Page:The History of the American Indians.djvu/78

 66 On the dcfcent of the American Indians from the Jews.

proceed from an oral tradition of the war which the rebellious angels waged againft the great Creator, and which the ancient heathens called the war of the giants ? Nothing founds bolder, or is more expreffive, than the Chee- rake name of thunder, Eentaquarojke. It points at the effeds and report of the battles, which they imagine the holy people are fighting above. The fmall-pox, a foreign difeafe, no way connatural to their healthy climate, they call Oonataquara* imagining it to proceed from the invifible darts of angry fate, pointed againft them, for their young people's vicious conduct. When they fay, " \ mall moot," their term is, Ake-rooka. The radix of this word is in the two laft fyllables -, the two firft are expreflive only of the firft perfon fingular, as Akeeohoofa, " I am dead, or loft ;" and Akeeoboofera y " I have loft." Rooka feems to have a reference to the Hebrew name for the holy Spirit.

The moft fouthern old town, which the Chikkafah firft fettled, after the Chokchoomah, Choktah, and they, feparated on our fide of the Miffifippi^ into three different tribes, they called Yaneka, thereby inverting Yahkane> the name of the earth ; as their former brotherhood was then turned into en mity. *. The bold Creeks on the oppofite, or north fide of them, they named Yehnabe, " killing to God," or devoting to death j for the mid confonant expreffes the prefent time. And their proper names of pcrfons, and places,. are always exprefTive of certain circumftances, or things, drawn from roots, that convey a fixed determinate meaning.

With the Mufkohge, Algeb fignifies " a language," or fpeech: and, becaufe feveral of the Germans among them, frequently fay Tab-yah, as an affirmative* they call them Yah-yah Algeh, " Thofe of the blafphemous fpeech ;" which, ftrongly hints to us, that they ftill retain a glimpfe of the third moral com mand delivered at Sinai, " Thou malt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain,'* or apply the name of YOHEWAH, thy ELOHIM, to vain, or created things.

of his word. In allufion alfo hereto, Nakkane fignifies a man, becaufe of the mother- earth ; and Nakke a bullet, or arrow. When the Cheerake aflc a perfon, Is it not fo ? they fay, Wahkane ? The divine eflcntial name, and Kane, are evidently the roots of thefe words*
 * They call the earth Yahkane, becaufe Yah formed it, as his footftool, by the power

Thefe

�� �