Brintons Library of Aboriginal American Literature - Forgotten ...

BRINTON’

s L IBRARY OF

ABORI G INAL AMERICAN LITERATURE.

NUMBER IV ,

Ow ing to the ab s ence of the Author on offic ia l

dut ies in the Indian T err itory , the Map wh ich

s hou l d accompany th is volume has not been pre

pare d . I t w i l l there fore b e is s ue d w ith the s econd

vo lume .

Na¢e xa‘

t pépvao"

dmo'

reiw

5pt9pa rabra ra’

wgopevfi v.

Epic/111m m .

PH ILAD ELPH IA

D . G . B R I N T O N .

BRI-NTON’

s L IBRARY OF

ABORIG INAL AMERICAN LITERATURE.

NUMBER IV ,

MIGRATIONLEGEND

CREEK IND IANS ,

WITH A L INGUISTIC ,HISTORIC AN D ETHNOG RAP HIC

INTROD UCTION ,

AL BERT S . G ATSCHET,

O F T H E 0 . S. B UR EAU O F B T H N O L O G Y , WA S H I N G T O N , D . C .

V O L U M E 1 .

Nfioe z a‘

t péuvao” dma

'

reiwfipwflpa rabra rt?” ¢pevd§m

Epickam w .

PH ILAD ELPH IA

D . G . B R I N T O N .

PREFATORY NOTE.

In the present work , Mr. G atschet has carried out a much needed

investigation. The tribes who inhabited the watershed of the north shoreof the Mexican Gulf must always occupy a prominent place in the studyof American Ethnology , as possibly connecting the races of North and

South America , and those of the Valley of the Mississippi with those of

Anahuac and Mayapan.

Years ago the general editor of this series stated , in various publications ,the problems that region offers , and on finding the remarkable legend of

Chekilli, translated it and published it, as pointing to a solution of some of

the questions involved . This legend has , at his request , been taken by Mr.G atschet as a centre around which to group the ethnography of that Wholeterritory , as well as a careful analysis of the legend and its language .

The first volume contains the general discussion of the subject, andcloses with the Creek version of the Legend and its translation. The

second wil l contain the Hitchiti Version, the Notes , and Vocabulary .

One statement of the author, overlooked in the proof reading, seems ofsufficient importance to be corrected here . The C/zoctaw G rammar of

the late Rev. Cyrus Byington was published complete, and from his las t

revin’

on ( 1866 not as an extract from his first draft, as stated on page1 17 . The full particulars are given in the Introduction to the Grammar .

THE ED ITOR .

P REFACE.

The present publication proposes to bring before the public, in popularform

,some scientific results obtained while studying the language and

ethnology of the Creek tribe and its ethnic congeners . The method of

furthering ethnographic study by all the means which the study of language can afford , has been too little appreciated up to the present time ,

but has been constantly

'

kept in view in this publication. Language is notonly the most general and important help to ethnology, but outside of

race, it 18 al so the most ancient of all ; ethnologists are wel l aware of thisfact , but do not generally apply it to their studies, because they find it tootedious to acquire the language of unlettered tribes by staying long enoughamong them .

The help afforded to linguistic studies by the books published in and

upon the Indian languages is valuable only for a few among the greatnumber of the dialects . The majority of them are laid down in phonetical ly defective missionary alphabets , about which we are prompted torepeat what the citiz ens of the young colony of Mexico wrote to thegovernment of Spain , in Cortez ’s time : Send to us pious and Christianmen, as preachers, bishops and missionaries , but do not send us scholars ,who, with their pettifogging distinctions and love of contention, createnothing but disorder and strife.

” 1 In the same manner, some Creekscholars and churchmen agreed five times in succession, before 1 853 ,

upon standard alphabets to be followed in transcribing Creek , but, as

Judge G . W . Stidham justly remarks, made it worse ear/z time. To arriveat trustworthy results, it is therefore necessary to investigate the forms of

speech as they are in use among the Indians themselves.Very few statements of the Kasi

’hta migration legend can be made

available for history . It is wholly legendary , in its first portion evenmythical ; it is of a comparatively remote age, exceedingly instructive forethnography and for the development of religious ideas ; it is full of thatsort of natwlé which we like so much to meet in the mental productionsof our aborigines, and afi

'

ords striking instances of the debasing and

brutaliz ing influence of the unrestricted belief in the supernatural and

Quotation, ad “m m, from Berna! Diaz ’ His toria verdadera .

V

PREFACE.

miraculous. Of the sun-worship, which underlies the religions of all thetribes in the Gulf territories, only slight intimations are contained in the

Kas i’hta legend , and the important problem , whether the Creeks evercrossed the Mississippi river from west to east in their migrations , seemsto be settled by it in the negative, although other legends may be adducedas speaking in its favor.Owing to deficient information on several Maskoki dialects , I have nottouched the problem of their comparative age. From the few indicationson hand I am inclined to think that Alibamu and Koassati possess moreand Cha hta less archaic forms than the other dialect-groups.From Rev. H . C. Buckner’ s Creek Grammar, with its numerous de

fects , I have extracted but a few conjugational forms of the verb isita totake, but have availed myself of some linguistic manuscripts of Mrs. A .

E. W. Robertson, the industrious teacher and translator of many parts ofthe Bible into Creek .

The re- translation of the legend into Creek and Hitchiti is due to JudgeG . W. Stidham , of Eufaula, Indian Territory, who in infancy witnessedthe emigration of his tribe, the Hitchiti, from the Chatahuchi river intotheir present location. My heartfelt thanks are al so due to other Indians

,

who have materially helped me in my repeated revisions of the subjectmatter embodied in these volumes , and in other investigations . Theywere the Creek delegates to the Federal government , Chiefs Chicote and

I spahidshi, Messrs . S . B . Callaghan, Grayson and Hodge.

I also fully acknowledge the services tendered by the officers of theU. S . Bureau of Ethnology , as well as by D r. Daniel G . Brinton and byGeneral Albert Pike, who placed the rich shelves of their libraries atmy disposition. In the kindest manner I was furnished with scientificstatements of various kinds by Messrs . W. R. Gerard , C . C . Royce and

D r. W. C . Hofi'

mann.

THE AUTHOR .

PVarl n'

ngton , Aug ust, 1 884 .

CONTENTS .

FIR S T P AR T.

THE SOUTHERN FAMIL IES OF

1 . L z'

ngnzstz'

t G roups of Me G ulfStates .

Timucua, 1 1 . Calusa , 13 . Tequesta , 15. Kataba, 15. Yuchi, 1 7 .

Cheroki, 24 . Arkansas , 29 . Taensa, 30. Tangipahoa, 34 .

Naktche, 34. Tonica, 39 . Adai, 4 1 . Pani, 42. Shetimasha , 44 .

Atakapa, 45. Bidai, 47 . Koroa, 47 . The Westo and Stono Indians , 48 . The Linguistic Map, 49 .

I]. TlzeMaskokiFamily .

The Common Maskoki Language, 53 . The Name Maskoki, 58.

Tribal Divisions ; the Vamassi, 62. Yamacraw, 65. Seminole ,66 . Apalachi, 74. Mikasuki, 76. Hitchiti, 77 . The HitchitiDialect , 80. Alibamu , 85. Koassati, 89 . Chicasa , 90 . Tribeson the Yazoo River, 9 7 . Cha’hta, 100 . The Cha’hta Language, 1 16.

[ I]. 7 715 Creek Indians .

Creek Settlements , 120 . List ofTowns,124 . The Indian Pathways,

151 . The Creek Government , 152. Tribal Divisions and Gentes,153 . Civil Government

,1 56. The Warrior Class, 158. War

Titles, 160. War Customs, 1 64 . Organization of the Confederacy ,168 . The Public Square, 1 7 1 . The Annual Busk , 1 77 . FurtherEthnographic Notes , 183 . Creek History , 188 . The Creek D ialect, 198 . Lexical Afiinities , 21 2.

SECON D P AR Ti

T/ze K as z"

lzta M igration L egend .

Indian Migration Legends , 214. Migration Legends of the CreekTribes , 222. Tchikilli’s Kasi

’hta L 42gend , 235. The Text, 237 .

TheTranslation, 244 .

A MIGRATION LEGEND

TH E CREEK IN D IAN S .

FIRST OR G ENERAL PART.

THE SOUTHERN FAMIL IES OF IND IANS .

The early explorers of the Gulf terri tories have left toposteri ty a large amoun t of informat ion concern ing the nat iveswhom they met as friends or fought as enemies . They havedesc ribed thei r picturesque at t ire, thei r cur ious , sometimesawkward , habi ts and customs , their dwell ings and plantat ions,thei r government in t imes of peace and war, as exhaustivelyas they could do , or thought fi t to do. They dist inguishedtr ibes from con federacies, and cal led the latter kingdoms andempires , governed by princes , kings and emperors . But thecharacter ist ics of race and language, which are the mostimportan t for ethnology , because they are the most ancien tin thei r origin , are not often al luded to by them , and whenthe modern sciences Of anthropology and ethnology hadbeen established on sol id principles many of these sou thernraces had al ready disappeared or in termingled , and scien t ificinqui ry came too late for thei r investigat ion .

A full eluc idat ion of the history and an tiquities of the

subjec t of our inquiries , the Creeks, is possible only afterhaving obtained an exhaus t ive knowledge of the tribes andnat ions l iving around them . The more populous amongthem have preserved their language and remember many o f

2

10 THE SOUTHERN FAMILIES .

their ancestors’ customs and habi ts, so that active explorat ionin the field can st il l be helpful to us in many respects int racing and rediscovering thei r ancient condit ion . Threecen turies ago the t r ibes of the Maskoki family must havepredominated in power over all their neighbors, as they doeven now in numbers , and had formed confederacies unit ingd istant tribes . Whether they ever crossed the Mississ ipp iriver or not , the Indians of this family are as thoroughlysouthern as their neighbors

,and seem to have inhabited

southern lands for t imes immemorial . The scient ists whonow claim that they descend from the mound builders , do soonly on the bel ief that they must have dwel t for uncountedcentur ies in the fert ile t racts where Hernando de Soto foundthem , and where they have remained up to a recent epoch .

In the terri tory once occupied by their tribes no topographicname appears to point to an earl ier and al ien populat ion ;and as to thei r exterior , the pecul iar ol ive admixture to theirc innamon complexion is a charac teris t ic which they have incommon with all other southern tribes .My in troduct ion to the Kas i’hta nat ional legend proposes

to assign to the Creeks : ( 1 ) their proper posi tion in the

Maskoki family and among thei r other neighbors ; and ( 2)to desc ribe some of their ethnologic character is t ics . The

material has been divided in several chapters wh ich I havein their logical sequence arranged as followsLingu ist ic families t raceable within the Gulf States .The Maskoki group ; i ts historic subdivisions .The Creek Indians ; tribal topography, historic and ethno

graphic not ices , sketch of thei r language.

I . LING UISTIC G ROUP S OFTHE G ULF STATES.

In the history of the Creeks , and in thei r legends of migrat ion

,many references occur to the tribes around them , with

whom they came in contac t . These contacts were ch iefly ofa hostile charac ter, for the normal state of barbaric t ribes

TIMUCUA. 11

is to l ive in almost permanent mutual confl icts . What followsis an at tempt to enumerate and Sketch them , the sketch to be

of a prevalently topographic nature . We are not thoroughlyacquain ted with the racial or an thropological pecul iari ties of

the nat ions surrounding the Maskoki proper on all sides, butin their languages we possess an excel len t help for classifyingthem . Language is not an absolute indicator of race, but i tis more so in America than elsewhere, for the large number

of linguist ic families in the western hemisphere proves thatthe populat ions speaking their dialects have suffered less thanin the eastern by encroachment

,foreign admixture, forcible

al terat ion or entire dest ruction .

Beginn ing at the sou theast , we first meet the historicTimucua family , the t ribes of which are extinct at the presen tt ime ; and after describing the Indians of the Floridian P eninsula, southern extremity

,we pass over to the Yuchi

,on

Savannah river, to the Naktche, Taensa and the other stocksonce set tled along and beyond the mighty Uk’hina, orwater road of the Mississippi river .

TIMUCUA .

In the sixteen th cen tury theTimucua inhabi ted the northernand middle portion of the peninsula of Florida, and al thoughthei r exact l imits to the north are unknown , they held a

port ion of Florida bordering on Georgia, and some of the

coas t islands in the Atlan t ic Ocean , as Guale ( then the nameof Amel ia) and others . The more populous set tlements ofthese Indians lay on the eas tern coast of Florida, along theSt . John ’s river and i ts tributaries , and in the northeasternangle of the Gul f of Mexico . Thei r sou thernmost villagesknown to us were H irrihigua, near Tampa Bay, and Tucururu,near Cape Canaveral , on the Atlan tic Coas t .The people received i ts name from one of thei r villages

called Timagoa, Thimagoua ( Timoga on D e Bry’s map),

situated on one of the western tributaries of St. John 's river,


and having some pol itical importance. The name meanslora

'

, ruler , master [atimuca“ wai ted upon (muca) by ser

vants (ati)] and the people’s name is wri t ten Atimuca earlyin the eighteenth century . We fi rst become acquain ted withtheir numerous tribes through the memoir of Alvar NunezCabeca de Vaca,the three chroniclers of de Soto ’s expedit ion

,and more fully through R éné de L audonniére

Two missionaries of the Franciscan order , Francisco Pareja

( 1 6 1 2 sqq .) and Gregor io de Mouilla have composeddevotional books in their vocal ic language. D e Bry ’s B rent

'

s

N arratz'

o, Frankfort a. M.,1 59 1 , contains a map of thei r

country, and engravings represent ing their dwell ings,fights

,

dances and mode of l iving .

A fewwords of their language ( lengua tz'

muquana in Span ish)Show affini ty wi th Maskoki, others with Carib . From 1 595

A . D . they gradually became converted to Christ ianity , re

volted in 1 687 against their Span ish oppressors , and early inthe eighteenth century ( 1 706) were so reduced in numberthat they yielded easily to the at tacks of theYamass i Indians

,

who,inst igated by Engl ish colonists , made incursions upon

their villages from the North . Their las t remnants wi thdrewto the Mosquito Lagoon , in Volusia County , Florida, wherethe name of the Tomoco river still recal ls their tr ibal name.

In 1 564, R éné de L audonniere heard of five head chiefs

(paracus i) of confederacies in theTimucua country, and fromPareja we can in fer that seven or more dialects were spokenin i ts c ircumference. The five head chiefs, Saturiwa, HolataUtina, P otanu, Onethcaqua and H ostaqua are only t ribal.names ( in the second , Utina is the t ribal appel lation) , andthe dialects , as far as known , were those of Timagoa,P otanu, Itafi, the Fresh -Water district , Tucururu, Santa Lucia

de Acuera, and Mocama (“ on the The las t but

one probably coincided with that of Ais .

The Ais Indians , who held the coas t from Cape Canaveral ,where the Spaniards had the post Santa Lucia, to a lagoon

CALUSA. 13

once called Aisahatcha (viz . , A Zs river) , were considered asa people dist inct from the Timucua. They worshiped the

sun in the Shape of a stuffed deer raised upon the end of a

high beam planted in the ground ; this gave, probably,origin to thei r name Ais , for B . Romans interprets Aisahatcha by D eer river ( i tchi , itche deer, in Creek and Seminole) . Thei r terri tory formed the northern part of the“ province ” of Tequesta. Cf. B . Romans , Eas t and Wes tFlorida (New York , pp . 2. 260 . 273 . 28 1 . Herrera

,

Dec . IV, 4, 7. Barcia, Ensayo , p . 1 1 8 .

CAL USA .

The languages spoken by the Calusa and by the people nextin order, the Tequesta, are unknown to us , and thus cannotbe men t ioned here as forming separate l inguis t ic stocks .I simply make mention of these ‘ t ribes , because they wereregarded as people dist inct from the Timucua and the tribesof Maskoki origin .

The Calusa held the southwestern extremity of Flor ida,and their tribal name is left recorded in Calusahatchi, a riversouth of Tampa bay. They are cal led Calos on de Bry ’smap otherwise Colusa, Cal los, Carlos , and formed a

confederacy of many villages , the names of which are givenin the memoir of Hernando d ’

EscalanteFontanedo (Mémoiresur la Floride, in Ternaux - Compans ’ Collect ion XX

,p . 22 ;

t ranslated from the original Spanish) . These names werewri t ten down in 1 559 , and do not Show much affinity withTimucua ; but since they are the only remnants of the Calusalanguage , I presen t the full l ist : “Tampa, Tomo , Tuchi , Sogo ,No (which sign ifies beloved Sinapa, Sinaesta,

Metamapo , Sacas pada, Calaobe, Estame, Yagua, Guaya,G uevu,

Muspa, Cas itoa, Tatesta, Coyovea, Jutun , Tequemapo,Comachica, Quiseyove and two others in the vic in i ty . Thereare o thers in the i nterior , near Lake Mayaimi

— viz . , Cutespa,

Tavaguemue, Tomsobe, Enempa and twenty others . Two

4 THE SOUTHERN FAMILIES.

upon the Lucayos obey to the cacique of Carlos , G uarunguveand Cuchiaga. Carlos and his deceased father were the

rulers of these fi fty towns . ” Fontanedo states that he wasprisoner in these parts from his thirteen th to h is thirt iethyear ; that he knew four languages , but was not familiar wi ththose of Ai

'

s and Teaga, not having been there.

One of these names is decidedly Span ish , Sacaspada orDraw- the-sword two others appear to be Timucua, CalaObe (kala fruit ; abo stalk, tree) and Comachica (hica land,

country ) . Some may be explained by the Creek language ,but only one of them , Tampa ( i timpi close to it, near it) isCreek to a certain ty ; Tuchi resembles tutchi kidney s ; Sogo ,sé -uka rattle, gourd

- rattle, and No is the radix of a-no- kitcha

lover , anukidshiis 1 love, which agrees wi th the in terpretat iongiven by Fontanedo . Tavaguemue may possibly contain theCreek tawa sumac/z ; Mayaimi (Lake) , which Fontanedo ex

plains by “ ziery large, the Creek augmen tat ive term mahi ,and G uevu the Creek u- iwa water.

The Spanish orthography , in which these names are laiddown

,is unfitted for t ranscribing Indian languages , perhaps

as much so as the English orthography ; nevertheless , werecogniz e the frequently - occurring terminal - esta, - sta, wh ichsounds quite l ike There are no doubt many geographic terms , taken from Seminole- Creek , in the south ofthe peninsula as wel l as i n the north ; i t only remains todetermine what age we have to asc ribe to them .

The Calusa bore the reputat ion of being a savage and

rapacious people, and B . Romans (p . 29 2) denounces them as

having been pirates . He informs us (p . that “at SandyPoint

,the southern extremity of the peninsula, are large

fields , being the lands formerly planted by the Colusasavages ;

”and that “ they were driven away from the cont i

nent by the Creeks, their more potent neighbors .” In 1 763

the remnants , about eighty famil ies , wen t to Havannah fromtheir last possessions at Cayos Vacos and Cayo Hueso (hueso ,

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The passage of Adai r being the only notice on the extentof the Kataba language found in the early authors , except ingLawson , I transc ribe i t here in full (H istory , pp . 224. 225)About the year 1 743 , the nat ion (of the Katahba) consisted

of almost four hundred warriors , of above twen ty difl'

erent

d ialects . I shal l mention a few of the nat ional names ofthose who make up th is mixed language the Katanoa is thestandard or court d ialect— the Wateree, who make up a largetown B eno, (lizard/z, -walz, now Chou/an, Canggaree, Nae/tee,

Ifamasee, Coosalz, etc. Thei r coun try had an old was te fieldof seven miles extent , and several others of smaller dimensions , which shows that they were formerly a numerous people,to cul t ivate so much land with their dull stone axes

,etc .

”

After Charah a new page begins , and the -wa}z fol lowing ,wh ich has no connect ion with what precedes , proves thatthere is a printer ’s lacune , perhaps of a whole l ine. B enois given by Lawson as a Tuscarora town Charah is theancient Sara, Saura, Saraw or Sarau mentioned by Ledererand others . The Nachee certainly d id not speak a Katabalanguage, nor is there much probabil i ty that the Vamassi d idso . By the Coosah are probably meant the Indians l ivingon Coosawhatchee river, South Carol ina, near Savannah .

Adai r, in his qual i ty as trader, had visi ted the Katabaset tlements personal ly .

’

P énicaut, in h is “ Relat ion , ment ions a curious fac t ,which proves that the al liances of the Kataba extended overa wide terri tory in the South . In 1 708 , the Alibamu hadinvi ted warriors of the Cheroki , Abika and Ka taba ( herecalled Cadapouees , Canapouees ) to an exped ition against theMobil ians and the French at Fort Mobile. These hordes

1 Reprint of 1860, pp . 9 7. 100. 101 . 383 .

3 Cf. B . R . Carroll , H istor. Collect. of S . C. , I I , p . 243. Lawson statesthat the Congaree dialect was not understood by the Waterees and Chicarees .

3 Margry , D éeouuertes , V , 477 .

YUCH I . 17

arrived near the bay, and were supposed to number fourthousand men ; they withdrew without infl ict ing muchdamage. More about th is expedition under “Alibamu ,

”

q . v .

YUCH L

None of all the al lophyl ic t r ibes ‘ referred to in this Firs tPart stood in closer connec tion with the Creeks or Maskoki

proper than the Yuchi or Uchee Indians . They consti tuteda portion of thei r confederacy from the middle of the eighteenth century , and this gives us the opportun ity to discussthei r pecul iari t ies more in detai l than those of the other“ outsiders . ” They have preserved their own language and

customs ; no mention is made of them in the migrat ion legend ,and the Creeks have always considered them as a peculiarpeople.

General Pleasant Porter has kindly favored me with a fewethnologic points, gained by himsel f from Yuchi Indians ,who inhabi t the larges t town in the Creek Nat ion , IndianTerr. , with a populat ion of about 500. In bodily siz e theyare smal ler than the Creeks

,but l i the and Of wiry musculature,

the muscles often protruding from the body . Thei r descen tis in the male l ine , and they were once polygamous . I t is adisputed fact whether they ever observed the custom of flat

tening thei r children ’s heads,l ike some of thei r neighbors .

They cal l themselves elzildren of Me Sun, and sun worsh ipseems to have been more pronounced here than with othert ribes of the Gulf States . The monthly efllux of the Sun ,whom they considered as of the female sex, fel l to the earth ,as they say, and from this the Yuchi people took its origin .

They increase in number at the presen t time, and a part o fthem are st i l l pagans . Popularly expressed , thei r languagesounds ‘ l ike the warble of the prairie- chickens .’ I t is statedthat thei r conjurers ’ songs give a clue to all thei r an tiqui t iesand symbolic customs . They exclude the use of sal t from all

drugs which serve them as medicine. While engaged in making


medicine they sing the above songs for a t ime ; then comesthe oral port ion of their ri tual , which is followed by othersongs . ”

Not much is known of thei r language, but i t might beeasily obtained from the natives familiar with Engl ish . Fromwhat we know of i t , i t shows no radical affinity with any

known American tongue, and i ts phonet ics have often beennot iced for thei r strangeness . They are said to speak withan abundance of arrested sounds or voice- checks , from whichthey start again with a jerk of the voice. The accent oftenrests on the ultima (Powel l

’s mscr. vocabulary) , and Wareascribes to them , though wrongly, the Hot tentot eluek.

The numerals follow the decimal , not the quinary systemas they do in the Maskoki languages . The lack of a dual

form in the in transi t ive verb also dist inguishes Yuchi fromthe latter.The earl iest habitat of the Yuchi , as far as t raceable, was

on both sides of the Savannah river, and Yuchi towns exis tedthere down to the middle of the eighteenth cen tury .

Whe'

n Commander H . de Soto reached these parts with hisarmy , the “ queen ”

( senora, cacica) of the country met himat the town Cofetacque on a large, a c ircumstance wh ichtestifies to the existence of a considerable water - course there.

Cofetacque, writ ten also Cofitachiqui (Biedma) , Cofachiqui

(Garci laso de la Vega) , Cutifachiqui (consonan ts inverted ,E lvas) was seven days

’ march from Chalaque (Cheroki)province, and distant from the sea about thirty leagues , asstated by the nat ives of the place. There were many ru inedtowns in the vic in i ty, we are told by the Fidalgo de Elvas .One league from there, in the direction up stream , was Talomeco town , the “ temple” of which is described as a won

derful and cur ious st ructu re by Garcilaso . Many modernhistorians have located these towns on the middle course ofSavannah river, and Charles C . Jones (Hernando de Soto ,1 880 ; pp . 27 . 29 ) bel ieves , with other inves tigators, that

YUCH I . 19

Cofetacque stood at Silver Bluff, on the left bank of theSavannah r iver , about twen ty -five miles by water belowAugusta. The domains of that “ queen ,

”or, as we would

express i t , the towns and lands of that confederacy, extendedfrom there up to the Cheroki mountains .The name Cofita- chiqui seems to prove by i tsel f that these

towns were inhabited by Yuchi Indians ; for i t containskowita , the Yuch i term for Indian, and apparen tly Indianof our own tribe. This term appears in all the vocabula

ries : kawita, man, male ; kohwita, ko - ita, plural kohino

’

h,

man ; kota, man, contracted from kow ’ ta, kowita alsoin compounds : kowet - ten- choo, e/ziqf; kohitta makinnung,elziefof a people. The terms for the parts of the human bodyall begin with kO The second par t of the name, - chiqui , isa term foreign to Yuchi , but found in all the dialects of

Maskoki in the funct ion of lzouse, dwelling , ( tchfiku, tchoko ,and in the eastern or Apalachian dialects, tchiki) and has tobe rendered here in the collec t ive sense of lzouses , town.

Local names to be compared with Cofitachiqui are Cofachi,

fu rther sou th , and Acapachiqui, a tract of land near Apalache.

The sign ificat ion of the name Yutchi, plu ral Yutchiha, bywhich this people cal ls i tsel f, is unknown . All the surrounding Indian tribes cal l them Yuch i , with the exception of theL enapi or Delawares , who style them Tahogaléwi.But there are two sides to this quest ion . We find the local

name Rawita, eviden tly the above term , twice on middleChatahuchi river , and also in Cofetalaya, set tlements of theCha’hta Indians in Tala and Green counties , Mississippi .D id any Yuchi ever l ive in these local i t ies in earl ier epochs?Garcilaso de Vega, Flor ida II I , c . 1 0 , states that Juan Ortiz ,who had been in the Florid ian peninsula before, acted as

in terpreter at Cofitachiqui. This raises the query, did the

nat ives of th is “ capital ” speak Creek or Yuchi? Whowil l at tempt to give an i rrefutable answer to this queryThe existence of a queen or cac ica, that is, of a chief

’

s


widow invested with the authori ty o f a chief, seems to showthat Cofetacque town or confederacy did not belong to the

Maskoki connection , for we find no similar instance in Creektowns . Among the Yuchi , succession is in the male l ine, butthe H i tchit i possess a legendary tradit ion , according to whichthe fi rst chief that ever stood at the head of thei r commun itywas a woman .

To determine the extent of the lands inhabited or claimedby the Yuchi in de Soto ’s time, is next to imposs ible. At alater period they l ived on the eastern side of the Savannahriver, and on its western s ide as far as Ogeechee river, andupon t racts above and below Augus ta, Georgia. These tractswere claimed by them as late as 1 736 . John Filson

,in h is

D iscovery etc. of Kentucky ” vol . II , 84—8 7 givesa l ist of thirty Indian tribes , and a statement on Yuch itowns , which he must have obtained from a much oldersource ° “ Uchees occupy four different places of residence,at the head of St . John 's , the fork of St . Mary ’s , the head ofCannouchee and the head of St . Till is.‘ These rivers rise onthe borders of Georgia and run separately in to the ocean.

”

To Cannouchee answers a place Canosi, mentioned in Juande la Vandera

’

s narrat ive ( 1 569) the name , however, isCreek and not Yuchi . Hawkins states that formerly Yuchiwere set tled in smal l villages at Ponpon , Saltketchers and

Silver Blufl'

, S . C. ,and on the Ogeechee river, G a. In 1 739

a Yuchi town existed on the Savannah river, twen ty -five milesabove Ebenez er, which is in Eflingham county, Georgia, nearSavannah City (Jones , Tomochichi, p . 1 1 7 see next page) .From notices contained in the firs t volume of Urlsperger

’

s

Ausfiihrliche Nach r icht ,” pp . 845. 850

—851 , we ,gather

the facts that th is Yuch i town was five miles above the Apa

lachicola Fort,which stood in the P allachucla savanna,

”

and that i ts inhabi tants celebrated an annual busk , whichwas at t imes visi ted by the colonists . Governor Oglethorpe1 The present Satil la river ; falsely written St. Illa, Santilla, St. Tillie.

YUCHL 21

concluded an al l iance with this town , and when he exchangedpresen ts to confi rm the agreement made, he obtained skinsfrom these Indians . Rev. Boltz ius , the minister of the Salzburger emigrants , settled in the vicin i ty, depicts thei r character in dark colors ; he states “ they are much incl ined toRobbing and Steal ing ,

” but was evidently influenced by the

Yamassi and Yamacraw in their vicin i ty , who hated them as

a race foreign to themselves . Of these he says, these Creeksare Honest , Serviceable and D isin terested .

” 1

The reason why the Yuch i people gradual ly left their Old

seats and passed over to Chatahuchi and Flint rivers isstated as follows by Benj . Hawkins , United States Agent

among the Creeks in his instruct ive “ Sketch of the CreekCountryIn 1 729 ,

“ Captain El l ick , an old ch ief of Kasi’

hta,

married three Yuchi women and brought them to Kas i’hta.

This was greatly disl iked by his townspeople, and he was

prevai led upon to move across Chatahuchi river, opposi te towhere Yuchi town was in Hawkins’ t ime ; he set tled therewith his three brothers , two of whom had in termarried withYuchis . After this , the ch ief collected all the Yuchi people,gave them lands on the site of Yuch i town , and there theysettled .

Hawkins eulogiz es the people by stat ing that they are morecivi l , orderly and industrious than thei r neighbors ( the LowerCreeks) , the men more at tached to thei r wives

, and thesemore chas te. He estimates the number of thei r warriorsgun -men including those of the three branch villages

,

at about two hundred and fifty. These branch towns wereIntatchkalgi, beaver-dam people ”

Padshilfiika,“ pigeon

roost and Tokogalgi,“tad - pole people ”

, on Flin t river1 Extract from Rev. B's Journal ; London, 1 734, 1 2mo, p . 37.

Collections of the Georgia Historical Society , vol . III , part first, pp.

6 1 - 63 (Savannah ,See below : List of Creek Settlements.


and i ts side creeks ; while a few Yuchi had gone to theUpper Creeks and set tled there at Sawané gi. Yuchi

, the

main town , lay on the wes tern bank of Chatahuchi river, ona tr ibutary cal led Yuchi creek , ten and one- hal f miles belowKawita Talahass i, and two miles above Osutchi. Anotherwater course, cal led Uchee river,

” runs from the wes t in toOklokoni river , or “ Yellow Water,

” in the southwes terncorner of the State of Georgia. Morse, in h is l ist of Seminole set tlements ment ions a Yuchi town near Mikasuki , Florida.

