different between hackmatack vs tamarack

English

Etymology

Believed to derive from Abenaki, though no specific etymon has been found. The term is first attested in the 1760s–90s, when it was spelled hakmantak and referred to dense forest.

In the 19th century, some authorities questioned if tacamahac, tamarack, and hackmatack could be cognate to one another, perhaps all corruptions of one term, but such cognacy is unlikely.

Compare the late 19th century German Low German term Hackemtackem (“tacamahac (medicinal resin)”).

Noun

hackmatack (plural hackmatacks)

1. A larch, a tree of the species Larix laricina.
2. A balsam poplar, a tree of the species Populus balsamifera.

Quotations

• 1867, Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture for the year 1866, page 483:

  The hackmatack is remarkable for having a principle root, which sometimes equals in size the trunk to which it belongs.

Synonyms

• (larch): tamarack, tacamahac

References

English

Etymology

From Canadian French tamarac, believed to derive from an Algonquian word.

In the 19th century, some authorities questioned if tacamahac, tamarack, and hackmatack could be cognate to one another, perhaps all corruptions of one term, but such cognacy is unlikely.

Noun

tamarack (countable and uncountable, plural tamaracks)

1. Any of several North American larches, of the genus Larix.
   • 2005, Joseph Boyden, Three Day Road, Penguin 2008, p. 36:

     The women peeled tamarack bark for tea, dug through the deep snow in hopes of finding a few dried fiddleheads.

2. The wood from such a tree.

Synonyms

• hackmatack
• tacamahac

References