed the Wawayanda deed is stated by a writer in "Magazine of American History," and may be repeated on that authority, viz: "Oshaquememus, chief of a village, near the point where the Beaver-dam Brook empties into Murderers' Creek near Campbell Hall; Moshopuck, on the flats now known as Haverstraw; Ariwimack, chief, on the Wallkill, extending from Goshen to Shawongunk; Guliapaw, chief of a clan residing near Long Pond (Greenwood Lake), within fifty rods of the north end of the pond; Rapingonick died about 1730 at the Delaware Water-Gap." The names given by the writer do not include all the signers of the deed. One of the unnamed grantors was Claus, so called from Klaas (Dutch), "A tall ninny"; an impertinent, silly fellow; a ninny-jack. The name may have accurately described the personality of the Indian.

Jogee Hill, in the town of Minisink, takes its name from and preserves the place of residence of Keghekapowell, alias Jokhem (Dutch Jockem for Joachim), one of the grantors of lands to Governor Dongan in 1684. The first word of his Indian name, Keghe, stands for Keche, "Chief, principal, greatest," and defined his rank as principal sachem. The canton which he ruled was of considerable number. He remained in occupation of the hill long after his associates had departed.

Wawayanda, 1702—Wawayanda or Wocrawin, 1702; Wawayunda, 1722-23; Wiwanda, Wowando, Index Col. Hist. N.Y.—the first form, one of the most familiar names in Orange County, is preserved as that of a town, a stream of water, and of a large district of country known as the Wawayanda Patent, in which latter connection it appears of record, first, in 1702, in a petition of Dr. Samuel Staats, of Albany, and others, for license to purchase "A tract of land called Wawayanda, in the county of Ulster, containing by estimation about five thousand acres, more or less, lying about thirty miles backward in the woods from Hudson's River." (Land Papers, 56.) In February of the same year the parties filed a second petition for license to "purchase five thousand acres adjoining thereto, as the petitioners had learned that their first purchase, 'called Wawayanda' was 'altogether a swamp and not worth anything.'" In November of the same year, having made the additional purchase, the parties asked for a patent for ten thousand acres "Lying at Wawayanda or Woerawin." Meanwhile Dr. John Bridges and Company, of New York, purchased under license and later received patent for "certain tracts and parcels of vacant lands in the county of Orange, called Wawayanda, and some other small tracts and parcels of lands," and succeeded in including in their patent the lands which had previously been purchased by Dr. Staats. Specifically the tract called Wawayanda or Woerawin was never located, nor were the several "certain tracts of land called Wawayanda" purchased by Dr. Bridges. The former learned in a short time, however, that his purchase was not "altogether a swamp," although it may have included or adjoined one, and the latter found that his purchase included a number of pieces of very fine lands and a number of swamps, and especially the district known as the Drowned Lands, covering some 50,000 acres, in which were several elevations called islands, now mainly obliterated by drainage and traversed by turnpikes and railroads. Several water-courses were there also, notably the stream now known as the Wallkill, and that known as the Wawayanda or Warwick Creek, a stream remarkable for its tortuous course.

What and where was Wawayanda? The early settlers on the patent seem to have been able to answer. Mr. Samuel Vantz, who then had been on the patent for fifty-five years, gave testimony in 1785, that Wawayanda was "Within a musket-shot of where DeKay lived." The reference was to the homestead house of Col. Thomas DeKay, who was then dead since 1758. The foundation of the house remains and its site is well known. In adjusting the boundary line between New York and New Jersey it was cut off from Orange County and is now in Vernon, New Jersey, where it is still known as the "Wawayanda Homestead." Within a musket-shot of the site of the ancient dwelling flows Wawayanda Creek, and with the exception of the meadows through which it flows in a remarkably sinuous course, is the only object in proximity to the place where DeKay lived, except the meadow and the valley in which it flows. The locative of the name at that point seems to be established with reasonable certainty as well as the object to which it was applied—the creek.

The meaning of the name remains to be considered. Its first two syllables are surely from the root Wai or Wae; iterative and frequentive Wawai, or Waway, meaning "Winding around many times." It is a generic combination met in several forms—Wawau, Lenape; Wohwayen, Moh.; [FN] Wawai, Shawano; Wawy, Wawi, Wawei, etc., on the North-central-Hudson, as in Waweiqate-pek-ook, Greene County, and Wawayachton-ock, Dutchess County. Dr. Albert S. Gatschet, of the Bureau of Ethnology, wrote me: "Wawayanda, as a name formed by syllabic reduplication, presupposes a simple form, Wayanda, 'Winding around.' The reduplication is Wawai, or Waway-anda, 'many' or 'several' windings, as a complex of river bends." As the name stands it is a participial or verbal noun. Waway, "Winding around many times";—-anda, "action, motion" (radical -an, "to move, to go"), and, inferentially, the place where the action of the verb is performed, as in Guttanda, "Taste it," the action of the throat in tasting being referred to, and in PopachÁndamen, "To beat; to strike." As the verb termination of Waway, "Round about many times," it is entirely proper. The uniformity of the orthography leaves little room for presuming that any other word was used by the grantors, or that any letters were lost or dropped by the scribe in recording. It stands simply as the name of an object without telling what that object was, but what was it that could have had action, motion—that had many windings—except Wawayanda Creek?

[FN] "Wohwayen (Moh.), where the brook 'winds about,' turning to the west and then to the east." (Trumbull.) Wowoaushin, "It winds about." (Eliot.) Woweeyouchwan. "It flows circuitously, winds about." (Ib.)

Mr. Ralph Wisner, of Florida, Orange County, recently reproduced in the Warwick Advertiser, an affidavit made by Adam Wisner, May 19th, 1785, at a hearing in Chester, in the contention to determine the boundary line of the Cheesec-ock Patent, in which he stated that he was 86 years old on the 15th of April past; that he had lived on the Wawayanda Patent since 1715; that he "learned the Indian language" when he was a young man; that the Indians "had told him that Wawayanda signified 'the egg-shape,' or shape of an egg." Adam Wisner was an interpreter of the local Indian dialect; he is met as such in records. His interpretations, as were those of other interpreters, were mainly based on signs, motions, objects. Waway, "Winding about many times," would describe the lines of an egg, but it is doubtful if the suffix, -anda, had the meaning of "shape."

The familiar reading of Wawayanda, "Away-over-yonder," is a word-play, like Irving's "Manhattan, Man-with-a-hat-on." Dr. Schoolcraft's interpretation, "Our homes or places of dwelling," quoted in "History of Orange County," is pronounced by competent authority to be "Dialectically and grammatically untenable." It has poetic merit, but nothing more. Schoolcraft borrowed it from Gallatin.

Woerawin, given by Dr. Staats as the name of his second purchase, is also a verbal noun. By dialectic exchange of l for r and giving to the Dutch Æ its English equivalent Ü as in bull, it is probably from the root Wul, "Good, fine, handsome," etc., with the verbal termination -wi (Chippeway -win), indicating "objective existence," hence "place," a most appropriate description for many places in the Wawayanda or Warwick Valley.

Monhagen, the name of a stream in the town of Wallkill, is, if Indian as claimed, an equivalent of Monheagan, from Maingan, "A wolf," the totem of the Mohegans of Connecticut. The name, however, has the sound of Monagan—correctly, Monaghan, the name of a county in Ireland, and quite an extensive family name in Orange County.

Long-house, Wawayanda, and Pochuck are local names for what may be regarded as one and the same stream. It rises in the Drowned Lands, in New Jersey, where it is known as Long-house Creek; flows north until it receives the outlet of Wickham's Pond, in Warwick, Orange County, and from thence the united streams form the Wawayanda or Warwick Creek, which flows southwesterly for some miles into New Jersey and falls into Pochuck Creek, which approaches from the northwest, and from thence the flow is northwest into Orange County again to a junction with the Wallkill, which, rising in Pine Swamp, Sparta, N.J., flows north and forms the main drainage channel of the Drowned Lands. In addition to its general course Wawayanda Creek is especially sinuous in the New Milford and Sandfordville districts of Warwick, the bends multiplying at short distances, and also in the vicinity of the De Kay homestead in Vernon. In Warwick the stream has been known as "Wandering River" for many years. The patented lands are on this stream. Its name, Long-house Creek, was, no doubt, from one of the peculiar dwellings constructed by the Indians known as a Long House, [FN] which probably stood on or near the stream, and was occupied by the clan who sold the lands. Pochuck is from a generic meaning "A recess or corner." It is met in several places. (See Wawayanda and Pochuck.)

[FN] The Indian Long House was from fifty to six hundred and fifty feet in length by twenty feet in width, the length depending upon the number of persons or families to be accommodated, each family having its own fire. They were formed by saplings set in the ground, the tops bent together and the whole covered with bark. The Five Nations compared their confederacy to a long house reaching, figuratively, from Hudson's River to Lake Erie.

Gentge-kamike, "A field appropriated for holding dances," may reasonably have been the Indian name of the plateau adjoining the rocky point, at the head of Newburgh Bay, which, from very early times, has been known as The Dans Kamer (Dance Chamber), a designation which appears of record first in a Journal by David Pietersen de Vries of a trip made by him in his sloop from Fort Amsterdam to Fort Orange, in 1639, who wrote, under date of April 15: "At night came by the Dans Kamer, where there was a party of Indians, who were very riotous, seeking only mischief; so we were on our guard." Obviously the place was then as well known as a landmark as was Esopus (Kingston), and may safely be claimed as having received its Dutch name from the earliest Dutch navigators, from whom it has been handed down not only as "The Dans Kamer," but as "t' Duivel's Dans Kamer," the latter presumably designative of the fearful orgies which were held there familiarly known as "Devil worship." During the Esopus War of 1663, Lieut. Couwenhoven, who was lying with his sloop opposite the Dans Kamer, wrote, under date of August 14th, that "the Indians thereabout on the river side" made "a great uproar every night, firing guns and Kintecaying, so that the woods rang again." There can be no doubt from the records that the plateau was an established place for holding the many dances of the Indians. The word Kinte is a form of GÉntge (Zeisb.), meaning "dance." Its root is Kanti, a verbal, meaning "To sing." GÉntgeen, "To dance" (Zeisb.), Gent' Keh'n (Heck.), comes down in the local Dutch records Kinticka, Kinte-Kaye, Kintecaw, Kintekaying (dancing), and has found a resting place in the English word Canticoy, "A social dance." Dancing was eminently a feature among the Indians. They had their war dances, their festival dances, their social dances, etc. As a rule, their social dances were pleasant affairs. Rev. Heckewelder wrote that he would prefer being present at a social Kintecoy for a full hour, than a few minutes only at such dances as he had witnessed in country taverns among white people. "Feast days," wrote Van der Donck in 1656, "are concluded by old and middle aged men with smoking; by the young with a Kintecaw, singing and dancing." Every Indian captive doomed to death, asked and was granted the privilege of singing and dancing his Kintekaye, or death song. War dances were riotous; the scenes of actual battle were enacted. The religious dances and rites were so wonderful that even the missionaries shrank from them, and the English government forbade their being held within one hundred miles of European settlements. The holding of a war dance was equivalent to opening a recruiting station, men only attending and if participating in the dance expressed thereby their readiness to enter upon the war. It was probably one of these Kantecoys that Couwenhoven witnessed in 1663.

There were two dancing fields here—so specified in deed—the "Large Dans Kamer" and the "Little Dans Kamer," the latter a limited plateau on the point and the former the large plateau now occupied in part by the site of the Armstrong House. The Little Dans Kamer is now practically destroyed by the cut on the West-shore Railroad. 'Sufficient of the Large Dans Kamer remains to evidence its natural adaptation for the purposes to which the Indians assigned it. Paths lead to the place from all directions. Negotiations for the exchange of prisoners held by the Esopus Indians were conducted there, and there the Esopus Indians had direct connection with the castle of the Wappingers on the east side of the Hudson. There are few places on the Hudson more directly associated with Indian customs and history than the Dans Kamer.

Arackook, Kachawaweek, and Oghgotacton are record but unlocated names of places on the east side of the Wallkill, by some presumed to have been in the vicinity of Walden, Orange County, from the description: "Beginning at a fall called Arackook and running thence northwesterly on the east side of Paltz Creek until it comes to Kachawaweek." The petitioner for the tract was Robert Sanders, a noted interpreter, who renewed his petition in 1702, calling the tract Oghgotacton, and presented a claim to title from a chief called Corporwin, as the representative of his brother Punguanis, "Who had been ten years gone to the Ottowawas." He again gave the description, "Beginning at the fall called Arackook," but there is no trace of the location of the patent in the vicinity of Walden.

Hashdisch was quoted by the late John W. Hasbrouck, of Kingston, as the name of what has long been known as "The High Falls of the Wallkill" at Walden. Authority not stated, but presumably met by Mr. Hasbrouck in local records. It may be from Ashp, Hesp, etc., "High," and -ish, derogative. The falls descend in cascades and rapids about eighty feet at an angle of forty-five degrees. Though their primary appearance has been marred by dams and mills, they are still impressive in freshet seasons.

Twischsawkin is quoted as the name of the Wallkill at some place in New Jersey. On Sauthier's map it stands where two small ponds are represented and seems to have reference to the outlet. Twisch may be an equivalent of Tisch, "Strong," and Sawkin may be an equivalent of Heckewelder's Saucon, "Outlet," or mouth of a river, pond, etc. Wallkill, the name of the stream as now written, is an Anglicism of Dutch Waal, "Haven, gulf, depth," etc., and Kil, "Channel" or water-course. It is the name of an arm of the Rhine in the Netherlands, and was transferred here by the Huguenots who located in New Paltz. (See Wawayanda.)

Shawangunk, the name of a town, a stream of water, and a range of hills in Ulster County, was that of a specific place from which it was extended. It is of record in many orthographies, the first in 1684, of a place called Chauwanghungh, [FN-1] in deed from the Indians to Governor Dongan, in the same year, Chawangon, [FN-2] and Chanwangung in 1686, [FN-3] later forms running to variants of Shawangunk. The locative is made specific in a grant to Thomas Lloyd in 1687; [FN-4] in a grant to Severeign Tenhout in 1702, [FN-5] and in a description in 1709, "Adjoining Shawangung, Nescotack and the Palze." [FN-6] In several other patent descriptions the locative is further identified by "near to" or "adjoining," and finally (1723) by "near the village of Showangunck," at which time the "village" consisted of the dwellings of Thomas Lloyd, on the north side of Shawangunk Kill; Severeign Tenhout on the south side; and Jacobus Bruyn, Benjamin Smedes, and others, with a mill, at and around what was known later as the village of Tuthiltown. In 1744, Jacobus Bruyn was the owner of the Lloyd tract. [FN-7] The distribution of the name over the district as a general locative is distinctly traceable from this center. It was never the name of the mountain, nor of the stream, and it should be distinctly understood that it does not appear in Kregier's Journal of the Second Esopus War, nor in any record prior to 1684, and could not have been that of any place other than that distinctly named in Governor Dongan's deed and in Lloyd's Patent.

