Page:The Name of Ottawa.djvu/2

 That writers who came after 1700, and who never had any intercourse with the nation before its dispersion, took upon themselves to modify the spelling and pronunciation of the name by making it "Ottawa" and "Outaouais," has no effect on the above authorities; but it puzzles everybody and makes us believe that there is yet a problem to be solved in that direction.

There is no doubt that Ottawa and Outaouais are both wrong.

The French made "Outaoua" out of "Ondatahoua." No other explanation can stand the test of the authors of the 17th Century. The plural took k.

The final sound is a broad and open note: oua, ouat, ouak, ouac, 8ack. In French (Normandy) letter a is broad, like aw in English. When you meet with ouak and ouac, rest assured that this is written to satisfy the pronunciation of some Frenchmen who use the flat a, such as in Gignac, Frontenac, Balzac (south west of France.)

Ondata, if corrupted into Outa as I believe, is less easy to explain. One would conceive that it was Oudata, but all the printed works and all the manuscripts of the 17th Century have On instead of Ou.

The figure 8 placed in the centre of the word is there to represent a soft w: 8anakong for Wanakong, Kaminisk8e for Kaminiskwe. Eight is "huit" in French and must be sounded with that particularly soft tone the letter u has in the north and west of France. It is not ou nor w; to pronounce it you must round your lips and try to whistle softly. It is not generally found practicable to any other people but those who have used it from the cradle. That sole letter in the mouth of a man suffices to detect how far his origin is French.

For instance, ask an Englishman to pronounce Huron—and hear the word from the tongue of a Frenchman, you will understand that the French u is not at all like the English one.

Now that we have said that Outaoua comes from Ondataoua, let us see the opinion of modern authors who have given a different etymology without consulting the true sources in this matter.

Some suppose that the expression, Grandes Oreilles applied to the Outaouas is a translation of the latter name. We have already shown that Ondataoua means the Men of the Woods. The French said Grandes Oreilles: Large Ears, for the same reason they qualified them also Cheveux Relevés,