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The Delaware River is a major river on the Atlantic coast of the United States. Its watershed drains an area of in five U.S. states—New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Delaware. Rising in two branches in New York state's Catskill Mountains, the river flows into Delaware Bay where its waters enter the Atlantic Ocean near Cape May in New Jersey and Cape Henlopen in Delaware. Not including Delaware Bay, the river's length including its two branches is .〔The main stem from Hancock, New York to the head of Delaware Bay is .〕〔U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data. (The National Map ), accessed April 1, 2011〕 The Delaware River is one of nineteen "Great Waters" recognized by the America's Great Waters Coalition. The Delaware River rises in two main branches that descend from the western flank of the Catskill Mountains in New York. The West Branch begins near Mount Jefferson in the Town of Jefferson in Schoharie County. The river's East Branch begins at Grand Gorge near Roxbury Delaware County. These two branches flow west and merge near Hancock in Delaware County and the combined waters flow as the Delaware River south. Through its course, the Delaware River forms the boundaries between Pennsylvania and New York, the entire boundary between New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and most of the boundary between Delaware and New Jersey. The river meets tide-water at the junction of Morrisville, Pennsylvania and Trenton, New Jersey at the Falls of the Delaware. The river's navigable, tidal section served as a conduit for shipping and transportation that aided the development of the industrial cities of Trenton, Camden, and Philadelphia. The mean freshwater discharge of the Delaware River into the estuary of Delaware Bay is 11,550 cubic feet (330 m³) per second. In 1609, the river was first visited by a Dutch East India Company expedition led by Henry Hudson. Hudson, an English navigator, was hired to find a western route to Cathay (present-day China), but his discoveries set the stage for Dutch colonization of North America in the seventeenth-century. Early Dutch and Swedish settlements were established along the lower section of river and Delaware Bay. Both colonial powers called the river the ''South River'' compared to the Hudson River which was known as the ''North River''. After the English expelled the Dutch and took control of the New Netherland colony in 1664, the river was renamed ''Delaware'' after Sir Thomas West 3rd Baron De La Warr, an English nobleman and the Virginia colony's first royal governor who defended the colony during the First Anglo-Powhatan War. ==Origin of the name== The Delaware River is named in honor of Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr (1577–1618), an English nobleman and the Virginia colony's first royal governor who defended the colony during the First Anglo-Powhatan War. Lord de la Warr waged a punitive campaign to subdue the Powhatan after they had killed the colony's council president, John Ratcliffe, and attacked the colony's fledgling settlements.〔Tyler, Lyon Gardiner (editor). ''Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography''. (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1915), I:33-34.〕〔Grenier, John. ''The First Way of War: The American War-Making of the Frontier, 1607-1814''. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 24–25.〕 Lord de la Warr arrived 150 soldiers in time to prevent colony's original settlers at Jamestown from giving up and returning to England and is credited with saving the Virginia colony.〔 The name of barony (later an earldom) is pronounced as in the current spelling form "Delaware" ( )〔''Random House Dictionary''〕 and is thought to derive from French ''de la Guerre''. It has often been reported that the river and bay received the name "Delaware" after English forces under Richard Nicolls expelled the Dutch and took control of the New Netherland colony in 1664.〔World Digital Library. ''(Articles about the Transfer of New Netherland on the 27th of August, Old Style, Anno 1664 )''. Retrieved March 21, 2013〕〔Versteer, Dingman (editor). "New Amsterdam Becomes New York" in ''(The New Netherland Register )''. Volume 1 No. 4 and 5 (April/May 1911): 49-64.〕 However, the river and bay were known by the name ''Delaware'' as early as 1641.〔Evelin, Robert. ''A direction for Adventurers With small stock to get two for one, and good land freely : And for Gentleman, and all Servants, Labourers, and Artificers to live plentifully, And the true Description of the healthiest, pleasantest and richest plantation of New Albion in North Virginia''. (London, s.n., 1641).〕 The state of Delaware was originally part of the William Penn's Pennsylvania colony. In 1682, the Duke of York granted Penn's request for access to the sea and leased him the territory along the western shore of Delaware Bay which became known as the "Lower Counties on the Delaware."〔Munroe, John A. ("Chapter 3. The Lower Counties On The Delaware" ), ''History of Delaware'' (Newark, Delaware: University of Delaware Press, 2006), 45. ISBN 0-87413-947-3〕 In 1704, these three lower counties were given political autonomy to form a separate provincial assembly, but shared its provincial governor with Pennsylvania until the two colonies separated on June 15, 1776 and remained separate as states after the establishment of the United States. The name also became used as a collective name for the Lenape, a Native American people (and their language) who inhabited an area of the basins of the Susquehanna River, Delaware River, and lower Hudson River in the northeastern United States at the time of European settlement.〔Schutt, Amy C. ''Peoples of the River Valleys: The Odyssey of the Delaware Indians''. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007).〕 As a result of disruption following the French & Indian War, American Revolutionary War and later Indian removals from the eastern United States, the name "Delaware" has been spread with the Lenape's diaspora to municipalities, counties and other geographical features in the American Midwest and Canada.〔Weslager, Charles A. ''The Delaware Indians: A History'' (New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1990).〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Delaware River」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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