On the other hand, in the Chipeway word for corn, mandamin, Ottawa mindamin, Cree mattamin, the second radical is retained in full, while for the first is substituted an abbreviation of manito, divine ("it is divine, supernatural, or mysterious"); if we may accept the opinion of Mr. Schoolcraft, and I know of no more plausible etymology.
Tobacco was called by the Delawares kscha-tey, Zeis., seka-ta, Camp., or in the English orthography shuate (Vocab. N. J. Inds.), and koshãhtahe (Cummmings). I am inclined to think that these are but dialectic variations and different orthographies of the root 'ta or 'dam (a nasal) found in the New England wuttãm-anog, Micmac tùmawa, Abnaki wh'dãman (Rasle), Cree tchistémaw, Chip. assema (= asté-maw), Blackfoot pi-stã-kan; a root which Dr. J. H. Trumbull has satisfactorily identified as meaning "to drink," the smoke being swallowed and likened to water. "To drink tobacco" was the usual old English expression for "to smoke."
If this etymology is correct, it leads to the inference that tobacco also was known to the ancient Algonkins before they split up into the many nations which we now know, and furthermore that they must have lived in a region where these two semi-tropical or wholly tropical plants, Indian corn and tobacco, had been already introduced and cultivated by some more ancient race. To conclude that they themselves brought them from a tropical land, would be too hazardous.
The pipes in which the tobacco was smoked were called appooke (modern Delaware o'pahokun', Cumings' Vocab.) They were of earthenware and of stone; sometimes, it is said, of copper. According to Kalm, the ceremonial pipes were of a red stone, possibly the western pipe stone, and were very highly prized.[84]
Of wild fruits and plants they consumed the esculent and nutritious tubers on the roots of the Wild Bean, Apios tuberosa, the large, oval, fleshy roots of the arrow-leaved Sagittaria, the former of which the Indians called hobbenis, and the latter katniss, names which they subsequently applied to the European turnip. They also roasted and ate the acrid cormus of the Indian turnip, Arum triphyllum, in Delaware taw-ho, taw-hin or tuck-ah, and collected for food the seeds of the Golden Club, Orontium aquaticum, common in the pools along the creeks and rivers. Its native name was taw-kee.[85]
House Building.
In their domestic architecture they differed noticeably from the Iroquois and even the Mohegans. Their houses were not communal, but each family had its separate residence, a wattled hut, with rounded top, thatched with mats woven of the long leaves of the Indian corn or the stalks of the sweet flag (Acorus calamus,) or of the bark of trees (anacon, a mat, Z.) These were built in groups and surrounded with a palisade to protect the inhabitants from sudden inroads.[86]
In the centre was sometimes erected a mound of earth, both as a place of observation and as a location to place the children and women. The remains of these circular ramparts enclosing a central mound were seen by the early settlers at the Falls of the Delaware and up the Lehigh valley.
Manufactures.
The art of the potter was known and extensively practiced, but did not indicate any unusual proficiency, either in the process of manufacture or in the methods of decoration, although the late Mr. F. Peale thought that, in the latter respect, the Delaware pottery had some claims to a high rank.[87] The representation of animal forms was quite unusual, only some few and inferior examples having been found.