The main Yuchi town on Chatahuchi river was buil t in a

vast plain rising from the river. W . Bartram , who saw.i t

in 1 775, depic ts i t as the largest , most compac t , and bestsi tuated Indian town he ever saw; the habi tat ions were largeand neatly buil t , the wal ls of the houses consisted of a woodenframe , lathed and plas tered inside and outside with a reddishclay, and roofed with cypress bark or shingles . He estimated the number of the inhabitan ts at one thousand orfi fteen hundred . They were usually at variance with the

Maskoki confederacy, and “ did not mix ” with its people,but were wise enough to unite with them against a commonenemy (Travels , pp . 386 .

The early reports may often have unconsciously includedthe Yuchi among the Apalachi

‘and ApalatchI

'

Ikla. Amongthe chiefs who accompanied Tomochichi, miko of the Yamacraw Indians , to England in 1 733 , was Umphichi or

Umpeachy,“a Uchee chief from P alachocolas .

” 2

William Bartram , who traveled through these parts from1 773 to 1 778 , and publ ished his Travels many years later

,

‘

calls them Uche or Savannuca, which is the Creek SawanOgi,or “ dwel lers upon Savannah river . ” This name Savannuca,and many equally sounding names, have caused much con

1 Cf. Gallatin, Synopsis, p . 95.

3 Chas . C. Jones, Tomochichi, pp . 58 . 83 .

Published Philadelphia, 1 79 1 .


t ions a tradition , according to which “ the ancient seats of theYuchi were cast of the Coosa, and probably of the Chatahuchiriver, and that they consider themselves as the most ancientinhabitants of the country .

”Of which coun try? If the

whole coun try is mean t , which was at the dawn of historyheld by Maskoki tribes, the name of the Yaz oo river may beadduced as an argument for the truth of this tradit ion , foryasu , yashu is the Yuchi term for leaf and any leaf- ba tting

tree, even pines ( from ya, wood, tree) , and Rawita has beenmentioned above. From a thorough comparat ive study ofthe Yuchi language, the Maskoki dialects and the localnomenclature of the country, we can alone expect any rel iable informat ion upon the extent and the area of terri toryanciently held by the Yuchi ; but at present i t is safes t tolocate their priscan home upon both sides of LowerSavannah river.

CHEROKL

Intercourse between the Creek and the Cheroki Indiansmust have taken place in prehistoric t imes , as ev idenced bylocal names , and more so by Cheroki terms adopted into theC reek language .The Cheroki , or more correctly , Tsalagi nat ion is essen

tially a hill people ; their numerous set tlements were dividedin to two great sections by the watershed ridge Of the Alle

ghany mountains , i n their language Unéga katus i wlzite,w/zitislz of which even now a portion is called“ Smoky Mountains . ” Northwest of that ridge lay the

Cheroki vi llages of the Over/till settlement, Otari , Otal i up,

above’

along the Great and Little Tennessee rivers and theirtributaries , while southeast of i t , in the mountains of NorthCarolina and on the head waters of the Georgia rivers , extended the towns of the L ower Clzeroki, or B rat i ( in Cherokié lati, below,

netlzer) . There were also a number of Cherokivillages in the northern parts of Alabama State, and du Pratzdist inctly states, that the Ché raquies

” l ived east of the

CHEROKI . 25

Ab é - ikas . 1 While call ing a person of thei r own people by thename Of Atsalagi, in the plu ral Anitsalagi, they comprise all

the Creeks under the name of Kusa, from Coosa r iver , or

more probably from the ancien t,far- famed town of the same

name : Agt’

rsa, K I'

Isa, Gi'

lsa, a Creekperson ; Anigt'

Jsa,the Creek

people; G I'

Isa uniwoni’

hsti, tlze Creek language.

The Cheroki language was spoken in many dialec ts beforethe people emigrated to the lands al lot ted to them in the

northeas tern part of the Indian Territory, and even now a

difference may be observed between the Western Cherokiand the Eas tern or Mountain Cheroki , which is the languageof the people that remained in the hills of Western Nor thCarol ina and Eastern Tennessee.

2 Mr . Horat io Hale hasrecently demonstrated the affi n i ty of Cheroki with the Iro

quois stock ;3 Wendat and Tuscarora form other dialect ic

branches of i t , showing much closer relat ion to the I roquoisd ialects of Western New York than Cheroki . Thirty - two

terms of the Keowe dialec t (Lower Cheroki) , taken down byB . Hawkins , are embodied in an unpublished vocabulary

,

which is in the posses sion of the Amer ican PhilosophicalSociety in Ph iladelph ia.

‘ Another ancien t dialec t is that ofKitOwa or Kitt’Ia this is the name by which the Cheroki areknown among several northern t ribes, as Delawares and Shawano (cf. below) ; i t was also the name of a secret societyamong the Cheroki , which existed at the t ime of the Secessionwar.

The Cheroki Indians are bodily wel l developed,rather

1 L e Page du Pratz , Hist . de la Louisiane, II , p . 208 sq . (Paris , 1 758)A l ’est des Abé - ikas sont les Chéraquis .

”

3 The Mountain Cheroki are centering around Quallatown,Haywood

county , N . C. , and an United States agent is residing in their country .

Their population is about 1600 ; others live in Northern Georgia.

H . Hale, “ Indian Migrations , as evidenced by language.

” AmericanAntiquarian, vol. V , pp. 18—28 and 108- 124

The name Keowe is taken from a narcotic plant used for catchingfish , which grew in the vicinity of that Village.

8


tal l in stature and of an irri table temper, flashing up easily .

In the eighteenth century they were engaged in constantwars, and from their mountain fastnesses made sall ies upon allthe surrounding Indian tribes . The Iroquois or NorthernIndians ” at tacked them in thei r own country, as they alsodid the Kataba and Western Algonkins . A warl ike spiri tpervaded the whole Cheroki nat ion , and even women participated in thei r raids and fights . ’

Wm . Bart ram states , that the Cheroki men had a l ighterand more ol ive complexion than the contiguous Creek tribes ,adding that some of their young gi rls were nearly as fai rand blooming as European women . H . Timberlake, whov isi ted a port ion of thei r villages ( on Great Tennessee river)i n 1 762, represents them as of a middle stature, st raight , wel lbuil t , with smal l heads and feet , and of an ol ive color

,

though general ly pain ted . They shaved the hai r of thei rheads , and many of the old people had i t plucked out bythe roots , the scalp - lock only remain ing . The cars were sl i tand stretched to an enormous c ircumference, an operat ionwhich caused them incredible pain and was adopted fromthe Shawano or some other northern nat ion . The womenwore the hair long , even reach ing to the knees , but pluckedi t out from all the other parts of the body, especially thelooser part of the sex (Memoirs , pp . 49 Polygamy thenexisted among them . They erected houses extending somet imes from sixty to seventy feet in length , but rarely oversixteen in width , and covered them with narrow boards .Some of these houses were two stories high , and a hot - houseor sudatory stood close to every one of these capaciousst ructures . They also made bark canoes and canoes ofpoplar ’ or pine, from th irty to forty feet long and about

Lieut . H .Timberlake, Memoirs (London, 1 765), pp. 70. 7 1 . Urlsper.

ger, Nachricht, I , p . 658 , where they are called Tzerrickey Indianer.”D . Coxe calls them Sulluggees .

The term forpoplar , tstyu, is also the term for canoe and for trough.

CHEROKL 27

two feet broad , with flat bottoms and S ides . Pottery wasmade by them of red and wh i te clay (l bid . , pp . 59

The male populat ion was divided into a class of head -men

or ch iefs , recruited by popular elect ion , the selec tion beingmade among the most valorous men and the best orators intheir counc i ls ; and i n two classes of yeomen the

“ warriors ” and the “ fighting men, these being in feriort o the warriors .D ist inc t ion in reward of exploi ts was conferred through

the honorary t i tles of Outacity,“ man killer , ” Kolona,

raven ”and “ Beloved , names to which parallels will be

found among the Creeks . (fbid . , pp. 70 ,

Seven clans or gentes exist among the Cheroki , and manyof them observe to the present day the regulat ions imposedby the gentile organiz ation . They will not marry in to theirown gens or phratry , for instance. The to tems of thesegentes (anatéya

‘we, gens , clan) were obtained in 1 880 fromMr. R ichard Wolf, delegate of the people to theUnited Statesgovernmen t , as follows

1 . Aniweyahiaanatéya°we, wolf gens , the most importan t

of all.2 . Ane- igit i anataya

nwe,long hair gens.

3 . Anigodegé’we

,the gens to which Mr . Wolf belongs .

They can marry in to all gentes , except in to the long hair

clan , because this contains thei r“aunts

4. AnitsI'

skwa, bird gens .

5. Aniwo'

te,paint gens; clay ; aniwo’

ti,paint) .6 . Anigo -ulé

,anikulé , acorn gens .

7 . AnisahOne, blue gens .Besides the fact that gentes Nos . 2 and 3 belong to one

phratry , the other phratries and their names were not remembered by the i nformant. The prefix ani marks the plural ofanimate beings .The l ist of totemic gentes printed in Lewis H . Mo rgan

,

Ancien t Society, p . 1 64, differs from the above in giving ten


gentes , two being ext inct , and one or two being perhapsph ratr ies and not gentes

1 . [Vol],aniwhiya. 2. R edpaint, aui te. 3 . L ongprairie,anigatagani

’

h. 4 . D eaf (a bird) , dsuliniana. 5. H olly tree,

anisdasdi. 6 . D eer, anikawi’

h. 7 . B lue, anisahOkni. 8 .

L ong hair , anikat ai. 9 . Acorn, anidsfila (extinct). 1 0 .

B ird, anidsé skwa (extinct) .The names of several Cheroki towns are ment ioned by the

historians of de Soto ’s expedit ion , which traversed a portionof their country by Adai r , Timberlake and by Wm . Bar tram ,

who has left a long l ist of their set tlements .The rare publicat ion : Weston (Pl . Chas . Jennet t) , Docu

ments connected with the H isto ry of South Carol ina, London ,1 856, 4to, contains an art icle by de Brahm ,

which gives anethnologic sketch and many other part iculars of the SouthernIndians , and espec ially refers to the Cheroki (pp . 21 8

The English - Cheroki war, from February to August , 1 760 ,

is narrated pp . 208- 2 1 3 .

The t radit ion that the Cheroki , or rather a portion ofthem ,

were found l iving in caves , is substant iated by the

appellat ion Cave-dwel lers,” given to them by the Northern

Indians . The Comanches cal l them Eb ikuita ; the Senecas ,Uyz

'

ida, cave-men theWendat, Uwatayo—rOno, from uwatayo,wh ich in their language means “ hole in the ground

, cave ,

”

the Shawano cal l them Katowa, plural Katowagi; and the

Delawares by the same name, G atohua (Barton , Appendix,p . 8 : G attOchwa) . This refers to K itOwa, one of thei r townspreviously ment ioned . Caves of the old Cheroki countrywere examined by archaeologists , and some of them showedmarks of former occupat ion , especially caves in Sullivan andHawkins count ies , Tennessee. This reminds us of the Trog

lodytae and Mandritae of ancient t imes , of the Cliff-Dwel lerson Upper Colorado river, NewMexico , and ofother Americant ribes , which l ived in caves . Thus a Shast i tribe, theWeo

how,are reported to have received th is name from a stone

ARKANSAS. 29

house or rock dwel l ing situated in thei r count ry , eas t ofShasta R iver and south of the Siskiyou Mountains . lLists of the ancien t Cheroki towns will be found in W .

Bartram ’s Travels , p . 3 7 1—3 72 ( forty - three) in H . Timber

lake (h is map is also reproduced in Jefferys Topography ofN . A. , an atlas in fol. , and in J . Gerar W . de Brahm ,

H ist . of the Prov . of Georgia, Wormsloe 1 849 , fol . , p . 54.

ARKANSAS .

Nonle of the numerous Algonkin tribes l ived in the immediate neighborhood of the Maskoki family of Indians, but ofthe Dakotan stock the Arkansas (originally Akansa— the

Akansea of Father Gravier) , dwel t in close proximity,and

had frequen t in tercou rse with this Southern nat ion .

P énicaut relates 2 that the French commander, Lemoyned

’

Iberville, sai led up the Mississippi river , and sixty leaguesabove the mouth of theYaz oo found the mouth of the Arkansas river ; eigh t leagues above, on the same western shore,was the nat ion of the Arkansas , and in their town were twoother “ nat ions ,

” cal led Torimas and Kappas . By thesewarl ike and hunting tribes he was received in a friendlymanner. The men are described as s tout and thick - set

(gros et trapus) , the women as pret ty and l ight - complexioned.

Imahao , ano ther Arkansas village, is men tioned in Margry

IV, 1 79 . The affluen t of the Mississippi on wh ich the

Arkansas were settled was , according to D . Coxe, Carolana,p . 1 1 , the Ousoutowy river : another name for Arkansas river.From Rev. J . Owen Dorsey , who makes a special s tudy ofall

the Dakota tribes, I Obtained the following oral informat ion ,founded on his personal intercourse with individuals of the

Kappa tribeAkansa is the Algonkin name by which the Kapa, Quapa

1 Cf. Ind . Affairs’ Report , 1864 , p. 1 20.

1 Margry, P . , Dé couvertes et Etablissements des Francais dans l’ouest etdans le Sud de l‘Amé rique Septentrionale, Paris , 1876, etc.

, V , 402.

30 THE SOUTHERN FAMIL IESQ

were called by the eas tern Indians, as Ill inois, etc. Theycal l themselves Ugazpa and once l ived in four vi llages , twoof wh ich were on Miss issippi , two on Arkansas river , neari ts mouth : Their towns , though now transferred to the

Indian Terri tory, northeas tern angle, have preserved the

same names :1 . Ugal paz ti or

‘ real Kapa.

’ Ugazpa means downstream ,

’ j ust as O’maha means up stream .

’

2 Tiwadima‘ , cal led Toriman by French authors .

3 . Uz utiuhe, corrupted in to O’

sotchoue, O’

sochi, Southois

by the French authors . Probably means village uponlow- land level . ’

“4 . Ta1wa°zhika or smal l village corrupted in to Topinga,

Tonginga, D onginga by the French .

“ The P acaha ‘ province ’ of de Soto ’s historians is a namei nverted from Capaba, which is Ugazpa. The form Quepa isincorrect , for Kapa (or Kapaha of L a Sal le) , which is abbreviated from Ugazpa.

”

In 1 721 L aHarpe saw three of thei r v illages on the Miss issippi river, and not iced snake worship among these Indians .

TAENsA.

I . THE NORTHERN TAENSA .

On account of the recen t discovery of their consonantic language, which proves to be disconnected from any

other abo riginal tongue spoken in North America, a peculiarin terest at taches itsel f to the tribe of the Teensa Indians ,whose cabins stood in Tensas county , Louisiana, borderingeast on Mississippi river . The Tensas r iver, in FrenchB ayou Tens a , which joins the Washi ta river at Trin i ty Ci ty

,

after forming a prodigious number of bends , and flowingpast a multi tude of art ificial mounds , st il l keeps up the

memory of th is extinc t t ribe.

In March 1 700 , the French cOmmander L . d’

Iberville

1 cf. D . Coxe, Carolans , pp. 1 1 . 13.


cf. p . 9 1 : hastri to figla, make war ; has trir warrior, man ;has triryipeople, tribe; but Tensagini also occurs in the texts ,which would point to an extensive maiz e cul ture.

The Taensa were sun worshipers , and had a temple withidols and a perpetual fire. When d

’

Iberville sojournedamong them , l ightn ing struck thei r temple and destroyed it ,upon which the mothers sacrificed thei r infants , to appeasethe wrath of the incensed dei ty , by throwing them into theburn ing edifice (Margry IV, 4 1 4, etc . V , The peoplethen rubbed thei r faces and bodies with earth. Nothingdefinite is known about thei r gentes , phratries and totems .Several French authors represent them as speaking theNaktchelanguage (which is un true) and as being of the same nat ion . l

D’

Iberville states that thei r language differed from that ofthe Huma tribe .

The remnants of a tribe ca l led Mosopellea, probably ofIl l inois -Algonkin origin and previously resid ing west of theIsle of Tamaroa,

” on western shore of Miss issippi river,joined the Taensa , and were met there in 1 682 by Tont i .They had been almost ann ihilated by the Iroquois . ’

The Taensa had , at one t ime , formed an al liance with theKoroa, then on Yaz oo river, and another with the ArkansasIndians .TheTaensa grammar speaks ofa northern and of a southern

,

more pol ished dialect, but does not locate them topographi

cally . The only word of Taensa wh ich I have found to agreewith any other language, is ista ey e ; i t also occurs in SouthernDakotan dialects .

1 Grammaire et Voc . Taensa, Introafl , pp . 1111. xiv. Compare alsoMargry , D ee. et Etaol., I , 556—557 , 566 -

568 , 600- 602, 609—6 10, 6 16 ;

IV , 4 14. Their temple , described by le Sieur de Tonty (traveling withla Sal le in 1682) in French , Hist. Coll . of L a. , I , pp . 6 1 . 64.

Margry I , 6 10. Mosopolea, ioid . II , 237 ; Monsopela, on the mapin D . Coxe, Carolana.

TAENSA. 33

II . THE SOUTHERN TAENSA.

In early colonial t imes a port ion of the Northern Taensa ,

driven from their homes on the Taensa river by the rage of

the Ch icasa , fled to the Mobilians . The French set tled themon the western side ofMobile bay, below Fort S t . Louis, andth i rty miles above Fort Condé , wh ich stood on the site of

the present c i ty of Mobile.

1 The French cal led them “ les

pet i ts Taénsas i n contradist inct ion to the “ great (orno rthern) Taénsas ,

”

on Mississippi and Taensa rivers . Aboutthe middle of the eigh teenth century one hund red of thei rcabins stood northof the French fort St . Louis , and also northof the Tohome Indian set tlement . The Taensa were thenspeaking their nat ive language and , besides this, a corruptCh icasa dialect , called the Mobil ian language by the French .

2

Subsequently they must have removed from there to the

eastern channel , for Bar tram ,Travels , pp . 40 1 . 403 , describes

Taensa there as a pret ty high b lufi'

, on the eastern channelof the great Mobile river, about thirty miles above FortCondé , or c i ty of Mobile, at the head of the bay

with many art ificial mounds of earth and other ru ins . During the wars of 1 8 1 3

- 1 5 the adjacent country is called the

Tensaw count ry .

”

I t is not unl ikely that these Taensa were identical wi th the

pet its Taé nsas seen by Lemoyne d ’

Iberville at the Humatown in March 1 700 , and described by him as migratory

,

but l iving most of the t ime at three days’ distance west ofHuma, and then warring against the Bayogoulas . Theygained thei r sustenance by hunting , though buffaloes werescarce in thei r country, and were men of a fine physique

(Margry IV, In 1 702 they defeated the Bayogoulasand burn t thei r village on Mississippi river ; the Bayogoulas

1 At that time they were warring unsuccessful ly against the HumaP énicaut (in Margry V , 508 . 509 ) saw them at Manchac.

3 T. jefl'

erys , Hist. of French Dominions in America ; London, 176 1 ; I ,p. 162, sq.


fled to the French fort on that river, then commanded byMr . St . Den is . If identical with the Taensa on Mobi le r iver ,these figh ts of thei rs must have occurred during thei r passagefrom the North to the bay of Mobile.

111 . THE TANG IPAHOA.

A third tribe , wh ich may have stood in some connectionwi th the two tribes above, are the Tang

-

zpalzoa I ndian: set tledin various places east of New Orleans , espec ial ly on Tangipahoa river, in southeastern Louisiana. A French authorstates that they formed one of the seven villages of the Acolapissa. The name is wri t ten in different ways , and is in ter

preted by Gov . Allen Wright as “ those who gather maiz estalks ,

” from té ‘ dshe maiz e ; api stalk, coo; ayua {key gather.

P énicaut defines the name differently , for he states (Margry

V , 387) we found (northwes t of L ake Pontchart rain) a

river , Tandgepao, which in the Indian signifies bled olaae.

’

The Taensapaoa t ribe, on the river of the same name, is referred to in Bartram , Travels , p . 422 ; cf. p . 423 . We haveno not ice concerning the language spoken by this t ribe,which was

,perhaps , incorpo rated in to the Cha

’h ta l iving nowaround NewOrleans ; thus we are unable to decide whetherthey spoke Cha’hta, l ike the other Acolapissa, or anothertongue. TheTangibao t ribewas destroyed by the Oumas ,

”

as stated in a passage ofMargry ( IV,1 68) by which is mean t ,

that they were scat tered and their tribal connect ion disrupted .

NAKTCHE.

Of the Lower Miss iss ippi t ribes the most powerful andpopulous was that of the Naktche, set tled at the beginn ingof the eigh teenth cen tury in n ine vi llages on and about St .Catherine creek (L Ukfi -akula

.in Cha’h ta “

clay- digging

plaee,” to daub houses with) , in a beaut iful and fert i le coun

t ry . This stream wends its way first south , then wes t , in a

semi- circular course, around the present c i ty of Natchez ,

NAKTCHE. 35

Miss issippi , and runs at an average distance of three to fourmiles from i t . Other Naktche villages existed in i ts vicin i ty .

Naktche is the correct form of the tribal name, though th ispeople appears to have cal led itsel f by some other appel lation .

Natchez is the old - fashioned plural adopted from Frencho rthography ; we migh t j ust as well wri te Iroquoiz , Islinoizor Adayez , instead of the terminal - s now designat ing the

plu ral in French . The Cheroki Indians cal l a Nache, Natebeor Naktche person A'

noz tse, A’nnofl se, the people or t ribe

Aninol tse, shortened into Ani’

htse, which proves that a guttural has been el ided from the present form of the name.

Isalakti, from whom Albert Gallat in obtained a vocabularyof the language, cal led himsel f a Nahktse, not a Natche chief.The name is of Shetimasha origin , I have reasons to as sume.

Naksh in that language means one t/zat is in a hurry , one run

ning , naksh asi, l abbrev . nék sh warrior ; and the earl ies tFrench explorers may have heard that name from the Shet imasha Indians set tled on the Mississippi , where Bayou L afourche

,also cal led the river of the Shetimasha, branches Off

from i t . Should the name belong to the Ch icasa t radelanguage,we might th ink of the Cha

’h ta adverb : naks ika asia’e,away from, referring to the si te of the Naktche villages at

some distance from the great “ water - road ,”the Mississippi

river .The Naktche tr ibe owes its celebr i ty and almost romantic

fame to several causes : their towns were populous , the government more cen t ral iz ed than that of the surrounding nat ivepopulat ions ; the French set tled in thei r vicini ty, and hencetheir authors have left to posteri ty mo re in format ion concerning thei r confederacy than concern ing other t r ibes ; thei rstubborn resistance to French encroachmen ts gave them a

high reputat ion for bravery ; thei r rel igious customs , centeringin a highly developed sun -worship

,made of them an object

Literally , “a hurrying man. In the sign language of the Mississippiplains , the sign forjig/rang or battle is the same as for riding a barre.


of curious in terest and far- going ethnologic speculat ion forthe white colonists , whose views on the Naktche we mustreceive with the utmost caution .

L . d’

Iberville reports , that at the t ime of h is v is i t (March1 699 ) the villages of the Naktche made up one town only,and formed a complex of contiguous v illages cal led Thé loé lor Thécoé l1 (Margry IV,

The annalis t P énicaut, who visited these parts in 1 704,

s tates that the n ine villages were si tuated in a delightfulcountry, swarming with

‘

bufl'

aloes , drained by rivulets and

partly wooded . The village or residence of the head ch ief,llze Sun, lay one league from the Mississ ippi river , and threeother vi llages were one brook

,at a d istance of hal f a league

from each other. He alludes to thei r human sacrifices , thefrequency of infant icide, and gives descriptions of thei rtemple, perpetual fire, their mare/re fie: cadavres and

art icles of d ress . The house of the Sun was large enough tocontain four thousand persons ; he had female servants calledonleltil tie/ton, and th irty male at tendan ts orloner, the Allouez of other chroniclers . Mother - right prevailed among them (Margry V, 444

The Taensa guide, who accompan ied d ’

Iberville to the

Naktc’

he tribe in 1 699 , furn ished him a l ist of the n inevillages, thei r names being given in the Chicasa t rade language . I presume that they are given in the topographicalorder as they followed each other on St . Catharine creek ,from i ts mouth upward , since the Naches village or res idence of the Sun was distan t one league only from the Mississippi river. We are not acquain ted with the names givento these vil lages in the Naktche language. The etymologiesof the Cha’hta language were obtained from Allen Wrightthe suffixed word - ougoula is the Cha

’hta Okla people, trio} .

1 The handwriting of this name is indistinct , but in the sequel , whereverthis name is mentioned , Margry prints it Thé loé l. There can scarcely beany doubt of its identity with Thoucoue, the seventh village in the list.

NAKTCHE. 37

1 . Nachesz . P ochougoula pond- lily people, from Cha’hta pantchi

pona’ lily .

3 . Ousagoucoulas ;“ hickory people, from Cha’hta u'ssak,

Ossak hickory .

4. Cogoucoulas swanpeople, from Okok swan.

5. Yatanocas ;

6 . Ymacachas ; almost homonymous with the Arkansasvillage Imahao, mentioned above.

7 . Thoucoue ; probably iden t ical with Thé loé l (cf. above)and the Thioux of later authors .

8. Tougoulas wood orforestpeople, from i t i wood .

9 . Achougoulas ;“pipe people

,from ashunga pipe, l i ter

al ly, “the thing they smoke from cf. shungal i

I smokefrom.

Although these names are considerably frenchified in theiro rthography , the meaning of some admits of no doubt . WhenI v isi ted Natchez c i ty in January 1 882, I was in formed thatthe Wh i te Apple vi llage, called Apilua (Vpelois) and .men

tioned by L e Page du Pratz , is supposed to have existedtwel ve to fifteen miles southeas t of the city . The White Earthvillage and the vil lage of the Meal were other sett lemen ts oftheirs . Owing to incessan t rains , I could not explore the si testo thei r full exten t , but found a flat mound south of St . Catharine’s c reek , with a diameter of thirty - two feet and perfectlyc ircular , which lay at the same distance from theMississippi asgiven above for the residence of the Sun . Col. J . F. H . Clai

borne’s [ fistoty of M ississ ippi, vol. I, 40

—47, gives valuable

extracts from French archives , poin ting to the real si tes ofthe Naktche habi tat ions . The colossal mound of Sel tz ertown stands but a shor t distance from the creek al luded to

,

and is fourteen miles from Natchez ci ty to the northeas t .The set tlemen t of the French on the heights of Natchez ,

the growing an imosi ty of the nat ives against the in truders,the

th ree successive wars , the massacre of the colonists in Novem


her, 1 729 , and the final dispersion of the tribe in February1 730, are wel l-known h istoric facts and need not be repeatedin th is volume. The disorgan iz ed warriors retreated withtheir famil ies to different parts of the country . One partyfled across Mississ ippi river to some local i ty near Tr in i tyCity , L a where they entrenched themselves , but were at

tacked , defeated and partly captured by a body of Frenchtroops two years later. Another party reached the Chicasacountry and was granted a home and protect ion by that t ribebut the revengeful French colonists declared war upon the

hospi table Ch icasa for shel ter ing their mortal enemies , andinvaded their lands by way of the Yaz oo river in 1 736, butwere compelled to retreat after suffering considerable loss .Fort Tombigbee, construc ted in 1 735, served as a second basefor the French operat ions . Further French - Chicasa warsoccurred in 1 739

-

40 and i nLater on , we find their remnants among the Creeks , who

had provided them with seats on Upper Coosa river, andincorporated them in to their confederacy . They buil t a

village cal led Naktche, and a part of them went to reside i nthe neighboring Ab ikudshi town . Naktche town lay, in B .

Hawkins ’ t ime on a creek Of the same name, join ingCoosa river sixty miles above i ts confluence with Tallapoosar iver, and harbored from fifty to one hund red warriors

(Hawkins, p . A number of Naktche families , speakingtheir paternal language, now live in the hilly parts of theCheroki Nat ion , Indian Terri tory .

A body of Indians, cal led by French and Engl ish wri tersThioux and G rigras , remained in the vicin ity of the Natchezcolony after the departure of the Naktche Ind ians , who hadbeen the ruling tr ibe of the confederacy. I t is doubtfulwhether these two divisions were of foreign or of Naktcheorigin

,though the lat ter seems improbable. The G rigras

1 Cf. Adair, History , p. 354 sqq. On Fort Tombigbee, ibid ., pp. 285,


the Taensa Indians , at some distance from the Chicasa, and1 70 leagues from the Gulf of Mexico . When d ’

Iberville

ascended the Yaz oo river in the same year, he found a villageof this tribe on its righ t (or western) bank , fou r days

’ t ravelfrom the Natchez landing . Seven villages were seen uponthis river, which is navigable for sixty leagues . The Tonicavillage, the lowest of them , was two days

’ t ravel from Thysia,the uppermost (Margry IV, 1 80 . 362. 39 8 ; V , L a

Harpe ment ions the establishmen t of a mission house amongthe Tonica on Yaz oo river. ‘

In 1 706, when expecting to become involved in a confl ictwith the Chicasa and Alibamu Indians , the Tonica tribe, or

a part of i t , fled southward to the towns of the Huma, andmassacred a number of these near the site where NewOrleanswas buil t afterwards (French , H ist . Coll . of L a.

, III ,The Tunica Old Fields ” lay in Tunica county

,Missis

sippi State, opposite Helena, Arkansas . Cf. Cha’hta.

They subsequently l ived at the Tonica Bluffs, on the eas tshore of the Miss issippi river, two leagues below the influx of

the Red river. T . Jefferys , who in 1 76 1 gave a descript ionof thei r v illage and chief’ s house, states that they had settledon a hil l near the R iver of the Tunicas ,

” wh ich comes fromthe Lake of the Tunicas , and that in close vicini ty two othervillages were exist ing (H ist . of French Dominions , I , 1 45

Th . Hutchins , Louisiana and West Florida, Phila.,

1 784 , p . 44, locates them a few miles below that spot , opposi te Pointe Coupée and ten miles below the Pascagoulas , onMiss issippi river. So does also Baud ry de L oz ieres in 1 802,

who speaks of a populat ion of one hundred and twenty men.

In 1 8 1 7, a portion of the tribe, i f not the whole, had goneup the Red r iver and set tled at Avoyel les , ninety miles above

1 French , Hist . Coll . III, 16 ; cf. Margry V, 525. The names of thesevillages to be given under Chicasa, q. v.

2This was probably the placewhere L e Page du Pratz saw them (about1 720 or “

vis -a-vis de la Riviere Rouge, ” II , 220- 221 .

ADAI. 41

i ts confluence with the Mississippi . A group of these Indiansis now in Calcas ieu county , Louisiana, in the neighborhood of Lake Charles City.

A separate chapter has been devoted to th is tribe , becausethere is a strong probabil i ty that thei r language differed en

tirely from the rest of the Southern tongues . L e Page duPratz

,in confirming this statement , test ifies to the exist

ence of the sound R in thei r language, which occurs nei therin Naktche nor in the Maskoki dialec ts or Shetimasha ( II ,220 We possess no vocabulary of i t , and even the

t r ibal name belongs to Chicasa : tunnig post, pillar, support,probably pos t of terr i tor ial demarcation of thei r lands on

the Yaz oo river . The only direc t in t imat ion which I possesson that tongue is a correspondence of Alphonse L . Pinart

,

who saw some Tonica individuals , and inferred from thei rterms that they might belong to the great Pan i stock of theWestern plains .

