USA > Rhode Island > The lands of Rhode Island : as they were known to Caunounicus and Miantunnomu when Roger Williams came in 1636 : an Indian map of the principal locations known to the Nahigansets, and elaborate historical notes > Part 5
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THE TRIBUTE OF WILLIAMS TO THEIR POLITICAL INTEGRITY.
revelry and intoxication; though Cutshamokin himself was not known to have been drunk, yet his conduct was scandalous". A few days later, on the 24th September, 1651, Eliot held a day of "fasting and humiliation", when he permitted this renegade to offer prayers, implore the forgiveness of his sins, and further implored God that the spirit of the Lord might govern his heart ( Francis's Life Eliot. p. 172). This in all soberness this clergyman writes, after having on the preceding page ( 171) written that Mr. Eliot "was doubtful in respect of the thoroughness of his heart". If his actions in Rhode Island did not indicate "thoroughness of heart," what did they indicate? But the Reverend clergyman has most falsely wronged Mr. Gorton by attributing to to him the selling of the rum to Cutshamokin which caused this "scandalous conduct" of this "praying Indian". Mr. Gorton never sold or gave rum to Indians, while it was the constant work of Benedict Arnold as the Factor of Massachusetts. Before this rum was sold to Cutshamokin he had been used by Benedict Arnold, before the Massachusetts Gen- eral Court, to break down the Deed given by Miantinomi to Mr. Gorton and his friends of Showomet. The Massachusetts Colony Records will prove this fact. (R. I. Hist. Soc. Col. 2. 93.) Mr. Williams has shown carefully and well the character of the Narra- gansetts as it existed before the "process of debasement" began, which Mr. Dorr says, "went on unchecked" under the influence of English trade. It took just forty years to undermine and destroy. by rum and civilization, one of the two great tribes in this country ( Narr. Club 6, 273).
. William Harris thus writes of the Narragansetts after the war of cxtermination in 1675-6 waged not by the Rhode Island people, but by the Connecticut, and Plymouth, and Massachusetts Bay Colonies : "These Indians before the war did live with more ease, pleasure. and plenty, and far less care than poor laboring men or tradesmen in England" ; again, "They now are not only in danger of the English (from those outside Colonies), but of divers sorts of Indians, and of their supposed friends : they are afraid of all they see, but least oj all of those of Rhode Island" ( Harris Papers, 178). Here is Harris's story of the deaths of Miantinomi and Canonchet : "Above thirty years since (in 1643), a Sachem of Narragansett, to say
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44-45 SPECIMENS OF THE VERSE OF WILLIAMS.
Meantenomeah, whom God delivered into the hands of Unkas, who slew him; and ye foresaid Naunauntanute ( Canonchet ) who was the son of Meantenomeah ye father, slaynes by Unkas, and ye son by Unkas his son; the said Narraganset Sachems both of them monsterous proud, and both treacherous to ye English, and had not God formerly so cut off ye father, he had then done as did since his son, a most cruell man. O God soe defeat all thine enemies and deliver all that are innocent" ( Harris Papers, 172). It was not God apparently who delivered Miantinomi into the hands of Uncas to be murdered by contract ; but a synod of Massachusetts clergymen, who did the delivery and who sent two agents to see that the contract was executed.
Such was the character of these barbarians who gave shelter and food to Roger Williams and his five companions when they were driven by their own countrymen, then dwelling at Boston and Plymouth, in mid-winter, into the wilderness to find religious liberty.
I close this chapter on the characteristics of the Narragansetts with verses by Roger Williams. First their hospitality :
Let none sing blessings to their sonles For that they courteous are; The wild barbarians with no more Than nature, goe so farre.
I've known them leave their house and mat To lodge a friend or stranger. When Jews and Christians oft have sent Christ Jesus to the Manger.
The very Indian boyes can give To many stars their name, And know their course, and therein doe Excell the English tame.
Oft have I heard these Indians say These English will deliver us Of all that's ours, our lands and lives ; In the end they will bereave us.
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THE INDIAN NAMES OF PLACES
ON THESE LANDS AND THE MEANINGS OF
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Mr. J. Hammond Trumbull thus describes the knowledge of the Indian language possessed by Roger Williams : "It is evident he had not thoroughly mastered all the anomalies of Indian grammar and that he had not given much attention to the polysynthetic structure which characterizes this family of languages and renders every com- pound word a new puzzle" (Narr. Club 1, 66). Possibly Mr. Wil- liams had considered the "anomalies of Indian grammer" more thoroughly than Mr. Trumbull gives him credit. We regarded the "Grammar way" of treating the language "as being not so aceom- modate to the benefit of all." This in 1643. ( Indian Key, 88). But Mr. Eliot thought differently ; he made a Grammar in 1666, twenty- three years later; but what was the result? We will let Prof. Converse Francis tell it: "The Grammar was not destined to become so extensively or permanently useful as its author hoped." "The interest in the Indian cause declined and the Gram- mar went out of notice." ( Francis' Life. Eliot, 249).