Topographically, the tract was at and on the side of a hill running north from the fiats on the stream to a point of which Nescotack was the summit, the Lloyd grant lying in part on the hill-side and in part on the low lands on the stream. The mountain is eight miles distant. Without knowledge of the precise location of the name several interpretations of it have been made, generally from Shawan, "South"—South Mountain, South Water, South Place. [FN-8] The latter is possible, i.e. a place lying south of Nescotack, as in the sentence: "Schawangung, Nescotack, and the Paltz." From the topography of the locative, however, Mr. William R. Gerard suggests that the derivatives are Scha (or Shaw), "Side," -ong, "hill," and -unk, locative, the combination reading, "At (or on) the hill-side." [FN-9] This reading is literally sustained by the locative.The name is of especial interest from its association with the Dutch and Indian War of 1663, although not mentioned in Kregier's narrative of the destruction of the Indian palisaded village called "New Fort," and later Shawongunk Fort. The narrative is very complete in colonial records. [FN-10] The village or fort was not as large as that called Kahanksan, which had previously been destroyed. It was composed of ten huts, probably capable of accommodating two or three hundred people. The palisade around them formed "a perfect square," on the brow of a tract of table-land on the bank of Shawongunk Kill. Since first settlement the location has been known as "New Fort." It is on the east side of the stream about three miles west of the village of Wallkill. [FN-11] In the treaty of 1664 the site and the fields around it were conceded, with other lands, to the Dutch, by the Indians, as having been "conquered by the sword," but were subsequently included (1684) in the purchase by Governor Dongan. Later were included in the patent to Capt. John Evans, and was later covered by one of the smaller patents into which the Evans Patent was divided. When the Dutch troops left it it was a terrible picture of desolation. The huts had been burned, the bodies of the Indians who had been killed and thrown into the corn-pits had been unearthed by wolves and their skeletons left to bleach on the plain, with here and there the half eaten body of a child. For years it was a fable told to children that the place was haunted by the ghosts of the slain, and even now the timid feel a peculiar sensation, when visiting the site, whenever a strange cry breaks on the ear, and the assurance that it is real comes with gratefulness in the shouts of the harvesters in the nearby fields. It is a place full of history, full of poetry, full of the footprints of the aboriginal lords, "Further down the creek," says the narrative, "several large wigwams stood, which we also burned, and divers maize fields which we also destroyed." On the sites of some of these wigwams fine specimens of Indian pottery and stone vessels and implements have been found, as well as many arrow-points of flint.

[FN-1] "Land lying about six or seven miles beyond ye Town where ye Walloons dwell, upon ye same creek; ye name of ye place is Chauwanghungh and Nescotack, two small parcels of land lying together." (N.Y. Land Papers, 29, 30.)

[FN-2] "Comprehending all those lands, meadows and woods called Nescotack, Chawangon, Memorasink, Kakogh, Getawanuck and Ghittatawah." (Deed to Gov. Dongan.)

[FN-3] "Beginning on the east side of the river (now Wallkill), and at the south end of a small island in the river, at the mouth of the river Chauwangung, in the County of Ulster, laid out for James Graham and John Delaval." (N.Y. Land Papers, 38.)

[FN-4] "Description of a survey of 410 acres of land, called by the Indian name Chauwangung, laid out for Thomas Lloyd." (N.Y. Land Papers, 44.)

[FN-5] N.Y. Land Papers, 60.

[FN-6] Ib. 169. Other early forms are Shawongunk (1685), Shawongonck (1709), Shawongunge (1712).

[FN-7] From Jacobus Bruyn came the ancient hamlet still known as Bruynswick. He erected a stone mansion on the tract, in the front wall of which was cut on a marble tablet, "Jacobus Bruyn. 1724." The house was destroyed by fire in 1870 (about), and a frame dwelling erected on its old foundation. It is about half-way between Bruynswick and Tuthilltown; owned later by John V. McKinstry. The location is certain from the will of Jacobus Bruyn in 1744.

[FN-8] The most worthless interpretation is that in Spofford's Gazeteer and copied by Mather in his Geological Survey: "Shawen, in the Mohegan language, means 'White,' also 'Salt.' and Gunk, 'A large pile of rocks,' hence 'White Rocks' or mountain." The trouble with it is that there is no such word as Shawen, meaning "White" in any Algonquian dialect, and no such word as Gunk, meaning "Rocks."

[FN-9] The monosyllable Shaw or Schaw, radical Scha, means "Side, edge, border, shore," etc. SchauwunuppÉque, "On the shore of the lake." Enda-tacht-schawÛnge, "At the narrows where the hill comes close to the river." (Heck.) Schajawonge, "Hill-side" (Zeisb.), from which Schawong-unk, "On the hill-side," or at the side of the hill, the precise bound of the name cannot be stated.

[FN-10] Doc. Hist. N.Y., iv, 71, 72, et. seq. Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 272, 326.

[FN-11] Authorities quoted and paper by Rev. Charles Scott, D. D., in "Proceedings Ulster Co. Hist. Soc."

Memorasink, Kahogh, Gatawanuk, and Ghittatawagh, names handed down in the Indian deed to Governor Dongan in 1684, have no other record, nor were they ever specifically located. The lands conveyed to him extended from the Shawangunk range to the Hudson, bounded on the north by the line of the Paltz Patent, and south by a line drawn from about the Dans Kamer. Ghittatawagh is probably from Kitchi, "Great, strong," etc., and Towatawik, "Wilderness"—the great wilderness, or uninhabited district. Gatawanuk seems to be from Kitchi, "Strong," -awan, impersonal verb termination, and -uk, locative, and to describe a place on a strong current or flowing stream. The same name seems to appear in Kitchawan, now Croton River. It may have located lands on the Wallkill.

Nescotack, a certain place so called in the Dongan deed of 1684, is referred to in connection with Shawongunk. It was granted by patent to Jacob Rutsen and described as "A tract of land by the Indians called Nescotack and by the Christians Guilford." (N.Y. Land Papers, 29, 30.) Guilford was known for many years as Guilford Church, immediately west of Shawongunk. The actual location of the name, however, is claimed for a hamlet now called Libertyville, further north, which was long known as Nescotack. The district is an extended ridge which rises gradually from the Shawongunk River-bottoms on the east and falls off on the west more abruptly. The name, probably, describes this ridge as "High lands," an equivalent of Esquatak and Eskwatack on the Upper Hudson; Ashpotag, Mass., and Westchester Co. Esp, Hesp, Ishp, Hesko, Nesco, etc., are record orthographies. (See Schodac and Shawongunk.)

Wishauwemis, a place-name in Shawongunk, was translated by Rev. Dr. Scott, "The place of beeches," from Schauwemi, "Beech wood"; but seems to be an equivalent of Moh. Wesauwemisk, a species of oak with yellow bark used for dyeing. Wisaminschi, "Yellow-wood tree." (Zeisb.)

Wickquatennhonck, a place so called in patent to Jacobus Bruyn and Benj. Smedes, 1709, is described as "Land lying near a small hill called, in ye Indian tongue, Wickqutenhonck," in another paper Wickquatennhonck, "Land lying near the end of the hill." The name means, "At the end of the hill," from Wequa, "End of"; -ateune (-achtenne, Zeisb.), "hill," and -unk, "at." The location was near the end of what is still known as the Hoogte-berg (Hooge-berg, Dutch), a range of hills, where the proprietors located dwellings which remained many years.

Wanaksink, a region of meadow and maize land in the Shawongunk district, was translated by Dr. Scott from Winachk, "Sassafras" (Zeisb.); but Wanachk may and probably does stand for Wonachk, "The tip or extremity of anything," and -sing means "Near," or less than. A piece of land that was near the end of a certain place or piece of land. It is not the word that is met in Wynogkee.

Maschabeneer, Masseks, Maskack, Massekex, a certain tract or tracts of land in the present town of Shawongunk, appear in a description of survey, Dec. 10, 1701, of seven hundred and ten acres "at a place called Maschabeneer Shawengonck," laid out for Mathias Mott, accompanied by an affidavit by Jacob Rutsen concerning the purchase of the same from the Indians. At a previous date (Sept. 22) Mott asked for a patent for four hundred acres "at a place called Shawungunk," which was "given him when a child by the Indians." Whether the two tracts were the same or not does not appear; but in 1702, June 10, Severeyn Tenhout remonstrated against granting to Mott the land which he had petitioned for, and accompanied his remonstrance by an extract from the minutes of the Court at Kingston, in 1693, granting the land to himself. He asked for a patent and gave the name of the tract "Called by the Indians Masseecks, near Shawengonck," i.e. near the certain tract called Shawongunk which had been granted to Thomas Lloyd. He received a patent. In 1709, Mott petitioned "in relation to a certain tract of land upon Showangonck River" which had been granted to Tenhout, asking that the "same be so divided" that he (Mott) should "have a proportion of the good land upon the said river"—obviously a section of low land or meadow, described by the name of a place thereon called MaskeÉk (Zeisb.), meaning "Swamp, bog"; Maskeht (Eliot), "Grass." The radical is ask, "green, raw, immature." The suffix -eghs represents an intensive form of the guttural formative, which the German missionaries softened to -ech and -ck, and the English to -sh, and is frequently met in X. Heckewelder wrote that the original sound was that of the Greek X, hence Maskex and x in Coxsackie. Maschabeneer, the name given by Mott, is not satisfactorily translatable.

Pitkiskaker and Aioskawasting appear in deed from the Esopus Indians to Governor Dongan, in 1684, as the names of divisions of what are now known as the Shawongunk Mountains south of Mohunk or Paltz Point. The deed description reads: "Extending from the Paltz," i.e. from the southeast boundmark of the Paltz Patent on the Hudson, now known as Blue Point (see Magaat-Ramis), south "along the river to the lands of the Indians at Murderers' Kill, thence west to the foot of the high hills called Pitkiskaker and Aioskawasting, thence southwesterly all along the said hills and the river called Peakadasink to a water-pond lying upon said hills called Meretange." [FN-1] Apparently the general boundaries were the line of the Paltz Patent on the north, the Hudson on the east, a line from "about the Dancing Chamber" on the Hudson to Sam's Point on the Shawongunk range on the southwest, and on the west by that range and the river Peakadasank. The Peakadasank is now known as Shawangunk Kill. The pond "called Meretange," is claimed by some authorities, as that now known as Binnen-water in the town of Mount Hope, Orange County. On Sauthier's map it is located on the southern division of the range noted as "Alaskayering Mts.," and represented as the head of Shawongunk Kill. The same distinction is claimed for Meretange or Peakadasank Swamp in the town of Greenville, Orange County. A third Maratanza Pond is located a short distance west of Sam's Point. The name of the hill has been changed from Aioskawasting to Awosting as the name of a lake and a waterfall about four miles north of Sam's Point, and translated from Awoss (Lenape), "Beyond," "On the other side," and claimed to have been originally applied to a crossing-place in the depression north of Sam's Point, neither of which interpretations is tenable. The prefix, Aioska, cannot be dropped and the name have a meaning, and the adjectival, Awoss, cannot be used as a substantive and followed by the locative -ing, "at, on," etc. Awoss means "Beyond," surely, but must be followed by a substantive telling what it is that is "beyond." The particular features of the Shawongunk range covered by the boundary line of the deed are "The Traps," a cleft which divides the range a short distance south of Mohunk, and Sam's Point, [FN-2] about nine miles south of Mohunk. The latter stands out very conspicuously, its general surface covered by perpendicular rocks from one hundred to two hundred and fifty feet high, the point itself crowned by a wall of rock which rises 2200 feet above the valley below.

[FN-1] Meretange, Maretange, or Maratanza, is from Old English Mere, "A pond or pool," and Tanze, "Sharp" or offensive to the taste. The name was transferred to this pond from the pond first bearing it in the town of Greenville, Orange County, in changing the northwest line of the Evans Patent. (See Peakadasank.) The pond is about a mile in circumference and is lined with cranberry bushes and other shrubbery, but the water is clear and sweet. It lies about three-quarters of a mile west of Sam's Point. Long Pond, lying about four miles north of Maratanza, is now called Awosting Lake. It is about two miles long by possibly one-quarter of a mile wide and lies in a clove or cleft of the hills. Its outlet was called by the Dutch Verkerde Kil, now changed to Awosting. About one mile further north lies "The Great Salt Pond," so called in records of the town of Shawongunk. It is now called Lake Minnewaska, a name introduced from the Chippeway dialect, said to mean "Colored water," which has been changed to "Frozen water." The lake is particularly described as being "Set into the hills like a bowl." It has an altitude of 1,600 feet and a depth of seventy to ninety feet of water of crystal clearness through which the pebbly bottom can be seen. The fourth pond is that known as Lake Mohonk.

[FN-2] Sam's Point is in the town of Wawarsing, about seven miles south of the village of Ellenville and about nine miles south of Mohunk or Paltz Point. It is the highest point on the Shawongunk range in New York State. Its name is from Samuel Gonsaulus, who owned the tract. Gertruyd's Nose, the name of another point, was so called from the fancied resemblance of its shadow to the nose of Mrs. Gertrude, wife of Jacobus Bruyn, who owned the tract. The pass, cleft or clove known as "The Traps," was so called from the supposed character of the rock which it divides. The rock, however, is not Trappean. The pass is 650 feet wide and runs through the entire range. Its sides present the appearance of the hill having slipped apart.

Peakadasank, so written in Indian deed to Governor Dongan in 1684—Pachanasinck in patent to Jacob Bruyn, 1719; Peckanasinck, Pachanassinck, etc.—is given as the name of a stream bounding a tract of land, the Dongan deed description reading: "Thence southwesterly all along said hills and the river Peakadasank to a water-pond lying on said hills called Meretange." The name is preserved in two streams known as the Big and the Little Pachanasink, in Orange County, and in Ulster County as the "Pachanasink District," covering the south part of the town of Shawongunk. The Big Pachanasink is now known as Shawongunk Kill. In 1719, Nov. 26, a certain tract of land "called Pachanasink" was granted to Jacobus Bruyn and described in survey as "on the north side of Shawongunck Creek, beginning where the Verkerde Kill [FN] flows into said river," indicating locative of the name at the Verkerde Branch. In a brief submitted in the boundary contention, it is said that the line of the Dongan purchase ran "along the foot of the hills from a place called Pachanasink, where the Indians who sold the land had a large village and place," and from thence "to the head of the said river, and no where else the said river is called by that name." The evidence is cumulative that the name was that of the dominant feature of the district, from which it was transferred to the stream. It is a district strewn with masses of conglomerate rocks thrown off from the hills and precipitous cliffs. The two forms of the name, Peakadasank (1684) and Pachanassink (1717), were no doubt employed as equivalents. They differ in meaning, however. Wm. R. Gerard writes: "Peakadasank, or Pakadassin, means, 'It is laid out through the effects of a blow,' or some other action. The participial form is Pakadasing, meaning, 'Where it is laid out,' or 'Where it lies fallen.' The reference in this case would seem to be to the stone which had fallen off or been thrown down from the hills." Pachanasink means, "At the split rocks"; Pachassin, "Split stone." In either form the name is from the split rocks.