ADAL

Of th is smal l and obscure Indian communi ty men tion ismade much earl ier than of all the other tribes hi therto spokenof in this volume, for Cabeca de Vaca, in h is N aufragios ,ment ions them among the inland tribes as Atayos . In thel ist of eigh t Caddo villages , given by a Taensa guide toL . d

’Iberville on his expedit ion up the Red river (Marchthey figure as the Natao (Margry IV ,

The Adai , Ata- i,Hata- i

,Adayes ( incorrectly cal led Adaize)

seem to have pers isted at thei r ancient home, where theyformed a tr ibe belonging to the Caddo confederacy . Charlevoix (H is t . de la Nouvelle France, ed . Shea VI

, p . 24)relates that a Span ish mission was founded among the Adaesin 1 7 15. A Spanish fo rt existed there, seven leagues wes t ofNatchitoches , as late as the commencemen t of the nineteen thcentury . Baud ry de L oz ieres puts thei r populat ion at one

hundred men and Morse ( 1 8 22) at thirty, who then

4


passed thei r days in idleness on the Bayou Pierre of Redriver. Even at the present time they are remembered as a

former d ivision of the Caddo confederacy, and cal led Hata- i

by the Caddo , who are set tled in the southeastern part of theIndian Terri tory .

A list of about 300 Adarwords was gathered in 1 802 byMartin Duralde, which proves i t to be a vocal ic languageindependent of any other, though a fewaffini ties are t raceablewith the Pani d ialects . The o rthography of that vocabularycannot , however, be fully rel ied on . The original is in thel ibrary of theAmerican Philosophical Soc iety, in Ph iladelphia.

Rob . G . Latham , in his “Opuscula ; Essays, chiefly philological ,

”

etc . , London 1 860 ; pp . 402-

404, has comparedAdahi words with the corresponding terms of other NorthAmerican languages , but wi thout arriving at a definite resul t .

PAN I .

The great family of Pan i Indians has , in historic t imes ,extended from the Plat te river sou thward to the Gulf ofMexico . From the main stock , the Sanish orArikari havewandered on thei r hunting trips north to the Middle Missouriri ver, while the Pan i , in four divisions, had the Plat te and

i ts tributaries for their headquarters . The southern tribesare the Witchita, the Towakone or Three Canes, who speaktheWitchita dialect , the Kichai and the originally Texantribes of the Caddo and Waco (Weko , in Spanish :The Pan i family was too remote from the Maskoki t ribes

to enter in direct connec t ion with them . Some of the southern septs had in tercourse with them ,

mainly through the

French colonists . Fights between Caddos and Cha’hta are

recorded for the eighteenth century . The Pani family is

men tioned here simply because the legendary caves fromwhich the Creek nat ion is said to have sprung lay on Red1 Cf. R . G . Latham, Opuscula, p . 400, who was the first to hint at a

possible affinity of Caddo to Pani.

PANI . 43

river, within the l imi ts of the terri to ry held by some of thesou thern Pan i nat ions .When L . d

’

Iberville ascended the western branch of the

Red river, now cal led Red river (the eastern branch beingWashi ta or Black river) , i n March 1 699 , he saw and vis i ted

eight villages of the Caddo connect ion . H is Taensa guidenamed them as followsYataché cal led Yatassi by Americans .

Nactythos they are the Natchitoches .

Yes ito

Natao ; the Adai above.Cachaymons

Cadodaquis ful l form , Cado-hadatcho or “ chief tribe.

Natachés ;

Natsytos .

The Cachaymons and the Cadodaquis had been previouslyvisited by Cavelier de la Sal le, when returning from the

Cenys , in the central parts of Texas .‘

The Caddo confederacy consists of the following divisionsor tribes , as given me by a Caddo Indian in 1 882

Kado proper ; kado means chief, principal.Anadako , Anadaku ; also Nandako.

Ainai, Ayenai also H in i , Iniesupon an affl uent of Sabineriver ; identical wi th the Tachies (Sibley) . Fromthis tribal name is derived Texas , anciently Tachus ,Taxus .

Natchidosh, Nashédosh; the Na'

tchi toches .Yatassi.

Anabaidaitcho, Nabadatsu ; the Nabedatches , who are

nearly ext inc t now.

Natass i iden ti cal wi th the Natachés above.Nakfihédb tch, NakohodOtse ; the Nagogdoches .

Asstne,Amlni ; the Asinays of French explorers .

Hadal ; the Adai, Adaye, q . v .

1 Cf. Margry IV, 178. 3 13. 409 .


Yowa'ni , now in Texas .A

’- ish ; a few of these are now l iving in Texas , cal led

Al ish , Eyish by former writers .The Caddo relate, as being the myth ical origin of thei r

nat ion , that they came from a water- sink in Louisia na, wentwestward , shoved up earth by means of arrow-heads , and

thus made a mountain . The totems of thei r gen tes oncewere, as far as remembered , bear na- ustse, panther kO

'

she,

wolf ta- isha, snake kika, wildcat wad6 , owl néa, (rush .

When Milfort passed through the Red r iver country about1 780 , the Caddo , whom he desc ribes as fal lacious in trad ing ,were at war with the Cha’hta (Mémoire, p .

In 1 705 some Colapima from the Talcatcha river, fourleagues from Lake Pontchartrain , sett led upon the northernbank of this lake at Castembayouque ( now Bayou Cast in , atMandeville) , and were joined , six months after, by a partyof Nassitoches , whom famine had driven from their homeson Red river. ‘

SHETIMASHA.

These nat ives once dwel t in numerous settlements clustering

around Bayou Lafourche, Grand river (or Bayou Atchafalaya) ,and chiefly around G rand Lake or Lake of the Shetimasha.

All that is left of them —about fifty-five Indians, of a parentage strongly mixed wi th white blood , reside at Charenton ,St . Mary ’ s Parish , on the southwestern side of the lake,though a few are scat tered through the forests on Grandr iver . They cal l themselves P antehpinunkansh, men al together red . The name Shetimasha, by which they are

generally known , is of Cha’hta origin , and means “ theypossess ( imasha) cooking vessels Thei r cen tralplace of worship was three miles north of Charenton , on a

small inlet of Grand Lake. They worshiped there, by dancesand exhaustive fas t ing , their principal dei ty , Kat-Nahansh,the mid - day sun .

”

1 P énicaut, in Margry V, 459-

462.

ATAKAPA. 45

They were not warl ike, and never figured prominently incolonial h istory. When a port ion of the tribe, set tled onBayou Lafourche, had murdered Mr. Sain t - Cosme, a Naktchemissionary descending the Mississippi river in 1 703 , theywere at tacked by the colonists and their Indian

~

all ies. Thewar ended with a speedy submission of the savages . They

cal led the Naktche Indians thei r brothers , and thei r mythsrelated that thei r Great Spiri t ” created them in the countryof that people

,and gave them laws , women and tobacco .

The Cha’hta tribes, who at tempted to deprive them of thei rnat ive land , made continual forays upon them during the

eighteenth century .

These Indians were strict monogamists. The chieftaincywas a l ife- long office among them . The chiefs l ived in lodgeslarger than those of the common people, and their tobaccopipes were larger than those of the warriors . The foreheadsof the children were subjected to the flat tening process . ‘

Thei r language is extremely polysyn thet ic as far as derivat ion by suffixes is concerned , and there are also a number ofprefixes . For the pronouns than and ye a common and a

reveren t ial form are in use. The faculty for forming compound words is considerable, and the numerals show the

decimal form of computat ion .

ATKRAP A.

To close the l ist of the l inguistic families encircl ing theMaskoki stock , we mention the Atakapa, a language whichhas been studied but very imperfectly . This tribe once ex

isted upon the upper Bayou Teche northwes t and wes t of theShetimasha, north and northwest of the Opelousa Indians ,and from the Teche extended beyond Verm il ion river, perhaps down to the sea coast . The Atakapa of old were a wel lmade race of excellen t hun ters , but had , as their name indi

1 Of these Indians I have given an ethnographic sketch in : Transact .Anthropolog. Society of Washington, 1883 , Vol . II , pp. 148 158.


cates, the reputat ion of being anthropophagists (Cha’hta

hatak , bat takperson, apa to eat). At firs t , they suffered noin trusion of the colon ists in to their terri tory and cut off

expedi t ions at tempting to penetrate into thei r seats . Duringthe n ineteenth century they retreated toward the Sabine river.The name by which they cal l themselves is unknown ; perhapsi t is Skunnemoke, which was the name of one of their vi llageson Vermil ion river, six leagues west of New Iberia. Cf. Th .

Hutchins (Phila. ,

The scanty vocabulary of thei r language, taken in 1 802,

shows clusters of consonants , especially at the end of words ,but with i ts queer, half- Spanish orthography does not appearto form a reliable basis for l inguistic conclusions . A few

words agree with TOnkawe,the language of a small Texan

tribe ; and accord ing to trad i tion , the Karankawas , once the

giant people of Matagorda bay, on the Texan Coas t , spoke a

dialec t of Atékapa. These three tribes were, l ike all otherTexan t ribes , reputed to be anthropophagists . In extenuat ion of this charge, Milfort asserts that they “ do not eat

men, but roas t them only, on account of the cruel t ies fi rstenacted against thei r ances tors by the Spaniards (p .

This remark refers to a t ribe, also called Atakapas , whichhe met at .a distance of five days ’ travel wes t of St . Bernardbay .

We have but few not ices of exped it ions sent by Frenchcolon ists to explore the unknown interior of what forms nowthe State of Louisiana. One

'

of these, consist ing of threeFrenchmen , was in 1 703 directed to explore the tribes aboutthe river de la Madeleine, now Bayou Teche. The twomen who returned reported to have met seven “ nations ”

there ; the man they lost was eaten by the nat ives , and thismisfortune prompted them to a speedy departure. The locat ion seems to poin t to the territory of the Atakapa.

‘

1 P énicaut, in Margry V , 440.


Coroa differed from that of the Tinsa and Natfiie, ” but thatin his Opinion their manners and customs were the same

(Margry 1. 558)Koroas afterward figure as one of the tribes settled on

Yaz oo river, formerly cal led also R iver of the Chicasa , and

are ment ioned there by D . Coxe, Carolana p . 1 0 , as

Kourouas . They were then the all ies of the Chicasa, butafterward merged in the Cha’hta people, who call them Kolwa ,Kulua. Allen Wright , descended from a grandfather of th istribe, states that the term is nei ther Cha

’hta nor Chicasa, andthat the Koroa spoke a language differing ent irely fromCha’hta.

’ A place Kolua is now in Coahoma county , probably far distan t from the ancien t home of this t ribe. The

origin of the name is unknown ; the Cha’hta word : ka'lo

strong , powerfiel, presents some analogy in sound .

THE WESTO AND STONO INDIANS

l ived in the vicin i ty of the Engl ish colony at Charles ton ,South Carol ina. Their predatory habits made them particularly troublesome in 1 669

- 1 67 1 and in 1 674 , when they hadto be repulsed by an army of volunteers . The Stonos musthave l ived north of the colony , or on the upper course ofsome river, for, in 1 674 , they are described as

“coming

down ”

(Hewat,H istor. Account of S . C . and G a. , London

1 779 ; I , 51 . Stono Inlet is the name of a cove nearCharles ton . Both tribes also met with disas trous reverses atthe hands of the Savannah Indians , probably the Vamass i

(Archdale) . They are bo th mentioned as having belongedto the Kataba confederacy , but this does not by any meansprove that they spoke Kataba or a dialec t of i t . As to thename, the Wes to Indians may be ident ified with the Oustacs

of Lederer (who are reported as being at war with the Usherees) , and with the H ostaqua of René de L audonniere, who

1 This is corroborated by the fact that the sound R did exist in theKorea language : Jefferys I, 163 .

REMARKS To THE LINGUISTIC MAP . 49

mentions them as forming a confederacy under a paracusi i nthe northern parts of the “ Florid ian ”

territory . Possiblythe Creek word O'stafour, in the sense of four al l ied tribes ,has given origin to this tribal name (ostéka in Alibamu) .The affini ty of the extinct Congaree Indians , on Congaree

river, is doubtful also ; Lawson relates that they did notunderstand the speech of theWaterees and Chicarees . Cf.Kataba. Owing to the inactivi ty of the local historians ,our ethnographic in format ion on the North and SouthCarol ina Indians is extremely meagre and unsat isfactory .

REMARKS TO THE LINGUISTIC MAP.

The l inguist ic map added to this volume is an attempt tolocate, i n a general way, the settlemen ts pertain ing to theInd ians of each of the l inguist ic stocks of the Gulf States, asfar as traceable in the eighteenth century. Some of them ,

as the Timucua and Vamassi set tlements , are taken from datessomewhat earl ier , wh i le the location of the Atékapa tribe isknown to us only from the first decenn ium of the n ineteenthcentury. The marking of the l ingu is t ic areas by dots , poin ting to the t ribal set tlements , answers much bet ter the purposethan the coloring of large areas , which conveys the erroneousimpression that the population was scattered all over a certaincoun try . This wil l do very well for densely populated countries, or for tracts inhabi ted by roving , errat ic Indians , whomwe meet only on the west side of the Mississippi river. The

Gul f States ’ Indians were no longer in the condi t ion of purehunt ing tribes ; they had sett led in stat ionary villages , andder ived the main part of their sustenance from agricultureand fishing.

The locat ion of the Chicasa, Cheroki , Seminole and Caddo

(Pan i) tribes were not indicated with that completenesswhich the subject requires . The northwest corner of themap shows the tracts occupied at presen t in the Ind ianTerritory by tribes ofMaskoki l ineage.

THE MASKOKI FAMILY.

II . THE MASKOK I FAMILY.

Among the various nat ional i t ies of the Gulf territories theMaskoki family of tribes occupied a central and commandingposi t ion . Not only the large exten t of terri tory held bythem

,but also their numbers , thei r prowess in war, and a

certain degree of mental culture and self- esteem made of theMaskoki one of the most impo rtan t groups in Indian history .

From their ethnologic condit ion of later times , we infer thatthese tribes have extended for many centuries back in time,from the Atlantic to the Mississippi and beyond that river ,and from the Apalachian ridge to the Gulf of Mexico . Withshort in termissions they kept up warfare with all the circumiacent Indian communit ies , and also among each other. Allthe various disposit ions of the human mind are representedin the Maskoki tribes . We have the cruel and lurkingChicasa, the powerful and ingen ious but t reacherous and

corrupt ible Cha’hta, the magnan imous and hospi table, proudand revengeful Creek , the aggress i ve Alibamu , the quarrelsome Vamassi , and the sel f-willed , independent Seminole,jealous of the enjoyment of his savage freedom in the swampsand everglades of the semi - tropical peninsula.

The i rresolute and egot istic pol icy of these tribes oftencaused serious difliculties to the government of the Engl ishand French colonies , and some of them constantly waveredin thei r adhesion between the French and the Engl ish cause.

The American government overcame thei r opposit ion easi lywhenever a conflic t presen ted itself ( the Seminole war formsan exception) , because, l ike all the Indians , they never knewhow to unite against a common foe.

The two main branches of the stock , the Creek and the

Cha’hta Indians , were constantly at war, and the remembrance of their deadly conflicts has now passed to thei rdescendants in the form of folklore. The two differ anthro

pologically in their exterior , the people of the western orCha’hta branch being thick - set and heavy, that of the eas tern

ETHNOGRAPHIC PRACTICES. 51

or Creek connec t ion more l i the and tal l . Prognathism isnot frequen t among them , and the complexion of bothis a rather dark c innamon , with the southern ol ive t inge.

The general intell igence of this gifted race renders i t suscept ible for civ il iz at ion , endows i t wi th eloquence, but does notalways restrain i t from the outbursts of the wildest pass ion .

Among the tribes of the Maskoki family, we notice the

following ethnographic practices : the use of the red and

white colors as symbols ofwar and peace, an extensive systemof totemic gentes , the use of the Ilex cas sine for the manufacture of the black drink , the erec t ion of artific ial mounds ,the bel ief in a dei ty cal led “Master of Life,

”and original

sun -worship . The eas tern tribes all had an annual fest ivalin the town square, cal led afast (puskita in Creek) , and sometraces of it may be found al so among the western connec t ion .

In the eas tern and wes tern branch (also among the Naktche

people) the children belong to the gens of the mother , acustom which differs from that of the Yuchi and dates fromhigh ant iquity. No instances of anthropophagy are recorded ,but the custom of scalping seems to have been indigenousamong them . The early Timucua scalped their enemies anddried the scalps over thei r camp -fires . The art ific ial flattening of the foreheads of male infants seems to have prevailedin the wes tern branch only , but some kind of skull deformation could be observed throughout the Gulf terr i tories. There- in termen t of dead bodies , after clean ing thei r bones fromthe adhering muscles several months after death , is reco rdedmore especially for the western branch , but was probablyobserved among all tribes in various modificat ions .None of the customs just enumerated was pecul iar to the

Mas koki tribes , but common throughout the south , many ofthem being found in the north also . They were men tionedhere only , to give in their totality a fai r ethnographic pictureof the Maskoki nat ional i ty.

The genealogy of the Maskoki tribes cannot be established

2 THE MASKOKI FAMILY.

on anthropological , that is racial , characterisfics ; these Indians formerly incorporated so many al ien elements in to thei rtowns , and have become so largely mixed with hal f- castes inthe n ineteenth century , that a division on racial grounds hasbecome almost imposs ible.

Hence, the only characterist ic by which a subdivision ofthe family can be at tempted , is that of language. Followingthei r ancient topographic locat ion from eas t to west , we ob

tain the following synopsisFirst branch, orMaskokiproper . The Creek , Maskokalgi or

Maskoki proper , set tled on Coosa, Tallapoosa, Upper andMiddle Chatahuchi rivers . From thme branched off bysegmentat ion the Creek port ion of the Seminoles , of theYamass i and of the l i ttle Yamacraw commun i ty.

Second , or Apalachian branch. Th is southeastern division ,which may be cal led also a partepotiori the H itchit i connection , anciently comprised the t ribes on the Lower Chatahuchiriver and , eas t from there, the ext inct Apalachi, the Mikasuki ,and the H i tchi ti port ion of the Seminolm, Yamassi and Yamacraws .Third, or Alibamu branch comprised the Alibamu villages

on the river of that name ; to them belonged the Koassati

and Witumka on Coosa river, its northern amuent.Fourth

,Western or Cha

’

hta branch. From the main people,the Cha’hta, set tled in o the middle portions of the State ofMiss issippi , the Chicasa, Pascagoula, Biloxi , Huma and othertribes once became separated through segmentat ion .

The stronges t evidence for a commun ity o f origin of theMaskoki t ribes is furn ished by the fac t that their dialects

belong to one linguisticfamily . The numerous incorporat ionsof foreign elemen ts have not been able to al ter the puri ty o ftheir language the number of intrusive words is very smal l ,and the grammar has repel led every foreign int rusion . Th isis the inference we draw from their best studied dialec ts , for

THE COMMON MASKOKI LANGUAGE . 53

with some of them , as with Abika, we are not acquain ted at

all, and with others very imperfectly. The princ ipal d ialects

of the family greatly d iffer from each other ; Cha’hta, for

instance, is unin tell igible to the Creek , Koassati and H itchit ipeople, and the speech of each of these three tribes is notunders tood by the two others . When Albert Gallat in published his vocabularies of Cha

’hta and Creek, hewas uncertain

at first whether they were related to each other or not. On

the other side, the difference between Cha’hta and Chicasa,

and between Creek and Seminole, is so insign ifican t thatthese dialects may be considered as practical ly iden t ical .The degree of dialec tic difi

'

erence points approximately to

the date of the separat ion of the respect ive communit ies , anduntold centur ies must have elapsed since the two main branchesof the family were torn asunder, for Cha

’hta difl'

ers about asmuch from Creek as the l i terary G erman does from Icelandic .

THE COMMON MASKOK I LANGUAGE .

Although the dialects ofMaskoki do not now diverge fromeach other more than did the Semitic dialects two thousandyears ago, the t ime when they all had a common language

,

or,in other words , the time preceding the separat ion into

four d ivis ions must lie further back than eight or ten thousandyears. We cannot expec t to reconst ruc t the parent Maskoki

language spoken at that t ime but very imperfectly, since theoldes t text known to exist in any of the dialects dates fromA . D . 1 688 only . An approach to i ts reconstruc tion couldbe at tempted by carefully comparing the lexicon and grammat ic forms of the dialects presently spoken , and an individualacqua inted with them all, or at leas t with thei r four representatives , might also compose a comparative grammar of thesedialects as spoken at the present epoch of thei r developmen t

,

which would reveal many points concern ing the ancient or historic shape of the language once common to all these tribes .What the Maskoki dialec ts presently spoken , as far as


published, have in common , may be stated in a general way inthe following outl inesP honetics — The dialects possess the sound f and the palata

liz ed l but lack th, v and r , while nasal izat ion of thevocal ic element is more pecul iar to the western than to theeastern divisions . There is a tendency to pronounce themale: or checks by applying the tongue to the alveolar partof the palate. The phonet ic system is as follows

EXP L OS IVES :Not aspirated . As pirated . Spiranu . Trina.

k g 1 h

Palatals tch, ts dsh, ds yLinguals k’ g’ sh

Denta ls t d s n

Labials p b f w mVowelrs— i, e, a, a, o, u ; with their long and nasalized sounds.

The syllable is qui te simple in i ts st ructure ; it consists ei therof a vowel only , or begins with one consonant ( in the easterndivision with one or two) , and ends in a vowel . Deviat ionsfrom th is rule must be explained by phonet ic al terat ion ,elis ion , etc . The frequent occurrence of homonymous termsforms a pecul iar difficul ty in the study of the dialects .Morphology — No thorough dist inct ion exists between the

d ifferent parts of speech , none especially between the nominaland the verbal elemen t . The fac t that all adjectives can beverb ified, could be be t ter expressed as follows : The adject ivesused at tribut ively are part ic iples of at tribut ive verbs and

inflected for number l ike these, thei r so -cal led plural beingthe plural form of a verb . This we observe in Iroquois ,Taensa and many other American languages i t also explainsthe posi t ion of the adject ive after the noun qual ified . Someforms of the fini te verb represent t rue verbs , while others ,l ike the Creek forms , with tcha tchi pu etc. , prefixed ,which is the posses sive pronoun , are nominal forms

, and

represen t nomina agenti: and nomina actionis . The threecases of the noun are not accurately distinguished from each

THE MASKOKI FAMILY.56

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THE COMMON MASKOKI LANGUAGE . 57

The Chicasa of this comparat ive table is from a vo

cabulary taken by G . G ibbs the Seminole and the

Mikasuki from Buckingham Smith ’s vocabular ies prin ted inthe H istorical Magaz ine (Morrisan ia, N . Y .) for August ,1 866, and in W . W . Beach ’s : Indian Miscellany , Albany

1 87 7, p . 1 20—1 26 . The latter d iffers but l i ttle from the

Mikasuki of G . G ibbs , in the l inguist ic collect ion of the

Bureau of E thnology in Wash ington . The few words ofApalachi were drawn from the missive sen t , A . D . 1 688 , to

the king of Spain , to be mentioned under “Apalachi the

Koassati terms I obtained in part at the Indian train ingschool at Carl isle, Pennsylvania, partly from G en. Alb . Pike’ svocabularies , which also furn ished the Alibamu terms .Readers wil l perceive at the firs t glance that Cha’hta is

pract ical ly the same language as Ch icasa, Creek as Seminoleand H i tchi t i as Mikasuki . Alibamu forms a dialect for itsel f,leaning more toward Cha’hta than Creek . The southeasterngroup holds a middle posit ion between Cha’hta and Creek .

As far as the queer and inaccurate Span ish or thography ofApalachi enables us to judge, this dialec t again differs somewhat from H i tchi ti and Mikas uki . I t wil l be well to rememberthat i n Indian and all il l i terate languages the sounds of thesame organ - class are interchangeable ; thus , a word may becorrectly pronounced and written in six , ten, or twelvedifferent ways . Tchato roch, stone can be pronouncedtchatu, tchado, tchadu, tsato , tsatu, tsado, tsadu , etc . Thisexplains many of the apparen t discrepancies observed in thecomparat ive table, and i n our texts prin ted below .

A comparat ive study of the existing Maskoki vocabularieswould be very fru i tful for the ethnographic h istory of thet ribes , and l ikely to disclose the relative epochs of their settlement, i f those that we have now could be thorough ly rel iedon. In the comparat ive table subjoined I have received onlysuch terms that answer to this requisi te.

Theretgm: terms which occur in all d ialects in the same or


nearly the same form , as hasi sun, itchu , Pss i a’

cer, Ofi, ifa

dog, the terms for chief, blach, y ellow,bird, s fl ahc, buf alo,

turtle, fox (also in Cheroki : tsu’

hla) , the numerals and the

personal pronouns ; they must , therefore, have been oncethe common property of the st i l l undivided , pr imordial tribe.

The fact that the words for chief (miki , mingo , miko) ,for hola’hta, and for warrior ( taska, taskaya) , agree in all

dialects , poin ts to the fact that when the tribes separated theyl ived under similar soc ial condit ions which they have kept upever since. The terms for maiz e disagree but apparently

,and

seem to be reducible to one radix , ateh or ash the terms fordog agree in all dialects— hence, the Maskoki tribes plantedmaiz e and kept dogs before , probably many centuries beforethey separated and the term ifa went over from them to theTimucua. The word for buf alo, yanase, is the same in alldialec ts , and was probably obtained from the North

,since

the term occurs in Cheroki also (ya’

bsa in Eastern Cheroki) .The name for salt, hapi , a mineral which had a sacrificialimportance, is found also in Yuchi in the form tapi

,but

Creek has Ok - tchanua, H i tchiti : ok- tchahane. The term fortobacco agrees in all divisions of the stock (haktchiimma) , except in the Creek branch , where i t is called hitchi, hidshi.Th is weed is said to have received its Maskoki names from a

similari ty of the top of the green plan t wi th the phallus,

which is called in Al ibamu and H i tchi t i : Oktchi or aktchi.

THE NAME MASKOKI ; ITS USE AND SIGNIFICATION .

Maskéki, MaskOgi, ist i MaskOki, designates a single personof the Creek tribe, and forms , as a collect ive plural , Maskokalgi

,the Creek community , the Creek people, the Creek

Indians . English authors write th is name Muscogee, Muskhogee, and i ts plural Muscogulgee. The fi rs t syllable, as

pronounced by the Creek Indians, con tains a clear, short a,and that the name was writ ten Muscogee and not Mascogee,

is not to be wondered at, for the English language, with i ts

THE NAME MASKOKI . 59

surd,indist inct and strongly modified vocal izat ion , will con

vert the clearest a in to a u . Whether the name Maskoki

was given to the Creeks before or after the incorporat ion of

the towns speaking other languages than thei rs , we are unableto tell , but the name figures in some of the oldest documentson this people. The accen t is usual ly laid on the middlesyllable : MaskOki, MaskOgi. None of the t ribes are able to

explain the name from their own language.

The Cheroki cal l a Creek Indian Kusa, the nat ion Anikhsa, probably because Kiisa was the fi rs t Creek town theymet, when coming from their coun try along Coosa river, Alabama. But why did the English colon ists call them Crceh

Indians? Because, when the Engl ish traders en tered the

Mas koki count ry from Charleston or Savannah , they hadto cross a number of st reams and creeks, especially betweenthe Chatahuchi and Savannah r ivers . Gal lat in thoughti t probable that the inhabitants of the country adjacentto Savannah river were called Creeks from an early t ime

( Synopsis , p . The French settlers rendered the termLower Creeks by Basses -R ivieres . ”

The Wendat or Hurons cal l the Creek people Ku-fi'

sha,

having obtained the name from the Cheroki . The Foxeso r Utagami cal l one Creek man U'mashgo anene-u, the

people U'mashgohak. B . S . Barton , New ViewsAppendix p . 8 , states that the Delawares cal l the CreeksMasquachki : swampland .

Caleb Swan , who wrote a report on the Creek people in179 1 , ment ions (Schoolcraft V, 259) a tradit ion current amongthem , that they incorporated the Alibamu firs t , then the

Koassati, then the Naktche, and finally the Shawano . Inh is t ime the Shawano had four towns on the Tallapoosa river,and other Shawano ( from the northwest) increased thei rpopulat ion every year by large numbers . One of thesetowns was cal led SawanOgi, another Kanhatki. A Muscogeecreek is near Columbus , running into Chatahuchi river from


the eas t . Muskhogans inhabited the tract north ofPensacola.

The term is not derived from any known Maskoki word .

If oki water formed a component part of i t , i t would standfirst

, as in the H i tchit i geographic terms Oké lakni “yellowwater,

”

OkifenOke “wavering , shaking waters ,”

Okmfilgi“bubbling water , Okitché bi river ,

” l it . “large river .

” We

are therefore entitled to look out for a Shawano origin of thet r ibal name, and remember the fac t that the Creek Indianscal led the Shawano and the Lenape (Delawares) their grandfathers . I t wil l be appropriate to consul t also the otherAlgonkin languages for proper names comparable wi th the

one which occupies our at tent ion .

The Shawano call a Creek person Humasko , the Creekpeople HumaskOgi. Here the hu is the predicat ive prefix :he is , she is , they are, and appears often as ho hui ku

Thus HumaskOgi means“they areMasha

"

, the suflix -

gi,-ki

being the plural ending of the animate order of substantivesin Shawano . A word masko is not t raceable at present inthat language , but muskiégui means lahe, pond , m

’

skiegu- pki

or muskiégu- pki timbered swamp, musk’hanui nepi the

water ( nepi) rises up to, surrounds , but does not coverup. Miskekopke in Caleb Atwater

's vocabulary (Archaeol .Americ . I , p . signifies wet ground , swamp. Rev.

Lacombe’ s Cree or Knisteno Dict ionary gives maskek

marsh, swamp ,trembling ground unsafe to walk upon Maske

kowiyiniw the Maskegons or B ogmen, a t ribe of Crees , alsocal led Maskekowok, who were formerly Odshibwe Indians ,but left Lake Superior to join the Crees thei r name forms astriking paral lel to our southern Maskoki. Rev. Watkins'

Cree D ict ionary , with its Engl ish , unscientific orthography ,has muskag, muskak swamp, marsh; Muskagoo Swampy Indian,Mashegon ; Muskagoowewhe is a Swampy Indian. Here thepredicat ive suffix -wew is placed after the noun

,while hu of

Shawano stands before i t . The Odshibwé D ict ionary of

THE NAME MASKOKI . 61

Bishop Baraga has mashkig, plur. maskigon swamp , marsh,

Mashki sibi B ad River ; a corrupt form standing forMashkigi

sibi Swamp R iver. In Abnaki we have megua’

k freshwater

marsh, maskehegat fetid water.

The Shawano word for creeh, brooh, branch of river ismethtékui Shawano often has thwhere the northern dialectshave 5 ( thipi river, in P otawat. and Sauk : sibe, i n Odshibwesibi) and hence the radix meth is probably iden tical wi thmas in maskek .

