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Title
"Introduction" and "Notes" to 1845 Gowans edition of Daniel Denton's A Brief Description of New-York (1670)
Date of this Version
January 2006
Abstract
Furman’s introduction and notes to Daniel Denton’s A
Brief Description of New York (1670) are less an attempt to
elucidate that original work than an occasion for disquisitions
on a variety of subjects; not, however, without their
own charm and intrinsic interest.
Gabriel Furman (1800-1854) was a Brooklyn lawyer,
justice, and state senator, as well as an antiquarian, collector,
and lecturer. He published Notes, Geographical and
Historical Relative to the Town of Brooklyn in 1824, and
was a lifelong compiler of research, manuscripts, and
documents, many of which were edited for publication after
his death as Antiquities of Long Island (1875). Furman
is said to have developed an opium habit, and he is known
to have died in poverty in the Brooklyn City hospital.
Furman’s edition of Denton’s Brief Description of New
York was the inaugural book in publisher William Gowans’
Bibliotheca Americana series—“of works, relating to the
history, literature, biography, antiquities and curiosities of
the Continent of America. … brought out in the best style,
both as to the type, press work, and paper, and in such a
manner as to make them well worthy a place in any gentleman’s
library.”
Furman’s “Introduction” discusses the rarity of
Denton’s original work, its impact on other accounts of the
region, the sack of Schenectady in 1690, and the reasons
for Denton’s predominant focus on the areas of Manhattan
and Long Island. He also relates episodes from his own
1842 stagecoach trip across Long Island from Brooklyn to
Sag Harbor and gives a sketch of Denton’s background,
with a detailed account of his involvement in the General
Assembly of Deputies in 1667 that drew up the first code
of laws for the English colony and expressed to the Duke
of York “our cheerful submission to all such laws, statutes,
and ordinances, which are or shall be made by virtue
of authority from your royal highness, your heirs and successors
forever”—which drew upon them the ire and rebukes
of the independent citizenry. Furman’s “Notes” include materials on the Indian
names of the islands and aboriginal villages of New York
City (by Henry N. Schoolcraft); legends of the Hell-Gate (by
Washington Irving); the Old Dutch houses of New York;
Ronconcoa Lake on Long Island; the famous Hempstead
Plains; the legend of Manetto Hill; the sports and entertainments
of occupying British forces; the manufacture of
seawant, wampum, or peague, and its use as colonial currency;
the first distribution of public money (1655); the
fourfold shopkeepers’ system of pay, money, pay as
money, and trust; Indian views on the future state and immortality of the soul and on marriage and polygamy; the
legal suits of the Montauk Indians; the unique topography
of the Hudson River; the disappearance of lobsters from
New York harbor during the Revolution; and two episodes
of travel from Williams Gowans’ Western Memorabilia.
The text of Denton’s A Brief Description of New York,
Formerly Called New Netherlands with the Places Thereunto
Adjoining is not reproduced here, but can be found at
http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/libraryscience/22/
Grateful acknowledgement is made to the University of
Oregon Libraries for their generous loan of their copy of
the 1845 edition.
Title page of 1845 edition (.tif file, 2.2 Mb)
TP 1845 J.jpg (1615 kB)
JPG version of 1845 title page
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The title page to the 1845 edition is attached as a supplemental file.