[FN] The Verkerde Kill falls over a precipice of about seventy feet. The exposed surface of the precipice is marked by strata in the conglomerate as primarily laid down. The entire district is a region of split rocks. Verkerde Kill takes that name from Dutch Verkeerd, meaning "Wrong, bad, angry, turbulent," etc. It is the outlet of Meretange Pond near Sam's Point. It flows from the pond to the falls and from the falls at nearly a right angle over a series of cascades aggregating in all a fall of two hundred and forty feet. The falls are in the town of Gardiner, Ulster County. (See Aioskawasting.)

The lands granted to Bruyn included the tract "Known by the Indian name of Pacanasink," now in the town of Shawongunk, and also a tract "Known by the Indian name of Shensechonck," now in the town of Crawford, Orange County. The latter seems to have been a parcel of level upland. It was about one mile to the southward of the stream.

Alaskayering, entered on Sauthier's map of 1774, as the name of the south part of the Shawongunk range, was conferred by the English, possibly as a substitute for Aioskawasting. The first word is heard in Alaska, which is said, on competent authority, to mean, "The high bald rocks"; with locative -ing, "At (or on) the high bald rocks." This interpretation is a literal description of the hill, and Aioskawasting may have the same meaning, although those who wrote the former may not have had a thought about the latter. [FN] (See Pitkiskaker.)

[FN] High Point, the highest elevation in the southern division of the range, is in New Jersey. It is said to be higher than Sam's Point, and to bear the same general description.

Achsinink, quoted by the late Rev. Charles Soott, D. D., from local records probably, as the name of Shawongunk Kill, is an apheresis apparently of Pach-achsÜn-ink, "At (or on) a place of split stones." Many of the split rocks thrown off from the mountain lie in the bed of the stream, in places utilized for crossing. "There are rocks in it, so that it is easy to get across." (Col. Hist. N.Y., viii, 272.) AchsÜn, as a substantive, cannot be used as an independent word with a locative. An adjectival prefix is necessary. (See Pakadasink.)

Palmagat, the name of the bend in the mountain north of Sam's Point, regarded by some as Indian, is a Dutch term descriptive of the growth there of palm or holly (Ilex opaca), possibly of shrub oaks the leaf of which resembles the holly. Gat is Dutch for opening, gap, etc.

Moggonck, Maggonck, Moggonick, Moggoneck, Mohonk, etc., are forms of the name given as that of the "high hill" which forms the southwest boundmark of the Paltz Patent, so known, now generally called locally, Paltz Point, and widely known as Mohunk. The hill is a point of rock formation on the Shawongunk range. It rises about 1,000 feet above the plain below and is crowned by an apex which rises as a battlement about 400 feet above the brow of the hill, now called Sky Top. Moggonck and Maggonck are interchangeable orthographies. The former appears in the Indian deed from Matseyay, and other owners, to Louis Du Bois, and others, May 26, 1677, and is carried forward in the patent issued to them in September of the same year. Moggoneck appears in Mr. Berthold Fernow's translation of the Indian deed in Colonial History of N.Y., xiii, 506. Moggonick was written by Surveyor Aug. Graham on his map of survey in 1709, and Mohunk is a modern pronunciation. The boundary description of the tract, as translated by the late Dr. E. B. O'Callaghan, from the Dutch deed (N.Y. Land Papers, 15), reads: "Beginning at the high hill called Moggonck, then southeast to Juffrouw's Hook in the Long Reach, on the Great River (called in Indian Magaat Ramis), thence north to the island called Raphoos, lying in the Kromme Elbow at the commencement of the Long Reach, thence west to the high hill to a place [called] Warachaes and Tawarataque, along the high hill to Moggonck." The translation in Colonial History is substantially the same except in the forms of the names. "Beginning from the high hill, at a place called Moggonck," is a translation of the deed by Rev. Ame Vaneme, in "History of New Paltz." It seems to be based on a recognition of the locative of the name as established by Surveyor Graham in 1709, rather than on the original manuscript. In the patent the reading is: "Beginning at the high mountain called Moggonck," and the southwest line is described as extending from Tawarataque "To Moggonck, formerly so called," indicating that the patentees had not located the name as they would like to have it located; certainly, that they had discovered that a line drawn from the apex of the hill on a southeast course to Juffrouw's Hook, would divide a certain fine piece of land, which they called the Groot Stuk (great piece), lying between the hill and the Wallkill and fertilized by that stream, which they wished to have included in the grant as a whole. So it came about that they hurried to Governor Andros and secured an amended wording in the patent of the deed description, and Surveyor-General Graham, when he came upon the scene in 1709, to run the patent lines, found the locatives "fixed," and wrote in his description, "Beginning at a certain point on the hill called Moggonick, . . . thence south, thirty-six degrees easterly, to a certain small creek called Moggonck, at the south end of the great piece of land, and from thence south, fifty-five degrees easterly, to the south side of Uffroe's Hook." Thereafter "The south end of the great piece," and the "certain small creek," became the "First station," as it was called. Graham marked the place by a stone which was found standing by Cadwallader Colden in a survey by him in 1729, and noted as at "The west end of a small gully which falls into Paltz River, . . . from the said stone down the said gully two chains and forty-six links to the Paltz River." The "west end" of the gully was the east end of the "Certain small creek" noted in Graham's survey. The precise point is over three miles from the hill. In the course of the years by the action of frost or flood, the stone was carried away. In 1892, from actual survey by Abram LeFever, Surveyor, assisted by Capt. W. H. D. Blake, to whom I am indebted for the facts stated, it was replaced by another bearing the original inscription. By deepening the gully the swamp of which the stream is the drainage channel, has been mainly reclaimed, but the stream and the gully remain, as does also the Groot Stuk. This record narrative is more fully explained by the following certificate which is on file in the office of the Clerk of Ulster County:

"These are to certify, that the inhabitants of the town of New Paltz, being desirous that the first station of their patent, named Moggonck, might be kept in remembrance, did desire us, Joseph Horsbrouck, John Hardenburgh, and Roeloff Elting, Esqs., Justices of the Peace, to accompany them, and there being Ancrop, the Indian, then brought us to the High Mountain, which he named Maggeanapogh, at or near the foot of which hill is a small run of water and a swamp, which he called Maggonck, and the said Ancrop affirmed it to be the right Indian names of the said places, as witness our hands the nineteenth day of December, 1722."

Ancrop, or Ankerop as otherwise written, was a sachem of the Esopus Indians in 1677, and was still serving in that office in 1722. He was obviously an old man at the latter date. He had, however, no jurisdiction over or part in the sale of the lands to the New Paltz Company in 1677. His testimony, given forty-five years after the sale by the Indians, was simply confirmatory in general terms of a location which had been made in 1677, and the interpretation of what he said was obviously given by the Justices in terms to correspond with what his employers wished him to say. In the days of the locations of boundmarks of patents, his testimony would have been regarded with suspicion. Locations of boundmarks were then frequently changed by patentees who desired to increase their holdings, by "Taking some Indians in a public manner to show such places as they might name to them," wrote Sir William Johnson, for many years Superintendent of Indian Affairs, adding that it was "Well known" that an Indian "Would shew any place by any name you please to give him, for a small blanket or a bottle of rum." Presumably Ankerop received either "A small blanket or a bottle of rum" for his services, but it is not to be inferred that the location of the boundmarks in 1677 was tainted by the "sharp practice" which prevailed later. It is reasonable to presume, however, that the name would never have been removed from the foot of the hill had not the Groot Stuk been situated as it was with reference to a southeast line drawn from its apex to Juffrouw's Hook.

Algonquian students who have been consulted, regard the name as it stands as without meaning; that some part of the original was lost by mishearing or dropped in pronunciation; that in the dialect which is supposed to have been spoken here the suffix -onck is classed as a locative and the adjectival Mogg is not complete. Several restorations of presumed lost letters have been suggested to give the name a meaning, none of which, however, are satisfactory. Apparently the most satisfactory reading is from Magonck, or Magunk (Mohegan), "A great tree," explained by Dr. Trumbull: "From Mogki, 'Great,' and -unk, 'A tree while standing.'" It is met as the name of a boundmark on the Connecticut, and on the east side of the Hudson, within forty miles of the locative here, Moghongh-kamigh, "Place of a great tree," is met as the name of a boundmark. Mogkunk is also in the Natick dialect, and there is no good reason for saying that it was not in the local dialect here. There may have been a certain great tree at the foot of the hill, from which the name was extended to the hill, and there may have been one on the Wallkill, which Ankerop said "Was the right Indian name of the place." It will be remembered that the deed boundmark was "The foot of the hill." It is safe to say that the name never could have described "A small run of water and a swamp," nor did it mean "Sky-Top." The former features were introduced by the Justices to identify the place where the boundary-stone was located and have no other value; the latter is a fanciful creation, "Not consistent with fact or reason," but very good as an advertisement.

Maggeanapogh, the name which Ankerop gave as that of the hill called Moggonck, bears every evidence of correctness. It is reasonably pure Lenape or Delaware, to which stock Ankerop probably belonged. The first word, Maggean, is an orthography of Machen (Meechin, Zeisb.; Mashkan, Chippeway), meaning "Great," big, large, strong, hard, occupying chief position, etc., and the second, -apogh, written in other local names -apugh, -apick, etc., is from -Ápughk (-Ápuchk, Zeisb.), meaning "Rock," the combination reading, literally, "A great rock." In the related Chippeway dialect the formative word for rock is -bik, and the radical is -ic or -ick, of which Dr. Schoolcraft wrote, "Rock, or solid formation of rock." No particular part of the hill was referred to, the text reading, "There being Ankerop, the Indian, then brought us to the High Mountain which he named Maggeanapogh." The time has passed when the name could have been made permanent. For all coming time the hill will bear the familiar name of Mohonk, the Moggonck of 1677, the Paltz Point and the High Point of local history, from the foot of which the place of beginning of the boundary line was never removed, although the course from it was changed.

Magaat-Ramis, the record name of the southeast boundmark of the Paltz Patent, is located in the boundary description at "Juffrou's Hook, in the Long Reach, on the Great River (called in Indian Magaat-Ramis)." (Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 15.) Juffrouw's Hook is now known as Blue Point. It is about two miles north of Milton-on-the-Hudson, and takes its modern name from the color of the rock which projects from a blue-stone promontory and runs for some distance under the water of the river, deflecting the current to the northwest. The primal appearance of the promontory has been changed by the cut for the West Shore Railroad, but the submerged point remains. The Dutch name, Juffrouw's Hook, was obviously employed by the purchasers to locate the boundmark by terms which were then generally understood. Juffrouw, the first word, means "Maiden," one of the meanings of which is "Haai-rog"; "rog" means "skate," or Angel-fish, of special application to a species of shark, but in English shad, or any fish of the herring family, especially the female. Hook means "Corner, cape, angle, incurved as a hook"; hence "Maiden Hook," an angle or corner noted as a resort for shad, alewives, etc.: by metonymie, "A noted or well-known fishing-place." The first word of the Indian name, Magaat, stands for Maghaak (Moh.), Machak (Zeisb., the hard surd mutes k and t exchanged), meaning "Great," large, extended, occupying chief position. The second word, Ramis is obscure. It has the appearance of a mishearing of the native word. What that word was, however, may be inferred from the description, "Juffrou's Hook, in the Long Reach, on the Great River (called in Indian Magaat-Ramis)," or as written in the patent, "To a certain Point or Hooke called the Jeuffrou's Hooke, lying in the Long Reach, named by the Indians Magaat-Ramis." That the name was that of the river at that place—the Long Reach—is made clear by the sentence which follows: "Thence north along the river to the island called Rappoos, at the commencement of the Long Reach," in which connection Ramis would stand for Kamis or Gamis, from Gami, an Algonquian noun-generic meaning "Water," frequently met in varying forms in Abnaki and Chippeway—less frequently in the Delaware. In Cree the orthography is Kume. The final s is the equivalent of k, locative, as in Abnaki Gami-k, a particular place of water. "On the Great Water," is probably the meaning of Ramis. In Chippeway Keeche-gummee, "The greatest water," was the name of Lake Superior. As the name of the "Great Water," Magaat-Ramis is worthy of preservation.

Rappoos, which formed the northeast boundmark of the Paltz Patent, is specifically located in the Indian deed "Thence north [from Juffrou's Hook] along the river to the island called Rappoos, lying in the Kromme Elbow, at the commencement of the Long Reach." The island is now known as Little Esopus Island, taking that name from Little Esopus Creek, which flows to the Hudson at that point. It lies near the main land on the east side of the river, and divides the current in two channels, the most narrow of which is on the east. Kromme Elleboog (Crooked elbow), is the abrupt bend in the river at the island, and the Long Reach extends from the island south to Pollepel's Island. The name is of record Rappoos, Raphoes, Raphos and Whaphoos, an equivalent, apparently, of Wabose and Warpose, the latter met on Manhattan Island. It is not the name of the island, but of the small channel on the east side of it from which it was extended to the island. It means, "The narrows," in a general sense, and specifically, "The small passage," or strait. The root is Wab, or Wap, meaning, "A light or open place between two shores." (Brinton.)

Tawarataque, now written and pronounced Tower-a-tauch, the name of the northwestern boundmark of the Paltz Patent, is described in the Indian deed already quoted: "Thence [from Rappoos] west to the high hills to a place called Warachoes and Tawarataque," which may refer to one and the same place, or two different places. Surveyor Graham held that two different places were referred to and marked the first on the east side of the Wallkill at a place not now known, from whence by a sharp angle he located the second "On the point of a small ridge of hills," where he marked a flat rock, which, by the way, is not referred to in the name. The precise place was at the south end of a clove between the hills, access to which is by a small opening in the hills at a place now known as Mud Hook. Probably Warachoes referred to this opening. By dialectic exchange of l and r the word is Walachoes—Walak, "Hole," "A hollow or excavation"; -oes, "Small," as a small or limited hollow or open place. "Through this opening," referring to the opening in the side of the hill at Mud Hook, "A road now runs leading to the clove between the ridges of the mountain," wrote Mr. Ralph LeFever, editor of the "New Paltz Independent," from personal knowledge. Tawarataque was the name of this clove. It embodies the root Walak prefixed by the radical Tau or Taw, meaning "Open," as an open space, a hollow, a clove, an open field, etc., suffixed by the verb termination -aque, meaning "Place," or -Áke as Zeisberger wrote in WochitÁke, "Upon the house." The reading in Tawarataque is, "Where there is an open space"; i.e., the clove. [FN] The late Hon. Edward Elting, of New Paltz, wrote me: "The flat rock which Surveyor Graham marked as the bound, lies on the east side of the depression of the Shawongunk Mountain Range leading northwesterly from Mohunk, at the south end of the clove known as Mud Hook, near the boundary line between New Paltz and Rosendale, say about half a mile west of the Wallkill Valley R. R. station at Rosendale. I think, but am not certain, that the rock can be seen as you pass on the railroad. It is of the character known as Esopus Millstone, a white or gray conglomerate. I cannot say that it bears the Surveyor's inscription."