The country inhab i ted by the Maskoki proper abounds increek bottoms overflowed in the rainy seas on , as the coun tryaround Opelika “

swamp- site”

( from Creek : opilua, apilua

swamp, li ikita to be stretched out) , Opil -‘ lako “great swamp,

”

west of the above (Hawkins , p . 50) and many other placesrendered uninhabitable by the moisture of the ground . The

countr ies of the Cha’hta and Chicasa also formed a successionof swamps, low grounds and marshes . In view of the fac tthat no other general name for the whole Creek nat ion wasknown to exist save Maskoki, and that the legend and the

chroniclers of de Soto ’s expedi tion speak of single tribesonly, we are ent i tled to assume th is foreign o rigin for thename unt il a bet ter one is presented . Another instance ofan Algonkin name of an Indian nat ional i ty adopted by theMaskoki is that of ist i Natuagi, or the enemies creeping upstealthily ,

” l i t . , snake-men, by which the Iroquois , or FiveNat ions , are mean t . 1

In this publ icat ion I cal l the Maskoki proper by the nameof Creeks only , and have used thei r name on accoun t of thecentral locat ion and commanding posi t ion of the Maskoki

proper , to whom this appellat ion properly belongs, todesignate the whole Cha ’

hta -Mashohifamily of Indians .

I t wil l also be remembered that several of the larger commu~

nities of American Indians are known to the white populat ion

By this same name the Algonkins designated many other Indianshostile to them ; it appears in Nottoway , Nadouess ioux, etc.


exclusively through names borrowed from other languagesthan thei r own , as , for instance, the Kalapfiya of Oregon ,who cal l themselves Ame’nmei, Kalapfiya (anc iently Kala

pfiyua) being of Chinook origin , and the Pani , whose nameis , according to J . H . Trumbull , taken from an Algonkindialec t , and means lungy , not bellicose, inferior , while theirown name is Tsarlksi tsariks “men of men.

” 1 Foreignnames have also been given to the smal ler tribes of theShetimasha and Atakapa, names wh ich are of Cha’htaorigin ; v. supra. The Patagonian and Argentin ian tribesare mostly known to us under Chilian names , and the

Aimboré or Nkra’kmun of Braz il we know only under thePortuguese name Botocudos .

THE TRIBAL DIVISIONS OFTHE MASKOKI FAMILY.

YAMAs s x.

As early as the lat ter hal f of the sixteen th century, a tribespeaking a Maskoki language was set tled on the shores of theAtlantic ocean , on lands included at presen t in the State ofSouth Carol ina, and from these shores they extended to somedistance inland . In that country Rene de L audonniere in1 564 establ ished a fort ificat ion in Port Royal Bay, cal ledCharlefort, and the terms t ransmit ted by h im , being all ofCreek origin , leave no doubt about the aflinity of the nat ives ,

yatiqui interpreter , tola laurel, Olataraca, viz . : hola’

hta ‘ lako ,nom. p r . “

the great leader.

” Shortly after , the Spanishcaptain Juan Pardo led an expedit ion ( 1 566—67) through thecountr ies along Savannah river, and the local names found i nthe report made ‘

of i t by Juan de la Vandera ( 1 569 ) alsopo in t to the presence of a people speaking Creek established on both sidm of that riverz’ Aboya “

two going Issa1 Prof. J. B . Dunbar, who composed an interesting ethnologic a'rticle on

this tribe, thinks that Pani is a true Paniword : pariki horn , meaning theirscalp lock ; Magazine ofAmerican History , 1880 (April number), p . 245.

3 Cf. Buck . Smith , Coleccion de Documentos ineditos , I , p. 15—1 9

(Madrid,


town , P ocotaligo .

1l Hewat ( 1 779) states that they possesseda large terri tory lying backward from Port Royal Island

,

in h is t ime cal led Indian Land (H is t . Acc . , I , Cf.Westo and Stono Indians , p . 48 .

They had been the staunchest Indian supporters of thenew Bri tish colony , and had sen t 28 men of auxiliary troopsto Colonel Barnwell , to defeat the Tuscarora insurrection onthe coast of North Carol ina ( 1 7 1 2 when they suddenlyrevol ted on April 1 5th , 1 7 15, commi tted the most atrociousdeeds against helpless colonists , and showed themselves to bequi te the reverse of what their name ind icates (yamas i, yémassi , the Creek term for mild , gentle, Amongtheir confederates in the unprovoked insurrection were Kataba,Cheroki and Congari Indians. Wholesale massacres of colonists occurred around Pocotal igo , on Port Royal Island and

at Stono , and the number of vic tims was est imated at fourhundred . A force of volun teers , commanded by GovernorCraven , defeated them at Saltketchers , on Upper Combaheeriver , southern branch , and drove them over Savannah river ,but for a while they con tinued thei r depredat ions from thei rplaces of refuge (Hewat, H istor. Acc . , I , 21 3

Names of Yamassi Ind ians mentioned at that period alsotest i fy to thei r Creek provenience. The name of aman called

Sanute is explained by Cr . sanOdshas encamp near, or withsomebody ; that of Ishiagaska (Tchiagaska by ika akaska hiss craped or shaved head ; o r iss i akaska his hair (on body )removed. At a publ ic council held at Savannah , in May

1 733 , a Lower C reek chief from Rawita expres sed the hopethat the Vamassi may be in t ime reunited to his people a fac twh ich ful ly proves the ethn ic affini ty ofthe two nat ional bod ies.’

1 Gallatin,Synops is, p. 84, recalls the circumstance that Poketalico is

al so the name of a tributary of the Great Kanawha river. This seems topoint to a foreign origin of

. that name.

3 Verb ified in tchayamass is : I am friendly, liberal , generous, hospitable.

Cf. Jones , Tomochichi, p. 3 1 .

YAMACRAW. 65

In Thomas Jefi‘

ery’

s Map of Florida, which stands opposi tethe t i tle'page of John Bartram ,

D escr. of East Florida,London

, 1 769 , 4to , a tract on the northeast shore of Pensacola bay is marked Yamase Land .

”

A t radi tion is current among the Creeks , that the Yamassiwere reduced and exterminated by them , but i t is difficult to

trace the date of that event. W. Bartram ,Travels, p . 1 3 7 ,

speaks of the sepulchres or tumul i of the Yamasees whowere here slain in the las t decisive bat tle, the Creeks hav ingd r iven them to this poin t , between the doubl ing of the river

( St . Juan , Florida) , where few of them escaped the fu ry ofthe conquerors . There were nearly thirty of thesecemeter ies of the dead , etc. , cf. p . 1 83 . 51 6. Fortyor fifty of them fled to St. Augustine and other coas t for tresses ,and were protected by the Spanish author ities ; p . 55. 485. 390.

After the middle of the eighteenth century the nameYamass i d isappears from the annals as that of a dist inct t r ibe.

They were now merged in to the Seminoles ; they continuedlong to exist as one of thei r hands west of the Savannahriver

,and i t is reported “ that the Yemasi band of Creeks

refused to fight in the Bri tish -American war of 1 8 1 3 .

All the above dates permit us to conclude that , ethnographically , the Vamas si were for the main part of Creek o rigin ,but that some foreign admixture, ei ther Kataba or Yuchi ,had taken place, which will accoun t for the presence of thei rlocal names of foreign origin . The Apalachian or H itchit ibranch of the Maskoki family must have also furn ished ele

ments to those Vamass i who were set tled southwes t of Savannah c i ty, for that was the coun try in which the Apalachianbranchwas establ ished .

YAMACRAW .

This small t ribe is known only throughj ts connect ion withthe young Bri tish colony of Savannah and the protect ionwhich i ts chief, Tomochichi, extended over it. This chief,from some unknown reason , had separated from h is mother

66 THE MASKOKI FAMILYi

tribe of Apalatchukla town , and went to reside upon a riverbluff four miles above the site of Savannah city. H e sub se

quently visi ted England and i ts court with EsquireOglethorpe( in and died , about n inety -seven years old , in 1 739 ,

highly respected by his Indians and the colonists . The

Yamacraw Indians , who had followed him to the Savannahriver , consisted mainly of d isaffected Lower Creek and ofsome Yamassi Indians.The Creeks cannot give any account of the name Yama

craw, and the R , which is a component sound of i t , does notoccur in any of the Maskoki dialects nor in Yuchi . Cf.Chas . C . Jones , H istorical Sketch of Tomo - chi - chi , mico of

the Yamacraws . Albany , 1 868 , 8vo .

SEM INOLE.

The term semané le, or ist i simanole, signifies separatist

or runaway , and as a tribal name points to the Indianswho left the Creek , especial ly the Lower Creek settlements ,for Florida

,to l ive

,hunt and fish there in entire independence.

The term does not mean wild, savage, as frequently statedif applied now in th is sense to an imals , i t is because of i tsoriginal meaning , “ what has become a runaway ”

: pinnas imané le wild turkey ( cf. pin- apuiga domesticated turhey ) ,tchu-ata semanoli, antelope, l i terally, goat turned runaway ,wild ,

” from tchu-ata, itchu hata goat, l i t . , bleat ing deer. ” lThe present Seminoles of Florida cal l themselves Ikaniuksalgi or Pen insula- People ( from ikana land, nitiksa, forin- yuksa its point, its promontory ,

-algi : collective ending) ;another name for them is Tallahéski, from thei r town Tal lahassie, now capital of the State of Florida. The Wendat orHurons cal l them Ungiayo- rono , P eninsula a P eople,

" fromungiayopeninsula . In Creek, the Florida peninsula is calledalso Ikan - faski , the Pointed Land ,

”

the Seminoles : Ikana1 This adjective is found verbified in isimané laidshit “he has caused

himself to be a runaway .

”

SEMINOLE . 67

féskalgi“ people of the pointed land . The name most

commonly given to the Seminoles in the Indian Terri tory bythe Creeks is Simano’lalgi, by the H itchiti : Simano

'la‘li.

Ind ians speaking the Creek language l ived in the south ofthe peninsula as early as the sixteen th century . This fac t isfully proved by the local names and by other terms used inthese parts t ransmit ted by Fontanedo ( in 1 559 , cf. Calusa)seletega !

“run hither !

” now pronounced silitiga, silitka,

abbrev. from isilitka isilitkz’

is I run away , l i t . , I carry mysel faway, off; litkas 1 am running . Silitiga is now used as a

personal name among the Creeks .We have seen that a port ion ofFontanedo ’

s local names ofthe Calusa country are of Creek origin , and that anotherport ion is probably Timucua. The rest of them , l ike Yaguaand others , seem to be of Caribbean origin , and a transien tor stat ionary population of Caribs is mentioned by Hervas ,Catalogo de las lenguas I , p . 386 as having l ived in the Apalachi coun try .

‘

The host ile encounter between Creeks and Calusa,men

tioned by Romans (cf. Calusa) , probably took place aboutA . D . 1 700 , but the name Seminole does not appear as earlyas that . Previous to that event the Creeks seem to have heldonly the coast l ine and the north part of what is now the areaof Florida State. A further accession resul ted from the

arrival of the Yamassi, whom Governor Craven had driveninto Georgia and in to the arms of thei r enemies , the Spaniards of Florida, after suppressing the revolt of 1 7 1 5 in whichthey had participated .

The Seminoles of modern times are a people compoundedof the following elements separatists from the Lower Creekand H i tchiti towns ; remnants of tribes partly c iviliz ed bythe Span iards Yamassi Indians and some negroes . According to Hawkins , Sketch of the Creek Coun try pp . 25.

26, they had emigrated from Okon i , Séwokli, Yufala, TaCf. Proceed. Am . Philos. Society of Phila., 1880, pp . 466 , 478.


ma‘ la, Apalatchukla and H i tchit i (all of which are LowerC reek towns) , being invited to Florida by the plen ty of game,the mildness of the cl imate and the productiveness of thesoil . The Seminoles ment ioned by him inhabited the wholepeninsula, from Apalachicola river to the Florida Poin t ,

”

and had the following seven towns : Semané le Talahass i,

Mikasuki , Witchotfikmi, Alachua, Oklawaha ‘ lako,Talua

tchapk- apopka, Kalusa-hatchi. Some of the larger immigra

t ions from the Creek towns in to those parts occurred : in1 750, after the end of the Revolut ionary war, in 1 808 and

after the revolt of the Upper Creeks in 1 8 1 4.

When Wm . Bartram traveled through the Seminole country , about 1 773 , he was in formed that Cuscowilla, a town ona lake of the same name and a sort of Seminole capital , hadbeen buil t by Indians from Okoni old town , set tled upon theAlachua plains : They abd icated the anc ien t Alachua townon the borders of the savanna, about fi fty miles west from the

river San Juan , and buil t here, call ing the new town Cuscowilla. (About 1 7 1 0) they had emigrated from Oconee town,on the Oconee river, on account of the proximity of thewh i te people.

” They formerly waged warwith the Tomocos

(Timucua) , Utinas , Calloosas , Yamases”

and other Flor idat ribes ]l

The Seminoles were always regarded as a sort of outcastsby the Creek t r ibes from wh ich they had seceded , and nodoubt there were reasons for th is . The emigrat ion includedmany of the more turbulent elemen ts of the populat ion , andthe mere fact that many of them spoke another dialect thanthe Maskoki proper ( some belonging to the H i tchit i or southeastern division of the family) is l ikely to have cas t a shadow

upon them . The anecdote narrated by Milfort (Mémoire,

1 Wm . Bartram , Travels, p . 9 7 . 1 79 . 190- 193 . 216. 21 7 . 251 . 379 - 380 .

The name Cuscowilla bears a curious resemblance to the Chicasa townTuskawillao , mentioned by Adair, History, p . 353 . Cf. also Ok6ni, inList of Creek Settlements .

SEMINOLE. 69

p . 3 1 1—3 1 7) furn ishes ample proof of the low esteem in which

the Seminoles were held by the Creeks . But , on the otherside , emigrat ion was favored by the Creek communit ies themselves through the practice observed by some of thei r numberto send away a part of thei r young men to form branchvillages

,whenever the number of the inhabitants began to

exceed two hundred . Several towns wil l be found in our“ List of Creek Set t lements,

” in which the process of segmentation was going on upon a large scale in the eighteen thcen tury.

The Seminoles first appear as a distinct pol it ic body inAmerican history under one of their chiefs , called KingPayne, at the beginning of this cen tury . This refers moreparticularly to the Seminoles of the northern parts of whati s now Florida ; these Indians showed , like the Creeks ,hosti le inten tions towards the th irteen states during and

after the Revolut ion , and conjoin tly wi th the Upper Creekson Tal lapoosa river concluded a t reaty of friendsh ip withthe Spaniards at Pensacola i n May, 1 784. Although underSpan ish con trol

,the Seminoles entered in to hosti li t ies with

the Americans in 1 79 3 and in 1 8 1 2. In the lat ter year Paynemiko was killed in a bat tle at Alachua, and his brother, theinfluent ial Bowlegs , died soon after. These unruly tribessu rprised and massacred American set tlers on the Sat i lla river,Georgia, in 1 8 1 7 , and another conflict began , which terminated in the dest ruction of the Mikas uki and Suwanee rivertowns of the Seminoles by General Jackson , in April , 1 8 1 8 .

After the cess ion of Florida, and i ts incorporat ion in to theAmerican Union the Seminoles gave up all their territory by the treaty of Fort Moultrie, September i 8th, 1 823 ,

receiving in exchange goods and annui t ies . When the government concluded to move these Indians west of the Mississippi river , a treaty of a condit ional charac ter was concludedwith them at Payne’s Landing , in 1 832. The larger portionwere removed , but the more stubborn part d issen ted , and


thus gave origin to one of the gravest confl icts which everoccurred between Indians and whites . The Seminole warbegan with the massacre of Major Dade’s command nearWahoo swamp , December 28th, 1 835, and con tinued withunabated fury for five years , entail ing an immense expenditureof money and l ives . A number of Creek warriors joined thehost ile Seminoles in 1 836.

A census of the Seminoles taken in 1 822 gave a populationof 3899 , wi th 800 negroes belonging to them . The popula

t ion of the Seminoles in the Indian Terri tory amounted to2667 in 1 88 1 ( Ind . Afi

'

airs’

and that of the FloridaSeminoles will be stated below . There are some Seminoles now in Mexico , who went there with thei r negroslaves .The set tlements of the Seminoles were partly errat ic , com

parable to hunters ’ camps , par tly stat ionary . The stat ionaryvil lages existed chiefly in the northern parts of the Seminolelands , corresponding to Southern Georgia and NorthernFlorida of our days . A very inst ructive table exists of someof thei r stat ionary vil lages , d rawn up by Capt . Young , andpr in ted in Rev. Morse ’s Report on the Ind ians of the UnitedStates p . 364. This table however inc ludes , with a

few exceptions, only places si tuated near Apalachicola r iver

(east and west of i t) , in Alabama, Georgia and Florida ; thel ist was probably made at a t ime when Floridawas st ill underSpanish dominat ion , which accounts for the fact that thecoun ty names are not added to the local i t ies . Many ofthese towns were, in fact , Lower Creek towns and not belonging to the Seminole proper, all of whom l ived east ofApalachicola river, mostly at some dis tance from i t . Seminoleand Lower Creek were, in earl ier times, often regarded as

ident ical appellat ions ; cf. Milfort , Mem.,p . 1 1 8 .

The remarks included in parentheses were added bymyself.


Etohussewakkes— Three miles above Fort Gaines ( from itu

log, hassi old, wakas ] lie on theground ) .Tattowhehallys— Scat tered among other towns (probably

talua ballui upperTallehassas— Ou the road from Okalokina (Oklokonee

river) to Mikasukey (now Tallahassie, or Old

City,"the capi tal of Florida State) .

Owass issas - Ou eas t waters of St . Mark ’s river (Wacissa,Bas isa is a river with a Timucua name).

Chehaws —Ou the Flin t river (comprehends the villagesplanted there from Chiaha, on Chatahuchi river) .

Tallewheanas— East side of Flin t river ( is Hotali buyana ;cf. List of Creek Set tlemen ts) .

Oakmulges— Eas t of Flint river, near the Tallewheanas.From reports of the eigh teenth century we learn that in the

south of the Floridian pen insula the Seminoles were scat teredin smal l bod ies , in barren deserts , forests , etc . , and that at intervals they assembled to take black drink or del iberate ontribal mat ters . I t is also stated that in consequence of theirseparat ion the Seminole language had changed greatly from

the original Creek ; a statement which is not borne out byrecent investigat ions , and probably refers only to the Seminole towns speaking H itchit i dialec ts .By order of the Bureau of E thnology, Rev. Clay Mac

Cauley in 1 880 visited the Seminoles settled in the southernparts of the pen insula, to take their census and inst i tute ethnologic researches . H e found that thei r populat ion amountedto 208 Ind ians , and that they lived in five set tlements towhich he gave the following names

1 . Miami settlement ; this is the old name of Mayaimi

Lake, and has noth ing in common with the MiamiAlgonkin t ribe.

2. Big Cypress , 26°

30’L at.

3 . Fish-eat ing Creek , 26° head - chief Tustenfiggi.

4. Cow Creek , fifteen miles north of Lake Okitché bi.

SEMINOLE . 73

5. Catfish Lake, 28° L at. The late Chipko was chief there,

who had been presen t with Osceola at the Dademassacre in 1 835.

Traces of languages o ther than the Seminole were not discovered by him .

In December 1 882 J . Francis L e Baron transmit ted tothe Smithson ian Insti tut ion a few ethnologic notices and a

vocabulary obtained from the Seminole Indians of Chipko’

s

( since deceased) band , which he had visited in March 1 88 1

in their village near Lake Pierce. The dialect of the vocabulary does not differ from Creek in any appreciable degree.

On marriage customs and the annual busk of these Indians hemakes the following remarks : They do not marry or intermix with the whites , and are very jealous of the virtue of

their women , pun ishing with death any squaw that acceptsthe at tent ions of a white man. Some Seminoles exhibit a

mixture of negro blood,but some are very tall , fine- looking

savages . Thei r three tribes l ive at Chipko town , near LakeOketchobee, and in the Everglades . They have a semirel igious annual fest ival in June or July , cal led the greencorn dance, the new corn being then ripe enough to beeaten . Plural i ty of wives is forbidden by thei r laws . TomTiger, a fine- looking Indian

,is said to have broken this rule

by marrying two wives, for which misdemeanor he was ban

ished from the tribef He traveled about one hundred milesto the nearest tribe in the Everglades , and j umped unseenin to the ring at the green corn dance. This procured himabsolution , confo rmably to their laws .

”

We have deemed it appropriate to dwel l at length on the

history , topography and peculiar customs of the Seminoleson accoun t of thei r ident i ty with the Creek Indians , the mainobject of this research . We now pass over to the Southeastern or Apalachian group ofMaskoki.


AP AL ACH I.

The H itchiti , Mikasuki and Apalachi languages form a

dialect ic group dist inc t from Creek and the western d ialects ,and the people speaking them must once have had a commonorigin . The proper names Apalachi and Apalatchfikli arenow extinct as tribal names , but are of very ancient date .The auriferous ledges of the Cheroki country were said to bewithin “

the extreme confines of the Apalachi province”

(Fontanedo, and the Apalachi found by Narvaez wasfi fteen days’ march north of Aute, l a roadstead or harbor onthe Gulf of Mexico , though the Indians had stated to him thati t lay at a distance of nine days

’ travel only. The “ province”

of Apalachi probably included the upper part or the wholeof the Chatahuchi river basin , and on account of the ending- okla in Apalatchukla, its origin must be sought in the Cha

'htaor H i tchi t i d ialect. Rev. Byington explains i t by helpingpeople, allies , in the Cha

’hta apalatchi 6kla, but the originalform of the name is Apalaz tchi 6kl i , not apalatchi -

1 tchi isa H i tchit i sufiix of adject ives , and apalui in that dialec tmeans “on the other side of .

” Hence the adject ive apalaz tchi“ those (people 6kl i) on the other side, shore or river.

”

The town of Apalachi, on Apalache bay, must be keptclearly distinct from the town of Apalachicola, or Apalatchfikla, about fi fty miles further west, on the river then cal ledby the same name.

Apalachi town was north of Apalachi bay, the principalport ofwhich is now St. Marks . This was probably the placeafter which “Apalache provincia ” was named in de Soto ’st ime ; Biedma, one of his historians , states ( in Smith , Doeum .

ined . , I , 48 . that “ this province was divided by a riverfrom the count ry east of i t, having Aguile as frontiers town.

Apalachi has many towns and produces much food , and ( theIndians) cal l this land visited by us Yustaga This river

was probably the St . Mark ’s river. Both names are also d is1 Perhaps from the Hitchiti term a-utilis “I build or hind/e afi re.

”

APALACH I . 75

tinguished as belonging to separate communit ies in Margry IV,

9 6 . 1 1 7 ( 1 699) and IV, 309 . The western P alachees are

laid down on the map in D an. Coxe, Carolana, on Chatahuchiriver, the eas tern “ P alachees on a river in the northeastangle of the Gulf of Mexico ; north of the latter are the

Tommachees (Timucua) . At presen t , a northwestern afl‘luentof Okon i river , in Upper Georgia, is cal led Apalache river.Apalatchukla, a name original ly belonging to a tribe, was

in early t imes transferred to the r iver, now Chatahuchi, andfrom this to all the towns of the Lower Creeks. An instanceof this is given by L . d

’

Iberville, who states (Margry IV ,

594. 595) that in 1 70 1 a difficul ty arose between theApalachicolys and the Apalachis on accoun t of depredat ions com

mitted ; that the Span ish cal l those Indians Apalachicolys ,the French Conchaques , and that they counted about 2000families— an equal number of men being ascr ibed to the

Apalachis , who were under Span ish rule.

The name of the tr ibe and town was Apalatchukla, alsowri tten P allachucla, P alachicola. Th is townwas on the westernbank of Chatahuchi river, 1% miles below Chiaha. In earlyt imes i ts tr ibewas the most importan t among theLower Creeks

,

adverse to warfare, a “ peace or white town ,”and cal led by

the people Talua ‘ lako , G reat Town. Like the town Apalachi , the inhabi tants of this town spoke a dialect resemblingH i tchit i very closely. Apalachicola river is now the nameof Chatahuchi river below its junct ion with the Flin t river.More about this town in the : List of Creek Sett lements .Later in the sixteen th cen tury the boundary between the

Timucua and the Apalachi lands is stated to have been onor near the Vacissa river ; Ibitachuco or B loch L ahe beingthe eas tern Apalachi boundary , the westernmost town of theTimucua being Asile (Ausile, Oxilla) .In 1 638 the Indians of Apalachi made war against the

Spanish colonists . Although the governor of Florida hadbut few troops to Oppose, he marched against them and


daun ted thei r aggress iveness (sobervia) by forcing them to adisastrous retreat and following them into their own country

(Barcia, Ensayo , p .

In 1 688 a number of Apalachi ch iefs (caciques) addresseda let ter of complain t to Charles the Second , king of Spain

(T1 700) , concerning the exact ions to which thei r former govcruors had subjected them ,

and other topics relat ing to thei ractual condit ion . The towns mentioned in the letter are SanLuis de Apalachi, Ibitachuco, P attali, San ta Cruz , Talpatqui,Vas isa, San Marcos . The original , with i ts Span ish translat ion

,was reproduced in a fac- simile edit ion in 1 860 by

Buckingham Smith and other documents wri t ten in

Apalachi are preserved in the archives of Havana, the seat of

the archbishopric , to which Apalachi and all the other set tlements comprised within the diocese of St . Helena belonged .

Christian iz ed Apalachis , who had been frequently raidedby Alibamu Indians , fled in 1 705 to the French colony atMobile, where Governor de Bienvil le gave them lands and

grain - seed to set t le between the Mobil ian and Tohome t ribe ;cf. P énicaut in Margry V , 46 1 . 485, where their rel igiousfest ivals and other customs are described . Like theApalachis ,the tribe of the heathen Taouachas had qui t ted the Span ishterri tory for being harassed by theAlibamu , and fled southwes tto the French , who settled them on Mobile river, one leagueabove the Apalachis ( 1 7 1 0 in Margry V, 485 SomeCha’hta refugees had been set tled at the Anse des Chactas

,

’

on Mobile bay , the year preceding . In the nineteenth centurythe las t remnants of the Apalachi tribe were l iving on theBayou Rapide , in Louisiana, and about A . D . 1 8 1 5 countedfourteen families.

mxasuxr.

Miccosukee is a town of Florida, near the northernborder of the State, in Leon county, buil t on the westernshore of the lake of the same name. The tribe established

there speaks the H i tchi t i language, and must hence have

HITCHITI. 77

separated from some town or towns of the Lower Creeks

speaking that language.

The tr ibe was reckoned among the Seminole Indians, butdoes not figure prominen tly in Ind ian history before the out

break of the Seminole war of 1 8 1 7. It then raised the red

pole as a sign of war, and became conspicuous as a sort ofpol it ical cen tre for these Southern soreheads .” Thevocabu

laries of that dialect show It to b e pract ical ly ident ical withthat of H i tch i t i town . Cf. the comparat ive table, p . 56 .

More notices on this tribe will be found under : Seminole.

H ITCH ITI .

The H i tchi t i tribe, ofwhose languagewe presen t an extensive specimen in this volume, also belongs to the southeasterngroup , which I have cal led Apalachian.

H i tchit i town was , i n Hawkins ’ t ime, established on the

eas tern bank of Chatahuchi river , four miles below Ch iaha.

The nat ives possessed a narrow strip of good land borderingon the river, and had the reputat ion of being honest and

industr ious . They obtained thei r name from H i tchi t i creek ,so cal led at i ts junction with Chatahuchi river , [and in i tsupper course Ahiki (Ouhe-

gee) cf. List]from Creek : ahi

tchi ta to looh up ( the They had spread out intotwo branch set tlemen ts : H itchitudshi or Li ttle H i tch i t i , onboth sides of Flin t river, below the junction of Kitchofunicreek , which passes th rough a coun ty named after i t ; and

Tutalosi on Tutalosi creek , a branch of Kitchofuni creek ,twenty miles wes t of H itchitiidshi (Hawkins

,p . 60.

The existence of several H i tchi t i towns is ment ioned by C .

Swan in 1 79 1 ; and Wm . Bartram states that they “ speakthe Stincard language .

” There is a popular saying amongthe Creeks

,that the ancient name of the tr ibewas Atchik ’

hade,

a H i tchit i word which sign ifies white heap (of ashes) .Some H i tch i t i Indians trace thei r mythic origin to a fal l

from the sky , but my informan ts , Chicote and G . W . St id


ham, gave me the following tale Their ancestors firstappeared in the country by coming out of a canebrake orreed thicket (fitski in H i tch i t i) near the sea coast . Theysunned and dried their children during fou r days, then set

out, arrived at a lake and stopped there. Some thought i twas the sea, but i t was a lake ; they set out again , traveledup a stream and set tled there for a permanency .

” Anothert radit ion says that this people was the fi rst to set tle at the

site of Okmulgi town , an ancient capital of the confederacy .

The tribe was a membe r of the C reek confederacy and

does not figure prominently in h istory. The fi rs t ment ion Ican find of i t

,is of the year 1 733 , when Gov . Oglethorpe met

the Lower Creek chiefs at Savannah , G a., to concil iate theirt ribes in his favor . The “ Echetas had sen t thei r warchiefs, Chutabeeche and Robin with four at tendan ts (Ch . C .

Jones , Tomochichi, p . The Yutchitalgi of our legend ,who were represen ted at the Savannah counc il of 1 735 byTomehuichi, dog king of the Euchitaws ,

”

are probably theH itchit i , not the Yuchi . Wm . Bartram calls them ( 1 773)Echetas

"also .

The d ialec t spoken by the H i tchi t i and Mikas uki onceSpread over an extensive area, for local names are wo rded ini t from the Chatahuchi river in an eastern direct ion up tothe Atlant ic coas t . To these belong those ment ioned under“the name Maskoki, p . 58 .

According to Wm . Bartram , Travels , pp. 462—464 , the fol

lowing towns on Chatahuchi river spoke the Stincard”

language, that is a language difi'

ering from Creek or Musco

gulge : Chiaha (Chehaw) , H itchit i (Echeta) , Oké ni (Occone) ,the two Séwokli (Swaglaw, Great and Lit tle) . From th is itbecomes probable, though not certain , that the dialect knownto us as H i tchit i was common to them all. The Séwokli

t ribe, set tled in the Indian Terr i tory, have un ited there withthe H i tchiti , a circumstance which seems to point to ancientrelat ionship .


At every second line of this song the singer kicks at a log ,feigning to start up the deer by the noise from its recesses inthe woods . The song - l ines are repeated thrice, in a slow

and plain t ive tune, except the refrain , which is sung or ratherspoken in a quicker measure, and once only. For the wordsof the text and of the refrain , cf. the H itchi t i Glossary .

THE HITCHITI DIALECT

of the Maskoki language- family is analogous , though by nomeans ident ical wi th the C reek d ialect in i ts grammat ic out

l ines . Many poin ts of comparison will readily suggest themselves to our readers , and enable us to be comparat ively shortin the following sketch .

