Yes, yes, precisely. One can DO squats with no weight, and I was trying to figure out what a deadlift without a barbell was, what the core of the motion was. As I suspected, the answers here are exceedingly helpful.

I anticipate that the amount of weight I can "deadlift" is actually going to go dramatically UP, since it doesn't appear to involve squatting butt-to-heel.

On the other hand, I am really going to have to work on the bar position on my squats. I had been holding the bar at arms length in front of me -- i.e., in a deadlift position -- because the on-the-shoulders position aggravated a rotator cuff injury from last year. That's healed up now, though, so I should be able to do it.