April i, 1892.] 



SCIENCE. 



191 



kehte, to carry. It must have signified war, or rather some 

 instrument of war. Roskenrakehte, rotiskewakehte in the 

 plural, a soldier, warrior, martial man, maa bearing arais." 

 Again, on page 35 of the same work, we find, " Onota, 

 .ionc," i.e., Onota, "a rush or reed," being the ownSto of 

 Father Bruyas. 



Following M. Cuoq. Mr. Horatio Hale says.' " Oskenra is 

 an ancient word for war. Kakehte is to carry. The com- 

 pound word, roskenrakehte, means 'one who carries on 

 -war.' " 



Lafitau, although clearly pointing out the true origin of 

 the two compound stems in question, fails to deduce from it 

 the exact etymology of either, stem. He was evidently 

 misled by the mistranslation of gaskenra by la guerre, 

 war, made by Father Bruyas, as cited hereinbefore, for 

 ka-ske"'' to' does not signify war. Before making an analy- 

 sis of the terms at issue, the writer will here quote at length 

 what Lafitau has written upon them. He says,^ " Les Iro- 

 quois et les Hurons, nomment la Guerre n^ Ondoiitagette et 

 Oaskenrhagette. Le verbe final Gagetton, qui se trouve dans 

 la composition de ces deux mots, et qui signiSe Porter, 

 marque bien qu'on y portoit quelque chose autrefois, qui en 

 ■etoit tenement le symbole, qu'elle en avoit pris sa denomina- 

 tion. Le terme Ondouta, signifie, le duvet qu'on tire de Tepy 

 des Roseaux de Marais, et signifle aussi la plante toute en- 

 tiere, dont- ils se serveut pour faire les nattes sur quoi ils 

 ■couchent, de sorte qu'il y a apparence qu'ils avoient affects 

 ce terme pour la Guerre, parce que chaque Guerrier portoit 

 avec soy sa natte dans ces sortes d'expeditions. En effet la 

 natte est encore aujourd'huy le symbole qu'ils representent 

 •dans leurs peintures Hieroglyphiques pour designer le nom- 

 bre de leurs eampagnes. Pour ce qui est du terme Gaskenrha, 

 il est si ancieu que les Sauvages eux-memes n'en sejavent 

 plus la signification. Mais comme il seroit inutile de courir 

 apres des etymologies, sur lesquelles les naturels du pais 

 sont embarrasses eux-memes, il me sufflt de dire, que tout 

 ce que les Sauvages portent dans leurs courses militaires, se 

 reduit a leurs armes, a quelques ustenciles necessaires dans 

 les campemens, et ^ quelques provisions de farine preparees 

 de la maniere, dont je I'ai explique." This quotation may 

 be rendered thus: "The Iroquois and the Hurons call war 

 n'Ondoutagette and Oaskenrhagette . The final verb Gaget- 

 ton, which is found in the composition of these two words, 

 and which signifies to bear or to carry, shows, verily, that 

 heretofore something was borne to it [i.e., to war] which was 

 a symbol of it [i.e., of war] to such a degree that it [war] 

 had assumed its [the symbol's] designation. The term On- 

 douta signifies the down [the wool like substance] which is 

 taken from the ear [cat-tails] of marsh-reeds, and it also 

 denotes the entire plant, which they use in making the 

 mattresses (nattes) upon which they lie, so that it appears 

 that tl»ey applied this term to war, because every warrior, 

 in this kind of expeditions, carried with him his own mat- 

 tress. In fact, the mattress is still to-day the symbol em- 

 ployed in their hieroglyphic picture-writing io denote the 

 number of their campaigns. As to the term Gaskenrha, it 

 is so old that the Savages themselves no longer know its 

 meaning. But as it would be pi-ofitless to run after etymol- 

 ogies concerning which the natives of the country themselves 

 are perplexed,- it suffices me to say that the entire equipage 

 of the savages in their military expeditions consists of their 

 arms, of some necessary utensils for the encampment, and 

 of some provision of meal prepared in the manner which I 



1 " TransactiODS of the BuEfalo Historlal Society," vol. 3, p. 73. 

