Yosemite Valley

: Myths And Legends Of California And The Old Southwest

(Explanatory) (3)



Mr. Stephen Powers claims that there is no such word in the Miwok

language as Yosemite. The valley has always been known to them, and is

to this day, when speaking among themselves, as A-wa'-ni. This, it is

true, is only the name of one of the ancient villages which it

contained; but by prominence it gave its name to the valley, and in

accordance with Indian usage almost everywhere, to t
e inhabitants of

the same. The word Yosemite is simply a very beautiful and sonorous

corruption of the word for grizzly bear. On the Stanislaus and north of

it, the word is u-zu'-mai-ti; at Little Gap, o-so'-mai-ti; in Yosemite

itself, u-zu'-mai-ti; on the South Fork of the Merced, uh-zu'-mai-tuh. .

. .



"In the following list, the signification of the name is given whenever

there is any known to the Indians:



"Wa-kal'-la (the river), Merced River.



"Lung-u-tu-ku'-ya, Ribbon Fall.



"Po'-ho-no, Po-ho'-no (though the first is probably the more correct),

Bridal-Veil Fall. . . . This word is said to signify 'evil wind.' The

only 'evil wind' that an Indian knows of is a whirlwind, which is

poi-i'-cha or Kan'-u-ma.



"Tu-tok-a-nu'-la, El Capitan. 'Measuring-worm stone.' [Legend is given

elsewhere.]



"Ko-su'-ko, Cathedral Rock.



"Pu-si'-na, and Chuk'-ka (the squirrel and the acorn-cache), a tall,

sharp needle, with a smaller one at its base, just east of Cathedral

Rock. . . . The savages . . . imagined here a squirrel nibbling at the

base of an acorn granary.



"Loi'-a, Sentinel Rock.



"Sak'-ka-du-eh, Sentinel Dome.



"Cho'-lok (the fall), Yosemite Fall. This is the generic word for 'fall.'



"Ma'-ta (the canon), Indian canon. A generic word, in explaining which

the Indians hold up both hands to denote perpendicular walls.



"Ham'-mo-ko (usually contracted to Ham'-moak), . . . broken debris lying

at the foot of the walls.



"U-zu'-mai-ti La'-wa-tuh (grizzly bear skin), Glacier Rock . . . from

the grayish, grizzled appearance of the wall.



"Cho-ko-nip'-o-deh (baby-basket), Royal Arches. This . . . canopy-rock

bears no little resemblance to an Indian baby-basket. Another form is

cho-ko'-ni, . . . literally . . . 'dog-house.'



"Pai-wai'-ak (white water?), Vernal Fall.



"Yo-wai-yi, Nevada Fall. In this word is detected the root of Awaia, 'a

lake' or body of water.



"Tis-se'-yak, South Dome. [See legend elsewhere.]



"To-ko'-ye, North Dome, husband of Tisseyak. [See legend elsewhere.]



"Shun'-ta, Hun'-ta (the eye), Watching Eye.



"A-wai'-a (a lake), Mirror Lake.



"Sa-wah' (a gap), a name occurring frequently.



"Wa-ha'-ka, a village which stood at the base of Three Brothers; also

the rock itself. This was the westernmost village in the valley.



"There were nine villages in Yosemite Valley and . . . formerly others

extending as far down as the Bridal Veil Fall, which were destroyed in

wars that occurred before the whites came."



(3) The explanation given above is that made by Mr. Stephen Powers, in

Vol. 3, U. S. Geographical and Geological Survey of the Rocky Mountain

region, Part 2, Contributions to North American Ethnology, 1877.



More

;