Footprints of the Red Men: Indian Geographical Names
From their principal seat on the tide-waters of the Delaware, and their jurisdiction on that stream, they became known and are generally met in history as the Delawares. In tribal and subtribal organizations they extended over Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, V'irginia, New Jersey, and New York as far north as the Katskills, speaking dialects radically the same as that of the parent stock.^ They were composed of three primary totemic tribes, the Minsi or Wolf, the Unulachtigo or Turkey, and the Unanii or Turtle, of whom the Turtle held the primacy. They were a milder and less barbaric people than the Iroquoian tribes, with whom they had little affinity and with whom they were almost constantly inconflict until they were broken up by the incoming tide of Europeans, the earliest and the succeeding waves of which fell upon their shores, and the later alliance of the English with their ancient enemies, the confederated Six Nations of New York, who, from their geographical position and greater strength from their remoteness from the demoralization of early European contact, offered the most substantial advantages for repelling the advances of the French in Canada. Ultimately conquered by the Six Nations, and made "Women," in their figurative language, i. c. a. people without power to make war or enter into treaties except with the consent of their rulers, they nevertheless maintained their integrity and won the title of "Men" as the outcome of the war of 1754-6. Their history has been fully -- perhaps too favorably -- written by Heckewelder and others. The geographical names which they gave to the hills and streams of their native land are their most remindful memorial. While western New York was Iroquoian, southern New York was Lenni-Lenape or Algonquian. Minisink, now so written and preserved as the name of a town in Orange County, appears primarily, in 1656, on Van der Donck's map, "Minnessinck ofte t' Landt van Bacham," which may be read, ' Two slightlj' different dialects prevailed among the Delawares, the one spoken by the Unami and the Unulachtigo, the other the Minsi.