Note 153 — SENECA FICTION, LEGENDS, AND MYTHS (continued 9)

The name Ganiagwaihegowa, written Niāʼgwaiʼhegōwā, or correctly Ganiăʼgwaiʹhegōwa, is the name of a mythic monster which was described as a huge bear, being vulnerable only in the soles of its forefeet; keen of scent, it never allowed anything to escape that crossed its circular track or path; it was represented as hairless except as to its tail, and that it had over its forequarters a large ridge or fold of flesh. These characteristics sufficed to make this fanciful creature a source of abject terror. Its reputed form may have been due to a confusion of buffalo form and that of a grizzly bear. The meaning of the sentence here is that this monster was one of the animal fetishes of the speaker. The final -gōwā, meaning “large, great,” signifies here “the well-known” or “the noted,” bear monster.