[Fishkill,] the English name of the stream of which Matteawan is the estuary, is from Dutch Vischer's Kil. It was probably applied by the Dutch to the estuary from Vischer's Rak which the Dutch applied to a reach or sailing course on the Hudson at this point. De Laet wrote: "A place which our country-men call Vischer's Rack, [FN] that is Fisherman's Bend." (See Woranecks.) On the earlier maps the stream, or its estuary, is named Vresch Kil, or "Fresh-water Kil," to distinguish it from the brackish water of the Hudson. From the estuary extended to the entire stream.
[FN] Rack is obsolete; the present word is Recht. It describes an almost straight part of the river.
[Woranecks,] Carte Figurative 1614-16; Waoranecks, 1621-25; Warenecker, Wassenaer; Waoranekye, De Laet, 1633-40; Waoranecks, Van der Donck's map, 1656—is located on the Carte Figurative north of latitude 42-15, on the east side of the river. De Laet and Van der Donck place it between what are now known as Wappingers' Creek and Fishkill Creek. De Laet wrote: "Where projects a sandy point and the river becomes narrower, there is a place called Esopus, where the Waoranekys, another barbarous nation, have their abode." Later, Esopus became permanent on the west side of the river at Kingston. It is a Dutch corruption of Algonquian Sepus, meaning brook, creek, etc., applicable to any small stream. From De Laet's description, [FN] there is little room for doubt that the "sandy point" to which he referred is now known as Low Point, opposite the Dans Kamer, at the head of Newburgh Bay, where the river narrows, or that Esopus was applied to Casper's Creek. On Van der Donck's map the "barbarous nation" is given three castles on the south side of the stream, which became known later (1643) as the Wappingers, who certainly held jurisdiction on the east side of Newburgh Bay. The adjectival of the name is no doubt from Wáro, or Waloh, meaning "Concave, hollowing," a depression in land, low land, the latter expressed in ock (ohke), "land" or place. The same adjectival appears in Waronawanka at Kingston, and the same word in Woronake on the Sound at Milford, Ct., where the topography is similar. The foreign plural s extends the meaning to "Dwellers on," or inhabitants of. (See Wahamenesing and {Waro?}nawanka.)
[FN] . . . "And thus with various windings it reaches a place which our countrymen call Vischer's Rack, that is the Fisherman's Bend. And here the eastern bank is inhabited by the Pachimi. A little beyond where projects a sandy point and the river becomes narrower, there is a place called Esopus, where the Waoranekys, another barbarous nation, have their abode. To these succeed, after a short interval, the Waranawankconghs, on the opposite side of the river." (De Laet.)
"At the Fisher's Hook are the Pachany, Wareneckers," etc. (Wassenaer.)
[Mawenawasigh,] so written in the Rombout Patent of 1684, covering lands extending from Wappingers' Creek to the foot of the hills on the north side of Matteawan Creek, was the name of the north boundmark of the patent and not that of Wappingers' Creek. The Indian deed reads: "Beginning on the south side of a creek called Matteawan, from thence northwardly along Hudson's river five hundred yards beyond the Great Wappingers creek or kill, called Mawenawasigh." The stream was given the name of the boundmark and was introduced to identify the place that was five hundred yards north of it, i. e. the rocky point or promontory through which passes the tunnel of the Hudson River R. R. at New Hamburgh. The name is from Mawe, "To meet," and Newásek, [FN] "A point or promontory"—literally, "The promontory where another boundary is met." The assignment of the name to Wappingers' Falls is as erroneous as its assignment to the creek.
[FN] Nawaas, on the Connecticut, noted on the Carte Figurative of 1614-16, is very distinctly located at a point on the head-waters of that river.