On page 65 of the same volume, Mr. Trumbull quotes from Gov. Bradford (1649), "We (the Mass. Bay Col. ) agree to send a copy (of the Treaty of Peace ) to Mr. Williams, who could best interpret to them." Mr. Trumbull continues, "His services as an interpreter were in constant requisition." . (p. 65). John Eliot was at that time an "apostle" to the Indians : he had dwelt in Massachusetts many more years than Williams had been allowed to live there. Why did not the Massachusetts Government select Eliot instead of Williams. Of what value was "Indian Grammar" in understanding the speech of a Narragansett Indian in 1636. or ever after. Polysynthetic struc- ture means in philology "The formation of a word by the combina- tion of several simple words". The slightest examination of the Indian Key will destroy Mr. Trumbull's statement that Roger Wil- liams "had not given it much attention" The "Key" is filled with illustrations of such combinations.
Mr. Trumbull again cites Mr. Williams thus. "Men cannot preach to the Indians in any propriety of speech", and then adds these two
(47)
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words without quotation marks, without inspiration. For this he cites "Bloody Tenent more Bloody (see Knowles, p. 328). Upon reference to Knowles it will be found that Knowles gives the refer- ence for this language to Callender. It will be found in Callender (Rhode Island Historical Society edition, page 139.) But it is a mis- representation of the opinions of Roger Williams, which opinion he has left to us in fixed type in the very neat form, made in 1735, by Callender ; in 1834 by Knowles ; and by Trumbull in 1866. I repro- duce the exact language used by Williams from "The Bloody Tenent, yet more Bloody."
Mr. Williams said, "I believe that none of the ministers of New England, nor any person in the whole country is able to open the mysteries of Christ Jesus in any proprietie of their speech, or lan- guage, without which proprietie it cannot be imagined that Christ Jesus sent forth his first apostles." ( Bloody Tenent yet more Bloody, ed. 1870, p. 371, 372).
Again, "The experience of the Discourses ( Roger Williams him- self) testifie how hard it is for any man to attaine a little proprietie of their language in common things." (Page 372).
Again, "There being no helps of art and learning amongst them. I see not how without constant use, or a miracle, any man is able to attaine to any proprietie of speech amongst them even in common things." ( Page 373). "And without proprietie, who knows not how hardly all men, especially barbarians, are brought to hear matters of Heaven, so strong and contrary to Nature, yea even matters of Earth, except profit and other Earthly, worldly ends compel them to spell out men's minds and meaning. ( Page 373).
Again, "Mr. Eliot, the ablest amongst them in the Indian speech. promising an old Indian a suit of clothes, the man ( saveth the rela- tion, Shepard's Clear Sunshine ) not well understanding Mr. Eliot's speech (in the Indian language ), asked another Indian ( Mr. Eliot's servant ) what Mr. Eliot said." ( Page 373). "The native not under- standing such a common and welcome promise of cloth, upon gift. would far more hardly understand Mr. Eliot's preaching of the gar- ment of righteousness Christ Jesus, unto which men mutually turn a deaf ear." ( Page 374).
Again, I express this much (not) to dampen Mr. Eliot. or any
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from doing all the good they can in any truly Christian way, but to show how great that mistake is that pretends such a true preaching of Christ Jesus to them in their own language." (Page 374).
Then continues Mr. Trumbull, "Roger Williams' Key has a value which is peculiar to itself and from no other source can we learn so many Indian names, general and specific, of objects animate and in- animate; it is in fact the only vocabulary of a language of southern New England which is trustworthy, or tolerably full ; and this special value is enhanced by the fact that it was compiled before the language of the Narragansetts had been essentially modified by intercourse with the English, or by the influence of Eliot." ( Narr. Club. Indian Key, 67). However much intercourse with the English modified the Indian language as spoken in what is now Rhode Island, the in- fluence of Eliot had no existence here.