It is not often that four boundmarks are met that stand out with the distinctness of those of the Paltz Patent, or that are clothed with deeper interest as geological features, or that preserve more distinctly the geographical landmarks of the aboriginal people.

[FN] The adjectival formative -alagat, or -aragat, enters into the composition of several words denoting "Hole," or "Open space," as Taw-Álachg-at, "Open space," Sag-Álachg-at, "So deep the hole." The verb substantive suffix -aque, or -ake (qu the sound of k), meaning "Place," is entirely proper as a substitute for the verbal termination -at.

Hudson's River From Butter Hill to Magdelen Island

Ossangwak is written on Pownal's map as the name of what is known as the Great Binnenwater (Dutch, "Inland water") in the town of Lloyd. The orthography disguises the original, which may have been a pronunciation of AchsÜn (Minsi), "Stone," as in OtstÓnwakin, read by Reichel, "A high rock," or rocky hill. Perhaps the name referred to the rocky bluff which bounds the Hudson there, immediately west of which the lake is situated.

Esopus—so written on Carte Figurative of 1614-16, and also by De Laet in 1624-5; Sopus, contemporaneously; Sypous, Rev. Megapolensis, 1657, is from Sepuus (Natick), "A brook"; in Delaware, Sipoes (Zeisberger). It is from Sepu, "River," and -es, "small." On the Carte Figurative it is written on the east side of the river near a stream north of Wappingers' Creek, as it may have been legitimately, but in 1623 it came to be located permanently at what is now Rondout Creek, from which it was extended to several streams, [FN] to the Dutch settlement now Kingston, to the resident Indians, and to a large district of country. The chirographer of 1614-16 seems to have added the initial E from the uncertain sound of the initial S, and later scribes further corrupted it to the Greek and Latin Æ. (See Waronawanka.)

[FN] The streams entering the Hudson in proximity came to be known as the Kleine Esopus, south of Rondout; the Groot Esopus, now the Rondout, and the Esopus, now the Saugerties. In the valley west of old Kingston was a brook, called in records the "Mill Stream."

Waronawanka, Carte Figurative 1614-16—Warrawannan-koncks, Wassenaer, 1621-5; Warranawankongs, De Laet, 1621-5, and Waranawankcougys, 1633; Waranawankongs, Van der Donck, 1656; Waerinnewongh, local, 1677—is located on the Carte Figurative on the west side of the Hudson a few miles north of latitude 42. On Van der Donck's map it is placed on the west side between Pollepel's Island and the Dans Kamer. De Laet wrote in his "New World" (Leyden edition): "This reach [Vischer's, covering Newburgh Bay] extends to another narrow pass, where, on the west side of the river, there is a point of land juts out covered with sand, opposite a bend in the river on which another nation of savages called the Waoranecks, have their abode at a place called Esopus. A little beyond, on the west side of the river, where there is a creek, and the river becomes more shallow, the Waranawankongs reside. Here are several small islands." In his French and Latin edition, 1633-40, the reading is: "A little beyond where projects a sandy point and the river becomes narrower, there is a place called Esopus, where the Waoranekys have their abode. To them succeed, after a short interval, the Waranawancougys, on the opposite side of the river." Read together there would seem to be no doubt that the Waoranecks were seated on or around the cove or bay at Low Point and the estuary of Wappingers' Creek, and that the Waranatwankongs were seated at and around the cove or bay at Kingston Point, "Where a creek comes in and the river becomes more shallow."

Of the meaning of the name Dr. A. S. Gatschet, of the Bureau of Ethnology, wrote me: "If the Warana-wan-ka lived on a bay or cove of Hudson's River, their name is certainly from Walina, which means 'hollowing, concave site,' and 'cove, bay,' in several eastern languages. A good parallel are the Wawenocks of S. W. Maine, now living at St. Francis, who call themselves Walinaki, or those living on a cove—'cove dwellers'—in referring to their old home on the Atlantic coast near Portland. In the Micmac (N. S.) dialect Walini is 'bay, cove,' and even the large Bay of Fundy is called so. The meaning of k or ka is not clear, but ong, in the later forms, is the locative 'at, on, upon.'"

It is safe to say that at either the Dans Kamer, Low Point, or Kingston Point, the clan would have been seated on a bay, cove, recess or indentation shaped like a bay, and it is also safe to say that Warona and Walina may be read as equivalents, the former in the local dialect, and the latter in the Eastern, and that its general meaning is "Concave, hollowing site." Zeisberger wrote l instead of r in the Minsi-Lenape, hence Woalac, "A hollow or excavation"; WalÓh, "A cove"; Walpecat, "Very deep water." The dialectic r prevails pretty generally on the Hudson and on the Upper Delaware. On the latter, near Port Jervis, is met of record Warin-sags-kameck, which is surely the equivalent of Walina-ask-kameck, "A hollowing or concave site, a meadow or field." It was written by Arent Schuyler, the noted interpreter, as the name of a field which he described as "A meadow or vly." Vly is a contraction of Dutch Vallei, meaning "A hollow or depression in which water stands in the rainy season and is dry at other times," hence "hollowing." Ask (generic), meaning "Green, raw," is the radical of words meaning "meadow," "marsh," etc., and -kameck stands for an enclosed field, or place having definite boundaries as a hollow. Awan (-awan, -wan, -uan, etc.), as Dr. Gatschet probably read the orthography, is an impersonal verb termination met on the Hudson in Matteawan, Kitchiwan, etc. Mr. Gerard writes that it was sometimes followed by the participial and subjunctive k. It may have been so written here, but it seems to be a form of the guttural aspirate gh, for which it is exchanged in many cases, here and in Kitchiwangh. In Connecticut on the Sound apparently the same name is met in Waranawankek, indicating that whoever wrote it on the Figurative of 1614-16 was familiar with the dialect of the coast Indians. As it stands the name is one of the oldest and most sonorous in the valley of Hudson's River.

Ponkhockie is the familiar form of the name of the point, cove or landing-place on the south side of Kingston Point. It is from Dutch Punthoekje, meaning, "Point of a small hook, or angle." The local interpretation, "Canoe harbor," is not in the name, except inferentially from the fact that the cove was a favorite landing place for canoes. [FN-1] After the erection of a stockaded redoubt there, the Dutch called the place Rondhout, meaning. "Standing timber," and the English followed with Redoubt, and extended the name to the creek, as of record in 1670. The present form is substantially a restoration of the early Dutch Rondhout. The stockade was erected by Director Stuyvesant, at the suggestion of the Amsterdam Chamber of the West India Company, about 1660. There were Dutch traders here certainly as early as 1622, and presumably as early as 1614, but no permanent settlement appears of record prior to 1652-3, nor is there evidence that there was a Rondhout here prior to 1657-8. Compare Stuyvesant's letter of September, 1657, and Kregier's Journal of the "Second Esopus War" (Col. Hist N.Y., xiii, 73, 314, also page 189), showing that the Rondhout was not completed until the fall and winter of 1660. De Vries wrote in 1639-40, referring to Kingston Point probably: "Some Indians live here and have some corn-lands, but the lands are poor and stony." When Stuyvesant visited the place, in 1658, he anchored his barge "opposite to the two little houses of the savages standing near the bank of the kil." (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 82.) In the vicinity the war of 1658 had its initiative in an unwise attack by some settlers on a party of Indians who had been made crazy drunk on brandy furnished them by Captain Thomas Chambers. Two houses were burned belonging to settlers, and hostilities continued for eight or nine days. "At the tennis-court near the Strand," a company of eleven Dutch soldiers "allowed themselves to be taken prisoners," by the Indians, in 1659. It does not seem probable that the Dutch had a Tennis Court here at that early date, but the record so reads. [FN-2] The hook or cove, was the most desirable place for landing on the south side of the Point. It has since been the commercial centre of the town and city. Punthoekje is certainly not without interesting history.

[FN-1] In early times there were two principal landing places: One at Punthoekje and one north of the present steamboat landing, or Columbus Point as it is called. The Point is a low formation on the Hudson and was primarily divided from the main land by a marsh. It was literally "a concave, hollowing site." The marsh was later crossed by a corduroyed turnpike connecting with the old Strand Road, now Union Avenue. A ferry was established here in 1752 and is still operated under its original charter. The Point is now traversed by rail and trolley roads.

[FN-2] Perhaps an Indian Football Court, resembling a Tennis Court. A writer in 1609 says of the Virginia natives: "They use, beside, football play, which women and boys do much play at. They have their goals as ours, only they never fight and pull each other down." There was a famous Tennis Court (Dutch Kaatsbaan) in the town of Saugerties, which seems to have been there long before the Dutch settlement. The Tennis Court referred to in the text is said to have been near the site of the present City Hall in Kingston, but would that place be strictly "near the Strand"? "Strand" means "shore, beach." It was probably on the beach.

Atkarkarton, claimed by some local authorities as the Indian name of Kingston, comes down to us from Rev. Megapolensis, who wrote, in 1657: "About eighteen miles [Dutch] up the North River lies a place called by the Dutch Esopus or Sypous, by the Indians Atkarkarton. It is an exceedingly beautiful land." (Doc, Hist. N.Y., iii, 103.) The Reverend writer obviously quoted the name as of general application, although it would seem to have been that of a particular place. As stated in another connection, Esopus, Sypous, and Sopus were at first (1623) applied to a trading-post on the Hudson, from which it was extended inland as a general name and later became specific as that of the first palisaded Dutch village named Wildwijk, which was founded a year after Megapolensis wrote. At the date of his writing the territory called Sopus included the river front, the plateau on which Kingston stands, and the flats on the Esopus immediately west, particularly the flat known as the Groot Plat, and later (1662) as the Nieuw Dorp or New Village, [FN-1] as distinguished from Sopus or Wildwijk, or the Old Village, the specific site of which could not have been referred to. Of the site of the Old Village, Director Stuyvesant wrote in 1658: "The spot marked out for the settlement has a circumference of about two hundred and ten rods [FN-2] and is well adapted for defensive purposes. When necessity requires it, it can be surrounded by water on three sides, and it may be enlarged according to the convenience and requirements of the present and of future inhabitants." The palisaded enclosure was enlarged by Stuyvesant, in 1661, to over three times its original size. The precise spot was on the northwest corner of the plateau. It was separated from the low lands of the Esopus Valley by a ridge of moderate height extending on the north, east, and west, and had on the south "a swampish morass" which was required to be drained, in 1669, for the health of the town "and the improvement of so much ground." The Groot Plat in the Esopus Valley was a garden spot ready for the plough and was regarded as of size sufficient for "fifty bouweries" (farms). From the description quoted, and present conditions, it may be said with certainty that the site of the Old Village of Wildwijk was a knoll in an area of prairie and marsh. Neither of the village sites seem to have been occupied by the Indians except by temporary huts and corn-lands. The Wildwijk site was given to Director Stuyvesant by the Indians, in 1658, "to grease his feet with" after his "long journey" from Manhattan. Of the Groot Plat one-half was given by the Indians to Jacob Jansen Stoll in compensation for damages. A commission appointed at that time to examine the tract, and to ascertain what part of it the Indians wished to retain, reported that the Indians had "some plantations" there, "but of little value"; that it was "only a question of one or two pieces of cloth, then they would remove and surrender the whole piece." (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 86, 89.) Instead of paying the Indians for the lands, however, the settlers commenced occupation, with the result that the Indians burned the New Village, June 7, 1663, attacked the Old Village, killed eighteen persons and carried away thirty captives, women and children. The war of 1663 followed, the results of which are accessible in several publications, but especially in Colonial History of New York, Vol. xiii. It is sufficient to say here that the Indians lost the lands in controversy and a much larger territory. Interpretation of the name can only be made conjecturally. William R. Gerard wrote me: "I think Atkarkarton simply disguises Atuk-ak-aten, meaning 'Deerhill,' from Atuk, 'Deer'; ak, plural, and aten, 'hill.' The r's in the name do not mean anything; they simply indicate that the a's which precede them were nasal." The Delaware word for "deer" is Achtuch. Dr. Schoolcraft wrote the tradition that the first deers were the hunters of men.

[FN-1] The land or place on the Esopus flat on which the New Village was founded, is now known as Old Hurley Village. It is repeatedly and specifically designated as "The Groot Plat"—"The large tract of land called the New Village"—"The burnt village called the Groot Plat." (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 275, et. seq.) Hurley was given to it by Governor Lovelace in 1669, from his family, who were Barons Hurley of Ireland.

[FN-2] A Dutch rod is twelve feet, which would give this circumference at less than an English half mile. Schoonmaker writes in "History of Kingston": "The average length of the stockade was about thirteen hundred feet, and the width about twelve hundred feet." Substantially, it enclosed a square of about one-quarter of a mile.

Wildwijk, Dutch—Wiltwyck, modern—the name given by Governor Stuyvesant, in 1650, to the palisaded village which later became Kingston, and then and later called Sopus, is a composition of Dutch Wild, meaning "Wild, savage," and Wijk, "Retreat, refuge, quarter"; constructively, "A village, fort or refuge from the savages." The claim that the place was so called by Stuyvesant as an acknowledgment of the fact that the land was a gift from the Indians, is a figment. The English came in possession, in 1664, and, in 1669, [FN] changed the early name to Kingston. The Dutch recovered possession in 1673, and changed the name to Swanendale, and the English restored Kingston in 1674. (See Atkarkarton.)

[FN] "On this day (vizt 25th) the towne formerly called Sopez was named Kingston." Date Sept. 25th, 1669. (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 435.)

Nanoseck, Manoseck, forms of the name of a small island in Rondout Creek, so "called by the Indians" says the record, may be from Natick Nohoosik, "Pointed or tapering." The Dutch called it "Little Cupper's Island." Cupper, "One who applies a cupping glass." Another island in the same stream, was "called by the Indians Assinke," that is "Stony land" or place. (See Mattassink.) Another island was called by the Dutch Slypsten Eiland, that is, "Whetstone Island"; probably from the quality of the stone found on it. It lies in the Hudson next to Magdalen Island.

Wildmeet, an Indian "house" so called by the Dutch, means, in the Dutch language, "A place of meeting of savages." It was not a palisaded village. It was burned by the Dutch forces in the war of 1660, at which time, the narrative states, some sixty Indians had assembled at or were living in it. Its location, by the late John W. Hasbrouck, at the junction of the Vernoy and Rondout kills, is of doubtful correctness, as is also his statement that it was "The council-house of all the Esopus Indians." Its location was about two (Dutch) miles from Wildwyck, or about six or seven English miles. Judge Schoonmaker wrote: "Supposed to have been located in Marbletown."

