320 JOHN E. REES
a great lake of water and pointed toward the setting sun. 4 That direction was their West, and if any of the tribe are asked to-day about "Oregon" they point to the west and say, "Pe-on-nah." This is undoubtedly the etymology of the word "Oregon" and its Shoshoni origin and meaning, The River of the West.
The Snake River valley, in Idaho, was the principal habitat of the Shoshonis at the time the white man came in contact with them. However, they ranged from the Colorado to the Columbia rivers and their language was understood by all the tribes from the Rocky Mountains to California and by a few in other tribes outside of these limits. While at no time, is it known, that any of this tribe inhabited the Columbia River section, yet they dwelt upon the Snake and Salmon rivers, streams which are tributary to that river. They were well acquainted with the physiography of that stream, yet if either they or any other tribe had a name for the Columbia River, I have been unable, so far, to ascertain what it was. However, it is said that the Chinooks, who inhabited the coast near the mouth of the river, had a descriptive term which they applied to it. 5
The oldest tradition among the Shoshonis is to the effect that their original home was just east of the Rocky Mountains in Montana, Wyoming and Colorado and that the Plains Tribes drove them into the mountains. They were great weavers of grass and twigs, making their lodges of such products, and called themselves "Shawnt", meaning plenty, and "Shaw-nip", grass, or the more euphonious name "Shoshoni", which, broadly speaking, means Weavers of Grass Lodges, and they always aimed to live near plenty of grass. Occasionally, they re-crossed the mountains and hunted buffalo on the Yellowstone and Platte rivers and often drifted down the Missouri River, where they came in contact with other tribes, sometimes in a friendly and at other times in a hostile manner. That they came in contact with the Plains Tribes is evident from the fact that the Arapahos, Blackfeet, Cheyennes, Crows,
4 Thwaites, Lewis and Clark, II, 380.
5 Bancroft's History of Oregon, I, 18.