The female dialect is an archaic form of H i tchit i paral lelto archaic Creek bo th were formerly spoken by both sexes .Only the common form (or male language) of H i tchi t i willbe considered here.

PHONETICS .

Thephonetic sy stem is the same as in C reek , except that thesonant mutes , b , g , are more dist inctly heard (d is quite rare) .The processes of al ternat ion are the same in both dialects .Many vowels of substantives are short in C reek , which appearlong in H i tchit i : a

'

pi tree : H . a'

pi ha'si sun, moon : H .

ha'si ni'ta day : H . nita etc .

MORPHOLOGY .

N oun. The case inflect ion of the substantive, adject ive, ofsome pronouns and of the nominal forms of the verb is effectedby the suffixes i for the absolute, -ut for the subject ive, -nu

for the object ive case : yatiperson, yatut, yatun ; naki what,which, makut , nakun . A few verbals inflect in -a

,-at,

-an ;

for instance, those term inat ing in -hunga.

The diminut ive ending is the same as in Creek : -odshi,- udshi.

THE HITCHITI DIALECT. 81

To the Creek collect ive suflix - algi corresponds -a‘li

, whichis, i n fact , the third person of a verbal plural : miki chief,mika‘ li the clas s of chief s and they are chiefs. Maskéki

Maskoka‘li the Creeh people ; fapli’

hitchiwind,fapli

’

htcha‘li

wind clan, wind gens .

H i tchit i has a greater power of verbifying substant ivesthan Creek : miki chief , mikolis I am chief ; tchoyipine- tree,

tch6yus it is apine tree.

There is no real substan t ive verb in the language, and ad

jectives , when becoming verb ified , are turned in to at tribut iveverbs , as in Creek : wan t i strong , hard ; tsawantus 1 am strong;

wantus he, it is strong, hard ; wantatik not strong ; wantigus he

is very strong ; Wantatis he is not strong ; wanta’

hlatis he is not

strong at all.

The gradat ion of the adject ive is expressed ei ther by theat tribut ive verb , to which isi is is prefixed , or in some otherways syntact ically :Kfidsuni tchatu-kunawun isinwantfis iron is harder than

ukitchubiokilosi ihayuxkiki o‘latiwats a lahe is deeper than

a river ; lit.“ to r iver the lake in i ts depth does not

come up .

” This may also be expressed : okilé si

(u)kitch6bi isihayuzkiiwats ; lit.“a lake ( than) a

river more- deepens .

ya hali’

hlé saka lapkun unweikas this boy is the tallest ; l i t .

“ this boy all surpas ses in height . ”

yat yakni tchéiih’- apiktchayayus this is the highestmountain ;

l i t . “ th is ground - high stands ahead .

The numeral has two forms for the card inal number : oneused at tr ibutively , and another

,abbreviated from it , used

exclusively for counting ; there are, outside of th is , forms forthe ordinal , for the distribut ive, and for the adverbialnumeral . The l ist of the numerals is as follows


1‘lérnin ‘lahai

’h indshuatki

beginning .

2 tuklan tuka’ saté klaka tuklakan

3 tutchtnan tutchi satotchinaka tutchiuékan

4 sitakin sita’h is itagika sitahakin

5 tchaz gipan tcha’hgi inchaz gipsaka tchal gipakan atsfi

’hgipi

6 lpégin ipa is ipagaka isipagi

7 kulapakin kfilapa iskulapakika'

kulapfihakan iskulapé ki

8 tusnapékin tashapa istusnapakika tusnapfihakan istusnapaki

9 ustapfikin unapé. isustapAl-Iika uaapihakan isunapéki

10 pokolin pukfi ispokolika puknlakan ispukfili

pokoli tfiklan ispokol- tfiklaka poko- tukulakan ispukuli- tuklan

100 tchfikpi‘ lamin iachukpi-

‘lamika tchukpi-‘ lamakan inchukpid i

Folded four times is exprm ed by the cardinal : po‘lé tki fi taki ; foldedeight times : po

‘lOtki tusnapfl rin.

The personal pronoun appears in difi'

erent forms : sub

jective absolute ; subjective prefixed to verbs and objec tivepronoun .

Subjective absolute Subj . prefixed Objective1 a

’ni tcha am an a tcha

thou tchl’

hni tchi tchihe, she, it i

’hni im in i

we pu’hui pu po pu

ye tchi’

hnitaki tchi inverted : itch tchi- ,w. sumxthey i

’

hnitaki im in i

anal i ( usual ly analut) my self, 2 s . tchi’

hnali, 3 s . i’

hnali

pu’

hnali ourselves , 2 pl. tchi’

hnalitaki, 3 pl . i’

hnalitéki.

I hepossessivepronoun.

my am an a

tchihis, her, its im in i

pfi’

hni, pu

your tchiy tchi, tchiim in i

tcha inverted : atchtchi inverted : itchim in i

pun'

?Pu'

, DO

tchi with suflixi etc. , with sufi x .

THE HITCHITI DIALECT. 83

tchalbi my hand or hands , tchilbi, llbi; pulbi our hand 01

hands, tchilbuy tchi, ilbi.

antchikimy houseorhouses ; tchintchiki, intchiki; pfintchiki,tchintchigoy tchi, intchigoytchi.

D emonstrativepronouns ma, mut, mun (Cr. ma) ; ya, yat,

yan or yun (Cr . hta); yakti, yaktut, yaktun (Cr.asa); ma

’

hmali the same.

D emons tr .- relat. pronoun : naki , nakut, nakun which, what.

[ nterrogative pronouns no ‘ l i?no ‘ lut or no ‘ lut i?no ‘ lunor no‘lun i?who? naki?nakut?nakun?which?what?nakon i?what is it?

Z he H itchiti verb equals the Creek verb in the abundanceof inflectional .forms . In order to show the inflection of

a verb (or rather a part of i t), going parallel to the onechosen as the Creek paradigm , we select isiki to tahe, to

carry ; awiki bei ng used when a plural i ty of objects is concerned ; C reek : isi ta, tchawita.

is ilis 1 tahe, 2 s . isitskas , 3 s . isis ; 1pl. isikas , 2 pl . isatchkas ,

3 pl . isa‘ l i .

awalis 1 tahe, pl . of obj . , 2 s . awitskas , 3 s . awas 1 pl. awikas ,2 pl . awatskas , 3 pl . awa

‘ lis .

i’

hsilis 1 tooh a short time ago (Cr. isayanks) ; a’hwalis .

isanis I toah several days ago (Cr. isfiimatas) ; also I hadtaken ; awanis .

isiliktas 1 have tahen many years ago (Cr. isayantas) ; awaliktas .

isilalis [ shall tahe (Cr . isa‘lis) ; awalalis .

isis ! pl . isitis ! tahe itt a’wis ! a’witis ! (or a’watis

isil tchihaving taken, holding in one’

s hands ; awiytchi.

i'

hs ik (object) tohen, part . pass ; a’hwak .

isigi , isiki to tahe, the tahing ; awigi, awiki .is i, isut, isun one who tahes , carries ; awi, awut, awun .

isihunka, - at,-an one who tooh, has taken ; awihfinka,

-at,-an .

isahika, a t, -an one who is going to tahe ; awahika, -at,-an.


From this verb is iki, awiki the language does not formany passive, reciprocal , reflec t ive and causat ive voice, butemploys verbs from other radices instead . The in terrogat iveand negat ive inflection is as followsisatas [ do not tahe, 2 s . isitskatis , 3 s . isitis ; 1 pl . isikatis ,

2 pl . isatskatis , 3 pl . awatas 1 do not tahe, pl . ofobj., awitskatis etc .

isilus?do [ taket 2 s. isitskus?3 s . isus?1 pl . isigo?2 pl .isatsko 3 pl . (P) . awalus?do I tahe?etc .

isatéi’sb s?do 1 not tahet 2 s. isitskatibos?3 s. isitisb s?1 pl .isikatibb s?2 pl . isatskatibb s?3 pl . awatéi

’

sb s?do [ not take?etc .

A form for the 3 . pl . was remembered by none of myinforman ts, who state that the H i tchi t i render i t by a circumscript ive sentence.

A specimen of the object ive or compound conjugat ion ofthe verb I strihe, bata

'

plilis , runs as follows1 stn

'

he thee once tchibataplilis , repeatedly tchibataspilis

1 strihe him, her once bata'

plilis bataspilis

y e tchibatap’

holilis tchibatas’

hopilis

them batas’hupilis batas

’

hupilis

H e, she strihes meonce: tchabataplis , repeatedly. tchabataSpis

thee tchibataplis tchibataspis

him, her bataplis bataspis

pfibataplis pubatas pis

ye tchibatap’

holis tchibatas’

hopis

them bataspis batas’

hopis

The same verb to strike gives origin to the following genera

verbi, each appearing under two different forms , and all

being quoted in the present tense of the declarat ive mode,affirmat ive voiceActive bata

’

plilis 1 strihe (now) by one blow

bata’spilis 1 strike ( now) by several blows

P assive tchabatapkas I am struch once, by one blow

tchabataspkas Iamstruckmore than once (obsolete)

ALIBAMU . 85

R eciprocal itibataplikas we strihe each other once

itibataspigas we strihe each other repeatedlyR efl ective ilbata

’

plilis I strihe my self by one blow

ilbataspilis I strihe my s elf by several blows

Causative : bataplidshilis cause to strihe once

bataspidshilis 1 cause to strihe repeatedly.

P ostpositions govern the absolute case of the noun just

as they do in Creek :konut tchigi i

- aynun i-aulidshis the shunh stays under the

house.

sawut ahi igapun untchoyolis the racoon sits on the top ofthe tree.

6taki labaki near or around an is land.

otagi apalu-un on the other side of the island.

yantuntun hitchkatigan beyond sight, is an instance of apostposit ion figuring as preposi t ion , and is connected withthe object ive case of a noun . I t is not a real postposi tion

,

but an adverb used in this function .

ALIBAMU .

The disconnected remarks on the Alibamu Indians whichwe find in the documents and chron icles represen t them as

early set tlers on Alabama river, at a moderate distance fromthe confluence of Coosa and Tal lapoosa rivers . In our legendthey are in troduced among the four t ribes contending for thehonor of being the most anc ien t and valorous .D . Coxe , Carolana, p . 24 mentions thei r tribal name in the

fol lowing connect ion : “On Coussa riverl are theUllibalies ’,

1 Anciently Coosa, Coussa river was a name given to our Coosa river,as well as to its lower course below the j unction ofTal lapoosa

, now calledAlabama river. Wright’s Ch. Dictionary has : alua a burntplace.

In the report of the Fidalgo '

de Elvas , Ullibahali, a walled town, isnot identical with Alimamu. Ullibahali is a name composed of the

Alibamu : Oli village, town and the Hitchiti : bahali down stream, and

southward, which is the Creek wahali South.


Olibahalies , Allibamus ; below them the Tall ises . AllenWright derives Alibamu (also wri t ten Allibamous , Alibami,Albamu, incorrectlyAlibamon) from Cha

’hta : alba thicket andayalmuplace cleared ( of trees , thickets) : alba ayamule [ open or

clear the thichet. If this derivat ion is correct , the name, withi ts generic definit ion , could apply to many local i t ies simultaneously. Let us hear what Sekopechi or

“ Perseverance,”

an old man of that tribe, related to Agent Eakin concerningtheir early migrat ions and set tlements. (Schoolcraft, Indians1, 266 sqq)

The Great Spirit brought the Alabama Indians from the

ground between the Cahawba and Alabama rivers , and theybel ieve that they are of right possessors of this soil . The

Muscogees formerly cal led themselves Alabamians thicketclearers ” P) , but other t ribes cal led them Oke- choy -at te,

The earl iest oral t radit ion of the Alibamu of a

migrat ion is, that they migrated from the Cahawba and Ala

bama rivers to the j unction of the Tuscaloosa and Coosarivers , where they sojourned for two years . After th is theydwel t at the junct ion of the Coosa and Alabama rivers , onthe west side of what was subsequently the si te of FortJackson . I t is supposed that at this t ime they numberedfifty effective men. They claimed the country from For tJackson to NewOrleans for thei r hunt ing grounds . ”

Whatever may be the real foundat ion of this confused narrative, it seems that the Alibamu reached their later seatsfrom a country lying to the west or southwest , and that theyshowed a preference for river - junc t ions, for this enabled themto take fish in two rivers simultaneously . Another migrat ionlegend of this tribe , as related by Milfort , will be given and

accoun ted for below.

Biedma relates that H . de Soto , when reaching the “Alibamo province,

”had to fight the nat ives enti'enched within a

palisaded fort ( fuerte de Alibamo, Garc . de laVega) and the1 Oktchoyi is the Cha’hta term for living , alive.

THE MASKOKI FAMILY.

In 1 7 1 3 , after the Alibamu had made an inroad in to the

Carol inas wi th a host of Kataba and Abika Indians,thei r

confederates,the head - chief of the firs t- named tribe besought

the French commander at Mobile bay to erect a fort in h isown country. The offer was accepted , and the tribe washelpful in erect ing a spacious fort of about three hund redfeet square, on a bluff overlooking the river, and close tothei r village (id . , Margry V, 51 0 This fort

,buil t

near the junct ion of Coosa and Tal lapoosa rivers, was cal ledFort Toulouse, and by the Brit ish colonists Fort Albamu, orAlebama garrison .

When Fort Toulousewas abandoned in 1 762, someAlibamuIndians followed the French , and es tabl ished themselvesabout sixty miles above New Orleans , on Miss issippi r iver,near the Huma village. Th . Hutch i ns p . 39 . est imates the number of their warriors set tled there at thi rty.

Subsequently they pas sed into the in terior of Louisiana, wheresome are hunt ing and roving in the woods at the presentt ime. The majori ty, however , set tled in Polk county , inthe southeastern corner of Texas , became agricul turists

, and

about 1 862 numbered over two hundred persons . SomeAlibamu reside in the Indian Terr i tory . Cf. Buschmann ,Spu ren d . az t. Spr. , p . 424.

The former seats of the tribe , near the si te of the presentcapital , Montgomery, are described as followsColonel Benj . Hawkins, United States Agent among the

Creeks , saw four Alibamu towns on Alabama ri ver , belowKoassati. “ The inhabitants are probably the ancient Alabamas , and formerly had a regular town . ( Sketch of theC reek Country, pp . 35

—3 7, The three first were sur

rounded by fert i le lands, and lay on the eas tern bank ofAlabama river . Their names were as follows :Ikan - tchat i or Red Ground ,

”a smal l village, with poor

and indolen t inhabitants .Tawés sa or Tawasa, three miles below Ikan - tchati , a smal l

KOAssATI . 89

vil lage on a high bluff. Called Taouacha by the French , of.Tobome. The Koassati word tabasa means widower, widow.

P awokti, small town on a bluff ; two miles below Tawassa.

A'tagi , a village four miles below the above, s i tuated on

the wes tern bank , and spreading along i t for two miles . Alsowrit ten At- tau-

gee, Autaugee, Autob i. Autauga county isnamed after i t .These Alibamu could raise i n all about eigh ty warriors ;

they did not conform to Creek custom , nor did they apply

the C reek law for the pun ishmen t of adultery . Althoughhospitable to white people, they had very l itt le in tercoursewith them . Whenever a wh ite person had eaten of a dishand left i t , they threw the rest away , and washed everythinghandled by the guest immediately. The above towns , togetherwi th Oktchoyndshi and Koassati were, upon a decree of the

nat ional council at Tukabatchi, November 27th, 1 79 9 , un itedin to one group or class under one warrior of the nat ion .

”

The dign itary elected to that post of honor was Hu‘lipoyi ofOktchoyudshi, who had thewar t i t les ofhadsho and tusténi

'

Iggi.

(Hawkins , pp . 51 . Cf. Witumka.

xoa s sKTI.

The ancient seat of this t r ibewas in Hawkins ’ timeon the right or northern bank of Alabama r iver, three milesbelow the confluence ofCoosa andTal lapoosa rivers . Coosada

,

E lmore coun ty, Alabama, is bui l t on the same spot . Theyare not C reeks , says Hawkins (p . al though they conform to thei r ceremonies ; a part of this town moved latelybeyond the Mississippi , and have settled there.

” G . W.

St idham , who visi ted their set tlement in Polk county, Texas ,during the Secession war, states that they l ived there east ofthe Alibamu , numbered about 200 persons , were pure-bloodedand very supersti t ious . Some Creek Ind ians are with them ,

who formerly l ived in Florida,between the Seminoles and

the Lowe;Creeks .


Thei r t ribal name is differently spel t : Coosadas , Koosati,

Kosadi, Coushatees , etc . Milfort , Mem. p . 265, writes i tCoussehaté . Th is tribe must not be confounded with the

Conshacs , q . v.

From an Al ibamu Indian , Sekopechi, we have a statementon the languages spoken by the people of the Creek confederacy (Schoolcraft , Indians , 1, 266 sq . ) The Muskogeesspeak six d ifferen t dialec ts : Muskogee, H itchitee, Nauchee,Euchee, Alabama and Aquassawtee, but all of them general lyunderstand the Muskogee language.

” Th is seems to indicatethat the Alibamu dialect difl

'

ers from Koassati, for this ismean t by Aquassawtee ; but the vocabularies of GeneralAlbert Pike show that both forms of speech are prac tical lyone and the same language.

H istoric notices of this tribe after i ts emigrat ion to westernparts were collected by Prof. Buschmann , Spuren d . az tek .

Sprache, p . 430 . Many Koassati l ive scat tered among theCreeks in the Creek Nat ion

,Indian Terri tory, at Yufala, for

instance.

H/itumha , on Coosa river, spoke , according to Bartram , the

Stincard” language , and was a town of the Al ibamu divi

sion . Cf. List of Creek Set t lements .

CH ICASA .

The northern parts of Mississippi State contain the earl iesthomes of the warl ike t ribe of Chicasa Indians which bistorical documents enable us to t race. Pontotoc county was thecentre of their habitations in the eigh teenth cen tury

,and was

so probably at the t ime of the Columbian discovery ; set tlements of the tribe scat tered along the Mississ ippi r iver, inWest Tennessee and in Kentucky up to Ohio river, arereported by the later chron iclers .In the year 1 540 the army of Hernando de Soto crossed a

port ion of their terri tory , called by its historians “ Chicacaprovincia, and also visited a town of this name, with a

CHICASA. 9 1

smal ler set tlement (alojamiento) in its vicin i ty named Chi

cacilla.

Two rivers ancien tly bore the name of “ Chicasa river ,not because they were part ial ly or exclusively inhabi ted byt r ibes of th is nat ional i ty , but because their headwaters laywithin the Chicasa boundaries . This gives us a clue to the

topograph ic posit ion of the Chicasa set tlemen ts. Jefl’

erys ( I ,states that Chicasa river is theMaubile orMobile river,

runn ing no rth and south (now cal led Lower Alibama river) ,and that i t takes i ts rise in the country of the Chicasaws i nth ree streams. ” When L. d

’

Iberville traveled up the Yaz oor iver, the villages on i ts banks were referred to him as lyingon “ la riviere des Chicachas .

” 1

The most luc id and comprehensive accoun t of the Chicasas ettlements is found in Adair ’s H istory.James Adair , who was for several years a trader among the

Chicasa, gives the following accoun t of thei r country and

sett lements (H istory , p . 352, The Chikkasah countryl ies in about thi rty -five degrees N . L at. , at the distance ofone hundred and sixty miles from the eastern side of the

Mississippi about hal f way from Mob ille to theIll inois, etc . The Chikkasah are now set tled between the

heads of two of the most western branches of Mob ille riverand with in twelve miles of Tahre Hache (Tal lahatchie) .

In 1 720 they had four cont iguous set tlemen ts, whichlay nearly i n the form of three parts of a square

,only that

the eastern side was five miles shorter than the wes tern , withthe open part toward the Choktah. One was called Yaneka,about a mile wide and six miles long another wasten miles long and from one to two miles broad .

The towns were called Shatara, Chookheereso, H ykehah,

Tuskawillao , and P halacheho . The other square, ChookkaPharaah or “ the long - house,

” was s ingle and ran four milesin length and one mile in breadth . It was more populous

1 Margry IV, 180.


than thei r whole nat ion con tains at present scarcely

450 warriors .” From Adair’s text i t appears that the three

towns were but a short d istance from the fort ified places heldby them at the t ime when he composed h is H is tory (published

They were about Pontotoc or Dal las count ies, Mississippi .The Chicasa settlements are referred to in detail by B .

Romans, East and West Florida, p . 63 :“ They l ive in the

centre of an uneven and large n itrous savannah ; have in i tone town , long one mile and a hal f, very narrow and i rregular ; this they divide into seven ( towns) , by the namesof Melattaw ‘ hat and feather ,

’

Chatelaw ‘ copper town ,’

Chukafalaya‘ long town ,

’Tuckahaw a certain weed ,

’

Ashuck booma ‘red grass .’ Formerly the whole of them

were enclosed in pal isadoes . Unfortunately , th is l ist givesonly five towns instead of the seven referred to .

D . Coxe, Carolana ( 1 74 1 ) says , when speaking of theTennessee river (p . 1 3 .

“ R iver of the Cusates,Chera

quees or Kas qui river a catarac t is on it, also thet ribe of the Chicazas . An early French report alludes to

one of thei r vil lages , si tuated thirty leagues inward from a

place forty leagues above the mouth of Arkansas river .From Abeeka to the Chickasaw towns the d istance is

about one hundred and fifty- n ine miles , crossing many

savannahs B . Romans , E . and W . Florida, p . 3 1 3 .

Through all the epochs of colon ial history the Chicasapeople main tained their old reputat ion for independence andbravery . They were constantly engaged in quarrels and

broils with all thei r Indian neighbors : somet imes wi th the

cognate Cha’hta and with the Creeks , at other t imes with theCheroki , Ill inois, Kickapu, Shawano , Tonica, Mobil ians ,Osage and Arkansas (Kapaha) Indians . In 1 732 they cut topieces a war party of the Iroquois invading their terri tory,but in 1 748 cooperated against the French with that confederacy. J . Haywood , in his Natural and Aboriginal H istory

CHICASA. 93

of Tennessee p . 240 , alludes to a tradi t ion purport ingthat the Ch icasa had formerly assisted the Cheroki in drivingthe Shawanese from the Cumberland river ; the Cherokidesired war, and attacked the Ch icasa shortly before 1 769 ,

but were utterly defeated by them at the Chicasa OldFields ,

”and retreated by way of Cumberland r iver and the

Cany Fork . On the au thori ty of chief Chenubbee, the same

author states (p . 290) that a part of the Chicasa establ ishedthemselves on Savannah river, opposite Augusta, but thatmisunderstandings with the C reeks made them go west again .

In 1 795 the Ch icasa claimed the land opposite Augusta, andsent a memorial to the United States Government to sub stantiate that claim . Another fract ion of the tribe, cal led the

Lightwood -Knots , went to war with the Creeks , but werereduced by them , and have l ived with them in peace eversince. These fact s seem to have some reference to the set tlemen t of a Chicas a band near Kasiy ta, and eas t of that towncf. Kasi’hta.

P énicaut ment ions an in tertribal war between them and

the Cha ’hta, and relates a case of treason committed by a

Cha’hta chief in A war with the C reeks occurred in1 79 3 , in wh ich the Americans stood on the Chicasa side.

The pol icy of the Chicasa in regard to the white colon istswas that of a steady and prot rac ted enmity agains t the

'

French . This feel ing was produced as well by the in triguesof the British traders resid ing among them as by thei r hatredof the Cha’hta , who had en tered in to friendly relat ions withthe French colonists , though they could not , by any means ,he cal led thei r t rusty al l ies . By establ ishing fortified postson theYaz oo and Lit tle Tombigbee rivers ,

“the French threat

ened the independence of these Ind ians, who began hostil i t ies

Marefy V. 433 sqq

3 The site once occupied by Fort Tombigbee is now called Jones’B lufl

'

, on Little Tombigbee river. Cf. Dumont in B . F. French , Histor.Co ll . of L a. , V , 106 and Note.


against them in 1 722, near theYaz oo post, and urged the

Naktche to a stubborn resistance against French encroachments . They shel tered the retreat ing Naktche against thepursuing French , l besieged the commander Denys at FortNatchitoches , though they were repulsed there with cons iderab le loss , defeated the French invading thei r country atAmalahta at the Long House, oi Tchuka falaya

(Adai r , p. and other poin ts , and in the second at tack of1 739

-

40 also bafl‘led their at tempts at conquering port ions ofChicasa territory .

The relat ions of these Indians with the United States wereregulated by a

,t reaty concluded at Hopewel l , 1 786, with Pio

mico and other Ch icasa ch iefs . Thei r terri tory was thenfixed at the Ohio river on the north side, and by a boundaryl ine passing through Northern Mississippi on the south side.

They began to emigrate to the west of Arkansas river earl yin th is cen tury, and in 1 822 the population remain ing intheir old seats amounted to 3625. Treat ies for the removalof the remainder were concluded at Pontotoc creek

, October20th, 1 832 , and at Was hington , May 24th, 1 834 .

After their establishmen t in the Indian Terri tory the pol i t ical connect ions st i ll exist ing between them and the Cha’h tawere severed by a treaty signed June 22d , 1 855. The l ineof demarcat ion separat ing the two “ nat ions , and followingthe merid ian , is not , however, of a binding character, forindividuals of both peoples set tle eas t or west of i t , whereverthey please (G . W . Stidham) .No plausible analysis of the name Chicasa, which many

western t ribes , as wel l as the Chicasa themselves , pronounceShikasa, Shikasha, has yet been sugges ted . Near the Gul f

1 Adair, History , p . 353 , asserts that the real cause of the thirdNaktcheFrench war lay in the instigations of the Chicasa . On the causes and

progress of the hostilities between the French and the Chicasa, cf. pp.

353—358 . They attacked there his own trading house, of. p . 357 . Cf.

al so Naktche, in this vol ., pp. 34—39 .


A few terms in which Ch icasa differs from main Cha’htaare as follows :

Chicasa kuishtopanther, Cha’hta kuitchitokoe domestic cat, kato (Span ish)isto large, tchitoiskitinusa small, iskitiné

hushi bird, fushiThe Chicasa t rade language also adopted a few terms from

northern languages , aspishu lynx ,

from Odshibwepishiu also an Odshibwe totemclan .

piakiminapersimmon, changed in the French Creole dialec ttoplaquemine.

shishikushigourd- rattle or drum,

Margry IV, 1 75.

sacacuya war-whoop,la huée.

Lewis H . Morgan published in his Ancient Society (NewYork , p . 1 63 , a communicat ion from Rev. Chas . C .

Copeland , missionary among the Chicasa Indians , on the

totemic gentes observed by him . Copeland states that thedescent is in the female l ine, that no in termarriage takes placeamong individuals of the same gens , and that property as

wel l as the oflice of ch ief is hereditary in the gens. The following l ist will show how considerably he differs from G ibbs ’

l ist inserted below :

P anther phratry, koa. Its gentes : 1 . ko- intchush, wild

cat; 2. fush i , bird ; 3 . nanni , fish ; 4 . iss i , deer .

Spanishphratry , Ishpani. Its gentes : I . shawi racoon ; 2 .

Ishpani’

Spanish; 3 . mingo R oyal ; 4. huské ni ; 5. ti’

inni

squirrel ; 6. hotchon tchapa alligator ; 7 . nashoba wolf; 8 .

tchi’

I’

hla blachbird .

Further inves tigat ions wil l show whether the two gentes ,Ishpani and mingo, are not in fact one and the same, as theyappear in G ibbs ’ l ist . This list is taken from a manuscriptnote to h is Ch icasa vocabulary , and contains n ine clans

or iksa, yéksa :

CHICASA. 97

Spane or Spanish gens ; mingos or chiefs could be chosenfrom this gens only , and were hereditary in thefemale l ine ; sha- é or racoon gens ; second chiefs

or headmen were selec ted from it kuishto or tigergens ; ko- intchfish or catamount gens ; nan i orfishgens issi or deer gens haloba or i’ gens foshé or

bird gens ; hunshkoné or shanh gens , the least re

spected of them all.

An account in Schoolcraft, Indians I , 3 1 1 , describes themode of tribal government, and the method by which the

chiefs rat ified the laws passed . S ick people, when wealthy ,treated their friends to a sort of donat ion party (or potlatchof the Pacific coast) after their recovery ; a custom calledtonshpashupa by the tribe.

TRIBES on THE YA Z OO R IVER .

Along theYaz oo ri ver existed a series of towns which seemto have been independent at the time of thei r discovery , butat a late period , about 1 836, were incorporated in to the

Chicasa people. Some were inhabited by powerful and

influent ial tribes , but it is uncertain whether any of themwere of Maskoki l ineage and language or not . 1 During theth ird Naktche-French war, the Yaz oo tribes sufl

'

ered consid

erab ly from attacks d irected upon them by the ArkansasIndians . The coun t ries along Yaz oo river are low and

swampy grounds , subject to inundat ions , especially the

narrow strip of land extending between that river and theMississ ippi .The Taensa guide who accompan ied Lemoyne d ’

Iberville,

up the Yaz oo river in March 1 699 , enumerated the villagesseen on i ts low banks in thei r succession from southwest tonor theas t , as follows (Margry IV, 1 80)

1 I have treated of some of these tribes (Tonica , Koroa) in separatearticles. Moncachtape said to du Pratz , that the Yazoo Ind ians regardedthe Chicasa as their elders , “ since from them came the language of the

country .

"


1 . Tonica, four days’travel from the Naktche and two

days’ t ravel from the uppermost town , Thysia. Cf.Ton ica, p . 39 sqq .

2. Q uispe ; the Oussipés of P énicaut.

3 . Opocoulas . They are the Affagoulas , Offogoula, Oufé

ogoulas or“Dog -People of the later authors, and

in 1 784 some of them arement ioned as res iding eigh tmiles above Pointe Coupée, on W . bank of Miss issippi river .

4. Taposa ; the Tapouchas of Baudry de L oz iere.

5. Chaquesauma. This important tribe, wr i tten also Chokeeohuma, Chactchioumas , Saques

’

huma, etc . , are

the Saquechuma visited by a detachment of deSoto ’s army in their walled town The

name signifia red crabs . " Cf. Adair , H is tory , p .

352 :“ Tahro- hache (Tallahatchi) ,

l which lowerdown is cal led Chokchooma river, as that nat ionmade their fi rs t set tlements there, after they cameon the other s ide of Missmippi. The

Chicasaw, Choktah and also the Chokchooma, whoin process of time were forced by war to set tle between the two former nat ions , came together fromthe west as one family,

”

etc. Cf. B . Romans, p .

3 1 5. Crab, crawfish is soktchu in Creek, saktchi

in H i tchi t i .6. Outapa cal led Epitoupa, Ibitoupas in other documents .

7. Thys ia ; at six days ’ canoe travel ( forty- two leagues)from the Naktche. They are the Tihiou of D an.

CoxeP énicaut, who accompanied d ’

Iberville in this exped i t ion ,gives an accoun t of the Yaz oo villages, which differs in somerespects from the above : Going up the river of the Yazouxfor four leagues , there are found on the right the villages

1 A large northern afi uent of Yazoo river, in northern parts of Mississippi State.


about 50 huts , on same river ; Oufé - ouglas,about 60 huts ;

Tapoussas , not over 25 huts.”

