Talk:Niagara

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A brief online search has turned up the following claims on the etymology of "Niagara":

1. from an Iroquoian town name [1] (the most reliable source)
2. The word "Onguiaahra" appears on documents as early as 1641, and a little later "Ongiara". Both are Indian words thought as meaning "The Straight". A more romantic meanings "Thunder of Waters" is also given. [2]
3. a Native American word for “at the neck” [3]
4. Wikipedia (Niagara River) says: According to George R. Stewart, it comes from the name of an Iroquois town called "Ongniaahra", meaning "point of land cut in two".. The source cited is: Stewart, George R. (1967) Names on the Land. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company; pg. 83. (also a reliable source)
5. Elsewhere (Niagara Falls) Wikipedia says: The name "Niagara" is said to originate from an Iroquois word "Onguiaahra" meaning "The Strait."
6. from an Indian word meaning "bisected bottom lands" [4]
7. On Sanson's Map of Canada, published in Paris in 1657, the Falls went under the name of "Ongiara". ... The name Niagara is of Indian extraction and means "thunder of the water". [5]

There's a lot of variation here, but it seems to me that the most commonly-cited origins generally have something to do with water cutting through land ("the strait"/"bisected land"/"point of land cut in two). "at the neck" is basically the exact opposite of that, so I'm wondering if that supposed etymology is a mistaken translation of "strait" or something...? "Thunder of the Waters"/"Thunder of Waters" doesn't seem to be as common a definition cited (and of the two sources that give it, one portrays it as unrealistic ("more romantic meaning" [sic] being "also" given). None of the above sources mention the Neutrals as specifically giving the name, although if they were the Iroquoian tribe who lived around the Falls, that would certainly make sense.

Anyway, what all this suggests to me is that the intro sentence here should read something like "from Onguiaahra or Ongiara, a word in an Iroquoian language, whose meaning is debated. It may have meant "strait" or "bisected land". Another possibility is "thunder of the water"." What do other people think? --Miskwito 07:35, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hm. William Bright, in Native American Place Names of the United States (2004), pg. 325, says "Niagara" comes from an Iroquoian language, and that the word means "neck". So my suggested wording of the intro would now be "from Onguiaahra or Ongiara, a word in an Iroquoian language, which probably meant either "strait" or "neck", though it is sometimes said to mean "thunder of the water"." --Miskwito 02:14, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In my opinion the first source that's cited in the opening of this article is really quite awful. It's more or less a mishmash of unsupported Victorian era lore, most of which has been set aside by modern scholarship. There is no such thing as *the* "Iroquois language", there are a group of related languages called "Iroquoian", eleven in number plus their related dialects, perhaps the best known of which are those spoken by the Six Nations people. What gets confusing in a lot of articles on Wikipedia regarding both Iroquoian language and cultural issues is the fact that we know very very little about the smaller groups that had little or no contact with incoming Europeans and virtually disappeared before many things about them were recorded. In many cases a lot of information that appears on the web regarding these subjects is a product of 19th and 20th century imaginations trying to "fill in the gaps". An example of what I'm talking about here is the case of "Niagara" translated as "Thundering of Waters" and related expressions, it's a highly romantic and dubious rendition, at best 150 years old or so. Currently I don't have access to my resources for researching this material, but when I do I'll see what I can do about providing more reliable citations for this article. cheers Deconstructhis (talk) 22:03, 15 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'd also like to read something about how the spelling that is used today has developed, and how the pronunciation has changed in English over time to become the modern "viagra" form. I was told that in other countries, including Germany and India, the word is still being pronounced nee-agg-árah (with emphasis on the second "a" which is actually silent in English today), which seems to be closer to the original native pronunciation and also resembles better a letter-by-letter Latin pronouncing.--95.113.183.69 (talk) 22:34, 15 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]