Edward Manning Ruttenber

Edward Manning Ruttenber, usually published as E. M. Ruttenber (July 17, 1825 – Dec. 5, 1907) was an American historian who wrote History of the Indian Tribes of Hudson's River and other histories[1] of the Hudson River Valley.

Works

Footnotes
  1. Wait, William (1909). "Edward Manning Ruttenber. Died Dec. 5, 1907". Proceedings of the New York State Historical Association. 8: 158–162.


The following is a slightly edited evaluation of Ruttenber's scholarship, from pages 89 and 185-86 of my 2005 book "Shawangunk Place-names: Indian, Dutch and English Geographical Names of the Shawangunk Mountain Region": "I have frequently quoted Ruttenber for historiographical purposes, since his was the first wide-ranging effort at interpretation of local Indian names, and he at least attempted an objective and scholarly presentation. Despite the air of authority he cultivates in his writing, however, when it came to geography Ruttenber was a virtual illiterate....In addition to a number of mistakes I've mentioned elsewhere in the text or notes of [my book], Ruttenber manages to commit the following transgressions on pages 145-47 of "Footprints [of the Red Men]": He describes Lake Maratanza as lying west of Sam's Point [it is north], and the Verkeerder Kill as being the outlet to Lake Awosting [it is nowhere near Lake Awosting]; he locates Verkeerder Kill Falls along the outlet to Lake Maratanza [it's along a different branch of the stream] and places it within the town of Gardiner [it's along the Shawangunk/Wawarsing town line]; he locates Lake Minnewaska only one mile north of Awosting [it's 2 1/2]; he fails to recognize the name "Traps" as being of Dutch origin; he locates Sam's Point seven miles south of Ellenville [it is less than four miles, southeast] and nine miles south of Mohonk...[it is more than twelve miles, southwest]; this would lead a reasonable person to conclude that Ellenville and Mohonk are only about two miles distant from one another [they are over twelve and a half]. Elsewhere, in his essay appearing in Clearwater's "History of Ulster County" [p.19], he confuses Verkeerder Kill Falls with Awosting Falls, locates Minnewaska a mere one mile from Sam's Point, and describes the latter as being of a lesser elevation than High Point, N.J. [it's more than 400 feet higher]. [In "Footprints," He also confuses Verkeerder Kill Falls with Kaaterskill Falls above Palenville, in the Catskill Mountains.] Although Ruttenber was writing at a time that predated modern scholarship about the Munsee language, it's also worth noting that, of the eight Indian geographical names that Ruttenber and I both discuss, the modern ethnographers I relied on found Ruttenber's translations to be wrong in every case.

    --MARC B. FRIED


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