Maskutchoung, a neck of land so called forming one of the boundaries of Hempstead Patent as entered in confirmatory deed of "Takapousha, sachem of Marsapeage," and "Wantagh, the Montauke sachem," July 4th, 1657: "Beginning at a marked tree standing at the east side of the Great Plain, and from thence running on a due south line, and at the South Sea by a marked tree in a neck called Maskutchoimg, and thence upon the same line to the South Sea." (Col. Hist. N. Y., xiv, 38, 416.) "By a marked tree in a neck called Maskachoung." (Thompson's Hist. L. I., 9, 15, 47.) It is probably an equivalent of Mask-ek-ong, "A grassy swamp or marsh." A local interpretation reads: "Grass-drowned brook," a small stream flowing through the long marsh-grass, to which the name was extended.

ON LONG ISLAND. 8f

Maskahnong, so written by Dr. O'Callaghan in his translation of the treaty between the Western Long Island clans, in 1656, is noted in "North and South Hempstead Records," p. 60, "A neck of land called Maskahnong." It disappears after 1656, but probably reappears as Maskachoung in 1658, and later as Maskutchoung, which see.

Merick, the nanie of a village in Hempstead, Queens County, is said to have been the site of an Indian village called Merick-oke. It has been interpreted as an apheresis of a form of Nanmnock, written Namerick, "Fish place." (See Moriches.) Curiously enough, Merrick was a proper name for man among the ancient Brittons, and the corruption would seem to have been introduced here by the early English settlers from resemblance to the Indian name in sound. The place is on the south side of the island. The Indian clan was known as the Merickokes.