Preumaker's Land, a tract described as "Lying upon Esopus Kil, within the bounds of Hurley," granted to Venike Rosen, April 1, 1686, was the place of residence of Preumaker, "The oldest and best" of the Esopus sachems, whose life was tragically ended by Dutch soldiers in the war of 1660. The location of his "house" is described as having been "At the second fall of Kit Davits Kil." [FN-1] A creek now bears the name of the sachem, who was a hero if he was a savage.

[FN] "Kit Davits' Kil" or the Rondout was so called from Christopher Davids, an Englishman, who was first at Fort Orange, and was an interpreter. He obtained, in 1656, a patent for about sixty-five acres, described as "Situate about a league (about three miles) inland from the North River in the Esopus, on the west side of the Great Kil, opposite to the land of Thomas Chambers, running west and northeast halfway to a small pond on the border of a valley which divides this parcel and the land of John de Hulter, deceased." Ensign Smith wrote: "I came with my men to the second valley on Kit Davietsen's River.. . . Further up in said valley I crossed the stream and found their house." (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii.) Supposed to have been at LeFever's Falls in Rosendale. (Schoonmaker.)

Frudyachkamik, so written in treaty—deed of 1677 as the name of a place on the Hudson at the mouth of Esopus (now Saugerties) Creek, is written Tintiagquanneck in deed of 1767 (Cal. Land Papers, 454), and by the late John W. Hasbrouck, Tendeyachameck. The deed orthography of 1677 is certainly wrong as there is no sound of F in Algonquian. (See Kerhonksen.)

{TN} {Unable to locate interlinear references to the following two notes which appear on this page.}

[FN-1] Saugerties is probably a corruption of Dutch Zager's Kiltje, meaning in English, "Sawyer's little Kill." The original appears first of record in Kregier's Journal of the Second Esopus War (1663), "They were at Zager's Kiletje"; "To Sager's little Kill"; "To the Sager's Killetje." (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 342, 344.) The first corruption of record also belongs to that period. It was by a Mohawk sachem who visited Esopus and at a conference converted Zager's Kiltje to Sagertjen. Some of the local Dutch followed with "de Zaagertje's." Other corruptions were numerous until the English brought in Saugerties. The original Zager, however, seems to have held legal place for many years. In 1683, in a survey of the Meals Patent, covering lands now included in Saugerties, it is written: "Being part of the land called Sagers," and in another, "Between Cattskill and Sager's Kill." It is also of record that a man known by the surname of Zager located on the stream prior to 1663, obtained a cession of the lands on the kill from Kaelcop, an Esopus sachem, and later disappeared without perfecting his title by patent. Zager is now converted to Sager, and in English to Sawyer. The claim that Zager had a sawmill at the mouth of the stream seems to rest entirely upon his presumed occupation from the meaning of his name. A sawmill here, in 1663, would seem to have been a useless venture. In 1750, ninety years later, one Burregan had a mill at the mouth of the kill. "Burregan" stands for Burhans.

[FN-2] "To Freudeyachkamik on the Groote River." (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 505.) It was probably the peninsular now known as Flatbush, Glasco, etc., at the mouth of the creek. The orthographies of the name are uncertain. An island south of the mouth of the creek was called Qusieries. Three or four miles north is Wanton Island, the site of a traditionary battle between the Mohawks and the Katskill Indians. It is now the northeast boundmark of Ulster County. Neither of these islands could have been the boundmark of the lands granted by the Indians. Wanton seems to be from Wanquon (Wankon, Del.), "Heel"—resembling a human heel in shape—pertuberant. The letter t in the name is simply an exchange of the surd mutes k and l. Modern changes have destroyed the original appearance of the island.

Kerhonkson, now so written as the name of a stream of water and of a village in the town of Wawarsing, Ulster County, is of record in several forms—Kahanksen, Kahanghsen, Kahanksnix, Kahanckasink, etc. It takes interest from its connection with the history and location of what is known, in records of the Esopus Indian War of 1663, as the Old Fort as distinguished from the New Fort. In the treaty of peace with the Dutch in 1664, the fort is spoken of without name in connection with a district of country admitted by the Indians to have been "conquered by the sword," including the "two captured forts." In the subsequent treaty (1665) with Governor Nicolls the ceded district is described as "A certain parcel of land lying and being to the west or southwest of a certain creek or river called by the name of Kahanksen, and so up to the head thereof where the Old Fort was; and so with a direct line from thence through the woods and crosse the meadows to the Great Hill lying to the west or southwest, which Great Hill is to be the true west or southwest bounds, and the said creek called Kahanksen the north or northeast bounds of the said lands." In a treaty deed with Governor Andros twelve years later (April 27, 1677), the boundary lines "as they were to be thereafter," are described: "Beginning at the Rondouyt Kill, thence to a kill called Kahanksnix, thence north along the hills to a kill called Maggowasinghingh, thence to the Second Fall, easterly to Freudyachkamick on the Groot River, south to Rondouyt Kill." In other words the district conceded to have been "conquered by the sword" lay between the Esopus and the Rondout on the Hudson, and extended west to the stream called Kahanksen, thence north to a stream called Maggowasinghingh, thence north, etc. The only stream that has been certainly identified as the Maggowasinghingh is the Rondout, where it flows from the west to its junction with the Sandberg Kill, east of Honk Falls, and this identification certainly places Kahanksen south of that stream. And in this connection it may be stated that the conquered lands did not extend west of the Rondout. The Beekman and the Beake patents were held primarily by Indian deeds. After the conquest the Indians did not sell lands east of the boundary line, but did sell lands west of that line. The deed from Beekman to Lowe distinctly states that the lands conveyed were "within the bounds belonging to the Indians." As the lands on the west of the kill were not conquered and ceded to the Dutch, the Old Fort could not have been on that side of the stream. In reaching conclusions respect must be had to Indian laws, treaties, and boundary descriptions. In the records of the town of Rochester, of which town Wawarsing was a part, is the entry, under date of July 22, 1709, "Marynus van Aken desired the conveyance of about one hundred acres of land lying over against the land of Colonel Jacob Rutsen called Kahankasinck, known as Masseecs," that is the land asked for by Van Aken took the name of Masseecs from a swamp which the name means. Colonel Rutsen's land has not been located; he held several tracts at different times, and one especially on the west line of Marbletown known as Rosendale. Whatever its location it shows that its name of Kahankasinck was extended to it or from it from some general feature. Obviously from the ancient treaty and deed boundaries the site of the Old Fort has not been ascertained, nor has the Great Hill been located. Presumably both must be looked for on Shawongunk Mountain.

The fort, as described by Kregier in his "Journal of the Second Esopus War," was a palisaded village and the largest settlement of the Esopus Indians. He made no reference to a stream or to a ravine, but did note that he was obliged to pass over swamps, frequent kills, and "divers mountains" that were so steep that it was necessary to "haul the wagons and cannon up and down with ropes." His course was "mostly southwest" from Wildwijk, and the fort "about ten miles" (Dutch), or from thirty to thirty-five miles English. It was not so far southwest from Wildwijk (Kingston) as the New Fort by "about four hours," a time measure equal to nine or ten English miles. The Indians did not defend the fort; they abandoned it "two days before" the Dutch troops arrived. No particular description of it has been handed down. Under date of July 31, 1663, Kregier wrote: "In the morning at dawn of day set fire to the fort and all the houses, and while they were in full blaze marched out in good order." And so disappeared forever the historic Indian settlement, not even the name by which it was known certainly translatable in the absence of knowledge of the topography of its precise location. [FN]

[FN] The name has the appearance of derivation from Gahan (Del.), "Shallow, low water"'; spoken with the guttural aspirate -gks (Gahaks), and indefinite formative -an. As a generic it would be applicable to the headwaters of any small stream, or place of low water, and may be met in several places.

Magowasinghinck, so written in its earliest form in treaty deed of 1677 (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii) as the name of an Indian family, and also as the name of a certain kill, or river—"Land lying on both sides of Rondout Kill, or river, and known by the name of Moggewarsinck," in survey for Henry Beekman, 1685—"Land on this side of Rondout Kill named Ragowasinck, from the limits of Frederick Hussay, to a kill that runs in the Ronduyt Kill, or where a large rock lies in the kill," grant to George Davis, 1677. The Beekman grant was on both sides of Rondout Creek west and immediately above Honk Falls, where a large rock lying in the kill was the boundmark to which the name referred and from which it was extended to the stream and place. The George Davis grant has not been located, and may never have been taken up. Beekman sold to Peter Lowe in 1708, and the survey of the latter, in 1722, described his boundary as running west from "the great fall called Heneck." In Mr. Lindsay's History of Ulster County it is said that the grant was half a mile wide on the southeast side of the stream and a mile wide on the northwest side. Hon. Th. E. Benedict writes me: "The Rondout is eminently a river of rocks. It rises on the east side of Peekamoose, Table, and Lone mountains, and west side of Hanover Mountain of the Catskills, and flows through chasms of giant rocks. All the way down there are notable rocks reared in midstream. The rock above Honk Falls is hogback shape, a hundred or more feet long. It lies entirely in the stream and divides it into two swift channels which join together just above the falls. Here, amid the roar, the swirl and dash of waters breaking through rocky barriers, with the rapids at the falls, the Great Rock was an object to be remembered as a boundmark."

Without knowledge of the locative of the name or of the facts of record concerning it, the late Dr. D. G. Brinton, replying to inquiry, wrote me: "I take Magow or Moggew-assing-ink to be from Macheu (Del.), 'It is great, large'; achsÜn, 'stone', and ink locative; literally 'at the place of the large stone'." The name does not describe the place where the rock lies. The Davis grant in terms other than the Indian name located one as lying "in the kill," and the other is described in the survey of the patent to Beekman: "Land situate, lying and being upon both sides of Rondout Kill or river, and known by the name of Moggewarsinck, beginning at a great rock stone in the middle of the river and opposite to a marked tree on the south side of the river, between two great rock stones, which is the bounds betwixt it and the purchase of Mr. William Fisher," etc.; both records confirm Dr. Brinton's interpretation. As a generic the name may, like Kahanksan, be found in several places, but the particularly certain place in the Beekman grant was at the falls called Honneck, now Honk.

Wawarasinke, so written by the surveyor as the name of a tract of land granted to Anna Beake and her children in 1685, has been retained as the name of a village situate in part on that tract, about four miles north of Ellenville. The precise location of the southern boundmark of the patent was on the west bank of the Rondout, south of the mouth of Wawarsing Creek, or Vernooy Kill as now called, which flows to the Rondout in a deep rocky channel, the southern bank forming a very steep, high hill or point. It is claimed that the Old Fort was on this hill, and that to and from it an Indian path led east across the Shawongunk Mountain to the New Fort and is still distinctly marked by the later travel of the pioneers. That there was an Indian path will not be questioned, nor will it be questioned that there may have been at least a modern Indian village on the hill, but the Old Fort was not there. At the point where the boundmark of the patent was placed the Rondout turns at nearly a right angle from an east and west course to nearly north, winding around a very considerable point or promontory. The orthography of the name is imperfect. By dialectic exchange of n and r, it may be read Wa-wa-nawÁs-ink, "At a place where the stream winds, bends, twists, or eddies around a point or promontory." This explanation is fully sustained by the topography. Hon. Th. E. Benedict writes me: "The Rondout at that point (the corner of the Anna Beake Patent) winds around at almost a right angle. At the bend is a deep pool with an eddying current, caused by a rock in the bank below the bend. The bend is caused by a point of high land. It is a promontory seventy-five feet high." The inquiry as to the meaning of the name need not be pursued further. The frequently quoted interpretation, "Blackbird's Nest," is puerile. (See Wawayanda.)

Honk, now so written as the name of the falls on Rondout Creek at Napanock, appears first in Rochester town records, in 1704, Hoonek, as the name of the stream. In the Lowe Patent (1722), the reading is: "Beginning by a Great Fall called Honeck." The Rochester record is probably correct in the designation of the name as that of the creek, indicating that the original was Hannek (Del.), meaning, "A rapid stream," or a stream flowing down descending slopes. As now written the name means nothing unless read from Dutch Honck, "Home, a standing post or place of beginning," but that could not have been the derivative for the name was in place before the falls became the boundmark. The familiar interpretation: "From Honck (Nar.), 'Goose'—'Wild-goose Falls,'" is worthless. The local word for Goose was Kaak. The falls descend two hundred feet, of which sixty is in a single cataract—primarily a wild, dashing water-fall.

Lackawack appears of record as the name of a stream in Sullivan County, otherwise known as the West Branch of Rondout Creek, and also as the name of the valley through which it passes. The valley passes into the town of Wawarsing, Ulster County, where the name is met in the Beekman and in the Lowe patents, with special application to the valley above Honk Falls, and is retained as the name of a modern village. In the Lowe Patent it is written Ragawack, the initials L and R exchanged; in the Hardenberg Patent it is Laughawake. The German missionary orthography is Lechauwak (Zeisb.), "Fork, division, separation," that which forks or divides, or comes together in the form of a fork; literally, "The Fork." Lechauwak, "Fork"; Lechau-hanne, "Fork of a river," from which Lackawanna; Lechau-wiechen, "Fork of a road," from which Lackawaxen—"abbreviated by the Germans to Lecha, and by the English to Lehigh." (Reichel.)

Napanoch, on the Rondout below Honk Falls, is probably the same word that is met in Nepeak, translated by Dr. Trumbull, "Water-land, or land overflowed by water." At or near Port Jervis, Napeneck, Napenack, etc. The adjectival is NepÉ, NapÉ, "Water."

Wassahawassing, in the Lowe Patent and also in the deed to Lowe from Henry Beekman, is probably from Awossi-newÁs-ing (Del.), "At the point or promontory beyond," or on the other side of a certain place.

Mopochock—"A certain Great Kil called Mopochock," in patent to Joachim Staats, 1688, is said to have been the name of what is now known as Sandberg Kill, but was not, as that stream was in no way connected with the Staats Patent.

Naversing is entered on Pownal's map between Rosendale and Fountain creeks, in the old town of Rochester. The map location may not be correct. The name is from NewÁs-ing, (Del.), "At a point or promontory." The familiar form is Neversink.

Mattachonts, a modern orthography, preserves the name of a place in the town of Rochester, Ulster County, and not that of an Indian maiden as locally stated. The boundary description refers to a creek and to a swamp. The record orthographies are Magtigkenighonk and Maghkenighonk, in Calendar of Land Papers, and "Mattekah-onk Kill," local.

Amangag-arickan, given as the name of an Indian family in western Ulster (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 505), is probably from Amangak, "Large," with the related meaning of terrible, and Anakakan, "Rushes," or sharp rushes. Amangak is from Amangi, "Big, large, powerful, dire," etc., and -ak, animate plural.

