The first, "Musketaquid", is generally understood to mean something along the lines of "grass grown river" or "place where the water flows through grass" and no section fits the above description better than the Sudbury River upriver from Sherman's Bridge in Wayland, MA. Sky, water, and grass...
A look down to my boat gives an idea as to its height in relationship to the brook/river confluence...
...and ran into a rather friendly groundhog...
With only an occasional tree upon which a very solemn heron greeted the morning sun...
Sherman's Bridge welcomed this paddler back to the terrestrial realm...
The second place, "Petapawag", is said to be the Native American word for the area where Nod Brook flows into the Nashua River and generally believed to mean "swampy place" or "miry place". At a spot near the Nashua River's Petapawag Boat Launch and the intersection of Nod Road and Main Street in Groton is this stone marker...
...which mentions the first English settler, John Tinker, having "built prior to 1659 an Indian Trading Post about 500 yds easterly of this marker". So I headed in an easterly direction down Nod Road and came to the John Tinker Trail...
...which ends at a beautiful spot overlooking one of the Nashua's sloughs.
However, if the stone marker's mention of 500 yards is accurate the John Tinker Trail is closer to 700 yards distant. Other than the stone marker, most written historical accounts mention Tinker's Trading Post having been located near the mouth of Nod Brook so with that in mind I tried paddling to the brook's mouth from the Nashua River in hopes of finding the site. Paddling into the brook's mouth revealed a very swampy place with only one section where there was any land high enough to fit the bill. At the base of this small hill or ridge was this tree bearing some interesting markings...
After finding a spot where anything close to landfall could be made, I climbed the bank to the elevated terrace at the top...
Of course I have no idea whether or not this terrace existed back in the 1650's, but if it did it may have been a suitable location for a trading post. Additionally it is located just about 500 yards from the stone marker except rather than being "easterly" it's in a more northeasterly direction.
At any rate I wonder what John Tinker might have given in trade for these specimens...
...gathered up along the way.
One thing I found troubling in reading about John Tinker was his practice of offering credit to Native Americans for up to two hunting seasons worth of furs in advance. In A Tinker Family: The Ancestors and Descendants of Joseph Wescot Tinker by Frederick James Libbie was the following: "At this time and later, he (Tinker) was a trader with the Indians, buying beaver and other skins. Original notes of hand are preserved, with Indian marks, showing how some of them mortgaged to him all their prospective gains for two hunting seasons." When some Native Americans failed to deliver an adequate amount of furs he then allowed them to sell him land in order to satisfy the debt. According to John Pendergast's The Bend in the River Tinker famously did this with one of the great sachem Passaconaway's sons, Nammacocomuck, who was imprisoned for a 50 pound debt he signed for. Passaconaway had to sell one of the most beautiful islands in the Merrimack River, Wickasee, to get his son out of jail.
From Petapawag I headed upriver...
I'd imagine the coat he's wearing may have fetched a good sum at Tinker's Trading Post.
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