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prettygoodwordtumpline (TUHMP-leyen) - n., a strap strung across the forehead (or chest) to support a pack carried on the back.
Commonly used by native peoples across northern and central America, rather than shoulder straps like a knapsack (in Mexican Spanish, it's a mecapal). Technically it's not on the forehead but the front top of the head, just above the hair-line, so the weight passes directly into the spine. The tump- part is shortened from Penobscot mattump or metomp, from proto-Eastern Algonquian *mat-, empty root appearing in names of manufactured objects + *-a·pəy, string -- which means the English word is almost duplicative string-line.
---L.
Commonly used by native peoples across northern and central America, rather than shoulder straps like a knapsack (in Mexican Spanish, it's a mecapal). Technically it's not on the forehead but the front top of the head, just above the hair-line, so the weight passes directly into the spine. The tump- part is shortened from Penobscot mattump or metomp, from proto-Eastern Algonquian *mat-, empty root appearing in names of manufactured objects + *-a·pəy, string -- which means the English word is almost duplicative string-line.
---L.