Ochmoachk-ing, an unlocated place, is described as "Above the village called Mombackus, extending from the north bound of the land of Anna Beake southerly on both sides of the creek or river to a certain place called Ochmoachking." (Patent to Staats, 1688.)

Shokan, the name of a village on Esopus Creek, in the town of Olive, has been interpreted as a pronunciation of Schokkan (Dutch), "To jolt, to shake," etc., by metonymie, "A rough country." The district is mountainous and a considerable portion of it is too rough for successful cultivation, but no Hollander ever used the word Schokken to describe rough land. At or near the village bearing the name a small creek flows from the west to the Esopus, indicating that Shokan is a corruption of Sohkan, "Outlet or mouth of a stream." Sohk is an eastern form and an is an indefinite or diminutive formative. Heckewelder wrote in the Delaware, Saucon, "The outlet of a small stream into a larger one." Ashokan is a pronunciation. The same name is met at the mouth of the East or Paghatagan Branch of the Delaware. Shokan Point is an elevation rising 3100 feet.

Koxing Kil, a stream so called in Rosendale, is of record Cocksing and Cucksink—"A piece of land; it lyeth almost behind Marbletown." It is not the name of the stream but of a place that was at or near some other place; probably from Koghksuhksing, "Near a high place." (See Coxackie.) On map of U. S. Geological Survey the name is given to the outlet of Minnewaska Lake, which lies in a basin of hills on Shawongunk Mountain, 1650 feet above sea level.

Shandaken, the name of a town in Ulster County, is not from any word meaning "Rapid water," as has been suggested, but is probably from Schindak, "Hemlock woods"—Schindak-ing, "At the hemlock woods," or place of hemlocks. The region has been noted for hemlocks from early times.

Mombackus, accepted as the name of a place in the present town of Rochester, Ulster County, is first met in 1676, in application to three grants of land described as "At ye Esopus at ye Mumbackers, lying at ye Round Doubt River." In a grant to Tjerck Classen de Witt, in 1685, the orthography is Mombackhouse—"Lying upon both sides of the Mumbackehous Kill or brook." The stream is now known as Rochester Creek flowing from a small lake in the town of Olive. The late John W. Hasbrouck wrote, "Mombakkus is a Dutch term, literally meaning 'Silent head,' from Mom, 'silent,' and Bak or Bakkus, 'head.' It originated from the figure of a man's face cut in a sycamore tree which stood near the confluence of the Mombakkus and Rondout kills on the patent to Tjerck Classen de Witt, and was carved, tradition says, to commemorate a battle fought near the spot," that "for this information" he was "indebted to the late Dr. Westbrook, who said the stump of the tree yet stood in his youthful days." Although the evidence of the existence of a tree marked as described is not entirely positive, the fact that trees similarly marked were frequently met by Europeans in the ancient forests gives to its existence reasonable probability. In his treatment of the name Mr. Hasbrouck made several mistakes. "Place of death" is not in the word, and Dutch Mom or Mum does not mean "Silent"; it means "Mask," or covering, and Bak or Bakkes, does not mean "head," it is a cant term for "Face, chops, visage." Mombakkes is plainly a vulgar Dutch word for "Mask." It describes a grotesque face as seen on a Mascaron in architecture, or a rude painting. Usually trees marked in the manner described included other figures commemorative of the deeds of a warrior designed to be honored. Sometimes the paintings were drawn by a member of the clan or family to which the subject belonged, and sometimes by the hero himself, who was flattered by the expectation that his memory would thereby be preserved, or his importance or prowess impressed upon his associates, or on those of other clans, and perhaps handed down to later generations.

Wieskottine, located on Van der Donck's map (1656), north of Esopus Creek and apparently in the territory of the Catskill Indians, is a Dutch notation of Wishquot-attiny, meaning, literally, "Walnut Hill." A hill and trees are figured on the map. The dialect of the Catskill Indians was Mahican or Mohegan. It seems to have influenced very considerably the adjoining Lenape dialect. On a map of 1666, the orthography is Wichkotteine, and the location placed more immediately north of the stream. The settlement represented can be no other than that of the ancient Wildwijk, now Kingston. The name has disappeared of record, as has also Namink on the Groot Esopus.

Catskill, now so written, primarily Dutch Kat's Kil, presumably from KÁterÁkts, or "Kil of the Katarakts," has come down from a very early date in Katskil. On Van der Donck's map of 1656 it is written Kats Kill, but he never wrote Kil with two l's. Older than Van der Donck's map it evidently was from the frequent reference to the "Kats Kil Indians" in Fort Orange records. Its origin is, of course, uncertain. Reasonably and presumably it was a colloquial form of Katerakts Kil—reasonably, because the falls on that stream would have naturally attracted the attention of the early Dutch navigators, as they have attracted the attention of many thousands of modern travelers. It was the absence of an authoritative explanation that led Judge Benson to inflict upon the innocent streams which now bear them the distinguishing names of Kat's and Kauter's, and to relate that as catamounts were probably very abundant in the mountains there and were naturally of the male and female species, the former called by the Dutch Kauter, or "He cat," and the latter Kat, "She cat," the streams were called by those names. His hypothesis is absurd, but is firmly believed by most of modern residents, who do not hesitate to write Kauter, "He cat," on their cards and on their steamboats, although it is no older than Judge Benson's application. He might have found a better basis for his conjecture in the fact that in 1650, on the north side of the Kat's Kil reigned in royal majesty, Nipapoa, a squaw sachem, while on the other side Machak-nimano, "The great man of his people," held sway; that, as they painted on their cabins a rude figure of a wolf, their totemic emblem, easily mistaken for a catamount, the name of "He cat" was given to one stream, and "She cat" to the other.

Katarakts Kil, as it is met of record—now Judge Benson's Kauter Kil—is formed by the outlets of two small lakes lying west of the well-known Mountain House. A little below the lakes the united streams leap over a ledge and fall 175 feet to a shelf of rock, and a few rod's below fall 85 feet to a ravine from which they find their way to the Kat's Kil. Beautiful are the falls and appropriate is the ancient name "The Kil of the Kataracts." Compare it, please, with Judge Benson's "He cat kil."

The Kat's Kil Indians have an interesting history. They are supposed to have been the "loving people" spoken of in Juet's Journal of Hudson's voyage in 1609. They were Mahicans and always friendly in their intercourse with the Dutch. In the wars with the Esopus Indians they took no part. Their hereditary enemies were the Mohawks who adjoined them on the west side of the mountains, their respective territories following the line of the watersheds. They came to be more or less mixed with fugitives from the eastern provinces, after the overthrow of King Philip. A palisaded village they had north of the Esopus, and fierce traditional battles with the Mohawks. They disappeared gradually by the sale of their lands, and gave place to the Rip van Winkles of modern history.

The River at Hudson Looking West

Quatawichnack and Katawichnack, record forms of the name given as that of a fall on Kauter's Kill, now so written, supposed to be the fall near the bridge on the road to High Falls, has been interpreted "Place of the greatest overflow," from the overflow of the stream which forms a marsh, which, however, the name describes as a "Moist, boggy meadow," or boggy land. (See Quatackuaohe.)

Mawignack, Mawichnack, Machawanick, Machwehenoc, forms of the name given as that of the meadow at the junction of the Kauter Kil and the Kat's Kil, locally interpreted, "Place where two streams meet," means, "At the fork of the river." (See Mawichnauk.)

Pasgatikook is another record name of the Katskill, varied in Pascakook and Pistakook. It is an orthography of PishgachtigÛk (Moh.), meaning, "Where the river divides, or branches." (See Schaghticoke.) In patent to John Bronck, 1705, the name is given to "A small piece of land called Pascak-ook, lying on the north side of Katskil creek." The locative is claimed by the village of Leeds.

Teteachkie, the name of a tract granted to Francis Salisbury and described as "A place lying upon Katskill Creek," has not been located. Teke, from Teke-ne, may stand for "Wood," and -achkie stand for land—a piece of woodland.

Quachanock, modern Quajack, the name of a place described as the west boundary of a tract sold to Jacob Lockerman, does not mean "Christian corn-lands," as locally interpreted, although the Indians may have called "the five great plains" the "Christian corn-land" after their occupation by the purchasers. The original word was probably Pahquioke, or Pohqu'un-auke (-ock), "Cleared, opened land," or land from which the trees and bushes had been removed to fit it for cultivation.

Wachachkeek, of record as the name of the first of "five great flats, with the woodland around them," which were included in the Catskill Patent of 35,000 acres, is otherwise written Machachkeek. It is described as "lying on both sides of Catskil Creek," and is claimed to be known as a place west of the village of Leeds. Dr. O'Callaghan interpreted the name from Wacheu, "hill," and -keag, "land" or place—"Hill country," and Dr. Trumbull gave the same meaning from Wadchuauke. The orthography of the second form, however, is probably the most correct—Machachkeek—which pretty surely, from the locative, stands for Maskekeck, meaning, "Marsh or wet meadow."

Wichquanachtekok, the name of the second flat, is no doubt an equivalent of Wequan-achten-Ûk, "At the end of the hill," from Wequa, "the end"; -achtene, "hill" or mountain, and -Ûk, locative.

Pachquyak, Pachquyak, Paquiage, etc., forms of the name of the third flat (Pachquayack, 1678), given also as the name of a flat "in the Great Imbocht," [FN] is the equivalent of Panqua-auke, Mass., "Clear land, open country." Brodhead wrote Paquiage as the name of the place on the west side of the Hudson to which the followers of King Philip retreated in 1675, but the name may have been that of any other open or unoccupied land west of the Hudson. (See Potik.)

[FN] Dutch Inbocht, "In the bend," "bay," etc. "Great" was added as an identification of the particular bend spoken off.

Paskaecq—"a certain piece of land at Katskill, on the north side of the kill, called by the Indians Paskaecq, lying under a hill to the west of it." Conveyed to Jan Bronk in 1674-5. The name describes a vale, cleft or valley. It is widely distributed. (See Paskack.)

Assiskowachok or Assiskowacheck, the name of record as that of the fourth flat, is no doubt from Assiskeu, "Mud"—Assiskew-aughk-Ûk, "At (or on) a muddy place."

Potic, the name of the fifth flat, is also of record Potick, Potatik, and Potateuck, probably an equivalent of PowntuckÛk (Mass.), denoting, "Country about the falls." (Trumbull.) From the flat the name was extended to a hill and to a creek in the town of Athens. Hubbard, in his "History of Indian Wars," assigns the same name to a place on the east side of Hudson's River. (See Pachquyak and Schaghticoke.)

Ganasnix and Ganasenix, given as the name of a creek constituting the southern boundary of the Lockerman Patent (1686), seems to be an orthography of Kaniskek, which see.

Waweiantepakook, Waweantepakoak, Wawantepekoak, are forms of a name given as that of "a high round hill" near Catskill. The description reads: "A place on the northeast side of a brook called Kiskatamenakook, on the west side of a hill called Waweantepakoak." (Land Papers, 242.) The location has not been ascertained. AntpÉch (Antpek, Zeisb.), means "Head." In Mass. (Eliot), Puhkuk—Muppukuk, "A head." Wawei is a reduplicative of Wai or Way; it means, "Many windings around," or deviations from a direct line. The name is sufficiently explained by the description, "On the west side of a hill," or a hill-side, but descriptive of a hill resembling a head—"high, erect"—with the accessory meaning of superiority. "Indian Head" is now applied to one of the peaks of the Catskills. The parts of the body were sometimes applied by the Indians to inanimate objects just as we apply them in English—head of a cove, leg of a table, etc. (See Wawayanda.)

Kiskatom, a village and a stream of water so called in Greene County, appears in two forms in original records, Kiskatammeeche and Kiskatamenakoak. The abbreviated form, Kiskatom, appears in 1708, more particularly describing "A certain tract by a place called Kiskatammeeche, beginning at a turn of Catrick's Kill ten chains below where Kiskatammeeche Kill watereth into Catrick's Kill," and "Under the great mountain called Kiskatameck." Dr. Trumbull wrote: "Kiskato-minak-auke, 'Place of thin-shelled nuts,' or shag-bark hickory nuts." He explained: "Shag-bark hickory nuts, 'nuts to be cracked by the teeth,' are the 'Kiskatominies' and 'Kisky Thomas nuts' of the descendants of the Dutch colonists of New Jersey and New York." (Comp. Ind. Geographical Names.)

Kaniskek, or Caniskek, of record as the name of Athens, is described in original deeds: "A certain tract of land on the west side of North River opposite Claverack, called Caniskek, which stretches along the river from the lands of Peter Bronck down to the valley lying near the point of the main land behind the Barren Island, called Mackawameck," now known as Black Rock, at the south part of Athens. The description covers the long marshy flat in front of Athens, or between Athens and Hudson. The name seems to be from Quana (Quinnih, Eliot), "Long"; -ask, the radical of all names meaning grass, marsh, meadow, etc., and -ek, formative—literally, "Long marsh or meadow." The early settlement at Athens was called Loonenburgh, from one Jan van Loon, who located there in 1706. Esperanza succeeded this name and was followed by Athens. The particular place of first settlement is described as running "from the corner called Mackawameck west into the woodland to the Kattskill road or path, which land is called Loonenburgh." Athens is from the capital of the ancient Greek State of Attica.

Keessienwey's Hoeck, a place so called, [FN-1] has not been located. It is presumed to have been in the vicinity of Kaniskek and to have taken its name from the noted "chief or sachem" of the Katskill Indians called Keessienwey, Keesiewey, Kesewig, Keeseway, etc. On the east side of the river, south of Stockport, Kesieway's Kil is of record. Mr. Bernard Fernow, in his translation of the Dutch text wrote, "Keessienweyshoeck (Mallows Meadow Hook)," but no meadow of that character is of local record. Kessiewey was a peace chief, or resident ruler, whose office it was to negotiate treaties of peace for his own people, or for other clans when requested, and in this capacity, with associates, announced himself at Fort Orange, in 1660, as coming, "in the name of the Esopus sachems, to ask for peace" with them. [FN-2] He was engaged in similar work in negotiating the Esopus treaty of 1664; signed the deed for Kaniskek in 1665, and disappears of record after that date. In "History of Greene County," he is confused with Aepjen, a peace chief of the Mahicans, and in some records is classed as a Mahican, which he no doubt was tribally, but not the less "a Katskil Indian." Beyond his footprints of record, nothing is known of the noted diplomat. His name is probably from Keeche, "Chief, principal, greatest." Keechewae, "He is chief." (See Schodac.)

[FN-1] ". . . We have, therefore, gathered information from the Mahicanders, who thought we knew of it, that more than fifteen days ago some Esopus [Indians] had been at Keessienwey's Hoeck who wanted to come up [to Fort Orange], but had been prevented until this time, and in order to get at the truth of the matter, we have concluded to send for two or three sachems of the Katskil Indians, especially Macsachneminanau and Safpagood, also Keesienwey, to come hither." (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 309.)

