Not in Scotland Anymore

The Narraganset Deputy Tribal Historic Preservation Officer takes the stage and he says:

"Let’s get one thing straight: you’re not in Scotland anymore.

They are not cairns (he pronounced it “Karns” and not “Karens”).”

He explains: “That’s a European word.

They are not rock piles or stone piles, not anything else,

They are Manitou Hussunash,
Sacred Stones, Spirit Stones.”

      And he adds something to the effect that there are many words for stone in many dialects, many Indigenous languages, says “I saw another one on a street sign on the way here, Quassuk.”

     And then I know he drove to the place on the Old Connecticut Path, the Old Indian Trail, now CT Route 6, and turned onto what’s now CT Route 47, passed by Quassuk Road, just before the bridge over the Weekeepeemee (Basswood) River. 

Quassuk, Qussuk =  ‘stone’- Qussukquanash = Stones

Manitou Quasskquanash = Sacred Stones, Spirit Stones

    I didn't drive in that way. I drove the back road short cuts, or so I thought - I took a wrong turn and saw my first Connecticut moose run across the road, ducking into the brush with an extra burst of speed when I honked my horn so I wouldn’t drive into him...

  Another time, another place, another transcript:  "Ceremonial stone landscapes. Anybody here, never heard the term? That’s great, we’ve got a few, a few takers. Ceremonial stone landscapes. Monatuhasanik (Manitou Hussunash), spirit stones. We are attempting as best we can to be bilingual in dealing with ceremonial stone landscapes. What I found was that when I tried to speak English to other tribal people about what we were saying in our protective enclaves, they didn’t know what I was talking about. I realized that it was a simple problem. It was not resonating in their spirits. When I would use words like, ceremonial stone landscapes. But Monatu, spirit, Hasanik are stones in groups. Our stones are identified as ceremonial stone grouping, as you see here, as opposed to stone piles, because in our tradition stones are our grandfathers. If in fact your talking about grandfathers who are congregated out in the field, you would not call them a pile of grandfathers. At least, I wouldn’t. I couldn’t get away with that, so Monatuhasanik, spirit stones or ceremonial stone groupings in English..." 

https://www.ncptt.nps.gov/blog/ceremonial-stone-landscapes-of-new-england-and-developing-best-practices-to-assess-submerged-paleocultural-landscapes/

    https://youtu.be/35hswwxcIFI

“Aside from small concentric stone works, qusukqaniyutôk (‘stone row, enclosure’ Harris and Robinson, 2015:140, ‘fence that crosses back’ viz. qussuk, ‘stone,’ Nipmuc or quski, quskaca, ‘returning, crosses over,’ qaqi, ‘runs,’ pumiyotôk, ‘fence, wall,’ Mohegan, Mohegan Nation 2004:145, 95, 129) define spaces, while świhwákuwi (viz. świk+wāgawi, ‘it grows around,’ Unami Lenapeuw, Zeisberger 1995:151, 173; świ, ‘three’ for 3-sided - Mohegan Nation 2004:98) form open ellipses that the author considers roughly equivalent to the “nave” of a Christian church, and sunś nipámu (‘marker stone’ Narragansett, Harris and Robinson 2015:140, viz. sunś, ‘stone,’ nipawu ‘stand up,’ Mohegan Nation 2004:100, 83) serve as indicators. Individual deaths and memorial services for those persons are marked with waûnonaqussuk (Natick Nipmuc wâunonukhauónat – ‘to flatter,’ Trumbull 1903:202, verb stem wâunon- ‘honor’ + qussuk ‘stone’ = wâunonaqussuk – ‘honoring stone’ + quanash pl., also Narragansett wunnaumwâuonck – ‘faithfulness, truthfulness,’ wunna, ‘good,’ wáunen, ‘honor,’ + onk, abstract suffix, O’Brien 2005:37, Wawanaquas- sik, ‘place of many honoring stones,’- Nochpeem Mahikkaneuw/Wappinger, Ruttenber 1992b:373). http://oso-ah.org/custom.html

A cairn is a human-made pile (or stack) of stones. The word cairn comes from the Scottish Gaelic: càrn [ˈkʰaːrˠn̪ˠ] (plural càirn [ˈkʰaːrˠɲ]). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cairn