"ALEXAUKEN (Hunterdon County). Nora Thompson Dean (in Kraft and Kraft 1985:45) identified Alexauken as a Southern Unami word, alàxhàking, “barren land.” Whritenour thinks Alexauken sounds very much like a Munsee word, *eeliikwsahkiing, “in the land of ants.” Alexauken Creek is a seven-mile-long piedmont stream that flows into the Delaware River just north of the City of Lambertville. Alexauken was first identified as Hockin Creek in an April 16, 1701, entry for a survey of 3,000 acres of West Jersey Society land “near Wishilimensey” (State of New Jersey 1880-1949 21:388). An “Indian path leading from Itshilominwing unto Noshaning” near “a small brook or run having its rise or first spring about Achilomonsing” was next mentioned in an Indian deed in the area signed on June 5, 1703 (New Jersey Archives, Liber AAA:443- 445). The name subsequently turned up in 1742 adorning the Alequemsokm Mill near the mouth of the creek (Moreau 1957:13). It later appeared as Aliashocking Creek on the 1770 William Scull map. Subsequently spelled Alexsocum and Alexsocken (Gordon 1834:93) during the 1800s, the current spelling of name adopted by the end of the century is now used to identify the creek, the small hamlet near the creek’s mouth where colonists first settled in 1695, the road paralleling that stream, and the 690-acre State Wildlife Management Area acquired in 2001 to regulate development on protected land on the West Amwell side of the creek."

Robert S. Grumet: BEYOND MANHATTAN: A GAZETTEER OF DELAWARE INDIAN HISTORY REFLECTED IN MODERN-DAY PLACE NAMES

© 2014 The New York State Education Department