CHA ’HTA .

The southwestern area of the Maskoki terri tory was occu

pied by the Cha’hta people, and in the eigh teen th centurythis was probably the most populous of all Maskoki d ivisions .They dwel t in the middle and southern parts of what is nowMiss issippi State, where, according to early authors , they hadfrom fifty to seventy villages ; they then extended from the

Mississippi to Tombigbee river, and eas t of i t .The t ribes of Tuskalusa or Black Warrior , and that of

Mauvila, which offered such a bold resistance to H . de Soto ’ssold iers

,were of Cha’hta l ineage, though it is not possible at

present to state the locat ion of their towns at so remote a

per iod .

On account of their vicin i ty to the French coloniesat Mobile, Biloxi , NewOrleans, and on other points of theLower Mississippi , the Cha

’hta assoc iated early with the colonis ts , and became thei r all ies in Indian wars . The French andBrit ish traders called them Tetes - Plat tes

,Flatheads . In the

third French war agains t the Naktche a large body of Cha’htawarriors served as al l ies under the French commander, andon January 27, 1 730, before dayl igh t , made a furious on

slaught on their princ ipal village, kill ing sixty enemies and

rescuing fifty- n ine French women and children and onehundred and fifty negro slaves previously captured by the

t ribe (Claiborne , Miss issippi , I , 45. In the Ch icasawarfourteen hund red Cha’hta Indians aided the French army ini ts at tack on the Chuka p

’

haraah or Long -House Town , asauxil iaries (Adair, H istory, p .

They cont inued friends of the French unti l (as stated byRomans , Florida, p . 74) some Engl ish traders found meansto draw the eas tern party and the district of Coosa ( togethercal led p at- oocooloo,

“ smal l nat ion ”

) in to a c ivil war

CHA’

HTA. 101

with the western divisions , called Oocooloo-Falaya (“ long

tr ibe Oocooloo -Hanalé (“ six tribes and Chickasaw

hays , wh ich , after many confl ic ts and the destruction of EastCongeeto, ended with the peace of 1 763 .

The Cha’hta did not rely so much on the products of thechase

,as other t ribes , but preferred to t i l l the ground exten

sively and with care. La ter travelers , l ike Adair , depicttheir character and moral i ty in very dark colors . In war

,

the Cha’hta east of the Mississippi river were less aggressivethan those who resided west of i t , for the pol icy of keepingin the defensive agreed bes t wi th thei r dull and slow disposi t iou of mind . About 1 73 2, the ordinary, though con testedboundary between them and the C reek confederacy was theridge that separates the waters of the Tombigbee from thoseof the Alabama r iver . Thei r principal wars

,always defensive

and not very sanguinary, were fought with the Creeks ; in a

confl ic t of six years , 1 765— 1 77 1 , they lost about three hundredmen (Gallat in , Synopsis , p . Claiborne men tions a

bat tle fough t between the two nat ions on the eas tern bankof Noxubee r iver , about five miles west of Cooksvi lle, Noxub ee County , Mississippi . Charles Dobbs , the settler at thefarm including the burying -

ground of those who fell in thatbat t le

,opened i t in 1 832, and found many Spanish dollars

in the graves . I t was some three hundred yards northeas t ofthe j unct ion of Shuqualak creek with the river . A decisivevictory of the Cha’h ta took place at Nusic- beah , or Linecreek , over the Chocchuma Ind ians , who belonged to the

Chicasa connection the bat tle occurred south of that creek ,at a local i ty named Lyon ’s Bluff. lMilfort establishes a thorough dist inct ion between the

northern and the southern Cha’hta as to thei r pursuits ofl i fe and moral character . The Cha’hta of the northern sect ion are warl ike and brave, wear garmen ts , and crop thei rhair in Creek fash ion . The southern Cha’hta, set tled on

1 Claiborne, Mississippi, Appendix , I , p. 485. 486.


fert ile ground west of Mobile and southwes t of P ascogoula,are dirty, indolen t and cowardly, miserably dressed and

inveterate beggars. Both sect ions could in h is t ime raisesix thousand warriors (p . 285 The mortuary customs

,

part of which were exceedingly barbaric , are spoken of withmany detai ls by Milfort (p . 29 2

—304) thei r pract ices in cases

of divorce and adultery (p . 304—3 1 1 ) are dwel t upon by

several other writers , and were of a revolt ing charac ter.lNo mention is made of the great house” or the square

in Cha’hta towns, as i t existed in every one of the largerCreek communit ies , nor of the green corn dance. But theyhad the favorite game of chunké , and played at ball betweenvillage and village (B . Romans , p . 79 . The men as sistedtheir wives in their agricul tural labors and in many otherworks connected with the household .

’ The pract ice offlattening the heads extended to the male children only ;the Aimaraof Peru observed the same exclusive custom .

The collect ing and clean ing of the bones of corpses wasa custom existing throughout the southern as wel l as thenorthern Indians eas t of Miss issippi river, and among somet ribes wes t of i t . Every tribe prac ticed i t in a differen tmanner ; the Cha

’h ta employed for the clean ing : “old gen

tlemen with very long nails ,”

and deposi ted the remains,placed in boxes , in the bone houses exist ing in every town .

8

Tombigbee river received i ts name from th is class of menitumbi- b ikpi coffin-maker . ” The Indians at Fort Orangeor Albany (probably the Mohawks) bound up the cleanedbones in smal l bundles and buried them : D e Vries , ,

Voyages

( 1 642) p . 1 64 ; the Nan t icokes removed them to the placefrom wh ich the tribe had emigrated (Heckewelder

,Delawares ,

p . 75 sq .) Similar customs were observed among the Dakota1 Cf. B .

-Romans , E. and W . Florida, p . 86—89 .

3 B . Romans , p . 86. He describes education among the Cha’hta, p . 76.

77 ; the sarbacane or blow-

gun, p. 77.

B . Romans, p . 89 . 90 .


Bayou Chicot, Opelousas Parish , Louisiana. Morse mentions

for 1 820 twelve hundred Cha’hta Indians on the Sabine and

Neche rivers, one hundred and forty on Red river nearNanatsoho, or Pecan Poin t , and many l ived scat tered aroundthat district. At the present t ime encampments of

Biloxis, who speak the Cha

’hta language, exist in the forestsof Louisiana south of Red river.The Cha’hta nat ion is formal ly, though not local ly , d ivided

into two iksa (yéksa) or kinst s , which exist promiscuouslythroughout their terri tory. These divisions were defined byAllen Wr ight as : I . Kashap

- ukla or kashapa uké la ( okla)“ part of the people ; 2. Llkla i°hula’hta “ people of theheadmen .

Besides th is , there is another formal division into th ree6kla, districts or fires , the names of wh ich were partlyalluded to in the passage from B . Romans6kla falaya “ long peopleahepat Okla potato - eat ing peopleOkla hannali Sixtown people,

” who used a special d ialect .The l ist of Cha’hta gentes, as pr in ted in Lewis H . Morgan

,

Ancient Society,‘ stands as follows

First plzrairy : kushap okla or Divided People. Fourgentes I . kush - iksa, reed gens . 2. L aw okla. 3 . Lulakiksa. 4. L inoklusha.

Secondplzratry : wataki hulata or Beloved People, peopleof head -men ” Four gentes : I . chufan iksa, belovedpeople.

2. iskulani, small (people) 3 . ch ito, large (people) 4.

shakch-fikla, t ray-fishpeople.

Property and the oflice of ch iefwas hereditary in the gens .As far as the wording is concerned , Morgan

’s l ist is notsat isfactory , but being the only one extan t I present it as i t is.Rev. Alfred Wr igh t , miss ionary of the Cha

’h ta,knows of

six gentes only, but states that there were two great familieswho could not intermarry . These were, as stated by Morgan ,

1 Published New York,1877 . pp . 99 . 162.

CHA’

HTA. 105

the reed gens and the chufan gens . Wr igh t then cont inuesWoman ’s brothers are considered natural guardians of the

ch ild ren , even dur ing father’s l ifet ime ; counsel was taken for

criminals from thei r phratry , the opposi te phratry, or ratherthe pr incipal men of th is, act ing as accusers. If they failedto adjust the case, the principal men of the next largerd ivision took i t up ; i f they also fai led , the case then camebefore the itimoklushas and the shakch-uklas , whose dec isionwas final . This practice is fal l ing in disuse now.

” A business - l ike and truly judic ial proceeding l ike th is does muchhono r to the character and pol icy of the Cha’hta, and willbe found in but a few other Indian communit ies . I t musthave acted powerfully against the prevail ing pract ice of

family revenge,and served to establ ish a state of safety for

the l ives of individuals .More poin ts on Cha’hta ethnography will be found in the

Notes to B . F . French , H istor. Collec t . of L a. , III , 1 28- 1 39 .

The legends of the Cha’hta speak of a gian t race, peaceable

and agr icul tural and also of a cann ibal race,both

of wh ich they met east of the Mississippi r iver .The Cha’hta t race their my t/zie origin from the Stooping

,

Lean ing or Winding H i ll ,” Nan i We

'

tya,a mound of fifty

feet al t i tude, si tuated in Winston county , Mississippi , on theheadwaters of Pearl river . The top of th is birthplace” of

the nat ion is level,and has a su rface of about one- fourth of

an acre. One legend states , that the Cha’h ta arrived there,

after crossing the Mississippi and separat ing from the

Ch icasa, who wen t north during an epidemic . NannaWaya creek runs through the southeastern parts of Winstoncounty , Miss .Another place, far- famed in Cha’h ta folklore, was the

House of Warriors,” Taska- tchuka, the oldest sett lemen t in

1 Nahullo ,nahunlo means : greater, higher race, eminent race ; though

the original meaning is that of more sacred , more honorable.

” A whiteman is cal led by the Cha’hta nahullo .

8


the nat ion , and s tanding on the verge of the Kushtush‘ . Itlay in Neshoba county , Mississippi . It was a sor t of temple,and the Unkala, a priestly order , had the custody or care of

i t . The I’ksa A’numpule or

“ clan - speakers ” prepared the

bones of great warriors for bur ial , and the Unkala went atthe head of the mourners to that temple , chant ing hymns inan unknown tongue.

”

The curious tale of the origin of the Cha ’hta from Nan iWaya has been often referred to by authors . B . Romansstates that they showed the “ hole in the ground , fromwhich they came, between thei r nat ion and the Chicasa, andtold the colonists that their neighbors were surprised at seeinga people r ise at once out of the earth (p . The mostc ircumstantial accoun t of th is preternatural occurrence islaid down in the following narrat ive.

” “When the earthwas a level plain in the condit ion of a quagmire , a superiorbeing , in appearance a red man, came down from above,and al igh ting near the centre of the Choctaw nat ion , threwup a large mound or hill , cal led Nanne Wayah

, stoopingor s loping lzill. Then he caused the red people to comeout of i t , and when he supposed that a sufficien t number hadcome out , he stamped on the ground with his foot . Whenth is signal of h is power was given, some were partly formed ,others were just raising their heads above the mud , emerginginto l igh t

,

‘and st ruggl ing into l ife. Thus seated

on the area of thei r h il l , they were told by thei r Creatorthey should l ive forever. But they did not seem to understand what he had told them ; therefore he took away fromthem the grant of immortal i ty, and made them subject to

1 Custuslza creek runs into K entawha creek , affl uent of B ig Black river,in Neshoba county.

2 Claiborne, Mississippi, I, p . 51 8 .

3 Missionary Herald , 1828, p . 18 1 .

Compare the poetic vision, parallel to this, contained in Ezekiel ,ch. 39 .


clustered together in tribes , perhaps also after gentes , as wesee i t done among the Mississippi tribes and in a few in

stances among the Creeks .The old Choctaw Boundary Line, as marked upon the

U . S . Land Office map of 1 878 , runs from Prentiss , a po in ton the Mississ ippi river in Bolivar county ( 33

°

3 7'

Miss . , in a southeastern direct ion to a poin t on Yaz oo river,in Holmes county. The “ Chicasaw Boundary Line ” runsfrom the Tun ica Old Fields , in Tunica county , opposi teHelena, on Mississippi river ( 34

°

33’ southeas t through

Coffeeville in Yallabusha county , to a poin t in Sumner county ,eastern part . The “ Choctaw Boundary Line passes fromeast to wes t , following approximately the 3 1

°

50’ of L at. , from

the Eas tern boundary of Mississippi State to the southwestco rner of Copiah coun ty . All these boundary l ines wererun after the conclusion of the t reaty at Doak ’s Stand .

The Gus/1a Indians , also cal led Coosa, Coosahs , had set tlements on the Cusha creeks , in Lauderdale coun ty .

The Ukla -falaya , or Long People,” were set tled in

Leake county . (P)The Cofetalaya were inhabi t ing Atala and Choc taw coun

t ies , set tled at French Camp , etc ., on the old mil i tary road

leading to Old Doak ’s Stand ; General Jackson advancedthrough th is road , when marching south to meet the

English army.

P ines/tan Indians , on a branch of Pearl river, in Winstoncounty .

B ogueelzilo Indians , on stream of the same name in Neshobacounty , near Philadelph ia. Some Mugulashas l ived in the

Boguechito distric t Wiatakali was one of the vi llages .Yaz oo Old Village also stood in Neshoba coun ty .

Six towns or English -Towns, a group of six villages in Smithand Jasper counties . Adair , p . 29 8 , ment ions seven townsthat lie close together and next to New Orleans ” ,

perhapsmean ing these. The names of the six towns were as follows

CHA’HTA.

Chinokabi, Okatallia, Kil l is - tamaha (kil is , in Creek : inkilisi,is English) , Tallatown, Nashoweya, B ishkon.

Sunz’

nale/zi or Factory Indians set tlement, in Lowndesand Kemper count ies . Allamutcha Old Town was ten milesfrom Sukinatchi creek.

Yanana , Yowanne was a pal isaded town on Pascagoulariver , or one of i ts atfiuents ; cf. Adai r, H istory, 29 7— 299 . 301 .

H e cal ls i t remote but considerable ; i t has i ts name froma worm ,

very dest ruc t ive to corn in the wet season . Frenchmaps place i t on the same river , where Chicachae

” fortstood above, and cal l i t : “Yanana, dernier village des Choctaws . ” Yoani, on the banks of the Pasca Oocooloo

(Pascagoula) B . Romans,p . 86 .

An old Cha’h ta Agency was in Oktibb eha county .

ColoI ndians ; west of Pearl river.Shuqualak in Noxubee county .

C/zieasaw/zay Indians on river of the same name, an affl uen tof the Pascagoula ri ver ; B . Romans , p . 86 , s tates , that “ theChoctaws of Chicasahay and the Yoani on Pasca Oocoolooriver are the only Cha’hta able to swim .

I t may be collected from the above, that the mai n sett lemen ts of the Northern Cha’hta were between Mobile and

Big Black river , east and west , and between 32°and 33

°

30'

L at., where their remnants reside even nowadays .

CHA ’HTA TRIBES OF THE GULF COAST.

In the southern part of the Cha’h ta terri tory several t ribes ,represented to be of Cha’hta l ineage, appear as dist inct fromthe main body , and are always mentioned separately . The

French colonists , in whose annals they figure extensively ,cal l them Mobil ians

,Tohomes , P ascogoulas , Biloxis , Mou

goulachas , Bayogoulas and Humas (Oumas) . They have all

disappeared in our epoch , with the exception of the Biloxi ,of whom scat tered remnants l ive in the forests o f Louisiana,south of the Red river .


fi eMobilians seem to be the descendants of the inhabi tants of Mauvila, a wal led town , at some distance from the

seat of the Tuscalusa chief, and dependent on h im . TheseIndians are well known for their stubborn resistance offeredin 1 540 to the invading t roops of Hernando de Soto .

Subsequently they must have removed several hundredmiles south of Tuscalusa r iver, perhaps on accoun t of in tertribal broils with the Alibamu for in the year 1 708 we findthem set tled on Mobile Bay, where the French had al lowedthem , the Naniaba and Tohome, to erect lodges around theirfort . Cf. Alibamu . On a place of worship visi ted by thistribe Margry IV, 51 3 .

Tlze Tohome, Thomes , Tomez Indians , set tled north ofMobile City , stood in the service of the French colony , andadopted the Roman Catholic fai th . Besides the Naniaba‘

and Mobil ian Indians , the French had set tled in thei rv icin i ty a pagan Cha’hta tribe from the northwes t and an

advent it ious band of Apalaches , who had fled the Spanishdominat ion in Flor ida. We are in formed that the languageand barbarous customs of the Tohomes differed considerablyfrom those of the neighboring Indians . Thei r name is theCha’hta adject ive tohé b i, contr . tobi m/zite.

In 1 702 they were at war with the Ch icasa. Thei r cabinsstood eigh t leagues from the French settlement at Mobile , onMobile river , and the number of thei r men is given as threehundred . They spoke a dialec t of the Bayogoula. Cf.Margry IV, 427 . 429 . 504. 51 2

- 1 4. 53 1 . The Mobil iansand the Tohomes combined coun ted three hundred and fiftyfamil ies : Margry IV , 594. 602.

TheTouaelzas settled by the French upon Mobile bay in 1 705were a part of theTawasa

,an Alibamu t ribe mentioned above.

1 Fish- eaters ,” from Cha’hta nani. nannifi s/z , apa to eat. On Turner’smap Nanihaba Island lies at the junction of Alabama with Tombigbee river, and Nanibaba Bluff lies west of the j unction.

2 Margry

1 12 THE MASKOKI FAMILY.

name is ident ical with Imuklasha or the “ opposi te phratryin the Cha’hta nat ion , from which Muklasha, a Creek town ,also received i ts name. In consequence of this gener icmean ing of the term this appel lat ion is met with in severalport ions of the Cha’hta country.

Previous to March 1 700, there had been a confl ict betweenthem and the Bayogoulas , in which the lat ter had killed all

of the Mugulashas who were with in thei r reach , and called infamil ies of the Colapissas and Tioux to occupy thei r desertedfields and lodges . Cf. Margry IV, Boguechito Indians ,Bayogoula and Acolapissa .

Tlie Aeolapissa Indians appear under various names in thecountry northwest to northeas t of NewOrleans . They arealso cal led Colapissa, Quinipissa, Quiripissa, Querepisa, formswhich all flow from Cha’hta okla- pisa “ those who lookout for people, guardians , spies , sentinels , watching men.

Th is term refers to their posi tion upon the in and out - flowof Lake Pontchartrain and other coas t lagoons

,combined

wi th their watchfulness for host ile part ies passing theseplaces . I t is therefore a generic term and not a specifictribal name ; hence i t was appl ied to several t ribes simultaneously, and they were reported to have seven towns ,Tangibao among them ,

wh ich were d istant eight days ’ t ravelby land E . N . E . from thei r set tlement on Miss issippi river .Cf. Margry IV,

1 20 . 1 6 7. 1 68 . Thei r village on Mississippi r iver was seen by L . d

’

lberville, 1 699— 1 700 , twen ty - five

leagues from i ts mouth ( IV, Their language is spokenof

, ibid. IV, 4 1 2. At the t ime of Tonti’

s visi t , 1 685, theyl ived twenty leagues further down the Mississ ippi than in1 699

— 1 700 . They sufl'

ered terribly from epidemics, and joined

the Mugulashas , q. v. ,whose chief became the ch ief of both

t ribes ; Margry IV, 453 . 602. On “Colapissas" residing on

Talcatcha or Pearl river, see Pan i , p . 44. The Bayogoulasinformed d ’

Iberville in 1 69 9 , that the“Quinipissas

” l ivedfi fty leagues east of them , and th irty or for ty leagues d istant

CHA’

HTA. 113

from the sea, in six villages : Margry IV, 1 1 9 . 1 20 . Are

they the Sixtown Indians?Tlze B ayogoula Indians inhabited a village on the Missis

s ippi river, western shore (Margry IV, 1 1 9 . conj oint lywi th the Mugulashas , sixty- four leagues distan t from the

sea, thirty - five leagues from the Humas , and eight days ’

canoe t ravel from Biloxi bay .

Commander Lemoyne d’

Iberville graphical ly describes

(Margry IV, 1 70- 1 72) the village of the Bayogoula wi th its

two temples and 1 0 7 cabins. The number of the males wasrather large ( 200 to 250) compared to the paucity of womeninhabit ing i t . A fire was burn ing in the centre of the

temples , and near the door were figures of an imals , the“choucoiiacha

”or opossum being one of them . Th is word

shukuasha is the diminut ive of Cha’hta : shukata opossum,

and contains the diminut ive terminal - ushi . Shishikushi or“tamboursfaits de ealeoasses

,

” gou rd - drums,is another Indian

term occurring in h is descript ion , ‘ probably borrowed froman Algonkin language of the north . A cur ious instance of

sign language displayed by one of the Bayogoula chiefs willbe found in Margry IV,

1 54. 1 55.

The full form of the t r ibal name is Bayuk - okla or river- tribe,

ereek or oayou-people ; the Cha’hta word for a smaller river ,or r iver forming part of a del ta is bayuk , con t r. bok , andoccurs in Boguechito , Bok

’humma, etc .

T/ze I I zérna, Ouma, Houma or Omma tribe l ived , in the

earl ier periods of French coloniz at ion , seven leagues abovethe junct ion of Red river, on the eas tern bank ofMississipp iriver . L . d

’

Iberville describes their set tlemen t , 1 69 9 , as

placed on a hill - ridge, 2% leagues inland , and contain ing 1 40cabins , with abou t 350 heads of famil ies . Thei r village isdescribed in Margry IV , 1 77. 1 79 . 265

- 27 1 . 452, located bydegrees of lat i tude : 3 2

°of longitude : 28 1

° The

Margry IV, 1 75 :“ des tambours chychycouchy , qui sont des cale

basses ."

1 14 THE MASKOKI FAMILY.

l imi t between the lands occupied by the Huma and the

Bayogoulawas marked by a high pole painted red , in Cha’hta

Istro ouma (P) , wh ich stood on the h igh shores of Mississippiriver at Baton Rouge, L a.

l Their hostil i t ies with the Tangipahoa are referred to by the French annal ists , and ended inthe destroying the Tangipahoa town by the Huma ; Margry

IV, 1 68 . 1 69 . Cf. Taensa. A tribe ment ioned in 1 682 inconnection with the Huma is that of the Chigilousa ; Margry

I , 563 .

Their language is d istinctly stated to have differed fromthat of the Taensa

,IV, 4 1 2. 448, and the tribal name, a

Cha’hta term fo r red, probably refers to red leggings , as

Opelusa is said to refer to black leggings or moccasins .They once claimed the ground on which New Orleans

stands , and after the Revolut ion lived on Bayou Lafourche.

’

A coas t parish , with Houma as parish seat , is now cal ledafter them .

H e country south of the Upper Creek set tlements , lyingbetween Lower Alabama and Lower Chatahuchi river, musthave been sparsely sett led in colonial t imes , fo r there is butone Indian tribe, the Pensacola (pa

‘ sha- okla or hair- people’

ment ioned there . This name is of Cha’h ta or igin , and thereis a t radit ion that the old homes , or a part of them , of theCha’hta nat ion lay in these tracts . On Escambia river thereare Cha’h ta at the present t ime, who keep up the custom offamily vendet ta or blood revenge, and that river is also mentioned as a constant bat tle-field between the Creeks and

Cha’h ta tribes by W . Bartram .

’ When the Cha’h ta conc ludedtreat ies with the Uni ted States Government in volving cessionsof land , they claimed ownership of the lands in quest ion ,even of some lands lying on the eas t side of Chatahuchi

r iver, where they had probably been hunt ing from an early1 Thomas Hutchins , French America, Phila. , 1 784 , p . 40.

3 P énicaut in Margry V , 395.

Travels, p . 436 :“ the bloody field of Schambe ”

; cf. 400. 414.


accounted for by the generic meaning of the appel lationConshac. I t is the Cha’hta word kanshak : ( 1 ) a species ofcane, of extremely hard texture, and ( 2) knife made fromit.These knives were used throughout the Gulf terri tor ies , andthus d ’

Iberville and du Pratz call by this name the CreekIndians or Maskoki proper, while to others the Conchaquesare the Cusha, Kusha, a Cha’h ta t ribe near Mobile bay ,

which is cal led by Rev. Byington in his manuscript dict ionaryKonshas , Konshaws . That the Creeks once manufacturedknives of this kind is stated in our Kasi

’

hta m igration legend .

THE CHA’HTA LANGUAGE ,

the representat ive pf the western group of Maskoki dialects ,differs in i ts phonetics from the eas tern dialects chiefly by themore general vocal ic nasal iz at ion previously al luded to .

Words cannot begin with two consonants ; the Creek st isreplaced by s lit, and combinat ions l ike tl, at, nt do notoccur (Byington

’

s G rammar, p . In shor t words theaccen t is laid upon the penult ima.

The cases of the noun are not so d ist inctly marked as theyare in the eas tern dialects by the case- suffixes in -t and - n, buthave often to be determined by the hearer from the posi t ionof the words in the sentence. But in other respects , caseand many other relat ions are pointed out by an extensiveseries of sufiixed or encl it ic syllables , mostly monosyllabic ,which Byington calls art icle-pronouns , and wri tes as separate words . They are simply suffixes of pronominal origin ,and correspond to our articles tlze, a , to our relat ive and

demonstrat ive pronouns, partly also to our adverbs , prepositions and conjunctions . They form combinat ions amongthemselves , and supply verbal inflect ion with i ts modalsuffixes or exponents . Adject ives possess a dist inct pluralform

,which points to their origin from verbs , but in sub

stantives number is not expressed except by the verb connected with them , or by means of separate words .

CHA’

HTA LANGUAGE . 117

There are two classes of personal pronouns , the relat iveand the absolute ( the former referr ing to something saidpreviously) , but the personal inflection of the verb is effectedby prefixes , the predicat ive suffix

’

/z being added to the endof each form in the affirmat ive conjugat ion . Only the fi rstperson of the singular is marked by a suffix : - li ( increased by’

li : The lack of a t rue substant ive verb to be is tosome extent suppl ied by this suffix -

’h. Verbal inflect ion is

rich in tenses and other forms,and largely modifies the radix

to express changes in voice, mode and tense. The sway ofphonet ic laws is all- powerful here, and they operate whenevera sligh t confl ic t of syllables d isagreeing with the del icate earof the Cha’hta Indian takes place.

Of abstrac t terms there exists a larger supply than in manyother Amer ican languages .Several dialec ts of Cha’hta were and are stil l in existence,

as the Sixtown dialec t , the ones spoken from Mobile bay toNewOrleans , those heard on the Lower Mississippi river ,and that of the Chicasa. The dialec t nowembodied in thel i terary language of the presen t Cha’h ta is that of the cen tralparts o f Mississippi State, where the American Protestan tmissionaries had selected a field of operat ion .

Rev. Cyrus Byington (born 1 79 3 , died 1 867) worked as a

missionary among th is people before and after the removalto the Indian terr i tory . H e completed the first draft of h is“ Choctaw Grammar ” i n 1 834, and an extract of i t waspubl ished by Dr . D . G . B rinton .

l H is manuscript ChoctawD ict ionary, now i n the l ibrary of the U . S . Bureau of

Ethnology, fil ls five folio volumes , con tains abouti tems (words , phrases and sentences) , and was completedabout 1 833 . The missionary alphabet used by him ,

which isalso the alphabet of Cha’hta l i teratu re, is very imperfect , asi t fails to express all sounds of the language by s igns for eaclz,

1 Published in Proceedings of American Philosoph . Society , 1870 (56pages), Svo.

118 THE CREEK INDIANS.

and ent irely neglects accentuation . The pronunciat ion of

Cha’hta is so del icate and pl ian t that only a superior scientific alphabet can approximately express i ts peculiar soundsand in tonat ions .Cha’hta has been made the subject of l inguist ic inqu iry by

Fr . Miiller, G rundz iige d . Sprachwissenschaft , II , 232- 238 ,

and by Forchhammer in the Transact ions of the Congres desAmé ricanistes, 2d session , 1 877, 8vo.; also by L . Adam .

III . THE CREEK INDIANS .

The Creek Indians or Maskoki proper occupy , in historict imes , a central posi t ion among the other tr ibes of thei raffi l iat ion , and through thei r influence and physical power,which they at ta ined by forming a comparat ively strong and

permanent nat ional union , have become the most noteworthyof all the Southern tribes of the United States terri tories .They stil l form a compact body of Indians for themselves ,and their history, customs and antiquit ies can be studied at

the present t ime almost as well as they could at the beginn ingof the n ineteen th century. But personal presence among theCreeks in the Indian Terri tory is necessary to obtain fromthem all the informat ion which is needed for the purposes ofethnologic science.There is a tradition that when the Creek people incor

porated t ribes of other nat ions into thei r confederacy, theset ribes never kept up their own customs and peculiarit ies forany length of t ime, but were subdued in such a manner as toconform with the dominant race. As a confirmat ion of this

,

i t is asserted that the Creeks ann ihilated the Yamas si Indianscompletely , so that they disappeared ent irely among theirnumber ; that the Tukabatchi, Taskigi and other tribes offoreign descent abandoned their paternal language to adoptthat of the dominant Creeks .

But there are facts which tend to at tenuate or disprovethis tradit ion . The Yuchi , as wel l as the Naktche tribe and


the settl ing of the Creeks proceeded from west to eas t andsoutheast . The oldes t immigrat ion to Chatahuchi river isthat of the Kas iz ta and Kawita tribes , both of whom , as ourlegend shows , found the Kusa and the Apalatchukla withthei r connect ions, in situ, probably the Ab iz ka also . Ifthere is any t ruth in the H i tchit i tradit ion , the tribes of thisdiv ision came from the s easliore, an indicat ion wh ich seemsto point to the coas t t racts afterwards claimed by the Cha’h ta.

All the other settlemen ts on Chatahuchi river seem youngerthan Kas iz ta and Kawiza, and therefore the Creek immigrat ion to those parts came from Coosa and Tal lapoosa rivers .At one t ime the no rthern or Cheroki -Creek boundary of theCoosa river settlements was Talatigi, now writ ten Talladega,for the name of th is town has to be interpreted by Villageat the End ,

”

italua atigi . If the name of Tal lapoosa river ,in H i tch i t i Talepusi, can be derived from C reek talepu

‘ la

stranger , this would furn ish another indication for a formeral lophyl ic populat ion in that valley ; but ‘ I rarely , i f ever ,changes into 5 . The Cheroki local names in these parts ,and eas t from there, show conclusively who these “strangers ”

may have been .

I t appears from old charts , that Creek towns , or at leas ttowns having C reek names, also ex isted

,wes t of Coosa r iver,

as on Canoe creek : L itafatcha, and on Cahawba river : Taluahadsho ,

“Craz y Town,

” together with ru ins of other villagesabove this .

THE CREEK SETTLEMENTS .

The towns and villages of the C reeks were in the eighteenthcentury buil t along the banks of rivers and their smallert r ibutaries , often in places subject to inundat ion during largefreshets , which occurred once in about fifteen years . The

smallest of them contained from twenty to thi rty cabins ,some of the larger ones up to two hundred , and in 1 832

Tukabatchi, then the largest of all the Creek set tlements,harbored 386 famil ies . Many towns appeared rather com

THE CREEK SETTLEMENTS . 121

pactly buil t , al though theywere composed of i rregular clustersof four to eight houses standing together ; each of theseclusters contained a gens (

“clan or family of relat ions ,

”

C . Swan) , eat ing and l iving in common . The huts and

cabins of the Lower Creeks resembled , from a distance,clusters of newly-burned brick kilns, from the high color

of the clay .