Mr. Williams thus writes. "At my last departure for England I was importuned by the Narragansett Sachem, and especially by Ninigret to present their petition to the high Sachem of England, that they might not be forced from their religion. and, for not chang- ing their religion, be invaded by war. for they said they were daily visited with threatenings by Indians that came from Massachusetts, that if they could not pray they should be destroyed by war." ( Let- ter of Williams to Mass. Gen. Court 1654). "Pray or be shot" was Mrs. Rowlandson's terse way of putting it. The influence of Eliot among the Narragansett Indians is again illustrated by Mr. Williams as follows: "It cannot be hid how all England has rung with the glorious conversions of the Indians in New England ; you know how many books are dispersed throughout the nation on the subject; in some of them the Narragansett Chief Sachems are publicly branded for refusing to pray and be converted." ( Williams letter to Gen. Court of Mass. 1654, Col. Rec. 1, 294).
Concerning these Indian names Mr. Fessenden ( Hist. Warren, R. I., p. 27) says. "The Indians invariably gave names to all varieties of land and water as necks, hills, rivers, springs, villages, countries, etc." For this Mr. Fessenden cites Callender's Historical Discourse, Hist. Soc. edition, p. 88. Mr. Callender wrote this discourse about 1734. He was a young Baptist clergyman at the time. He was the first person in Rhode Island to write "History" after the practical exter-
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mination of the Narragansett tribe in 1676 by Connecticut and Massa- chusetts troops. For this reason his opinions might suggest authority but he did not make such a statement. It was made by Romeo Elton, another Baptist clergyman, who edited Callender's Discourse about a century after the Discourse was written by Mr. Callender. Neither of these writers had ever given study to the structure of the lan- guage of the Narragansetts. For these reasons it is clear that we can rely only upon the work of Roger Williams as it exists in the "Key", and in his other writing.
No Indian ever born could read and understand Eliot's Indian Bible. It was printed in 1663, and with it an "Indian Grammar", and in 1672 a treatise on Logic in the Indian language as he under- stood it. The intellectual work is not here considered, but to make a Grammar, and a treatise on Logic which the author thought for a moment that an Indian could either read or understand transcends human reason. It was one of those illustrations of religious fanati- cism then existing and which culminated a few years later in the Salem witchcraft.
Even as late as 1709. Experience Mayhew, a clergyman of the Established Church in Massachusetts, published his Indian transla- tion of the Massachusetts Psalter and St. John's Gospel. In 1722 this man has the audacity to write that the language of the Indians on Martha's Vineyard had become more uniform with that of the Natick (Mass) Indians, since our Indians had the use of the Bible and other books translated by Mr. Eliot. ( Trumbull's extract from a manuscript copy of an unpublished letter. Narr. Club, 1, 68). Con- · ceive for a moment of classes of these barbarians in grammar and logic on Martha's Vineyard. But Mr. Trumbull tells another story. He says, "No account of the aborigines of America ; no history of New England or of any of its colonies would remain tolerably com- plete if Roger Williams' contributions were withdrawn from its pages." ( Narr. Club, 1. 69).
Again, "The Key does not differ more widely from Eliot's Bible than does the latter from ( Mayhew ) Massachusetts Psalter and the translation of John's Gospel printed in 1700." ( Narr. Club, 1, 69 ).
Mr. Williams wrote his Key chiefly in the Narragansett Dialect because it was most spoken in New England. He went to some ex-
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·
pense in procuring the means of fixing the pronunciation as the In- dian's accented it in speech ; the accents, tones, or sounds, being in- dicated by "acutes, graves, or circumflexes" because as he says "The life of all languages is in the pronunciation. Mr. Williams was the first man to attempt to reproduce in English letters the spoken words of an Indian. The Indian sometimes had two words meaning the same thing and Mr. Williams says so "Copious is their language that they have five or six words for one thing." ( Narr. Club, 1, 91). The difficulty in thus fixing sounds of speech in the English letters is clearly seen when we consider the tones in speech used by different individuals. But few in these days are competent to do it ; these were fewer still in those days. Suppose an educated German was to have spoken one of these words following to those of the English emigrants to New England of those days and those emigrants were to have attempted to write the German sounds into English letters ; imagination alone can conceive the result :
Tannenwaldfelseneck. A rocky place in the pine forest.
Hochbergerengpass. A narrow pass of the high mountain.
Schaltiergestade. A shell fish beach.
Aeckergrenze. The boundary of the field.
How much easier would it be were it possible for a barbarian In- dian to utter in his gutteral accents these three words from the Indian Key, to three of these emigrants.
Wunnakukkussaquaum. You sleep much. ( Narr. Club, I, 108).
Muckquachuckquemese. A little boy. (Narr. Club, 1, 117).
Cummusquaunamuckqunmanit. God is angry with you. (Narr. Club, 1, 161).
Aquiepokeshattous. Do not break the knot of marriage. (Narr. Club, 1, 171).
