The Composition of Indian Geographical Names | Page 4

its recognition. Capt. John Smith informs us that the "place of which their great Emperor taketh his name" of Powhatan, or Pawatan, was near "the Falls" of James River,[13] where is now the city of Richmond. 'Powatan' is pauat-hanne, or 'falls on a rapid stream.'
[Footnote 9: Col. Records of Connecticut, 1677-89, p. 275.]
[Footnote 10: Chandler's Survey of the Mohegan country, 1705.]
[Footnote 11: See Mourt's Relation, Dexter's edition, pp. 84, 91, 99. Misled by a form of this name, Patackosi, given in the Appendix to Savage's Winthrop (ii. 478) and elsewhere, I suggested to Dr. Dexter another derivation. See his note 297, to Mourt, p. 84.]
[Footnote 12: Descrip. of New Sweden, b. ii. ch. 1, 2; Proud's Hist. of Pennsylvania, ii. 252.]
[Footnote 13: "True Relation of Virginia," &c. (Deane's edition, Boston, 1866), p. 7. On Smith's map, 1606, the 'King's house,' at 'Powhatan,' is marked just below "The Fales" on 'Powhatan flu:' or James River.]
Ac��wm�� or Ogkom�� (Chip. agami; Abn. aga[n]mi; Del. achgameu;) means 'on the other side,' 'over against,' 'beyond.' As an adjectival, it is found in Acawm-auk��, the modern 'Accomac,' a peninsula east of Chesapeake Bay, which was 'other-side land' to the Powhatans of Virginia. The site of Plymouth, Mass., was called 'Accomack' by Capt. John Smith,--a name given not by the Indians who occupied it but by those, probably, who lived farther north, 'on the other side' of Plymouth Bay. The countries of Europe were called 'other-side lands,'--Narr. acawmen-��aki; Abn. aga[n]men-[oo]ki. With -tuk, it forms acawmen-tuk (Abn. aga[n]men-teg[oo]), 'other-side river,' or, its diminutive, acawmen-tuk-es (Abn. aga[n]men-teg[oo]��ss[oo]), 'the small other-side river,'--a name first given (as Agamenticus or Accomenticus) to York, Me., from the 'small tidal-river beyond' the Piscataqua, on which that town was planted.
Peske-tuk (Abn. pesk��-teg[oo]��) denotes a 'divided river,' or a river which another cleaves. It is not generally (if ever) applied to one of the 'forks' which unite to form the main stream, but to some considerable tributary received by the main stream, or to the division of the stream by some obstacle, near its mouth, which makes of it a 'double river.' The primary meaning of the (adjectival) root is 'to divide in two,' and the secondary, 'to split,' 'to divide forcibly, or abruptly.' These shades of meaning are not likely to be detected under the disguises in which river-names come down to our time. Rale translates ne-pesk��, "je vas dans le chemin qui en coupe un autre:" peskahak[oo]n, "branche."
Piscataqua, Pascataqua, &c., represent the Abn. pesk��-teg[oo]��, 'divided tidal-river.' The word for 'place' (ohke, Abn. 'ki,) being added, gives the form Piscataquak or -quog. There is another Piscataway, in New Jersey,--not far below the junction of the north and south branches of the Raritan,--and a Piscataway river in Maryland, which empties into the Potomac; a Piscataquog river, tributary to the Merrimac, in New Hampshire; a Piscataquis (diminutive) in Maine, which empties into the Penobscot. Pasquotank, the name of an arm of Albemarle Sound and of a small river which flows into it, in North Carolina, has probably the same origin.
The adjectival pesk��, or pisk��, is found in many other compound names besides those which are formed with -tuk or -hanne: as in Pascoag, for pesk��-auk��, in Burrilville, R.I., 'the dividing place' of two branches of Blackstone's River; and Pesquamscot, in South Kingston, R.I., which (if the name is rightly given) is "at the divided (or cleft) rock,"--pesk��-ompsk-ut,--perhaps some ancient land-mark, on or near the margin of Worden's Pond.
N?eu-tuk (N��ahtuk, Eliot), 'in the middle of the river,' may be, as Mr. Judd[14] and others have supposed, the name which has been variously corrupted to Norwottock, Nonotuck, Noatucke, Nawottok, &c. If so, it probably belonged, originally to one of the necks or peninsulas of meadow, near Northampton,--such as that at Hockanum, which, by a change in the course of the river at that point, has now become an island.
[Footnote 14: History of Hadley, pp. 121, 122.]
Tetiquet or Titicut, which passes for the Indian name of Taunton, and of a fishing place on Taunton River in the north-west part of Middleborough, Mass., shows how effectually such names may be disguised by phonetic corruption and mutilation. Kehte-tuk-ut (or as Eliot wrote it in Genesis xv. 18, Kehteihtukqut) means 'on the great river.' In the Plymouth Colony Records we find the forms 'Cauteeticutt' and 'Coteticutt,' and elsewhere, Kehtehticut,--the latter, in 1698, as the name of a place on the great river, "between Taunton and Bridgewater." Hence, 'Teghtacutt,' 'Teightaquid,' 'Tetiquet,' &c.[15]
[Footnote 15: See Hist. Magazine, vol. iii. p. 48.]
(2). The other substantival component of river-names, -HANNE or -HAN (Abn. -ts[oo]a[n]n or -ta[n]n; Mass. -tchuan;) denotes 'a rapid stream' or 'current;' primarily, 'flowing water.' In the Massachusetts and Abnaki, it occurs in such compounds as anu-tchuan (Abn. ari'ts[oo]a[n]n), 'it over-flows:' kussi-tchuan (Abn. kesi'ts[oo]a[n]n), 'it swift flows,' &c.
In Pennsylvania and Virginia, where the streams which