1

I t will be found appropriate to dist inguish between C reektowns and villages . By towns is indicated the set tlementswhich had a public square, by villages those which had none.

The square occupied the central part of the town , and wasreserved for the celebrat ion of fest ivals, especial ly the annualbusk or fas t (puskita) , for the meet ings of ch iefs , headmenand beloved men,

”and for the performance of daily dances .

Upon this cent ral area stood the great house,”tchuka ‘ lako

,

the council - house, and at tached to it was a play - ground,

called by traders the “chunkey

- yard .

” Descript ions of theseplaces will be given below .

Another thoroughgoing dist inction in the set tlemen ts of

the Creek nat ion was that of the red or war towns and the

white or peace towns .

The red or kzpaya towns , to which C . Swan in 1 79 1 refersas being al ready a thing of the past , were governed by warriors only. The term red refers to the warl ike disposi t ion of

these towns , but does not correspond to our adject ive bloody ;i t depicts the wrath or anger an imat ing the warriors whenout on the warpath . The posts of their cabin in the publ icsquare were pain ted red on one side .

The present Creeks st il l keep up formally this ancien t dist inct ion between the towns , and coun t the following amongthe kipaya townsRawita , Tukabatchi, ‘L a-

‘ lako, Atasi , Ka- ilafdshi

,Ch iaha

,

1 Cf. Yuchi, p . 22. At the time of the conquest of Mexico by Cortez ,many of the interior towns of that country were whitewashed in the samemanner, by means of a shining white clay coating .


Usudshi, Hutali-buyana, Alibamu , Yufala, Yufala hupayi,

H ilapi, Ki tcha- pataki .Tilewlzite towns , also called peace towns , conservat ive towns,

were governed by civil ofi cers or mikalgi, and , as some of the

earl ier authors al lege, were considered as places of refuge

and safety to individuals who had left their tribes in dread

of pun ishment or revenge at the hand of their pursuers . The

modern Creeks coun t among the peace towns , cal led taluamikagi towns , the following set t lementsH i tch i t i , Okfuski, Kas iz ta, Ab i

’hka

,Ahizkudshi, Tal isi ,

Oktchayi, Odshi- apofa, L utchapoka, Taskigi, Assi - lanapi or

Green - Leaf, Wiwuz ka.

Quite different from the above l ist is the one of the whitetowns given by Col . Benj . Hawkins in 1 79 9 , which refers to

the Upper Creeks only : Okfuski and i ts branch vil lages (viz

Niuyaz a, Tukabatchi Talahass i, Imukfa, Tutokagi, Atchinalgi,

Okfusku’

dshi, Sukapoga, Ipisogi) ; then Tal isi , Atas i , Fus’-hé

tch i,Kult

’

rmi. For this l ist and that of the kipaya towns , cf.his “ Sketch , p . 51 . 52.

The ancient dist inct ion between red and white towns beganto fal l in to disuse with the approach of the wh i te colon ists ,which entailed the spread of agricul tural pursuits among theseIndians nevertheless frequent reference is made to i t by themodern Creeks.Segmentat ion of villages is frequently observed in Indian

tribes , and the l ist below wil l give many striking instances .I t was brought about by over- populat ion , as in the case of

Okfuski ; and i t is probable that then only certain gentes ,not a promiscuous lot of cit iz ens , emigrated from a town .

Other causes for emigrat ion were the exhaustion of the cul tivated lands by many successive crops , as wel l as the need of

newand extensive hunting grounds . These they could notobtain in their neares t neighborhood wi thout warring withtheir proprietors , and therefore often repaired to distant

countries to seek new homes (Bartram ,Travels, p .

THE CREEK INDIANS .

in Creek persons speaking another than the C reek language ;tchilokas I speak an alien language.

“ Stincards would beexpressed in Creek by ist i fambagi. Of all the gentes of theChicasa that of the shank or hushkoniwas held in the lowestesteem , some of the lowest officials

,as runners , etc.

, beingappointed from it therefore i t can be conjec tured that fromthe Chicasa tr ibe a term like “ skunks ,

” “ st inkards, mayhave been t ransferred and applied to the less esteemed gentesof other nat ions .

ALPHABETIC LIST OF TOW NS AND V ILLAGES .

In this alphabet ic l ist of ancient Creek towns and villagesI have included all the names of inhabited places which Ihave found recorded before the emigration of the people to theIndian Territory . The descript ion of thei r si tes is chieflytaken from Hawkins ’ “Sketch, one of the most inst ruct ivebooks which we possess on the Creeks in thei r earl ier homes .Some of these town names are st ill exis t ing in Alabama and

Georgia, al though the site has not unfrequen tly changed .

I have interspersed into the l ist a few names of the largerrivers . The etymologies added to the names contain the

Opinions of the C reek delegates visi t ing Wash ington everyyear, and they seldom differed among each other on any

name. The local names are writ ten according to my soiea

tific system of phonet ics , the only change introduced beingthat of the palatal tch for ch.

LIST OFCREEK SETTLEMENTS .

Abi'hha , one of the oldest among the Upper Creek towns ;the oldest chiefs were in the habi t of naming the Creeknat ion after i t. Hawkins speaks of Abikfidshi only , notofAb i

’

hka. I t certainly lay somewhere near the UpperCoosa river, where some old maps have i t . EmanuelBowen , “A newmap ofGeorgia,

”

has only “Abacouse,”

and th is in the wrong place, below Kusa and above

LIST OF TOWNS AND VILLAGES . 125

Great Talasse, on the western side of Coosa river . Atown Ab i’hka now exists in the Indian Territory. The

name of the ancient town was pronounced Ab i’hka,Apizka and wri t ten Ob ika, Abeka, Abeicas , Abecka,Beicas , Becaes , etc . ; i ts people are cal led Apizkanagi.Some wri ters have identified them with the Khsa and alsowi th the Conshacs , e. g . da P ratz .

l D . Coxe, Carolana,p . 25, states that

“the Recaes or Abecaes have th irteen

towns,and the Ewemalas , between the Becaes and the

Chat tas , can raise five hundred fighting men ”

A part of the most anc ien t Creek customs originatedhere, as , for instance, the law for regulat ing marr iagesand for pun ishing adul tery . The Creek term ab i

’hka

signifies pile at the base, heap at the root”

(ab i stem,

pole) , and was imparted to this tr ibe, “because in thecontest for supremacy i ts warriors heaped up a pile of

scalps, covering the base of the war- pole only. Beforethis achievement the tr ibe was called sak

’hfitga door,

shutter , 01 simat’

ht'

Itga italua shutter,door of the towns or

tribes .

” Cf. ak ’hutas I close a door, sak’ht

'

Itga hawfdshas

I open a door.

A b ihzz’d s hi, an Upper Creek town on the right bank of

Natche (now Tallahatchi) creek , five miles east of Coosariver , on a smal l plain . Set tled from Abika , and bysome Indians from Natche, q . v . Bartram ( 1 775) states ,that they spoke a dialect of Ch icasa which can be trueof a part of the inhabitan ts only . A spacious cave existsin the neighborhood .

Ahihi cr eeh, H i tchi t i name of the upper course ofH itchi t icreek , an eas tern tributary of Chatahuchi river. Haw

kins (p . 60) writes it Ouhe-

gee creek . The name signi

fies sweet potato -mother (ahi, iki) , from the ci rcumstance that when planting sweet potatoes (ahi), the frui t

1 The map appended to the French edition of Bartram identifies themwith the Kusa : “Ahikas ou Coassas .”

THE CREEK INDIANS.

sown remains in the ground until the new crop comes tomaturi ty .

A la b ama r iver is formed by the junc tion of Coosa and

Tal lapoosa rivers ; pursues a winding course betweenbanks about fifty feet h igh , and joins Tombigbee riverabout th irty miles aboveMobile bay, when it assumes thename of Mobile river. I ts waters are pure, i ts currentgentle ; i t runs about two miles an hour, and has 1 5

— 1 8

feet depth in the driest seas on of the year. Boats travelfrom the junct ion to Mobile bay in about n ine days ,through a fert i le coun try , with h igh , cleared fields andromant ic landscapes (Hawkins) . The hunt ing groundsof the C reeks extended to the water - shed between theTombigbee and the Coosa and Alabama rivers .

Amaha l l i, Lower Creek town , planted by Chiaha Indianson a creek of that name, which is the main water- courseof K itchofuni creek , a northern affluent of Fl in t river ,Georgia. Inhabited by sixty men in 1 799 . The nameis not Creek ; i t seems identical wi th Amacalola, theCheroki name of a picturesque cascade on Amacalolacreek , a northern affluent of E towa river, Dawson coun ty ,Georgia. The derivat ion given for i t is : ama water ,kalola s liding, tumbling .

A nati tchdpho or“ Long Swamp

,a H illab i village, ten

miles above that town,on a northern tributary of

H illab i creek . A bat tle occurred there dur ing theCreek or Red Stick war, January 24th, 1 8 1 4. Usual lywritten Enotochopko. The C reek term ana

'

tti meansa br ushy , swampy place, where persons can secretethemselves .

Apa la tchzihla , a Lower Creek town on the west bank ofChatahuchi river, 1% miles below Chiaha. In Hawkins ’

t ime i t was in a state of decay, but in former t imes hadbeen a white or peace town , cal led (even now) Italua‘ lako “ large town ,

”

and the principal communi ty among


Ap a ta - i, a village Of the Lower Creeks , set tled by Kasr hta

people on Big creek or Hatchi ‘ lako,twenty miles eas t

of Chatahuchi river , in Georgia. The name refers toa sheet - l ike covering , from apatayés I cover ; of. patakz

’

isI spread out ; the Creek word apata- i signifies any

covering comparable to wal l - papers , carpets , etc . The

town of Upotoy now lies on Uporoy creek , Muscogeecounty , Alabama, in 32

°

38’L at.

As s i - lan ap i, an Upper Creek town , cal led OselanOpy inthe Census list of 1 832. I t probably lay on Yellow Leafcreek , which joins Coosa river from the west about fivemiles below Talladega creek . From it sprang Greenleaf Town in the Indian Territory , since lan i meansyel low and green at the same t ime. Green is now morefrequently expressed by pahi- lan i .

At a s i, or Atassi, an Upper Creek town on the eas t sideof Tal lapoosa river, below and adjoining Kal ibi batch icreek . I t was a miserable- looking place in Hawkins ’

t ime, wi th about 43 warriors in 1 766 . Like that of allthe other towns built on Tallapoosa river , below its fal ls ,the site is low and unheal thy . The name is derived fromthewar-club andwas written Autossee, Ottossee,Otasse, Ot- t is- se, etc . Battle on November 29 th, 1 8 1 3 .

A town in the Indian Territo ry is called after i t A'tesi ,i ts inhabitants Até salgi.

“A pos t or‘

column of pine, fortyfeet high , stood in the town of Autassee, on a low, cir

cular, art ificial hill . ” Bartram, Travels , p . 456 . Cf.Hu ‘ l i -Wa’hll.

A tchina - alg i, or Cedar Grove, the northernmost of allthe Creek settlemen ts , near the H illab i-E towa trail , ona side creek of Tallapoosa river and forty miles aboveNiuya

’al a. Settled from L utchapOga.

A t chi n a H d t chi, or Cedar Creek ,”

a village settled byIndians from Ka- ilaidshi, q . v . on a creek of the samename.


Ch a t a hn chi, a former town of the Lower Creeks , on the

headwaters of Chatahuchi river. Probably abandonedin Hawkins ’ t ime ; he calls i t old town Chatahutchi

cf. Chatahuchi river . Cal led Chata Uche by BartramChatahoosie by Swan

Ch a t a hn chi r ive r is the water - course d ividing , in i tslower port ion

, the State ofAlabama from that of Georgia.

On i ts banks were settled the towns and villages of theLower Creeks . Its name is composed of tchatu roch,

stone and hfitchi marhed, provided with s igns , and hencemeans : Pictured Rocks . ” Rocks of this descriptionare in the bed of the river, at the Old town Chatahuchi

,

”above H t

’

I‘li- taika (Hawkins , p . Other names

for this river were : Apalachukla river (Wm . Bartram) ,Cahouita or Apalachoocoly river (Jefferys

’ map in JohnBartram ’s report) .

Ch e ‘ l aho N i n i, or Horse-Trai l,

a Lower Creek townon the headwaters of Chatahuchi river, set tled byOkfuski Indians . Ment ioned in 1 83 2 as Chelucco

n inny. Probably ident ical wi th Okfuski-N in i see Ok

fuskfidshi, and : Indian Pathways.Ch i a ha , or Tchiaha, Chehaw, a Lower C reek town just

below Osotchi town and cont iguous to it , on westernbank of Chatahuchi river. The Chiaha Ind ians had i n1 79 9 spread out in villages on the Flint river , of whichHawkins names Amakalli, HOtali- buyana; and at Chiaht

'

I

dshi. Here a trai l c rossed the Chatahuchi river (Swan ,A town of the same name, where otters l ive,

”

existed among the Cheroki . An Upper Creek townof this name, with twenty- n ine heads of families , isment ioned in the Census l ist of 1 832 (SchoolcraftIV

, 578)Chi a h 12

'd s h i , or Li ttle Chiaha, a Lower Creek town

planted by Chiaha Ind ians in a pine forest one mile and

a hal f west of H i tchi t i town . Cf. H i tchiti , pp . 77. sqq .


Chi s ha t a l o’

f a , a Lower Creek town on the west side of

Chatahuchi river. Morse, Report , p . 364, refers to i tunder the name of “ Cheskitalowas ”

as belonging tothe Seminole villages . Is it Chisca, or “ Chisi prov incia visi ted by the army of H . de Soto in 1 540?Haw

kins states that Chiske talOfa batche was the name givento Savannah river ( from tchiska base of tree).

Co 0 s o R ive r, ( 1 ) an affluent of Alabama river in EasternAlabama, in Creek Kusa-batchi , runs through the roughes tand most hilly district formerly held by the CreekIndians . “ I t is rapid , and so full of rocks and shoalsthat i t is hardly navigable even for canoes ” : Swan , inSchoolcraft V , 257. Cusawati is an affluen t of UpperCoosa river, in northwestern Georgia, a tract whereCheroki local names may be expected .

( 2) A watercourse of the same name , Coosawhatchie,pas ses southeas t of Savannah City , South Carol ina, in tothe Atlan t ic ocean . For the etymology, see Kusa .

Fin - halu i, a town of the Lower Creeks or Seminoles. Thename signifies a high bridge, or a high foot - log , and thetraders ’ name was H igh L ogA swamp having the same name , Finholoway Swamp ,

l ies in Wayne county , between the lower Altamaha and

Sat illa rivers , Georgia.

Fi s h- P o n d s , or f ish-P ond Town; cf. ‘La‘ lo -kalka.

Fl i n t R i ve r , in Creek ‘L onotiska batchi , an eas ternGeorgian afliuent of Chatahuchi river, and almost ofthe same length . Creeks , Yuchi and Seminole Indianswere set tled on i t and on i ts numerous t r ibu taries , oneof which is ‘L Onoto creek , also called Indian creek ,Dooley county, Georgia. From ‘lOnotOfl int.

Fo r t To u l ou s e ; cf. Taskigi. Th is fort was also cal led ,from the tribe settled around i t , Fort Alibamu , FortAlbamo, Fort Alebahmah, Forteresse des Alibamons .

Abandoned by the French in 1 762.

THE CREEK INDIANS.

war (hu‘ l i war, awa hlita to share out, divide) the decla

rat ion was first sent to Tukabatchi, and from there amongthe other tribes . The town bordered west on Atas ’

hatchi creek . The name is writ ten ClewauleyHo- ithle-Wau- lee (Hawkins), Cleu -wath - ta

Cluale, Clewulla, etc .

[ hea na t chaha or Holy Ground , a town on the southernside of Alabama river, built on holy ground , and therefore said to be exempt from any poss ible inroads of thewh ite people. Weatherford , the leader of the insurgentCreeks , and their prophet H il is ’ - hako res ided therethe forces gathered at th is place by them were defeatedDecember 23d, 1 8 1 3 . From ikana ground, atchaka beloved, sacred.

I ha n’

- he thi , or white ground , a Shawano town justbelow Kulumi , and on the same side of Tallapoosa river.Cunhutki speaks the Muscogulge tongue ”

; W . Bar

t ram ( 1I m 12hf a , an Upper Creek town on Imukfa creek , wes t of

Tal lapoosa river . Near this place, in a bend or peninsula formed by the Tallapoosa river, cal led Horse Shoeby the whites, the American troops ach ieved a decisivevictory over the Red St ick party of the Creek Indianson March asth, 1 8 1 4, which resul ted in the surrender ofWeatherford , thei r leader, and put an end to this bloodycampaign . Not less than five hundred and fifty

- sevenCreek warriors lost thei r l ives in th is bat tle. The termimftkfa is H i tchi t i , for ( 1 ) shell ; ( 2) metal l ic ornament ofconcave shape Hawkins interprets the name by gorgetmade of a conch .

” In H i tchi t i , bend of river is hatchi

pazutchki ha’

htchafashki, hatsafaski is river- bend i nCreek . Tohopeka is another name for this bat tle-field ,

but does not belong to the Creek language.

I n t a t chhalg i or collect ion of beaver dams , a Yuchitown of Georgia sett led twenty-eight miles up Opil - ‘ lako


creek , a t ribu tary of Flint river. A square was buil t bythe fourteen famil ies of this town in 1 79 8 . Tatchki

means anything straight, as a dam, beaver dam, l ine,boundary l ine, etc . ,

ikan ’ - tatchka survey- line ; the above

creek was probably Beaver -dam creek an eastern tributary of Fl in t river, join ing it about 32 1 5

'L at.

I p i s o’

g i , an Upper Creek town upon IpisOgi creek , a large

eas tern tribu tary of Tallapoosa river, join ing i t opposi teOkfuski. Forty settlers in 1 79 9 . Cf. Pin-hOti.

I s t ap bg a , an Upper C reek set tlement not recorded in theearl ier documents ; a place of th is name exists now eas tof Coosa river, Tal ladega county, Alabama. The name,usually writ ten Eastaboga, sign ifies : “where peoplereside ”

( ist i people ; apOkita to reside).I s tu d s hi - l d iha , or child lying there, a H illab i

village, on H illab i creek , four miles below H illab i town .

I t owes its name to the c ircumstance that a child wasfound on i ts s i te.

K a - i l ii id s hi , an Upper Creek town , on a creek of the

same name, which jo ins OktchOyi creek , a western tributary of Tallapoosa river, join ing i t fifteen miles aboveTukabatchi. The two vil lages, Atchina Hatchi and

Hatchi tchapa, branched off from this town . The namewas variously written K i- a- l i -ge, Ki l iga, K illeegko, Kiolege, and probably referred to a warrior

’s head dress ika

his head ; iléiidshas I hill.

K a n t ch d t i, Kanshade, Red dirt ,”

Red earth , an

Upper Creek town , mentioned in 1 835 as Con

chan t - t i . Conchardee is a place a few miles northwest of Talladega.

K a s i’h ta , a Lower Creek town on the eastern bank of

Chatahuchi river, two and a hal f miles below Kawita

Talahassi ; Kas i’

hta once claimed the lands above the

falls of the Chatahuchi river on i ts eas tern bank . Inth is town and tribe our migration legend has taken its


origin . Its branch settlements spread out on the r igh tside of the river, the number of the warriors of the townand branches being estimated at 1 80 in 1 799 ; i t wasconsidered the largest among the Lower Creeks . The

nat ives were friendly to the whites and fond of visit ingthem ; the old chiefs were orderly men, desirous and

act ive in res training the young “ braves " from the

l icent iousness which they had contracted through thei rintercourse wi th the scum of the white colon ists . Haw

kins makes some strictures at their incompetency forfarming “ they do not know the season for plant ing, or,i f they do , they never avai l themselves of what theyknow , as they always plant one month too late (p .

A large con ical mound is desc ribed by h im as standingon the Kasf’hta fields , forty -five yards in diameter at i tsbase, and flat on the top. Below the town was the oldCussetuh town ,

” on a high flat, and afterwards “ a Chicasaw town occupied this site (p . A branch villageof Kas l’hta is Apata- i, q . v . The name Kasf’hta , Kasil ta,

is popularly explained as coming from the sun ”

(ha's i)

d being identical wi th has i’hta. The Creeks infer ,from the paral lel Creek form hasOti, sunsh ine,

” thatKasi

’

hta real ly meant “ l ight , or “ bright splendor ofthe sun ; ancien tly, this term was used for the sun h imself, “ as the old people say.

”The inhabitants of the

town bel ieved that they came from the sun . Cf. Yuchi .A place Cusseta is now in Chatahuchi county, Georgia,32

°20

’L at.

K awd ih i , a town Of the Inwer Creeks, having forty-five

heads of families in 1 832. Kawafki Creek is namedafter quails .

[ f awi t a , a Lower Creek town on the high western bankof Chatahuchi river, three miles below i ts falls . Thefishery in the western channel of the river , below the

fal ls, belonged to Rawita, that in the eas tern channel


K n l umi , Upper Creek town on right side of Tal lapoosariver, smal l and compact , below Fusi -hatchi and con

tiguous to i t . A conical mound , th irty feet in diameter ,was seen by Hawkins

,opposi te the town - house.

”

A part of the inhabitan ts had set tled on Likasa creek .

The significat ion of the name is unknown , but i t mayhave connec tion with a’hkolfimas I clinch (prefix a for

ani I ) . Of the old Coolome town ,” which stood on

the opposi te shore of Tallapoosa river, a fewhouses wereleft at the t ime of Bartram ’s visi t , c . 1 775 (Travels ,

p

K 12s a I ) an old capital of the Creek people, referred to as

Coca by the historians of de Soto ’s expedit ion , on the

eas tern bank of Coosa river, between Yufala and Natche

creeks , which join Coosa river from the east, a quarter

of a mile apart . 1 The town stood on a high hill in themidst of a rich l imes tone count ry , forty miles abovePakan-Talahassi and sixty above Taskfgi, q . v . Bartram

saw i t half deserted and in ru ins . “ The great

and old beloved town of refuge, Koosah, which standshigh on the eastern side of a bold river, about two hundred and fi fty yards broad , that runs by the late dangerous Alebahma fort , down to the black poisoning Mob ille,

and so in to the gulph of Mexico : ” Adai r, H istory , p .

395. This town , whichwas also , as i t seems, the sojourn ingplace of Tristan de Luna’s expedition ( 1 5 must havebeen one of the earl ies t centres of the Maskoki people,though i t does not appear among its four leadingtowns” . Its inhabi tan ts may at one t ime have beencomprised under the people of the neighboring Ab i’hkatown

,q . v . Kosa is the name of a smal l forest -bird

,re

sembling a sparrow but the name of the town and rivercould poss ibly be an ancient form of o

'sa, 05a,

’

osapohe

orpoheweed, a plant wi th red berr ies , which grows plen1 Now called Talladega and Tallahatchi creeks.

LIST OF TOWNS AND VILLAGES. 137

tifully and to an enormous heigh t throughout the South .

Cf. Coosa river . I t is more probable, however, that thename is of Cha’hta origin cf.

( 2) A town ,“Old Kusa ”

or“ Coussas old village,

is reported a short distance below Fort Toulouse, on thenor thern shore of Alabama river, between Taskigi andKoassati. I t was , perhaps , from this place that the Alabama river was , i n earl ier times, called Coosa or Coussariver, but since Hawkins and others make no men t ion of

th is town , I surmise that i t was ident ical wi th Koassati,the name being an abbreviation from the lat ter.

( 3) The Kusa, Cusha or Coosa towns , on the KhsaCreeks , formed a group of the eas tern Cha’hta set t lements . From Cha’hta kush reed, canewhich correspondsto the koa, koe of Creek . Cf. p . 1 08 .

‘L ei ‘l o - hci lha “Fish-P ond Town,”

or“ Fish-Ponds

,

an Upper Creek town on a smal l creek formingponds

,fourteen miles above i ts junct ion with Alko

hatchi, a stream running into Tal lapoosa river from the

west , four miles above Okfuski. The name is abbreviated from ‘ la‘ lo - akélka fish separated, placed apart ,from ‘la‘lofish, akalgiis I am separatedfrom. This was acolony plan ted by Oktchayi Indians, q . v .

‘L d n u d s hi ap al a , or “ beyond a l i t tle mountain, a

H illab i place fifteen miles from that town and on the

northwest branch of H illabi creek ; had a town -houseor public square.

‘L ap‘laho , or “ Tal l Cane,

” “ Big Reed , the name of

two villages of the Upper Creeks , ment ioned in 1 83 2.

‘L ap is a tal l cane, from which sarbacanes or blow -gunsare made.

L e ha t chha ,

‘ L i-i-hatchha, or“ Broken Arrow

, a

Lower Creek town on a ford of the southern trai l,

which crossed Chatahuchi river at this poin t,twelve

miles below Kasi’

hta and Kawfta (Swan , Bar10

THE CREEK INDIANS .

t ram cal ls i t Tukauska, Swan : Chalagatsca. Cal led sobecause reeds were obtained there for manufacturingarrow shafts .

L u t chapo’

g a , or“ Terrapin -Resort, an Upper Creek

town , probably near Tal lapoosa river . The vil lageAtchina-algi was set tled by nat ives of this town (H aw

kins,p . but afterwards incorporated with Okfuski.

Also ment ioned in the Census l ist of 1 832. A placecalled Loachapoka is now In L ee county , Alabama,about hal f-way between Mon tgomery and West Point .From ltitcha terrapin, poka hillingplace; poyas I destroy ,

hill ; poka occurs only in compound words .H . S . Tanner ’s map ( 1 827) marks an Indian town

L uchepoga on wes t bank of Tal lapoosa river , about tenmiles above Tukabatchi Talahass i also L uchanpogancreek , as a wes tern tributary of Chatahuchi river, in 33

°

8’L at. , j us t below Chatahuchi town .

M uhlas a , a smal l Upper Creek town one mile belowSawanOgi and on the same side of Tallapoosa river . Intimes of freshet the river spreads here nearly eight milesfrom bank to bank . Bartram states , that Mucclassespeaks the Stincard tongue,

”

and the list of 1 83 2writesMuckeleses .

” They are Alibamu,and a town of that

name is in the Indian Terri tory The Wolf- king , ourOld

,steady fr iend of the AmooklasahTown , near the late

Alebahma (Adair, H istory, p . The name poin tsto the Imuklasha, a division of the Cha’hta people ;imukla is the opposi te people, referring to the twoiksa, Kashap- ukla and Ukla i°hula’hta. Cf. Cha’hta, p .

1 04, and Mugulasha, p . 1 1 1 . 1 1 2.

N a t ch e (bet ter Naktche) , on“ Natebe creek, five miles

above Ab ikfi'dshi, scat tering for two miles on a richflat below the fork of the creek , which is an eas terntributary of Upper Coosa river.

” I Peopled by the

1 Now called Tallahatchi creek .

THE CREEK INDIANS.

Tuz tukagi, Atchina-algi , Ipiségi, S ka. The

Creek term akféski, akffiski signi e of a

confluence, promontory , from ak down in, faski sharp,

pointed. Tallapoosa river was also cal led Okfuski river .Okf u s h zz

’d s hi , or

“ Little Okfuski,

”a part of a smal l

village four miles above Niuyaxa. Some of these peopleformerly inhabi ted Okfuski-Nini , on Chatahuchi river ,but were driven from there by Georgian volun teers in1 793 . Cf. Che‘lako-Nini .

0 hi t iy d hn i , a lower Creek village on the eastern bankof Chatahuchi river, eight miles below Yufala. H aw

kins writes it O-ke- teyoc-en-ni

, and Morse, Report , p .

364, ment ions among the Seminole set tlements, Oka

tiokinans , near Fort Gaines .

”

Oki- tiyakni, a H i tchi t iterm

, means ei ther whirlpool, or river - bend .

ohmulg i a Lower Creek town on the eas t side of Fl intriver

,nearHOtali-huyana. The name signifies bubbling

,

boil ing water, from H . Okiwater ; mulgis it is boiling ,in Creek and H i tch it i .

( 2) Eas t of Flint river is Okmulgi river, which , afterjoin ing Little Okmulgiand Okon i rivers , forms Altamahariver .

Oho'

n i , a smal l Lower Creek town , six miles below Apalachukla, on the western bank of Chatahuchi river ;set tled by immigrants from a local i ty below the RockLanding on Okoni river

,Georgia . They spoke the

Stincard tongue ,”

and probably were Apalachians

of the H i tchi t i -Mikasuki dialec t . Cf. Cuscowilla, underthe head of : Seminole. The name is the Cheroki term

ekuOni river , from ékua great, large, viz . :“ great water . ”

Bartram , who encamped on the site of the old Okon itown on Okoni river, states (Travels , p . that theIndians abandoned that place about 1 7 1 0, on account

of the vicin ity of the white colon ists , and buil t a town

among the Upper Creeks. Their roving disposi t ion im


pelled them to leave th is set t lement also , and to migrateto the ferti leAlachua plains , where they built Cuscowillaon the banks of a lake, and had to defend i t against theat tacks of the Tomocos , Utinas , Calloosas (P) , Yamasesand other remnant tribes of Florida, and the morenorthern refugees from Carol ina, all of whom werehelped by the Spaniards . Being reinforced by otherIndians from the Upper Creek towns , “ thei r uncles ,

”

they repulsed the aggressors and dest royed their villages ,as wel l as those of the Span iards . This notice probablyrefers to the Indian troubles with the Vamas si , whichoccurred long before 1 7 1 0 , since in roads are recorded as

early as 1 687. Hawkins , p . 65, states that the townthey formerly occupied on OkOni river stood just belowthe Rock Landing, once the si te of a Brit ish post aboutfour miles below Milledgevil le, Georgia.

Oht chdy i , an Upper Creek town buil t along Oktchayicreek , a western t r ibutary of Tallapoosa r iver . The

town,men t ioned as Oak - tchoy in 1 79 1 , lay three miles

below Ka- ilafdshi, in the central dist rict. Cf. ‘La‘ lokalka. Milfort

,Mémoire, p . 266. 267, cal ls the tribe

les Oxiailles .

Oht chay a’d s hi , a

“ l ittle compact town of the UpperCreek Indians, on the eas tern bank of Coosa river, between Otchi- apOfa and Taskigi, i ts cabins joining thoseof the lat ter town . Thei r maiz e fields lay on the sameside of the river , on the Sambelo grounds , below Sam

belo creek . They removed their village to the eas ternside of Tallapoosa river on account of former Chicasaraids . The name of the town ,

“ Lit tle Oktchéyi,”

proves it to be a colony or branch of Oktchayi, q . v. ;

Pl . Porter says i t is a branch ofOkfuski.0pf l

’ ‘ l d ho or“ Big Swamp ,

” from opilua swamp,

‘ lakolarge. ( I ) An Upper Creek town on a stream of thesame name, which joins Pakan

’-Talahas si creek on i ts


left side. The town was twenty miles from Coosa riveri ts tribe is called P inclatchas by C . Swan

( 2) A local i ty west of Kasi’

hta cf. Tal isi .

