Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-11-22
BITS OF INDIAN LORE.
Indian Summer Is . Name Of Local Origin
Nomenclature of Western Pennsylvania
Learned Discussions as to the Origin
of Ohio and Auorl,.ry

/ .
Nomenclature of Western Pennsylvania
Learned Discussions as to the Origin
OF Ohio and Allegheny.
WRITTEN FOR THE DISPATCH
1T wonder how this very regularly oc-
curing and beautiful season ever came to
be called Indian summer,'I happened to
hear young lady e1claim in the Allegheny
Carnegie Library the other day. She could
have found out right in that institution had
she known what book to ask for. "Dodd-
ridges Notes. is undoubtedly there, though
the collection of Americana is so far onlya
mere nucleus Of what the library will ulti-
mately have in that line, and I remember
reading In Doddridge years ago goa an ex-
thor, I may remark, ma is one Of the
most interesting who have written from
actual experience of the life of the frontiers
men a,n and pioneers Of the period for 90 years
the Ohio river was the "away-out.west' re-
gion and Western Pennsylvania, the trans
montane portion Of old Virginia and a small
along the river,we receiving the vanguard
Of the pioneers.
"Indfan summer" to those pioneers, al
yet exhilarating season as at present, was
not looked upon by the pioneers with any
thing OF the spirit of welcome and satlsfac-
tion with which their descendants in this re-
gion contemplate its coming. To them
it was the season of all the year most un-
welcome, in fact, most productive OF fore
boding and fear: just at this time.wnen the
heavy storms of late autumn were over-the
equinoctial and its boisterous successors-
and nature put on her kindly mood as If in
recompense for her past compositions one and
as If to display her highest powers for good
before confronting man with her freezing,
pitiless winter power. the scattered frontier
settlers along the Ohio were taught to look
with most certainty for the foray or the
savages into whose great forest realm they
had dared to push their way. This was the
redman,s season of fopportunity-his last for
vanguard of the hated white race,
for when winter came the aborigines were
forced to remain .as a rule, in their businesses
until spring. At this season, too, the settlers
crops were usually all husbanded and gath
cred into his cabin or buried near 1t, his
live stock was brought as close about him as
circumstances would permit, and so the con-
d1t1ons necessary to crafty cupldltY were
all concentrated, and to them was added
the fast coming on of winter, always the In
dams time Of want. And so it was that the
son of the Indians opportunity, came No be
called the Indian summer.
Indian Names in Western Pennsylvania.
-Apropos of Indians it may be remarked
that those who inha abited Pennsylvania and
Eastern Ohio were, with the exception Of
some wandering tribes Of the Shawnees,
fragments Of tribes, or individuals as Logan
the Min2o" of the great Ler7if Le7,dpe nation,
called by the English Delawares, and nearly
waters are of the language of that race:
but the IroQuois of the region between the
upper Hudson and New York, frequently |
came into Pennsylvania on war expeditions
from their entirely different language. |
1t should be borne in mind that Indian |
even confiicting forms of pronun ciation and
different shades of meaning, sometimes |
almost contradictory ones according as they |
were translated by French or English, and
that wide variations have been made in |
sound and sense by translators who used the |
same language. Thus there have been great |
causes for contention and the raising of
moot questions by students of Indian his
tory.
A Cong1omeration of Language.
AS to the origin and meaning Of the
name Allegheny, for instance, scores or per-
haps hundreds of articles have been written,
and speculation upon tine derivation Of Ohio
has filled countless pages. In regard to the
latter it is sufficient to say that the |
Sf afe nSo
logical philandering, to-. rest themselves |
upon the quite satisfactorily sustained state |
ment that the name is of Iroauois origin and |
tion, and that the name meant pleasant or |
beautiful water" which the French trans |
lated into the well-known poetical ia Belle
Allegheny which it is proper enough to re-
gard as the true Ohio headwater.
Allegheny was, on the other hand, accord
ing to commonly accepted authority of
former name being the one usually applied
to the language of the Delawares and their
kindred nations, including almost all the
tribes OF the North except the Iroquois)
The name Allegheny was originally ap-
piled, as was Ohio, to the wl.ole stream
from the headwaters in New York to the
mouth upon the Mississippi, but came in
time to be limited to what is really tho north
fork Of the Ohio. HeckeweIder and many
other writers claim the Delawares called the
stream the AMege,oi-sipu or river of the
AUegeDis. whom they claim to have found
ages ago upon the stream, and this mythical
people are regarded by some as being iden-
tical with the wonderful lost race OF Mound
Allegheny is very likely the name of most
ancient origin in the United States.
Little Indian English Dictionary.
Erie, or hri, as it was at first, is of
Iroquois origin, and means the cat or wild
cat. The Irri-ronon was the cat nation or
tribe, the totem or badge of which, as we
would call it now, was the cat. But all this
is disputed-a cat-o'-nine tales, as it were, of
which I haven't space to tell the rema lining
eight.
Mahoning means, in Delaware Indian. "at
the lick" 1t is common to Pennsylvania
and Ohio and in slightly varying forms ap-
piled to dozen localities where there were
'ssalt licks" or "deer Hcks."
Venango is said to be French corruption
from the Indian word ba-nu'l-gah, said to re-
fer to an obscure figure carved upon a tree
at the fork of the river. So said the Rev.
Timothy Alden, who had been missionary
among the Indians on the reservation in
Warren county, and who, in Sl6, was editor
of the allegheny Jhdgdzine.