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Egg Rock is an outcrop of Silurian Straw Hollow Diorite〔Introduction by John McPhee to H.D.Thoreau's “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers,” online at http://press.princeton.edu/chapters/i7720.html – (the inscription on Egg Rock is misquoted. )〕〔USGS state geological data; map at http://tin.er.usgs.gov/geology/state/state.php?state=MA; detail of rock type at http://tin.er.usgs.gov/geology/state/sgmc-unit.php?unit=MASsaqd;0〕 at the confluence of the Assabet and Sudbury rivers, where they form the Concord River in Concord, Massachusetts. The outcrop is located on a roughly oval intermittent island of about 100 by 50 meters. Egg Rock is usually accessible using foot trails over land, but during high river levels the island is separated from the mainland by a narrow channel. The highest point of Egg Rock is about 39 meters above mean sea level and about 6 meters above normal river level. The United States Geological Survey (USGS) Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) includes Egg Rock as GNIS feature 617309, classified as an island. In the GNIS database as of February 2010, the listed position (latitude 42.4645383, longitude -71.3592266) is misplaced by about 125 meters to the southwest, and is not actually located on the intermittent island. A more correct position is latitude 42.4651, longitude -71.3585.〔Satellite imagery incorporating GNIS data (such as that available via "Google Maps") clearly shows the divergence between the GNIS feature location and the actual Egg Rock land form - see http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=42.4651,-71.3585&spn=0.002,0.002&t=h&q=42.4651,-71.3585〕 ==The inscription on Egg Rock== Egg Rock is perhaps most notable for the inscription carved into the rock in 1885 to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the 1635 founding of Concord:〔“Sudbury River Boater's Trail Commentary Guide,” Matthew Eisenson, online at http://www.sudbury-assabet-concord.org/documents/SudburyRiverCommentaryGuide.pdf. (the guide reflects archaic usage in referring to "installation of a tablet"; the "tablet" is actually carved into the native rock. ) The guide refers to page 47 of McAdow, Ron. ''The Concord, Sudbury, and Assabet Rivers''. Bliss Publishing Company, Marlborough, Massachusetts, 1990. 2nd Edition 2000.〕 ''On the hill Nashawtuck'' ''at the meeting of the rivers'' ''and along the banks'' ''lived the Indian owners of'' ''Musketaquid'' ''before the white men came'' The significance of the inscription would have been clear to most people familiar with local lore at the time it was carved, although it may seem cryptic now to many people who are unfamiliar with Concord's history and geography. The native Massachusett tribe used the Algonquian name ''Musketaquid'' for the surrounding area and its riverside meadows; the Algonquian word for grass is ''muskeht''.〔“Musketaquid,” Sudbury Valley Trustees – at http://www.sudburyvalleytrustees.org/node/217 (the inscription of Egg Rock is incorrectly quoted in this article. )〕 The Concord River and even the town of Concord were often called ''Musketaquid'' by writers in the nineteenth century, as may be noted in Henry David Thoreau's comment quoted below. The principal local settlement of the Massachusett tribe which remained in 1635 (after plague decimated the original population in the preceding two decades) was nearby on the gentle slopes of Nashawtuc Hill,〔Concord: A Pilgrimage to the Historic and Literary Center of America, written and published by Perry Walton, Boston Mass, 1922; online at http://ia311208.us.archive.org/0/items/concord00walt/concord00walt.pdf.; p 6.〕 whose crest is about 500 meters southwest of Egg Rock. Negotiations initiated by Simon Willard with leaders of the tribe gave English settlers the right to live in the area, which came to be called Concord. The importance of Egg Rock to Concord's historical self-image may be seen in the fact that at the time of its execution in 1885, the Egg Rock inscription was one of just seven town-wide "lasting memorials of stone and bronze" which were designed and commissioned by the "Tablet sub-committee" of the Concord Celebration Committee. As Charles Hosmer Walcott, chairman of the Tablet sub-committee, declaimed in a speech he delivered during the Sept. 12, 1885 celebration, the seven memorials "form an epitome of the town's history for a century and a half -- from the beginning of the plantation to the war of the revolution." Concerning the inscription on Egg Rock itself, he continued: "The simple words inscribed on the rugged face of the rock, where the rivers meet, will serve to remind us and succeeding generations of a people who have vanished from the face of the earth, leaving scarcely a trace of themselves, except a few arrow-heads and stone pestles, and, here and there, a mound or a heap of clam shells."〔"Celebration of the Two Hundred and Fiftieth Anniversary of the Incorporation of Concord, September 12, 1885." Concord , Mass. - "Published by the Town." The speeches at the celebration were transcribed by Frank A. Nichols and published in the Concord ''Transcript'' newspaper, Sept. 19, 1885, then published as a book by the Town of Concord. Available online at http://books.google.com/books?id=pW0WAAAAYAAJ〕 The inscription is carved into the eastern face of Egg Rock, where it is most easily seen from a boat in the Sudbury River. 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「Egg Rock」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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