The quarterly of the Oregon Historical Society, Vol. 1, No. 3, September, 1900Oregon Historical Society
History
The quarterly of the Oregon Historical Society, Vol. 1, No. 3, September, 1900
Oregon Historical Society
Oregon -- History -- Periodicals
Water, says Mr. Smith, unless enclosed by land, was never named. The
Columbia or the Willamette had no names. Water was to the native mind,
like air, a spiritual element, and just the same in one place as
another; and the circumstance that it was bounded by land made it no
other than simply “chuck”—the Jargon word. If Indians ever seemed to
give a name to a river, all that was meant was some locality on the
shore. The idea of giving an appellation to a body of water from source
to outlet never occurred to them.
The following are some of the more common Indian names of places, as
given by Mr. Smith:
_Chinook_, or _Tsinook_—The headland at Baker’s Bay.
_Clatsop_, or, more properly, _Tlahtsops_—About the same as
Point Adams at mouth of the Columbia.
_Wal-lamt_, accented on last syllable, and but two syllables—A
place on the west shore of the Willamette River, near Oregon
City, and the name from which Willamette is taken.
_E-multh-a-no-mah_—On east side of Sauvie’s Island; from which
the name Multnomah is derived.
_Chemukata_—Chemekata, site of Salem.
_Chemayway_—A point on the Willamette River about two and one-half
miles southward from Fairfield, where Joseph Gervais, who came to
Oregon with Wilson G. Hunt in 1811, settled in 1827-28. The name
Chemawa, the Indian school, is derived from this.
_Champoek_—Champoeg, an Indian name signifying the place of a
certain edible root. The name is not the French term _le campment
sable_, as naturally supposed by some, and stated by Bancroft.
_Ne-ay-lem_—The name from which Nehalem is derived.
_Acona_—Yaquina.
To these might be added, perhaps, Sealth, the name of the Indian chief
after whom the City of Seattle is called. The name is of two syllables,
accented on the first. This well illustrates the tendency of the whites
to transpose letters, here making an “lth” into a “tle” in imitation of
the French, or, perhaps, the Mexican names. Bancroft learnedly discusses
the similarity between the Washington and Mexican “tl,” apparently not
knowing that the Washington termination was not “tl,” but “lth.”
I will now give, in more detail, names of places, chiefs, and of some
primitive articles of food, and utensils, etc.:
NAMES OF PLACES AND CHIEFS IN CLATSOP COUNTY.
_Tle-las-qua_—Knappa.
_Se-co-mee-tsiuc_—Tongue Point.
_O-wa-pun-pun_—Smith’s Point.
_Kay-ke-ma-que-a_—On John Day’s River.
_Kil-how-a-nak-kle_—A point on Young’s River.
_Nee-tul_—A point on Lewis and Clark River.
_Ne-ahk-al-toun-al-the_—A point on west side of Young’s Bay,
near Sunnymead.
_Skip-p-er-nawin_—A point at mouth of Skipanon Creek.
_Ko-na-pee_—A village near Hotel Flavel, where the first white
man in Oregon, Konapee, lived.
_Ne-ahk-stow_—A large Indian village near Hammond.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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