[FN-2] "May 24, 1660. To-day appeared [at Fort Orange] three Mahican chiefs, namely, Eskuvius, alias Aepjen (Little Ape), Aupaumut, and Keessienway, alias Teunis, who answered that they came in the name of the Esopus sachems to ask for peace."

Machawameck, the south boundmark of Kaniskek, was not the name of Barrent's Island, as stated in French's Gazetteer. It was the name of a noted fishing place, now known as Black Rock, in the south part of Athens. The prefix Macha, is the equivalent of Massa (Natick Mogge), meaning "Great," and -ameck is an equivalent of -ameek (-amuk, Del.), "Fishing-place." As the root, -am, means "To take by the mouth," the place would seem to have been noted for fish of the smaller sort. The Dutch called the place Vlugt Hoek, "Flying corner," it is so entered in deed. Qr. "Flying," fishing with a hook in the form of a fly.

Koghkehaeje, Kachhachinge, Coghsacky, now Coxsackie, a very early place name where it is still retained, was translated by Dr. Schoolcraft from Kuxakee (Chip.), "The place of the cut banks," and by Dr. O'Callaghan, "A corruption of Algonquin Kaakaki, from Kaak, 'goose,' and -aki, 'place.'" In his translation of the Journal of Jasper Dankers and Peter Sluyter, in which the name is written Koch-ackie (German notation; Dutch, Kok, "cook"), the late Hon. Henry C. Murphy wrote: "The true orthography is probably Koek's-rackie (the Cook's Little Reach), to distinguish it from the Koek's Reach below the Highlands, near New York." Unfortunately there is no evidence that there was a reach called the Cook's north of the Highlands, while it is certain that the name is Algonquian. Dankers and Sluyter gave no description of the place in 1679-80, but their notice of it indicates that it was familiar at that date. In 1718 it was given as the name of a bound-mark of a tract described as "having on the east the land called Vlackte and Coxsackie." (Cal. N.Y. Land Papers, 124.) Vlackte (Vlakte) is Dutch for "Plain or flat," and no doubt described the Great Nutten Hoek Flat which lies fronting Coxsackie Landing, and Coxackie described the clay bluff which skirts the river rising about one hundred feet. The bluff and flat bounded the tract on the east. From the locative the name may be translated from Mass. Koghksuhk-ohke, meaning "High land." The guttural ghks had the sound of Greek x, hence Kox or Cox.

Stighcook, a tract of land so called, now in Greene County, granted to Casparus Brunk and others in 1743, is located in patent as lying "to the westward of Koghsacky." In Indian deed to Edward Collins, in 1734, the description reads, "Westerly by the high woods known and called by the Indian name Sticktakook." Apparently from Mass. Mishuntugkook, "At a place of much wood." The district seems to have been famed for nut trees. It is noted on Van der Donck's map "Noten Hoeck," from which it was extended to Great Nutten Hook Island and Little Nutten Hook Island, on which there were nut trees. (See Wieskottine, Kiskatom, etc.)

Siesk-assin, a boundmark of the Coeymans Patent, is described as a point on the west side of the Hudson, "opposite the middle of the island called Sapanakock and by the Dutch called Barrent's Island." The suffix -assin, probably stands for Assin, "Stone," but the prefix is unintelligible. Sapanak-ock means, "Place of wild potatoes," or bulbous roots. (See Passapenoc.) Barrent's is from Barrent Coeymans, the founder of the village of Coeymans. The earlier Dutch name was Beerin Island, or "She-bear's Island," usually read Bear's Island.

Achquetuck is given as the name of the flat at Coeyman's Hollow. The suffix -tuck probably stands for "A tidal river or estuary," and Achque means "On this side," or before. The reference seems to have been to land before or on this side of the estuary, or the side toward the speaker.

Oniskethau, quoted as the name of Coeymans' Creek, is said to have been the name of a Sunk-squa, or sachem's wife. Authority not given. The stream descends in two falls at Coeymans' Village, covering seventy-five feet. The same name is met in Onisquathaw, now Niskata, of record as the name of a place in the town of New Scotland, Albany County.

Hahnakrois, or Haanakrois, the name of a small stream sometimes called Coeymans' Creek, which enters the Hudson in the northeast corner of Greene County, is Dutch corrupted. The original was Haan-Kraait, meaning "Cock-crowing" Kill, perhaps from the sound of the waterfall.

Sankagag, otherwise written Sanckhagag, is given, in deed to Van Rensselaer, 1630, as the name of a tract of land described as "Situated on the west side of the North River, stretching in length from a little above Beeren Island along the river upward to Smack's Island, and in width two days' journey inland." Beeren Island is about twelve miles south of Albany, and Smack's Island is near or at that city. The western limit of the tract included the Helderberg [FN] hills.

[FN] Helder (Dutch) means "Clear, bright, light, clearly, brightly," and Berg means "hill" or mountain. It was probably employed to express the appearance of the hills in the landscape. Some of the peaks of the range afford fine view of the valley of Hudson's River.

Nepestekoak, a tract of land described, "Beginning at the northernmost fall of water in a certain brook, called by the Indians Nepestekoak"; in another paper, Nepeesteegtock. The name was that of the place. It is now assigned to a pond in the town of Cairo, Greene County. (See Neweskeke.)

Neweskeke, -keek, about ten miles south of Albany, is described as "The corner of a neck of land having a fresh water river running to the east of it." In another paper the neck is located "near a pool of water called Nepeesteek," and "a brook called Napeesteegtock." The name of the brook and that of the pool is from NepÉ, "Water," the first describing "Water at rest," a pool or lake, and the second a place adjoining extending to the stream. Neweskeke means "Promontory, point or corner," [FN]

[FN] This name appears to be a contraction of Newas-askeg, "Marshy promontory,' or a promontory or point near a marsh." (Gerard.)

Pachonahellick and Pachonakellick are record forms of the name of Long or Mahikander's Island, otherwise known historically as Castle Island. It is the first island south of Albany, and lies on the west side of the river, near the main land opposite the mouth of Norman's Kill. On some maps it is called Patroon's Island and Martin Garretson's Island. The first Dutch traders were permitted to occupy it, and they are said to have erected on it, in 1614, a fort or "castle," which they called Fort Nassau. In the spring of 1617 this fort was almost wholly destroyed by freshet. The traders then erected a fort on the west bank of the river, on the north side of Norman's Kill, which they called Fort Orange. This fort was succeeded, in 1623, by one on or near the present steamboat landing in Albany, to which the name was transferred and which was known as Fort Orange until the English obtained possession (1664), when the name was changed to Fort Albany, from which the present name of the capital of the State. [FN-1] In addition to the early history of the island the claim is made by Weise, in his "History of Albany," that it was occupied by French traders in 1540; that they erected a fort or castle thereon, which they were forced to leave by a freshet in the spring of 1542, and that they called the river, and also their trading post, "Norumbega." These facts are also stated in another connection. There is some evidence that French traders visited the river, and that they constructed a fort on Castle Island, but none that they called the river "Norumbega." (See Muhheak-unuk.) By the construction of an embankment and the filling of the passage between the island and the main land, the island has nearly disappeared. [FN-2]

[FN-1] Fort Albany was succeeded by a quadrangular fort called Fort Frederick, built by the English (1742-3) on what is now State Street, between St. Peter's Church and Geological Hall. It was demolished soon after the Revolution. Wassenaer wrote, under date of 1625: "Right opposite [Fort Orange] is the fort of the Maykans which they built against their enemies the Maquas" [Mohawks]. "Right opposite" means "directly opposite," i.e. directly opposite the present steamboat landing at Albany, presumably on the bluff at Greenbush.

[FN-2] The name seems to have been that of the mouth of Norman's Kill immediately west of the island, and to be from Sacona-hillak. "An out-pour of water," the mouth of the stream serving to locate the island. "Patroon's Island" and "Patroon's Creek" were local Dutch names. (See Norman's Kill.)

Norman's Kill, so well known locally, took that name from one Albert Andriessen, Brat de Noordman (the Northman), who leased the privilege and erected a mill for grinding corn, sometime about 1638. On Van Rensselaer's map of 1630 it is entered "Godyn's Kil and Water Val," a mill stream, not a cataract. Brat de Noordman's mill was in the town of Bethlehem, adjoining the city of Albany. The stream rises in Schenectady County and flows southeast about twenty-eight miles to the Hudson. The Mohawks called it Tawalsontha. In a petition for a grant of land near Schenectady, in 1713, is the entry, "By ye Indian name Tawalsontha, otherwise ye Norman's Kill"—"A creek called D'Wasontha" (1726)—from the generic Toowawsuntha (Gallatin), meaning, "The falls of a stream"; Twasenta (Bruyas), "Sault d'eau," applied by the French to rapids in a stream—a leaping, jumping, tumbling waterfall.

Aside from the names of the stream it has especial historic interest in connection with early Dutch settlement and the location of Fort Orange where Indians of all nations and tongues assembled for intercourse with the government. (See Pachonahellick.) Dr. Schoolcraft wrote, without any authority that I have been able to find, Tawasentha as the name of the mound on which Fort Orange was erected, with the meaning, "Place of the many dead," adding that the Mohawks had a village near and buried their dead on this hill; a pure fiction certainly in connection with the period to which he referred. The Mohawks never had a village here, nor owned a foot of land east of the Helderberg range. The Mahicans were the owners and occupants, but neither Mahicans or Mohawks would have permitted the Dutch to build a fort on their burial ground. Heckewelder wrote, in his "Indian Nations," "Gaaschtinick, since called by the name of Norman's Kill," and recited a Delaware tradition, with the coloring of truth, that that nation consented there, under advisement of the Dutch, to take the rank of women, i.e. a nation without authority to make war or sell lands. The tradition is worthless. The Dutch did make "covenants of friendship" here with several tribes as early as 1625 (Doc Hist. N.Y. iii, 51), but none of the character stated. All the tribes were treated as equals in trade and friendship. Whatever of special favor there was was with the Mahicans among whom they located. The first treaty, "offensive and defensive," which was made was by the English with the Five Nations in 1664-5. The Mahicans had then sold their lands and retired to the Housatenuk, and the Mohawks and their alliant nations had become the dominant power at Albany.

Nachtenak is quoted as the Mahican name of Waterford, or rather as the name of the point of land now occupied by that city, lying between the Mohawk and the Hudson. Probably the same as the following:

Mathahenaak, "being a part of a parcel of land called the foreland of the Half-Moon, and by the Indians Mathahenaack, being on the north of the fourth branch or fork of the Mohawk." Matha is an orthography of Macha (Stockbridge, Naukhu; Del. Lechau), with locative Ûk, "At the fork"—now or otherwise known as Half-Moon Point, Waterford.

Quahemiscos is a record form of the name of what is now known as Long Island, near Waterford.

Monemius Island, otherwise Cohoes Island and Haver Island, just below Cohoes Falls, the site of Monemius's Castle, or residence of Monemius or Moenemines, a sachem of the Mahicans in 1630, so entered on Van Rensselaer's map. Haver is Dutch, "Oat straw." (See Haverstraw.)

Saratoga, now so written, was, primarily, the name of a specific place extended to a district of country lying on both sides of the Hudson, described, in a deed from the Indian owners to Cornelis van Dyk, Peter Schuyler, and others, July 26, 1683, as "A tract of land called Sarachtogoe" (by the Dutch), "or by the Maquas Ochseratongue or Ochsechrage, and by the Machicanders Amissohaendiek, situated to the north of Albany, beginning at the utmost limits of the land bought from the Indians by Goose Gerritse and Philip Pieterse Schuyler deceased, there being" (i.e. the bound-mark) "a kil called Tioneendehouwe, and reaching northward on both sides of the river to the end of the lands of Sarachtoge, bordering on a kil, on the east side of the river, called Dionandogeha and having the same length on the west side to opposite the kil (Tioneendehouwe), and reaching westward through the woods as far as the Indian proprietors will show, and the same distance through the woods on the east side." The boundary streams of this tract are now known as the Hoosick (Tioneendehowe), and the Batten Kill (Dionondehowe), as written on the map of the patent. The boundaries included, specifically, the section of the Hudson known as "The Still Water," [FN-1] noted from the earliest Dutch occupation as the Great Fishing Place and Beaver Country, two elements the most dear to the Indian heart and the most contributive to his support, inciting wars for possession. Specifically, too, the locative of the name, from the language of the deed and contemporary evidence, would seem to have been on the east side of the river—"the end of the lands of Sarachtoge, bordering on a kil on the east side of the river, called," etc., a place which Governor Dongan selected, in 1685, on which to settle the Mohawk Catholic converts, who had been induced to remove to Canada, as a condition of their return, and which he described as a tract of land "called Serachtogue, lying upon Hudson's River, about forty miles above Albany," and for the protection of which Fort Saratoga was erected in 1709; noted by Governor Cornbury in 1703, as "A place called Saractoga, which is the northernmost settlement we have"; topographically described, in later years, as "a broad interval on the east side of the river, south of Batten Kill," and as including the mouth of the kill and lake Cossayuna. (Col. Hist. N.Y.; Fitch's Survey; Kalm's Travels.) On the destruction of the fort, in the war of 1746, the settlement was removed to the opposite side of the river and the name went with it, but to which it had no legitimate title. (See Kayauderossa.)

Apparently the Mahican name, Amissohaendiek, is the oldest. It carries with it a history in connection with the wars between the Mohawks and the Mahicans. At the sale of the lands, the Mahicans who were present renounced claim to compensation "because in olden time the lands belonged to them, before the Maquas took it from them." [FN-2] (Col. Hist. N.Y., xiii, 537.) It is this section of Hudson's River that the only claim was ever made and conceded of Mohawk possession by conquest.

The Mohawk name, Ochseratongue or Ochsechrage, became, in the course of its transmission, Osarague and Saratoga, and in the latter form, without reference to its antecedents, was translated by the late Henry R. Schoolcraft "From Assarat, 'Sparkling water,' and Oga, 'place,' 'the place of the sparkling water,'" the reference being to the mineral springs, one of which. "High Rock," was, traditionally, known to the Indians, who, it is said, conveyed Sir William Johnson thither, in 1767, to test the medicinal virtues of the water; but, while the tradition may recite a fact the translation is worthless.

