[FN] The name has the appearance of derivation from Gahan (Del.), "Shallow, low water"'; spoken with the guttural aspirate -gks (Gahaks), and indefinite formative -an. As a generic it would be applicable to the headwaters of any small stream, or place of low water, and may be met in several places.
[Magowasinghinck,] so written in its earliest form in treaty deed of 1677 (Col. Hist. N. Y., xiii) as the name of an Indian family, and also as the name of a certain kill, or river—"Land lying on both sides of Rondout Kill, or river, and known by the name of Moggewarsinck," in survey for Henry Beekman, 1685—"Land on this side of Rondout Kill named Ragowasinck, from the limits of Frederick Hussay, to a kill that runs in the Ronduyt Kill, or where a large rock lies in the kill," grant to George Davis, 1677. The Beekman grant was on both sides of Rondout Creek west and immediately above Honk Falls, where a large rock lying in the kill was the boundmark to which the name referred and from which it was extended to the stream and place. The George Davis grant has not been located, and may never have been taken up. Beekman sold to Peter Lowe in 1708, and the survey of the latter, in 1722, described his boundary as running west from "the great fall called Heneck." In Mr. Lindsay's History of Ulster County it is said that the grant was half a mile wide on the southeast side of the stream and a mile wide on the northwest side. Hon. Th. E. Benedict writes me: "The Rondout is eminently a river of rocks. It rises on the east side of Peekamoose, Table, and Lone mountains, and west side of Hanover Mountain of the Catskills, and flows through chasms of giant rocks. All the way down there are notable rocks reared in midstream. The rock above Honk Falls is hogback shape, a hundred or more feet long. It lies entirely in the stream and divides it into two swift channels which join together just above the falls. Here, amid the roar, the swirl and dash of waters breaking through rocky barriers, with the rapids at the falls, the Great Rock was an object to be remembered as a boundmark."
Without knowledge of the locative of the name or of the facts of record concerning it, the late Dr. D. G. Brinton, replying to inquiry, wrote me: "I take Magow or Moggew-assing-ink to be from Macheu (Del.), 'It is great, large'; achsün, 'stone', and ink locative; literally 'at the place of the large stone'." The name does not describe the place where the rock lies. The Davis grant in terms other than the Indian name located one as lying "in the kill," and the other is described in the survey of the patent to Beekman: "Land situate, lying and being upon both sides of Rondout Kill or river, and known by the name of Moggewarsinck, beginning at a great rock stone in the middle of the river and opposite to a marked tree on the south side of the river, between two great rock stones, which is the bounds betwixt it and the purchase of Mr. William Fisher," etc.; both records confirm Dr. Brinton's interpretation. As a generic the name may, like Kahanksan, be found in several places, but the particularly certain place in the Beekman grant was at the falls called Honneck, now Honk.
[Wawarasinke,] so written by the surveyor as the name of a tract of land granted to Anna Beake and her children in 1685, has been retained as the name of a village situate in part on that tract, about four miles north of Ellenville. The precise location of the southern boundmark of the patent was on the west bank of the Rondout, south of the mouth of Wawarsing Creek, or Vernooy Kill as now called, which flows to the Rondout in a deep rocky channel, the southern bank forming a very steep, high hill or point. It is claimed that the Old Fort was on this hill, and that to and from it an Indian path led east across the Shawongunk Mountain to the New Fort and is still distinctly marked by the later travel of the pioneers. That there was an Indian path will not be questioned, nor will it be questioned that there may have been at least a modern Indian village on the hill, but the Old Fort was not there. At the point where the boundmark of the patent was placed the Rondout turns at nearly a right angle from an east and west course to nearly north, winding around a very considerable point or promontory. The orthography of the name is imperfect. By dialectic exchange of n and r, it may be read Wa-wa-nawás-ink, "At a place where the stream winds, bends, twists, or eddies around a point or promontory." This explanation is fully sustained by the topography. Hon. Th. E. Benedict writes me: "The Rondout at that point (the corner of the Anna Beake Patent) winds around at almost a right angle. At the bend is a deep pool with an eddying current, caused by a rock in the bank below the bend. The bend is caused by a point of high land. It is a promontory seventy-five feet high." The inquiry as to the meaning of the name need not be pursued further. The frequently quoted interpretation, "Blackbird's Nest," is puerile. (See Wawayanda.)
[Honk,] now so written as the name of the falls on Rondout Creek at Napanock, appears first in Rochester town records, in 1704, Hoonek, as the name of the stream. In the Lowe Patent (1722), the reading is: "Beginning by a Great Fall called Honeck." The Rochester record is probably correct in the designation of the name as that of the creek, indicating that the original was Hannek (Del.), meaning, "A rapid stream," or a stream flowing down descending slopes. As now written the name means nothing unless read from Dutch Honck, "Home, a standing post or place of beginning," but that could not have been the derivative for the name was in place before the falls became the boundmark. The familiar interpretation: "From Honck (Nar.), 'Goose'—'Wild-goose Falls,'" is worthless. The local word for Goose was Kaak. The falls descend two hundred feet, of which sixty is in a single cataract—primarily a wild, dashing water-fall.
[Lackawack] appears of record as the name of a stream in Sullivan County, otherwise known as the West Branch of Rondout Creek, and also as the name of the valley through which it passes. The valley passes into the town of Wawarsing, Ulster County, where the name is met in the Beekman and in the Lowe patents, with special application to the valley above Honk Falls, and is retained as the name of a modern village. In the Lowe Patent it is written Ragawack, the initials L and R exchanged; in the Hardenberg Patent it is Laughawake. The German missionary orthography is Lechauwak (Zeisb.), "Fork, division, separation," that which forks or divides, or comes together in the form of a fork; literally, "The Fork." Lechauwak, "Fork"; Lechau-hanne, "Fork of a river," from which Lackawanna; Lechau-wiechen, "Fork of a road," from which Lackawaxen—"abbreviated by the Germans to Lecha, and by the English to Lehigh." (Reichel.)
[Napanoch,] on the Rondout below Honk Falls, is probably the same word that is met in Nepeak, translated by Dr. Trumbull, "Water-land, or land overflowed by water." At or near Port Jervis, Napeneck, Napenack, etc. The adjectival is Nepé, Napé, "Water."
[Wassahawassing,] in the Lowe Patent and also in the deed to Lowe from Henry Beekman, is probably from Awossi-newás-ing (Del.), "At the point or promontory beyond," or on the other side of a certain place.
[Mopochock]—"A certain Great Kil called Mopochock," in patent to Joachim Staats, 1688, is said to have been the name of what is now known as Sandberg Kill, but was not, as that stream was in no way connected with the Staats Patent.