Quick links
vase
[< Cdn F < F, ult. < Gmc]
Fur Trade, Obs.
DCHP-1 (pre-1967)
Entry from the DCHP-1 (pre-1967)
This entry may contain outdated or offensive information, terms, and examples.
n.
a muddy, boggy tract, especially a portage (def. la) through such terrain.
Quotations
1760
[We reached the Portage a la Vase . . . Their name describes the boggy ground of which they consist.]
1793
Leaving this lake we have three portages running called the vases. The men will have the first vase to be some perches longer than the Grand Callumet... .
1821
We then passed through a Succession of small Lakes and at 9 encamped on the last Vase.
1933
The propriety of the name Portages des Vases, or Muddy Portages, was attested to by Henry the elder, who noted the term with understanding in 1760, and by Bigsby, who passed that way more than half a century later.