Note 127 — Chapter X · AMPHIBIAN MILLIONS. (continued 2)
Reading edition
Definitions for Russian Names of the Rookeries, etc.—The several titles on my map that indicate the several breeding-grounds, owe their origin and have their meaning as follows:
Zapadnie signifies “westward,” and is so used by the people who live in the village.
Zoltoi signifies “golden,” so used to express a metallic shimmering of the sand there.
Ketavie signifies “of a whale” so used to designate that point where a large right whale was stranded in 1849 (?); from Russian “keet,” or “whale.”
Lukannon—so named after one Lukannon, a pioneer Russian, that distinguished himself, with one Kaiecov, a countryman, who captured a large number of sea-otters at that point, and on Otter Island, in 1787-88.
Tonkie Mees signifies “small (or “slender”) cape” [tonkie, “thin”; mees, “cape”].
Polavina literally signifies “half way” so used by the natives because it is practically half way between the salt-houses at Northeast Point and the village. Polavina Sopka, or “half-way mountain,” gets its name in the same manner.
Novastoshnah, from the Russian “novaite,” or “of recent growth,” so used because this locality in pioneer days was an island to itself; and it has been annexed recently to the mainland of St. Paul.
Vesolia Mista, or “jolly place,” the site of one of the first settlements, and where much carousing was indulged in.
Maroonitch, the site of a pioneer village, established by one Maroon.
Nahsayvernia, or “on the north shore” from Russian, “sayvernie.”
Bogaslov, or “word of God,” indefinite in its application to the place, but is, perhaps, due to the fact that the pious Russians, immediately after landing at Zapadnie, in 1787, ascended the hill and erected a huge cross thereon. Einahnuhto, an Aleutian word, signifying the “three mammæ.”
Tolstoi, a Russian name, signifying “thick”; it is given to at least a hundred different capes and headlands throughout Alaska, being applied as indiscriminately as we do the term “Bear Creek” to little streams in our Western States and Territories.