The markings were claimed to be rude Runic characters constituting an inscription, out of which one writer, by ingeniously interpolating missing letters, formed the words Kirkjussynir akta, which translated are " Sons of the Church tax (or rake a census)." k' I suppose it to mean," added this writer, " that representatives of the Church of Rome had been there to tax, or number the people, and that this stone was inscribed to commemorate the event."1 Thus it is seen that the general region of which our county forms a part has been connected with the fabled ages of Norse habitation of America-- whatever may The Inwood be thought of the specific ground for the connection. An

Inscribed Stone, by Cornelia Horsford (Privately printed. Cambridge. 1S95), p. 14.

HISTORY

WESTCHESTER

COUNTY

stone is possibly as plausible a specimen of "Runic" lettering as other so-called inscribed stones which have been scrutinized and repudiated byarchaeologists from time to time. The all-sufficient argument against the Norse theory is that no satisfactory traces of Norse residence, aside from the doubtful inscriptions, have ever been discovered-- no ruins of dwellings or works of any kind, no personal relics, and no indisputable graves, -- whereas such a people could not conceivably have dwelt here without transmitting to us some more visible tokens of their presence than laboriously carved memorials. The authentic history of Westchester County begins in the month of September, 1609, when Henry Hudson, in his little ship the " Half Moon," entered the harbor of New York and ascended the great river which now bears his name. But there are strong reasons for believing that Hudson was not the first navigator to appear on our shores, or at least in their immediate vicinity. In 1524 Juan Yerrazano, an Italian in the French service, sailing northward along the coast, came to anchor at a place apparently outside the Narrows.