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.Ruttenber, Edward Manning
History
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.
Ruttenber, Edward Manning
Indians of North America -- New York (State); Names, Geographical -- New York (State); Names, Indian -- North America
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
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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