An Indian shoe. The accent is on the first syllable.
See Notes and Queries, 10 S. ii. 225, 495.
1612. Mockasins, Shooes.—Capt. Smith, ‘Map of Virginia,’ 44. (N.E.D., which also furnishes examples 1704, 1725, 1760, &c.)
1791. They put a blanket [over the body], a pair of moggasins on the feet…. She found the deceased was barefoot, and enquired why they had omitted the moggasins.—Gazette of the U.S., Oct. 15 (Phila.).
1796. The wild men that I now describe have neither feathers on their heads nor moggasins on their feet.—Mass. Spy, Oct. 5.
1797. These mockasons are made of deer skins, which are smoked instead of tanned, and are thereby rendered very soft and pleasant to the feet; they are sowed together at the top with the sinews of the deer, and are finished oftentimes in a very curious manner with wampum and porcupine quills.—Fra. Baily, F.R.S., ‘Journal of a Tour,’ p. 272 (Lond., 1856).
1803. Mocossins are Indian shoes, made of deer-skin.—John Davis, ‘Travels in the U.S.A.,’ p. 33 note (Lond.).
1816. [Mr. Jefferson has in his collection] wampum belts, mockasins, &c. several dresses and cooking utensils of the Mandan and other nations of the Missouri.—Boston Weekly Messenger, Oct. 24: from the Cape Fear Recorder.
1817. They [the Miami Indians] all wear pantaloons, or rather long mocassins of buckskin, covering the foot and leg and reaching half way up the thigh which is bare.—M. Birkbeck, ‘Journey in America,’ p. 113 (Phila.).
1817. In this case we must travel without mockasons, or even leggings.—John Bradbury, ‘Travels,’ p. 41.
1817. I was much annoyed by the abundance of the prickly pear. Against the thorns of this plant I found that mockasons are but a slight defence.—Id., pp. 72–3.
1818. “A general assortment of Gloves, Hosiery, Mogasins, &c.,” advertised in the Mass. Spy, Feb. 4.
1829. Their hearts revolted from the outlandish and foreign aspect of the tall planters, dressed in deer-skin hunting-shirts, with fringed epaulets of leather on their shoulders, a knit sash of red, green, and blue about their waists, buck-skin pantaloons and moccasins, a rifle on their shoulders, five or six dogs attending each one of them, and a dozen ragged and listless negroes lounging behind them.—T. Flint, ‘George Mason,’ p. 7 (Boston).
1830. We seldom killed them [the seals] except to make moccassins of their hides, for shoes were out of the question, the very strongest of Lynn manufacture vanishing from the feet like wet paper.—N. Ames, ‘A Mariner’s Sketches,’ p. 146.
1835. Buskins, or, as named among them, mocquasins, also of the skin of the deer, tanned, or in its natural state, according to caprice or emergency, enclosed his feet tightly.—W. G. Simms, ‘The Yemassee,’ i. 18 (N.Y.). (Italics in the original.)
