Footprints of the Red Men: Indian Geographical Names
West, Co.) as the name of Long Island Sound and interpreted, "Broad flowing river," was more correctly explained by Dr. Trumbull : "Apparently a diminutive of Manunkatcsuck, 'Menhaden country,' from Miinongutteau, 'that which fertalizes or manures land,' the Indian name for white fish or bony fish, which were taken in great numbers by the Indians, on the shores of the Sound, for manuring their corn lands." Moharsic is said to have been the name of what is now known as Crom-pond, in the town of Yorktown. The pond is in two parts, and the name may mean, "Where two ponds meet," or come together. Crom-pond is corrupt Dutch from Krom-poel, " Crookec pond." Maharness, the name of a stream rising in Westchester County and flowing east to the Sound, is also written Mianus and Mahanus, in Dutch records Mayane, correctly Mayanno. It was the name of "a sachem residing on it between Greenwich and Stamford, Ct., who was killed by Capt. Patrick, in 1643, and his head cut ofif and sent to Fort Amsterdam." (Brodhead, i, 386.) Dr. Trumbull interpreted, "He who gathers together." Kechkaives is written as the name of the stream in 1640. Nanichiestawack, given as the name of an Indian village on the southern spur of Indian Hill (so called) in the town of Bedford, rests on tradition. Petuckquapaug, a pond in Greenwich, Ct., but originally under the jurisdiction of the Dutch at Fort Amsterdaim, signifies "Round Pond." It is now called "Dumpling Pond." The Dutch changed the suffix to paen, "soft land," and in that form described an adjacent district of low land, (See Tappan.) Katonah, the name of a sachem, is preserved in that of a village