 = " Moe irs des Sauvages Ameriquains, Companies aux Moeurs des Premiers 

 Temps," Tom? I'., 194-5 pp. Paris, 1724. 



have explained." Again, on page 46 of the same Tome, while 

 discussing the monogrammatic or hieroglyphic picture-writ- 

 ing of the Indians, Lafitau says, "Le nombre des expeditions 

 est designe par des nattes. On distingue celles oi"! il s'est 

 trouve, et celles oti il a commande, en ce que ces dernieres 

 sont marquees par des colliers attaches a la natte." This 

 citation may be rendered thus: " The number of expeditions 

 is denoted by mats or mattresses (des nattes). There is a 

 distinction made between those wherein one was merely a 

 member and those wherein he commanded, in this, that the 

 latter are designated by having wampum strings attached to 

 them.'' 



It is only by a figure of speech,^ by metaphor, — that 

 either one of the compound stems, n'Ondoutagette or Gas- 

 kenrhagette, signifies war or warfare, for neither of the com- 

 ponent nouns of the two stems is denotive of war, nor does 

 the verb-stem with which they are compounded signify war- 

 ring or to make war. 



In the following lines, the alphabet used in the orthogra- 

 phy of the Iroquoian terms and stems, other than those 

 quoted, is that of the Bureau of Ethnology, Smithsonian In- 

 stitution. 



The verb-stem -keq-te\ although having the form of the 

 perfect tense of a simple verb, the present tense form of which 

 is now not in use (being no longer a living form of the verb), 

 has the force and meaning of a present tense; and it is for 

 this reason that its personal or pronominal affixes are those 

 of the perfect tense of regular verbs. It has a specific mean- 

 ing only; namely, to bear or rather bearing [something] on 

 the back [by means of the forehead strap]. Hence, for the 

 purposes of etymology, to translate it simply by such general 

 terms as "to bear," "to carry," and " to carry on," is a 

 mere waste of time and a confession of the ignoring of 

 its only and specific meaning which requires its composition 

 with such nouns of things only which may be borne on the 

 back. Indeed, the name of the forehead-strap, ka-keq -ta\ is 

 derived directly from it, the initial ka- being only a gender 

 sign, and the final -a' a nominal formative. 



In the compound stem n'Ondoutagette, cited by Lafitau, 

 the initial n and apostrophe are used for the definitive ne 

 pronounced as a proclitic. The noun in it is on-du -ta' 

 (Ondouta), which signified a reed or rush, the material for 

 mat and mattress-making; the down, or cotton, of reeds, 

 rushes, and plants; and, lastly, the war-mattress or war- 

 mat. 



To confirm what has been advanced in support of the 

 writei-'s definition of the word on-du'-ta\ he will cite what is 

 found in the " Huron Grammar " of Pere Pierre Potier, 

 dated ahout 1750. Therein are to be found the following 

 entries, ''kandota, jouc ix nattes," i.e., reed or rush for mats; 

 again, under "Meiibles d'une Maison," is to be found " on- 

 dota, natte de guerre, i.e., war-mat or war-mattress. This 

 is conclusive evidence as to the early meaning of on-du -ta' 

 as pertaining to warfare. Hence, on-du-ta-keq'-ta\ the par- 

 ticipial form, signifies, etymologically, "bearing a war-mat or 

 mattress on the back." Replacing the initial gender-sign o- 

 by the masculine pronoun of the singular third person of the 

 anthropic gender, ho-, he, we have hon-duta-keq'-te', "he 

 bears a war-mattress on the back," which was one of the 

 customs of warriors on the war-path. 



It has been said elsewhere in this article that ka ske""-ra' 

 (Gaskenrha) did not mean warring or warfare. Lafitau 

 states, in the citation from his work above quoted, that, 

 in his time, its meaning was unknown to the Indians 

 themselves. But, misled by Bruyas's mistranslation of il, he 