The exceeding difficulty of putting these Indian pronunciations into English letters is shown by the variety of spelling even the most fixed names. Take the name Miantunnomu as it was written by Williams on the original deed in 1638. There are upwards of twenty- seven spellings of the word in the Rhode Island, or Providence, and in Bradford, and Winthrop's histories.
Wanasquatuckqut as written by Williams appears in more than fifty-one forms.
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Mooshausuck, also written by Williams, appears in forty-four forms.
Notaquonckanet, also written by Williams, appears in upwards of sixty forms.
Many of these last named forms are given in a note which appears among the notes following.
The name Narragansett appears in many eccentric forms. Four different forms are given in the historical note which follows, all taken from original manuscripts written at different periods by Roger Williams. I note here two or three forms not given in the note. Nantygansick. (R. I. Hist. Soc. Col. 4. 73). Nanhygansicks. (Same book. p. 123). Narroganset. ( Williams' Indian Key, Narr. Club, 1, 89).
There seems to be a growing modern fancy of attempting to de- fine the meaning of Indian names of things or localities. Several such definitions have been discussed in the notes which follow.
Specifically Notaquonckanet, Natick, Narragansett, Pascoag, An- nawamscutt. Opponaug. Quowatchaug. Popanomscut.
Mr. Trumbull has defined certain Indian names existing in Rhode Island : among them are the following :
Pascoag. Land at the branch, or crotch of the river.
Chepatchet. Place of diversion, or the fork of the river.
Wunnashowatuckqut. At the crotch of the river.
Schaghticoke. As where the river branches.
It so happens that in the regions where these names appear there are streams of water having two branches.
Mr. Trumbull defines Pawtucket as meaning "at the Fall". He then says that Pawtuxet is the diminutive of Pawtucket and means "at the little Fall."
An aged Indian woman at Stoningtown in 1679 stated that "the river near Mr. Blackstone's house is called in Indian Pautuck and signifies a fall because there the fresh water falls into the salt water." ( Potter Early Hist. Narr. 266). The same conditions existed at Pawtuxet.
Mr. Trumbull gives the Indian name of the locality now known as Fall River as being Quequecham, and meaning "it leaps or bounds."
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This happens to be just what the small stream does as it falls into the salt water.
Woonsocket is defined by Trumbull as meaning "at the descent" or "below the falls".
Loquassuck, the Louisquisset of our times, is a well known locality even now. Concerning it Mr. Trumbull said, "It is unintelligible and corrupt beyond conjecture of its original Indian origin." It was the section of land which Massasoit claimed west of the Blackstone River above Pawtucket. Mr. W. W. Tooker defines it, first giving its pedi- gree. He says it means "At the place of meeting". For full particu- lars, see the note which follows :
From these examples it is clear that only distrust can arise from such translations. The effort seems to be to first learn the character of the place, or some place or thing nearby, and then suggest a defi- nition.
Elaborate methods of defining words by an analysis which cannot be sustained by conclusive logic are much in vogue, but the meaning is reached by finding some natural object near by or by some land mark as an illustration, Notaquonckanet is suggested. It was writ- ten in the deed full thirty years before it was referred to as being near a "short bound", and years before the short bounds were fixed, it had existed.
Not only were there many ways of spelling the same name as here- in shown, but many things had different names not made different by the spelling. Quonacontaug Pond, lying in Divisions 28 and 29 on the Indian map, was also called Nekeequawese Pond and also Narragunset Pond ( Potter's Narragansett 267). In the same divi- sions was Teapanock Pond: it was also called Muxquata Pond. There was also Wecapaug, a brook, called also Wexcodawa.
Misquamicut, the Indian name for what is now Westerly, appears in many different forms, Ascomicutt ( Potter's 241), Squamocuck ( Potter's 244). Misquomacock, Misquamicoke ( Potter's 242).
Mr. Knowles in a foot note in his Life of Roger Williams (p. 328) relates an amusing anecdote concerning the difficulty of defining In- dian words. While Eliot was engaged in translating the Bible into the Indian language he came to the following passage in Judges 5: 28: "The mother of Sisera looked out at the window and cried
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through the lattice", etc. Not knowing an Indian word signifying · lattice, he applied to several of the natives, and endeavored to ex- plain to them what a lattice resembled ; they gave him a long, bar- barian, unpronouncable word, as are most of the words in their lan- guage. Some years after, Eliot, when he had learned their dialect more correctly, found that the Indians had given him the true term for eel pot." Mr. Knowles took this from Biglow's Hist. Natick (p. 84).
