,
as Mr. Judd[14] and others have supposed, the name which has been
variously corrupted to Norwottock, Nonotuck, Noatucke, Nawottok, &c.
If so, it probably belonged, originally to one of the necks or
peninsulas of meadow, near Northampton,--such as that at Hockanum,
which, by a change in the course of the river at that point, has now
become an island.

[Footnote 14: History of Hadley, pp. 121, 122.]

_Tetiquet_ or _Titicut_, which passes for the Indian name of Taunton,
and of a fishing place on Taunton River in the north-west part of
Middleborough, Mass., shows how effectually such names may be
disguised by phonetic corruption and mutilation. _Kehte-tuk-ut_ (or as
Eliot wrote it in Genesis xv. 18, _Kehteihtukqut_) means 'on the great
river.' In the Plymouth Colony Records we find the forms
'_Cauteeticutt_' and '_Coteticutt_,' and elsewhere,
_Kehtehticut_,--the latter, in 1698, as the name of a place on the
great river, "between Taunton and Bridgewater." Hence, 'Teghtacutt,'
'Teightaquid,' 'Tetiquet,' &c.[15]

[Footnote 15: See Hist. Magazine, vol. iii. p. 48.]

(2). The other substantival component of river-names, -HANNE or -HAN
(Abn. _-ts[oo]a[n]n_ or _-ta[n]n_; Mass. _-tchuan_;) denotes 'a rapid
stream' or 'current;' primarily, 'flowing water.' In the Massachusetts
and Abnaki, it occurs in such compounds as _anu-tchuan_ (Abn.
_ari'ts[oo]a[n]n_), 'it _over_-flows:' _kussi-tchuan_ (Abn.
_kesi'ts[oo]a[n]n_), 'it _swift_ flows,' &c.

In Pennsylvania and Virginia, where the streams which rise in the
highlands flow down rapidly descending slopes, _-hanne_ is more common
than _-tuk_ or _sepu_ in river names. _Keht-hanne_ (_kittan_, Zeisb.;
_kithanne_, Hkw.) was a name given to the Delaware River as 'the
principal or greatest stream' of that region: and by the western
Delawares, to the Ohio.[16] With the locative termination,
_Kittanning_ (Penn.) is a place 'on the greatest stream.' The
Schuylkill was _Ganshow-hanne_, 'noisy stream;' the Lackawanna,
_Lechau-hanne_, 'forked stream' or 'stream that forks:'[17] with
affix, _Lechauhannak_ or _Lechauwahannak_, 'at the river-fork,'--for
which Hendrick Aupamut, a Muhhekan, wrote (with dialectic exchange of
_n_ for Delaware _l_) '_Naukhuwwhnauk_,' 'The Forks' of the Miami.[18]
The same name is found in New England, disguised as Newichawanock,
Nuchawanack, &c., as near Berwick, Me., 'at the fork' or confluence of
Cocheco and Salmon Fall rivers,--the '_Neghechewanck_' of Wood's