The locality known as Nayack (68) is of particular interest as the refuge of the natives of Manhattan who made the sale of their home on the lower part of that island to Peter Minuit. The name denotes a point or angle of land, and as such may be appropriately applied to the Fort Hamilton tract, bounded probably by Dyker Heights Park on the south, and extending perhaps as far north as Yellow hook to meet the bounds of the home-lands of the
INDIAN NOTES
THE CANARSEE
Gouwanis chieftaincy. Through the heart of this district the old trail ran a crooked course, roughly approximating the line of 78th and 79th streets. At Third avenue it probably later became the Van Brunt or Bennett lane, which extended to the shoreline at 78th street, but as to which there is no record of its having been a native trail. Throughout this favored region of broad uplands and attractive shore there is no recorded information on the existence of native settlements. There was a deed of November 22, 1652, by Seisen and Mattano to Cornells Van Werckhoven for New Utrecht land "stretching from behind Mr. Paulus' land, called Gouwanis, across the hills to Mechawanienck, lying on the southeast side of Amersfoort and thence past Gravesend to the sea following the marks on the trees." This conveyance included all Bay Ridge and New Utrecht to the Gravesend line. Seisen was the same chieftain of Marechkawick who in 1637 sold Blackwells island. Mattano was chief of Nayack at the date of this deed, having succeeded Meijeterma after 1649.