Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 16.djvu/366



INDIAN WORDS IN OUR LANGUAGE

By J. NEILSON BARRY.

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck, if a woodchuck would chuck wood? might suggest the question as to what other variety of "chuck" there may be besides the little animal which has gotten itself into the calendar on account of its supposed curiosity in regard to its shadow. The Indian word o-t-c-h-i-g or w-e-j-a-c-k altered to woodchuck is an example of the many Indian words which have become incorporated into our language, and it is of interest to note how many things peculiar to America have retained their Indian names and also how many such words have also developed a significance altogether different from the original.

The Indian word w-e-j-a-c-k appears to have designated the fisher, or Pennants marten, the largest of the weasel family, but is now popularly applied to the moosack or ground hog, which latter term has so often furnished the punster with an alternate for sausage.

Chipmunk, the striped ground squirrel, is from the Indian word atchitamon, meaning head foremost, originally applied to the red squirrel on account of its manner of descending a tree so differently from a man or a bear.

Other animals, however, have retained their original names, the moose, or wood-eater, from its habit of gnawing the bark of trees; wapiti, the white rump; caribou, that paws the snow; skunk, coyote, quickhatch or wolverine, meaning hard to hit by the Indian archer, and cougar, which on account of its wide distribution is also designated in various localities as mountain lion, California lion, catamount or cat-of-the-moun- tains, panther, called by negroes in the south "de painter" and also puma in South America, from which country also we have obtained such Indian words as alpaca, llama, tapir, jaguar, chinchillar and peccary.