Prof. Converse Francis clerverly knocks the story to pieces by this, "On turning to the passage in the Indian Bible, I find that the word by which lattice is translated is translated latticeut, a term which un- doubtedly is nothing but the English word with an Indian termina- tion" (p. 237). Mr. Francis states that the word is so printed in the first edition of the Bible in 1663, and in the second edition in 1685.
Mr. Trumbull states that "no instance can be shown of the adoption by Indians of a local name from a foreign language." ( Potter's Nar- ragansett 409). This was said with reference to the idea that the name Mount Hope was of Icelandic origin, having been used by the Indians since the visit of the Northmen five hundred or six hundred years before. Such an idea was, as Mr. Trumbull declared, ridic- ulous. There is, I believe, no evidence that the Indians ever knew this mound as Montup.
Doubtless the Indians did adopt English words into their dialects. This can be shown by Mr. Williams' Key, the very highest authority. I will give a few specimens.
Cuppaimish, meaning "I will pay." (Key, p. 241).
Mr. Williams says it was a new word made from the English word "pay".
Shottash, meaning shot. Mr. Williams says "A word made from us, though their gunnes they have from the French." ( Key 200).
Moncash. Mr. Williams says: "The Indians are ignorant of Eu- ropean coynes, yet they have given a name to ours, and call it Mo- neash from the English money." ( Key 173).
Chicks. A cocke, or a hen, "a name taken from the English chicke, because they had no hens before the English came". ( Key 73).
The Narragansett Indian had never known of a horse, or an ox. or a cow, or a goat, or a hog. or a pig. They at once invented these
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names for these domestic animals : Pigsuck, Hogsuck, Goatesuck, Cowsnuck. But for the horse they spoke the name Naynayoumewot. (Indian Key, Narr. Club. 1, 129). This name was in the singular number, but the preceding names ending in suck were in the plural.
Concerning the termination suck, Mr. Williams says, "It is com- mon in this language, and therefore add it to our English cattle not knowing what names to give them." ( Key 129).
The Indian name for horse is clearly of imitative origin ; they fol- lowed the whinney of the animal, using the English word neigh. ( Key p. 98).
The Indian name for Geese was Honck-honckock. This name like that for horse was of imitative origin. Webster's Dictionary so states the fact in both cases.
The Indian name for Turkies was Neyhommauog. (Key 113). This must has been also imitative.
Concerning these names for domestic animals Mr. Williams calls the animals "English cattle" and says the Indians knew no other name to give them. But on page 127 of the Key, he gives another name, Netasuog, which he defines as meaning cattle. The word "cattle" at that time meant chattels, all domestic animals, boys and women, and other things, but "Neat cattle meant cows or oxen and animals of this species. It was thus that the English used it, and the Indians adopted it. (Key 127).
The Indians named the new settlers Englishmanuck, and the Dutch traders, Dutchmanuck. (Key 158).
Writing in 1866, Mr. Trumbull says : "Eliot transfers the English word cows into his Bible. But for young cows, in translating Isaiah 1 7:21, he (invented ) the word Cow-ishinne as being the diminutive.
Eliot did not "transfer" the English word cow into the Indian lan- guage and incorporate it into his Bible, as Mr. Trumbull states. It was first used by the Indians themselves and incorporated by Wil- liams into his "Key" in 1643, twenty years before Mr. Eliot used it in his Bible in 1663.
The diminutive of cow cannot necessarily be alone a question of age ; a very small cow may be a very aged cow. The diminutive of cow must then necessarily mean a calf, but no Indian philologist has so far suggested such an idea as that cow-ishinne must mean a calf.
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The handling of this matter of the diminutive is interesting. Paw- tuxet is said to be the diminutive of Pawtucket ; but does it stand when the first form of the name is written upon our earliest records Pootatugock? Is Pootatugock also the diminutive of Pawtucket : These considerations illustrate the worthlessness of Indian Grammar. as for instance Eliot's. They also oblige the consideration of Mr. Trumbull's hazardous remark concerning the ignorance of Roger Williams in this matter, to wit, that "it is evident that he had not thoroughly mastered all the anomalies of Indian grammar" ( Narr. Club 1, 6). These amusing illustrations confirm the remark of Williams, that "every compound Indian word was a new puzzle". Mr. Trumbull puts it in this form: "He had not given much atten- tion to the polysynthetic structure of this family of languages". How can these gentlemen know more concerning this matter than Roger Williams? Concerning their salutations Mr. Williams wrote: "The natives are of two sorts, as the English are ; some more rude and clownish, who are not apt to salute, but upon salutation re-salute lovingly ; others, and the generall are sober and grave and yet chear- full in the meane".
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