clattawa

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Chinook Jargon tlatoa (“to go”), from Nootka ƛatw̕a (“to paddle away”).

Verb

clattawa (third-person singular simple present clattawas, present participle clattawa-ing, simple past and past participle clattawa-ed)

(obsolete, rare, west coast North America: British Columbia to Oregon) To go; depart, leave. [mid- to late 19th c.]
- 1850, Working Farmer, vol. 1-4, page 175:
  From the above, our friends in the States will readily see that we are not only blessed with a rich soil, and superior mineral wealth, but a climate infinitely superior to that of their present abode. Pack up, therefore, ye frozen tillicums and clatawau over to Oregon.
- 1864, Edwin Mosely, “A Survivor's Account”, in the Daily Chronicle‎^[1]:
  The Chilcootens told him that he had better clattawa and gave him a knife, to defend himself in case he came across any white men.
- 1864, “Origin of the Massacre”, in the Daily Chronicle‎^[2]:
  Tenas George’s Statement[...]The Indian who shot him had a scar on one cheek. A young Chilcoaten, who had been a slave, (Chraychanuru, also called Bob, one of the six) told him then to klatawaw [go] as quickly as possible, and gave him a knife to defend himself.
- 1887, John Harrison Mills, chapter 10, in Chronicles of the Twenty-first Regiment New York State Volunteers‎^[3], page 204:
  The midday echoes reply drowsily, the solitary horseman curses and “clattawa’s” up the road as though suddenly impressed with the idea that somebody is hooking his dinner over the hill[...]
- 1899, Emily Inez Denny, Blazing the Way: Or, True Stories, Songs and Sketches of Puget Sound and Other Pioneers‎^[4], page 414:
  [T]hey were attacked by their northern enemies, who shot two or three while the rest klatawaw-ed with all the hyak (hurry) possible and hid themselves.
- 1900, Robert Vaughn, Then and Now: Or, Thirty-six Years in the Rockies. Personal Reminiscences of Some of the First Pioneers of the State of Montana. Indians and Indian Wars. The Past and Present of the Rocky Mountain Country. 1864-1900, Tribune Printing Company, page 68:
  After a full discussion of the situation, by aid of the little ‘Chinook’ I had picked up, and a vigorous exhibition of sign language on our part, we finally persuaded the chief that it was best for him to ‘clatawaw,’ which he did much to our relief. (Clatawaw means go away.)
- 1909, Congressional Series of United States Public Documents, Volume 3469‎^[5]:
  […] said we had better clattawa — get out. Some of them talked very fair English ; they asked for a small portion of Hour and a little yeast powder, calling it "yeast powder." They were superior-looking Indians and rodo good ponies […]
- a. 1968, BC Studies, University of British Columbia Press:
  On May 12 the disease was “creating fearful ravages among all the northern tribes,” but the Songhees were on Discovery and had no cases. May 15: “The Indian huts at Esquimalt have been destroyed with fire by the Police, and the occupants directed to clattawa.”

Alternative forms