With a view to obtain a satisfactory explanation of the record names, the writer submitted them to the late eminent Iroquoian philologist, Horatio Hale, M. A., of Clinton, Ontario, Canada, and to the eminent Algonquian linguist, the late Dr. D. G. Brinton, of Philadelphia. In reply, Mr. Hale wrote: . . . "Your letter has proved very acceptable, as the facts you present have thrown light on an interesting question which has heretofore perplexed me. I have vainly sought to discover the origin and meaning of the name Saratoga. My late distinguished friend, L. H. Morgan, was, it seems, equally unsuccessful. In the appendix of local names added to his admirable 'League of the Iroquois,' Saratoga is given in the Indian form as Sharlatoga, with the addition, 'signification lost.' There can be no doubt that the word, as we have it, and indeed as Morgan heard it, is, as you suggest, much abbreviated and corrupted. One of the ancient forms, however, which you give from the old Dutch authorities, seems to put us at once on the right track. This form is Ochsechrage. The 'digraph' ch in this word evidently represents the hard guttural aspirate, common to both the Dutch and the German languages. This aspirate is of frequent occurrence in the Iroquois dialects, but it is not a radical element. As I have elsewhere said, it appears and disappears as capriciously as the common h in the speech of the south of England. In etymologies it may always be disregarded. Omitting it, we have the well-known word Oserage—in modern Iroquois orthography Oserake, meaning 'At the beaver-dam.' It is derived from osera, 'beaver-dam,' with the locative particle ge or ke affixed.

"In Iroquois r and l are interchangeable, and s frequently sounds like sh. Thus we can understand how in Cartier's orthography Oserake (pronounced with an aspirate) became Hochelaga, the well-known aboriginal name of what is now Montreal. That this name meant simply 'At the beaver-dam' is not questioned. It is rather curious, though not surprising, that two such noted Indian names as Saratoga and Hochelaga should have the same origin. In Ochseratongue the name is lengthened by an addition which is so evidently corrupted that I hesitate to explain it. I may say, however, that I suspect it to be a 'verbalized' form. It may possibly be derived from the verb atona, 'to become' (in its perfect tense atonk), added to osera, in which case the word would mean, 'where a beaver-dam has been forming,' or, as we should express it in English, 'where the beavers have been making a dam.'

"With regard to the Mahican name Amissohaendiek or Amissohaendick (whichever it is) I cannot say much, my knowledge of the Algonquin dialects not being sufficient to warrant me in venturing on etymologies. I remark, however, that 'beaver' in Mahican, as in several other Algonquin dialects, is Amisk or some variant of that word. This would apparently account for the first two syllables of the name. In Iroquois the word for 'beaver-dam' 'has no connection with the word 'beaver,' but it may be otherwise in Mahican." . . .

Dr. Brinton wrote:

. . . "I have little doubt but that the Mahican term is practically a translation of the Iroquois name. It certainly begins with the element Amik, Amisk or Amisque, 'Beaver,' and terminates with the locative ck or k. The intermediate portion I am not clear about. There is probably considerable garbling of the middle syllables, and this obscures their forms. In a general way, however, it means 'Place where beavers live,' or 'are found.'"

Father Le June wrote Amisc-ou, "Beaver," an equivalent of Amis-so in the text. Dr. Trumbull wrote: "Amisk, a generic name for beaver-kind, has been retained in the principal Algonquian dialects." The district was a part of Ochsaraga, "The beaver-hunting country of the Confederate Indians," conquered by them about 1624. The evolution from Ochsera-tongue (deed of 1683) appears in Serachtogue (Dongan, 1685); Serasteau (contemporary French); Saractoga (Cornbury, 1703); Saratoga (modern). The Ossarague, noted by Father Jogues, in 1646, as a famous fishing-place, is now assigned to Schuylerville.

Aside from its linguistic associations, the Batten Kill is an interesting stream. It has two falls, one of which, near the Hudson, is seventy-five feet and preserves in its modern name, Dionandoghe, its Mohawk name, Ti-oneenda-houwe, for the meaning of which see Hoosick.

[FN-1] "At a place called the Still Water, so named for that the water passeth so slowly as not to be discovered, yet at a little distance both above and below is disturbed and rageth as in a sea, occasioned by great rocks and great falls therein." (Col. Hist. N.Y., x, 194.)

[FN-2] The war in which the Mahicans lost and the Mohawks gained possession of the lands here occurred in 1627, as stated in Dutch records (Doc. Hist. N.Y., iii, 48), sustained by the deed to King George in 1701. (Doc. Hist. N.Y., i, 773.) There was no conquest on the Hudson south of Cohoes Falls.

Sacondaga, quoted as the name of the west branch of the Hudson, is not the name of the stream but of its mouth or outlet at Warrensburgh, Warren County. It is from Mohawk generic Swe'ken, the equivalent of Lenape Sacon (Zeisb.), meaning "Outlet," or "Mouth of a river," "Pouring out," and -daga, a softened form of -take, "At the," the composition meaning, literally, "At the outlet" or mouth of a river. (Hale.) Ti-osar-onda, met in connection with the stream, means "Branch" or "Tributory stream." (Hewitt.) The reference may have been to the stream as a branch of the Hudson, or to some other stream. The stream comes down from small lakes and streams in Lewis and Hamilton counties, and is the principal northwestern affluent of the Hudson.

Scharon, Scarron, Schroon, orthographies of the name now conferred on a lake and its outlet, and on a mountain range and a town in Essex County, is said to have been originally given to the lake by French officers in honor of the widow Scarron, the celebrated Madam Maintenon of the reign of Louis XVI. (Watson.) The present form, Schroon, is quite modern. On Sauthier's map the orthography is Scaron. The lake is about ten miles long and forms a reservoir of waters flowing from a number of lakes and springs in the Adirondacks. Its outlet unites with the Hudson on the east side at Warrensburgh, Warren County, and has been known for many years as the East Branch of Hudson's River. The Mohawk-Iroquoian name of the stream at one place is of record At-a-te'ton, from Ganawate^cton (Bruyas), meaning "Rapid river," "Swift current." (J. B. N. Hewitt.) A little valley at the junction of the stream with the Hudson at Warrensburgh, dignified by the name of "Indian Pass," bears the record name of Teohoken, from Iroquois generic De-ya-oken, meaning "Where it forks," or "Where the stream forks or enters the Hudson." (J. B. N. Hewitt.) The little valley is described as "a picture of beauty and repose in strong contrast with the rugged hills around." (Lossing.)

Oi-o-gue, the name given by the Mohawks to Father Jogues in 1646, at Lake George, to what we now fondly call Hudson's River, is fully explained in another connection. The stream has its sources among the highest peaks of the Adirondacks, the most quoted springlet being that in what is known as "Adirondack or Indian Pass," a deep and rugged gorge between the steep slopes of Mt. Mclntyre and the cliffs of Wallface Mountain, in Essex County. The level of this gorge is 2,937 feet above tide. [FN-1] The highest lakelet-head sources, however, are noted in Verplanck Colvin's survey of the Adirondack region as Lake Moss and Lake Tear-of-the-clouds on Mount Marcy, [FN-2] the former having an elevation of 4,312 feet above sea-level and the latter 4,326 feet, "the loftiest water-mirror of the stars" in the State. The little streams descending from these lakes, gathering strength from other small lakes and springlets, flow rapidly into Warren County, where they receive the Sacondaga and Schroon. Between Warrensburgh and Glen's Falls the stream sweeps, in tortuous course with a wealth of rapids, eastward among the lofty hills of the Luzerne [FN-3] range of mountains, and at Glen's Falls descends about sixty feet, passing over a precipice, in cataract, in flood seasons, about nine hundred feet long, and then separates into three channels by rocks piled in confusion. In times of low water there is, on the south side of the gorge, a perpendicular descent of about forty feet. Below, the channels unite and in one deep stream flow on gently between the grained cliffs of fine black marble, which rises in some places from thirty to seventy feet. At the foot of the fall the current is divided by a small island which is said to bear on its flat rock surface a petrifaction having the appearance of a big snake, which may have been regarded by the Mohawks with awe as the personification of the spirit of evil, according to the Huron legend, "Onniare jotohatienn tiotkon, The demon takes the figure of a snake." (Bruyas.) Under the rock is a cave over which the serpent lies as a keeper, extending from one channel to the other and which, as well as the snake, comes down to us embalmed in Cooper's "Last of the Mohegans," though some visitors with clear heads have failed to discover the snake. In times of flood the cave is filled with water and all the dividing rocks below the fall are covered, presenting one vast foaming sheet.

At Sandy Hill the river-channel curves to the south and pursues a broken course to what are known as Baker's Falls, where the descent is between seventy and eighty feet—primarily nearly as picturesque as at Glen's Falls, untouched by Cooper's pen. The bend to the south at Sandy Hill is substantially the head of the valley of Hudson's River. Throughout the mountainous region above that point several Indian names are quoted by writers in obscure orthographies and very doubtful interpretations, the most tangible, aside from those which have been noticed, being that which is said to have been the name of Glen's Falls, but was actually the name of the very large district known as Kay-au-do-ros-sa. In Mohawk, Sandy Hill would probably be called Gea-di-go, "Beautiful plain," but it has no Indian name of record. The village stands upon a high sandy plain. It has its traditionary Indian story, of course; in this section of country it is easy to coin traditions of the wars of the Mohawks, the Hurons, and the Algonquians; they interest but do not harm any one.

[FN-1] This famous Pass is partly in the town of Newcomb and partly in the town of North Elba, Essex County. Wall-face, on the west side, is a perpendicular precipice 800 to 1,000 feet high, and Mt. Mclntyre rises over 3,000 feet. The gorge is seldom traversed, even adventurous tourists are repelled by its ruggedness.

[FN-2] By Colvin's survey Mount Marcy has an elevation of 5,344.411 feet "above mean-tide level in the Hudson." It is the highest mountain in the State. Put four Butter Hills on the top of each other and the elevation would be only a few hundred feet higher.

[FN-3] French, "Spanish Trefoil." "Having a three-lobed extremity or extremities, as a cross." Botanically, plants having three leaves, as white clover, etc. Topographically, a mountain having three points or extremities.

Glens Falls Above Leather Stocking Cove

Kay-au-do-ros-sa (modern), Kancader-osseras, Kanicader-oseras (primary), the name given as that of a stream of water, of a district of country, and of a range of mountains, was originally the name of the stream now known as Fish Creek, [FN] the outlet of Saratoga Lake, and signifies, literally, "Where the lake mouths itself out." Horatio Hale wrote me: "Lake, in Iroquois, is, in the French missionary spelling, Kaniatare, the word being sounded as in Italian. Mouth is Osa, whence (writes the Rev. J. A. Cuoq in his Lexique de la langue Iroquois), Osara, mouth of a river, 'boudhe d'un fleure, embouchure d'une riviere.' This word combined would give either Kauicatarosa or Kaniatarossa, with the meaning of 'Lake mouth,' applicable to the mouth of a lake, or rather, according to the verbalizing habit of the language, 'the place where the lake disembogues,' literally, 'mouths itself out.'" To which J. B. N. Hewitt added the explanation, "Or flood-lands of the lake—the overflow of the lake."

[FN] "About Kayaderossres Creek and the lakes in that quarter." "The chief tract of hunting land we have left, called Kayaderossres, with a great quantity of land about it." (Doc. Hist. N.Y., ii, 110.) The stream drains an extensive district of country, flows into and becomes the outlet of Saratoga Lake, and is now known as Fish Creek and Fish Kill, a very cheap substitute for the expressive Mohawk term.

Adirondacks, or Ratirontaks, a name now improperly applied to the mountainous district of northern New York, is said to have been primarily bestowed by the Iroquois on a tribe occupying the left bank of the St. Lawrence above the present site of Quebec, who were called by the French Algonquins specifically, as representatives of a title which had come to be of general application to a group of tribes speaking radically the same language. [FN-1] The term is understood to mean, "They eat trees," i.e. people Who eat the bark of certain trees for food, presumably from the climatic difficulty in raising corn in the latitude in which they lived. [FN-2] Horatio Hale analyzed the name: "From Adi, 'they'; aronda, 'tree,' and ikeks, 'eat.'" The name was not that of the district, nor is it convertible with Algonquin. The later is a French rendering of Algoumquin, from A'goumak, "On the other side of the river," i.e. opposite their neighbors lower down. (Trumbull.) Schoolcraft gave substantially the same interpretation from the Chippewa, "Odis-qua-guma, 'People at the end of the waters,'" making its application specific to the Chippewas as the original Algonquins, instead of the Ottawas. The accepted interpretation, "Country of mountains and forests," is correct only in that that it is descriptive of the country. The record names of the district are Cough-sagh-raga and Canagariarchio, the former entered on Pownal's map with the addition "Or the beaver—hunting country of the Confederate Indians," and the latter entered in the deed from the Five Nations to the King in 1701. (Col, Hist. N.Y., iv, 909.) Cough-sagh-raga is now written Koghsarage (Elliot) and Kohserake (modern), and signifies "Winter" or "Winter land"; but the older name, Cana-gariarc-hio, means, "The beaver-hunting country." [FN-3] It is not expected that this explanation will affect the continuance, by conference, of Adirondacks as the name of the district; but it may lead to the replanting of the much more expressive Iroquoian title, Kohsarake, on some hill-top in the ancient wilderness.

[FN] The specific tribe called Algonquins by the French, were seated, in 1738, near Montreal, and described as a remnant of "A nation the most warlike, the most polished, and the most attached to the French." Their armorial bearing, or totem, was an evergreen oak. (Doc. Hist. N.Y., i, 16.) It is claimed that they were principally Ottawas, residing on the Ottawa River. (Schoolcraft.) The primary location of the language is only measurably involved in the first application of the name, the honor being claimed for the Chippewa, the Cree, and the Lenni-Lenape. The Eastern Algonquins substituted for the Iroquois Adirondacks, MihtukmÉchaick (Williams) with the same meaning.

[FN-2] The bark of the chestnut, the walnut, and of other trees was dried, macerated, and rolled in the fat of bears or other animals, and probably formed a palatable and a healthful diet. Presumably the eating of the bark of trees was not confined to a particular tribe.

[FN-3] "Coughsaghrage, or the Beaver-Hunting Country of the Confederate Indians. The Confederates, called by the French Iroquois, surrendered this country to the English at Albany, on the 19th day of July, 1701; and their action was confirmed the 14th of September, 1724. It belongs to New York, and is full of Swamps, Lakes, Rivers, Drowned Lands; a Long Chain of Snowy Mountains which are seen. Lake Champlain runs thro' the whole tract. North and South. This country is not only uninhabited, but even unknown except towards the South where several grants have been made since the Peace."

So wrote Governor Pownal on his map of 1775. There is no question that Coughsaghraga means "Winter." It may also mean "At the Beaver-dam," or "In the country of Beaver-dams." Kohseraka may be a form of Hochelaga or Ochseraga. Osera means "Beaver-dam" as well as "Winter," wrote Horatio Hale. (See Saratoga.) In explanation of Canagariachio Mr. Hale wrote: "Kanagariarchio is a slightly corrupted form of the Iroquois word Kanna'kari-kario, which means simply 'Beaver.' It is a descriptive term compounded of Kannagare, 'Stick' or club, Kakarien, To bite,' and Kario, 'Wild animal.' It is not the most common Iroquois word for Beaver, which, in the Mohawk dialect is Tsionuito, or Djonuito. That the word should be understood to mean 'The Beaver-Hunting Country,' is in accordance with Indian usage."

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