( 3) A stream running into Flin t river, Georgia. Cf.Intatchkalgi.

d s o t chi , OTutchi, Oiudshi, or Ufutchi, a Lower Creektown about two miles below Yuch i town , on the

western bank of Chatahuchi river,whose inhabitan ts

migrated to th is place in 1 79 4 from Flin t river . The

town adjoins that of Chiaha Bartram cal ls i t Hoositchi.

The descendan ts of i t and of Chiaha have consol idatedin to one town in the Creek Nat ion , Indian TerritoryCf. Hawkins , p . 63 .

P a d s hi l d iha , or Pigeon Roost ; ( r) a Yuchi town onthe j unct ion of P adshilaika creek with Fl in t river, Maconcounty , Georgia, about 32

°

38'L at. The village suf

fered heavily by the loss of sixteen warriors , who weremurdered by Benjamin Harrison and h is associates ; cf.Hawkins , p . 62 sq .

( 2) Patsilaika river was the name of the westernbranch of Conecuh river , in Southern Alabama, Cov ington coun ty , which runs in to Escambia river and Pensacola bay. From padshipigeon, and laikis I sit down

,am

P aha n’

Ta ta has s i , Upper Creek town on a creek ofthe same name, which joins Coosa river from the east ,forty miles below Khsa town . From ipakana, mayapple,italua town, hass i ancient, in the sense of waste. G . W .

Stidham interprets the name Old Peach OrchardTown .

”

P in - ho’

t i , or Turkey-Home, an Upper Creek town onthe right side of a small tributary of IpisOgi creek ; cf.

IpisOgi. The trai l from Niuyal a to Kawita Talahas s i

passed through this set tlement . From pinna turhey , hut i ,hOti home.

THE CREEK INDIANS.

square cabin , roof “ eight feet pi tch , sédes and roofcovered with pine- bark . Cf. Ikan ’ - hatki .

S awoh l i, or Great Sawokli, Sé -ukli , a Lower C reek town ,six miles below Okoni , on the wes t bank of Chatahuchiriver, and four miles and a hal f above Wilani (

“Yel lowWater ” ) Creek junct ion . The H i tch it i word sawi meansracoon, ukl i town ; and both Séwokli towns spoke the“ Stincard tongue (Bart ram) . Cal led Chewakala in1 79 1 ; Swaglaw, etc . Among the H itch i ti the mikalgiwere appointed from the racoon gens only .

S awohl r’

or “ Lit tle Siwokli,”

a Lower Creektown on the eastern bank of Chatahuchi river , four milesbelow Okoni town ; con tained about twenty famil ies in1 799 . About 1 865 both Sawokli towns in the Ind ianTerri tory have disbanded in to the Talua ‘ lako cf. Apalatchukla.

S uha i sp o’

ha , or Suka- ishpégi, called Hog Range bythe traders , a smal l Upper Creek village si tuated on thewestern bank of Upper Tallapoosa river , twelve milesabove Okfuski; its inhabitan ts had in 1 79 9 moved , forthe larger part , to Imttkfa. It is the place called elsewhere Soguspogus , SokaSpoge, Hog Resort , the namemean ing l i teral ly : “ hog-kill ing place.

” Cf. L utchapoga.

Ta l a t ig i , now Tal ladega, an Upper Creek set tlemen t inthe central d istric t eas t of Coosa river . A bat tle wasfought there November 7th, 1 8 1 3 . The name signifies“ border town ,

” from italua town and atigi at the end ,

on the border ; cf. atigis “ i t is the las t one, i t forms theextremity .

” Cf. KusaTe l i s i , abbrev . Talsi , or : Old Town , a contract ion of

the term italua hassi ; a town of the Upper Creeks onthe eas tern bank of Tallapoosa river , opposite Tukabatchi , in the fork of Yufab i creek . In Hawkins ’ t imethe nat ives of this place had for the larger part left the

LIST OF TOWNS AND VILLAGES. 145

town and settled up Yufab i creek , and the chief,Hobo- i‘li miko

,was at variance with the Uni ted States

and Spanish colon ial author i t ies . The t raders ’ trai l fromKasi

'hta to the Upper Creek set tlemen ts crossed Yufab i

creek twice at the Big Swamp ,”Opil ’ -

‘ lako . The

Census of 1 83 2 cal ls Tal isi“ Big Tallassie or the

Hal fway House.

”

Ta1i s i L i t t l e , a town of the Upper Creeks , ident icalwith Odshi-apOfa, q . v .

T o l l apo o s a r iv e r , a considerable tributary of Alabamariver, ful l o f rocks , shoals and falls down to Tukabatchitown for thirty miles from here to i ts j unct ion with theCoosa, it becomes deep and quiet . The H i tchi t i formof the name is Talapt

'

Isi ; cf. Okfuski. A lit tle villagenamed Tal lapoosa l ies on the headwaters of Tallapoosariver , from wh ich the river perhaps received i ts name ;cf. talepu

‘li stranger ( in Creek) .T ci l u a ‘ laho , properly Italua ‘ lako, “ the G reat Town ,

the popular name of Apalatchukla, q . v. , the latter beingno longer heard at the present t ime.

T é l u a ma t chas i, ( I ) The new name for TukabatchiTalahas si

, q . v . It is commonly abbreviated into Talmodshasi Newtown .

” From italua town,mutchas i new.

( 2) A Lower Creek town , on west shore of Chatahuchiriver, mentioned by Morse ( 1 822) as : Telmocresses ,among the Seminole towns .

Ta 77: e ‘l i , a Lower Creek town on Chatahuchi river , sevenmiles from Odshisi (Morse, Report , p . Hawkinswri tes i t Tum -mul t - lau, and makes i t a Seminole town .

Probably a Cheroki name ; there was on the southernshore of Tennessee river

,between Ballplay creek and

Toskegee, a settlemen t cal led Tommotley town in earlymaps ; cf. Jefferys ’ Atlas of N . Amer ica (map of

Ta s hig i or Tuskiki, a l i tt le, ancien t Upper Creek town ,buil t near the si te of the former French Fort Toulouse,

THE CREEK INDIANS.

at the confluence of Coosa and Tal lapoosa r ivers . Its tood on the h igh Shore of Coosa river, forty - six feetabove i ts waters , where the two rivers approach eachother within a

’

quarter of a mile, to curve out again . On

this bluff are also five conic mounds, the largest thirtyyards in diameter at the base. The town , of 35 warriors ,had lost its ancient language and spoke the Creek ( 1The noted A . MacG illivray, head ch ief of the Creeks inthe latter part of the eigh teenth century , or as he was

styled , Emperor of the Creek Nat ion ,” l ived at Taskigi,

where he owned a house and property along'

Coosa river,hal f a league from Fort Toulouse ; Milfort , Memoire, p .

27. On the immigrat ion of the t ribe , cf. Milfort , pp .

266. 267.

The name of the town may be explained as :“ jumping

men, jumpers , from Cr . taska- is , ta’

skas I jump ( tulupkal is in H i tchi ti); or be considered an abbreviated formof taskialgi warriors ; cf. taskaya citiz en (Creek) , and

Hawkins , Sketch , p . 70. But since the town formerlyspoke another language, i t is, in view of the frequencyof Cheroki names in the Creek count ry, appropriate toregard Taskigi as l ingu is t ically ident ical with Toske

gee,”a Cheroki town on Great Tennessee river , southern

shore, mentioned by several au thors , and appearing onLieutenant H . Timberlake

’

s map in his Memoir, reproduced in Jefferys’ Topography (Atlas) of North America,dated March , 1 762.

Z eht a‘laho, or “ Great Cabin of the publ ic square ,

( 1 ) A Lower C reek town on Chatahuchi river , set tled byOkfuski Indians .

( 2) A place of the same name is mentioned in theCensus of 1 83 2 as an Upper Creek town .

Tohog d lg i , or“ tadpole place ,

”a small Yuchi set tlement

on Kitchofuni creek , a northern aflluent of Flin t river ,Georgia, which joins i t about 3 1

°

40'L at. Beaver dams

THE CREEK INDIANS.

rough sketches of them are given in Adair, l . 1. Theyappear to be of Spanish origin , and are produced at thebusk . The town anc iently was known under two othernames : IspokOgi, or Italua ispokOgi, said to mean

“ townof survivors ,

” or surviving town , remnan t of a town”

;

and Italua fatcha- sigo , “ incorrect town , town deviat ingfrom str ictness.” With th is las t appellat ion we maycompare the Spanish village- name Villa Viciosa.

On nat ional councils held there, cf. Hawkins , Sketch ,p . 51 ( in the year 1 799) and Milfort, p . 40 ( in the year1 780) and p . 266.

Tuha b at chi Ta la ha s s i,or “ old town of Tukabatchi,

an Upper Creek town on west side of Tallapoosa river,four miles above Niuyaz a. Since 1 79 7 i t received a

second name, that of Talua mutchas i or “ new town .

”

The Census l ist of 1 832 cal ls i t Talmachussa, Swan in1 79 1 Tuckabatchee Teehassa.

Tu hp a/ha ,

“ Spunk -knot,

”a village on Chatahuchi r iver,

Toapafki in 1 83 2, from which was set tled the town ofNiuyaz a, q . v . A creek of the same name is a t ributaryof P otchus ’ -Hatchi, q . v . Tukpafka, not Tutpafka, isthe correct form ; it means punhy wood, spunk, rotten

Tu1 tu- hag i , or

“ Corn cribs set up by the Okfuski

nat ives to suppo rt themselves during the hunt ing seas on ,was an Upper Creek town on the wes tern bank of Tal la

poosa R iver , twen ty miles above Niuyal a. The trai lfrom H illab i to E towa in the Cheroki country passedthis town , which is near a spur of mountains. Men

tioned as Corn House in the Census l ist of 1 832, as

Totokaga in 1 79 1 . Tfilmmeans a crib ; kagi is the pas tpart ic iple of kakis , q . v .

T u t a l o'

s i , a branch village of H i tchi t i town . Cf. H itchi ti ,p . 77 . The Creek word tutalOsi means chichen, inH itchi t i tatayahi ; its inhabitants, who had no town


square, are cal led by the people speaking H i tchit iTatayahukli.

(fht a ha - s d s i , or Sand -Heap , two miles from H illab itown

,of which i t was a branch or colony . Cf. H illab i.

If the name was pronouncedUktaha lasi , it is sandl ick .

”

U i uh 12f hi , Uyukfifki, an Upper Creek town , on a creekof the same name, a tributary of Hatchet creek (Haw

kins , p . 42) Wiogufka The name points tomuddy water : o - iwa water, uktifki muddy ; and is alsothe Creek name for the Mississippi ri ver . Exists nowi nIndian Terri tory . Cf. P otchus ’ - batchi .

Wa ho - hay i , Wa z oha- i , or

“ Blow-horn Nest, an

Upper Creek town on Tukpafka creek, a branch of

P otchus’-Hatchi, a watercourse which joins Coosa river

from the east . Also writ tenWolkukay by cartographers ;Wacacoys , in Census List of 1 83 2 ; Wiccakaw by Bartram ( 1 77 Wa

'

iko is a species ofheron, bluish -grey , 2high kayi breeding -place. Another Wacacoys isment ioned , in 1 832, as situated on Lower Coosa river,belowWitumka.

Wa t u’

l a II o’

ha hat chi . The locat ion of th is stream ismarked by Watoola village, which is si tuated on a runjoining Big Yuchi creek in a southern course, abou t

eigh teen miles west of Chatahuchi river , on the roadbetween Columbus , G a. and Montgomery, Ala.

Wi - ha i ‘l aho , or“ Large Spring , a Lower Creek or

Seminole town , referred to by Morse under the nameWekivas . From u- iwa, abbrev . t

'

t- i water , kaya rising ,‘ lako great, large. A Creek town in the Indian Territory bears the same name.

Wi t umha , ( 1 ) Upper Creek town on the rapids of Coosariver

,eas t side, near i ts j unct ion wi th Tallapoosa. Haw

kins does not men t ion th is old set tlemen t , but Bartram ,

who traveled from 1 773 to 1 778 , quotes Whittumke


among the Upper Creek towns speaking the Stincard

tongue, which in this instance was the Koassati

dialect.

( 2) A branch town of Kawita Talahassi, and twelvemiles from it, on Witumka creek , the main fork of

Yuchi creek . The place had a town -house, and ex

tended for three miles up the creek . The name signifies “ rumbling water from u- i, abbrev . from u- iwa

water,”and tI

'

ImkIs “ i t rumbles , makes noise.

”

Wi tumho Cr e eh , cal led Owatunka river in the migrat ionlegend , is the northern and main branch of Yuchi creek,wh ich runs in to the Chatahuchi r iver from the northwes t , and joins i t about 32

°1 8

’L at. The other branch

was Little Yuchi creek or Hosapo- latki ; cf. Note to

Hawkins, p . 6 1 .

Wi s y ha , or Wi ka, Upper Creek town on Wi kacreek , an eastern tributary of Coosa river, join ing i t

about ten miles above Witumka. The town was fifteenmiles above Odshi-apOfa, and in 1 79 9 numbered fortywarriors . Cal led Weeokee in 1 79 1 i t means waterroaring , u- iwater, wOl kIs it is roaring.

Wohs oy fi'd s h i , an Upper Creek town , mentioned in the

Census List of 1 832 as Waksoyochees , on Lower Coosariver, below Wetumka.

Yn chi , a town of foreign extraction belonging to the LowerCreeks ; has branched out in to three other villages . Cf.Yuchi , p . 21 .

Yuf ab i c r e eh ,an eas tern tributary of Tallapoosa river,

join ing it a short distance from Tukabatchi. Nofapi

creek , mentioned in the legend , is now Naufaba creek ,an upper branch of “ Ufaupee creek,

” jo ining i t in a

southwestern direct ion .

Yuf ala , ( 1 ) Y . or Yufala Hatchi, Upper Creek town onYufala creek, fifteen miles above i ts confluence withCoosa river. Called Upper Ufala in 1 79 1 .


and went almost due west to Shallow Ford of Chatahuchi

river, about twelvemi les right north of Atlanta, Georgia, inthe river bend .

3 . The southern trail crossed the Chatahuchi river, comingfrom the Okon i and Okmulgi rivers, l at the Broken Arrow,

”

‘L é -katchka, while other travelers crossed i t at the Yuchi

towns , which cannot have been distan t from the “ BrokenArrow.

”The Tallapoosa river was pass ed at Tukabatchi

cf. Schoolcraft , Indians , V, 254.

From Tukabatchi i t crossed over almost due west , as represented in Em . Bowen ’s map, to Coosa river, which was passedby a horse- ford , then followed the Coosa river up to Coosaold town . This is the t rai l partly traveled over by the Kas iz tat ribe, as described in the migrat ion legend .

4. The trail leading from St. Mary ’s river , Georgia, to theCreek towns wen t in to d isuse since 1 783 , and at the t ime ofSwan ’ s visi t ( 1 79 1 ) was difficul t to trace. Cf. Schoolcraft ,V

, 256. If correctly represented in Tanner ’s map of 1 827,

a road then runn ing from St . Mary ’s river to the H i tch it iford of the Chatahuchi river crossed that river at H itchitu'

dshi.

THE CREEK GOVERNMENT.

The social organizat ion of all the Indian nat ions of Americais based upon the existence of the tribe. The tribe i tself isbased upon smal ler un its of individuals which are joinedtogether by a common tie ; this t ie is ei ther the archaic

1 Bartram , Travels, p. 54, gives the following particulars : “On the

east bank of the Okmulgee this trading road runs nearly two milesthrough ancient Indian fields, the Okmulgee fields with artificialmounds or terraces , squares , etc.

” This horsepath began at the RockLanding on Okoni river, a B ritish post just below Wilkinson and aboutfour miles below Milledgeville, Georgia , passed Fort Hawkins built uponthe Okmalgi old fields , then the site of Macon, on the shore opposite,then Knoxville, then the old Creek agency on Flint river, then crossedP atsilaika creek , the usual ford on Chatahuchi river lying betweenKasil ta and Apata-i Creek .

TRIBAL DIVISIONS AND GENTES. 153

maternal descen t , or the more modern tie of paternal descent ,or a combinat ion of both . Among the Indians of Nor thAmer ica eas t of the Rocky mountains , and also among manytr ibes west of them ,

the single groups descending from the

same male or female ancestor form each a gens providedwi th a proper name or totem generally recall ing the name of

an an imal .Among the Creeks , Seminoles and all the other Maskoki

t ribes descent was in the female l ine. Every ch i ld bornbelonged to the gens of its mother , and not to that of i tsfather , for no man could marry in to h is own gens . In caseof the father ’s death or incapaci ty the children were caredfor by the nearest relat ives of the mother. Some publicofficers could be selected only from certain gen tes , amongwhich such a pr ivilege had become heredi tary . Regulat ionsl ike these also cont rolled the warr ior class and exerc ised a

profound influence upon the government and history of thesingle tribes , and i t often gave a too prominent posit ion tosome gentes in certain tribes , to the detrimen t or exclusion

of others . The H i tchi t i and Creek totems were the same.

The admin istrat ion of publ ic affairs in the Creek nat ioncan be studied to best advan tage by dividing the dates onhand in to three sect ions : the civi l governmen t of the C reektribe thewarrior class the con federacy and i ts governmen t .What we give below wil l at leas t suffice to give readers abet ter understanding of some points in the migrat ion legend .

But before we en ter upon these points,let us consider the

basis of Indian social l ife, the gens .

TRIBAL D IVIS IONS AND GENTES .

0

Paral lel to the two iksa of the Cha’hta the C reeks are

divided in to two fires ( tutka) , a civil fire and a mili tary fire.

The term fire eviden tly refers to council fires , wh ich had tobe kindled ceremonial ly by the frict ion of two pieces of wood .

The term firewas also appl ied by Shawanos and other North11


ern Indians to the States formed by the early colonists, andis st il l used of the States now consti tut ing the AmericanUnion : the thirteen fires , the seventeen fires , etc .

Concern ing the gentes (alaikita) of the Creek people, i t isimportant to not ice that in thei r towns each group of housescontained people of one gens only,

1and these gentes are

often ment ioned in their local annals ; and that the gens ofeach individual was determined by that of his mother .Some of the towns had separate gentes for themselves , allof which had privileges of their own .

Marriage between individuals of the same gens was prohib ited the office of the miko and the succession to propertyof deceased persons was and is st il l hereditary in the gens .In the Tukabatchi town the c ivil rulers or mikalgi wereselected from the eagle gens; those of H i tchi t i town from theracoon gens only ; of Kas iz ta from the bear gens ; those ofTaskigi probably from the wind gens . The beloved men oristitchaké lgi of Kas il ta were of the beaver gens .

In adul tery and murder cases the relat ives of the gens ofthe injured party alone had the right of judging and oftaking sat isfaction ; the miko and his council were debarredfrom any interference. This custom explains why treatystipulat ions made with the colon ists or the Federal Government concerning murders commit ted have never beenexecuted .

2

There is probably no Indian tribe or nat ion in NorthAmerica having a larger number of gentes than the Maskoki

proper . This fac t seems to poin t ei ther to a long historicdevelopmen t of the tribe, through which so large a seg

mentat ion was brought about , or to in ternal d issensions ,which could produce the same resul t. About twenty gentes

1 A similar distribution is observed in the vil lages, hunting and war

camps of the Pani and Southern Dakotan tribes, and was very strictlyenforced by them .

1 Cf. Hawkins, p . 75.

156 THE CREEK INDIANS .

Odshisalgi hickory nut gens ; o’

dshi hickory nut. Somebel ieve this gens represen ted the people ofOtchisi town , p . 7 1 .

Oktchunualgi sal t gens ; Oktcht'

mua sal t .Isfanalgi seems analogous to the Ispani phratry and gens

of the Chicasa.

Wé ’hlakalgi cf. Hu ‘ l i -wa’bl i , town name.

Muz lasalgi said to mean people ofMuklés a town0

Imuklasha, under Cha’hta.

The Creek phratries and thei r names were not fully te

membered by my informants . The only poin ts which couldbe gathered were , that ind ividuals belonging to the pantherand the wildcat gentes could not in termarry, nor could the

TchukOtalgi with the individuals of the toad gens orSopaktalgi. Th is proves that the two groups formed each aphrat ry , which perhaps comprised other gentes besides. I tis possible that among the above totemic gentes some are infact phratries and not gentes ; and the twofires (or tutka)of the Creeks are not real phrat ries , but formal d ivisionsonly .

cxv11. GOVERNMENT OF THE TRIBE .

Several gen tes , with thei r famil ies, uni ted into one town orsett lement , l ive under one chief, and thus consti tute a tribe.

The t ribe, as far as consti tut ing a poli t ic body govern ingitself, is cal led in Creek italua, which could also be renderedby : communi ty or c ivil district. Amitaluadshi is my owntown

,where I belong ,

”

amitalua “ my own country .

”

Italua also signifies nation. Another term , talOfa, meanstown or village, city as a collect ion of houses wi thout anyreference to i ts inhabitants .The execut ive officer of each town is the mike or chief,

formerly cal led “ king ” by the whites . H is duty is tosuperintend all public and domest ic concerns , to receivepublic characters , to l isten to thei r speeches, the contents ofwhich were referred to the town , and to del iver the talks ”

of his community . The town elects h im for l ife from a

CIVIL GOVERNMENT OF THE TRIBE . 157

certain gens . When he becomes sick or old he chooses an

assistan t , who is subject to the approval of the counsel lorsand head men. When the miko dies the next of kin in thematernal l ine succeeds him ,

usual ly h is nephew, i f he is fi t

for office.

Next in authori ty after the miko are the mikalgi and the

counsel lors , both of whom form the council of the town .

The counci l appoin ts the Great Warrior, approves or rejectsthe nominat ions for a miko ’s assistan t , and gives advice i nlaw, war or peace quest ions .Next in authori ty after the council is the body of the hini

halgi, Old men and advisers , presided over by the b iniha‘ lz

'

IkO . They are in charge of publ ic buildings , supervise theerect ion of houses for new set tlers , direct the agricul tu ralpursu i ts and prepare the black drink . They are the mastersOf ceremonies ,

”and the name biniha

,iniba, which is no

longer understood by the present generat ion , is said to sign ify“ sel f- adorner,

” i n the sense of “ warrior embel l ished withbody pain t . ” H iniha ‘ lako

,abbreviated in to Nia ‘lako , is

now in use as a personal name, and recal ls the name of thecelebrated Seminole chief Neamathla (biniha ima

‘ la) . Inthe H i tch i t i towns they were comprised among the class ofthe beloved men. Before the broken days , n ita zatska, theyconsul ted about the t ime of the busk , and during the buskdirec ted the performances .B eloved men or z

'

sti- tcheihalgi follow next in rank after theabove. They are the men who have dist inguished themselvesby long public service, especial ly as war leaders , and the

majori ty of them were advanced in age. C . Swan states thatthe beloved men were formerly cal led mikalgi in wh i tetowns .Then follows the common people . For the tustenuggi

‘ lako or Great Warrior,cf. “Warrior Class and “ Creek

Confederacy .

”

Since Indian character expresses i tsel f in the most pro


nounced, sel f-willed independence, the powerb f the authori

t ies was more of a persuasive than of a constrain ing or

commanding nature. Th is wil l appear st ill bet ter when wespeak of the warrior class and i t may be appropriate toremember that no man fel t h imsel f bound by decrees of apopular assembly , by edicts of chiefs and their counsellors ,or by treat ies concluded by these with al ien tribes or governments . The law exercised by the gens was more powerfulthan all these temporary rul ings , and , in fact, was the realmotive power in the Indian community .

The dist inct ion between red and white towns is not clearlyremembered now, and there are very fewCreeks l iving who areable to tel l whether such or such a townwas red or white. As

soon as the agricultural in terests began to prevail over themilitary, through the approach of the colonial settlements , thisfeaturehad to d isappear, and the social order also changed fromthe gens orwith; in to that of civitas . Adair , H ist. ,p. 1 59 , seemsincl ined to identify the whi te ( or

“ancient

,holy , old beloved ,

peaceable towns ” ) with the “ towns of refuge, one of which

THE WARR IOR CLASS .

The geographic posit ion of the Creeks in the midst ofwarl ike and aggress ive nat ions was a powerful st imulant formaking invinc ibles” of their male offspring . The rul ingpassion was that ofwar ; second to i t was that of hunting . Apeculiar incent ive was the possess ion of war- t i t les , and therage for these was as strong among the younger men as thatfor plunder among the older. The surest means of ascendingthe ladder of honor was the capture of scalps from the enemy,and the pol icy of the red or bloody towns was that of fosteringthe warl ike spiri t by frequent raids and expedit ions. In sometowns young men were treated as menials before they had

performed some daring deeds on the bat tle-field or acquireda war ti tle.

1 To become a warrior every young man had to1 Milfort, Mémoire, p . 251 .


a c ivil and mili tary officer,1and nowadays his funct ions are

those of a c ivi l funct ionary only .

In cases when the towns had resolved upon a general war,a leader for all the town - tusténuggis was appoin ted in theperson ofa general issimo

,cal led also paka

'

dsha, tusténuggi,

or tusténuggi‘ lako .

Among the Creeks now inhabit ing the Indian Terri torythe nomenclature has been al tered from the above. A youngman is cal led tassikaya after receiving the war- t i tle and

having some employment du ring the busk he becomestusténuggi after being declared as such by a vote of his townbut in aboriginal t imes a young man was not cal led tusténuggibefore he had shown his bravery by the taking of at least onescalp .

WAR - TITLES .

War- t i tles are important dist inctions bestowed in almostevery part of the world , for mil itary achievements ; but , to preserve thei r dist inct ive value, are usually conferred only on asmall port ion of the warriors . Among the Creeks warnames are, however, so common that at presen t one is conferred upon every young man of the people. Accord ing tothe old reports , a Creek warrior of the eighteen th centurycould obtain a war- t i tle only after taking one or severalscalps , but the tradi t ions current among the modern Creeksare silent on this poin t . In earl ier days many warriors hadseveral , even four or five of these t i tles ( tas sikaya inhotchifka) ,and when part icipan ts of a war party were present in numbersat the taking of a scalp , each of them obtained a war- t it leaccording to the report of the fight made by the paka

’

dsha

on his retu rn home. The war- t i tles were not always , thoughmost frequently , conferred upon the warriors during the

busk , or within the square.

Chief Chicote informs me, that the names in question were

1 Milfort , Mémoire, p . 237 : Aujourd’hui il est le premier chef dc lanation pour le civil et pour le militaire.

”

WAR TITLES . 161

dist r ibuted by the beloved men or ist ’ - atsakalgi whiles it t ing in their cabins or arbors on two opposite sides of thesquare. The is t ’ - atsakalgi called out young men from the

S ide opposi te to them ,and imparted one of the five t i tles to

b e men tioned below , according to thei r free choice, and

S imultaneously in trusted each with some office connec tedwith the busk . These offices consisted ei ther in sweeping thearea or in carrying water, in build ing and keeping up the

fire in the centre,i n set t ing up the medicine- pots or i n help

ing to prepare black drink . War- ti t les and busk-ofiices wereformerly given also to such who had never joined awar party .

The use of the other name, which every man had obtainedduring childhood , was prohibited with in the square.

To the five war- t i tles below, the to tem of the gens wasoften added , so that , for instance, one of the yaholalgi, whooffered the black d r ink , could be cal led itcho yahola hadsho , or

y . miko , y. fiksiko, etc. I t is said , that anciently some t i t leswere l imi ted to certain clans only . The idea that advancement by degreewas connected wi th these t it les is an erroneousinference from our own mil itary

’

inst i tut ions . Althoughregarded as warnames at the presen t t ime, they seem tohave been mere busk - t i tles from the beginn ing , and are sucheven now . In connec t ion wi th itcho deer, a gens name, theyare as fol lows :itcho tassikaya deer warrior.

itcho hadsho tass ikaya deer crazy ( foolish , mad , drunken)warrior .

itcho fl ksiko tassikaya deer heartless warrior .

itcho yahola tassikaya deer ital/ooing warrior .

itebo ima" la tassikaya deer (leading warrior .

O therwar- t i t les were hola’hta tusténuggi, miko tusténuggi,

biniha , bin iha ‘ lako . Inhola’

hti,plur. inholaxtagi figu res in

war- ti t les , but stands in no connect ion wi th the busk . The

appellat ion of immikagi comprehends all the men of thatgens from which the miko in the town ceremonies , not the


miko as a poli tical office- holder, is selected . The pronounim in i in all these names ( ihinihalgi, intastenaz algi,

signifies that they “ belong to the miko ” of the t ribalceremonies .War- t i tles should be clearly dist inguished from warnames

and other names . Any of the nine appellat ions contained inthe i tem above, and any name composed with one of them ,

is a war- t itle ; all others , as Old R ed Slzoe, are simply namesorwar- names . Women and boys never had but one name,and whenever a warrior had , by success ive campaigns, fiveor six honorific t i tles conferred upon him , he became generally known by one or two of these only .

These names and war- t i t les are high ly importan t for thestudy of Creek ethnography , and have been already referredto in the chapter on gentes . A br ief l ist of warnames ofinfluent ial men is contained in Major C . Swan ’s Repo rt , asfollows 1

Hallowing King (Kawita) White Lieu tenan t (Okfuski)Mad Dog (Tukabatchi miko) ; Opilth miko (Big Talahassi) ;Dog Warrior (Naktche); Old Red Shoe (Alibamu and Koassati) . To these may be added the dog king ,

”Tamhuidshi,

of the H itchit i , mentioned in the prooemium of the legend ,and a war- leader , the son of the dog - king of the Huphale

The Cha’hta war- ti tles frequently end in -abi, -api

killer ; cf. the Creek term p6yz'

is , tipé yas 1 kil

The Creeks often conferred war- t i tles on whi temen of note,and made Milfort , who became a relat ive of the chief McG il

livray by marriage, the chief warrior of the nat ion . The

ceremonies performed on that occas ion are described at

length by himself. ‘

1 1 79 1 - Schoolcraft, Indians , V, 263.

3 Adair, History , p . 278.

Milfort , Mémoire, p . 4 1 sqq. , 220 sqq . The council of the

nation, assembled at Tukabatchi, conferred this charge on him in May

1 780.

THE CREEK INDIANS.

Wéksi, Cha’hta term referring to the d rawing up of the

prepuce. Occurs in Wéksi hola’hta and other Creekti tles , perhaps also in the tribal name of the Waxsaws

on Santee river, S . C. , and in Waxahatchi, town inAlabama. The name conveyed the idea of a low ,

unmanly behavior, but had no obscene mean ing .

Other nat ions regard epithets l ike these (anti/lac, veryi)as high ly injurious

,and load their enemies with them ,

as the Tchiglit- Inuit do the Tinne Indians of the

interior : taordshioit, ortcho- todsho - eitut. ‘

W AR - CUSTOMS AND TACTICS .

A few notes on the war- customs of the Creeks , whichresembled those of mos t Southern tribes , may be useful forshedding light on the early migrat ions of the people and

upon the tact ics observed in their campaigns .The principal motive for Indian wars being the conquest

of scalps, slaves , plunder and hunt ing grounds, the Creeks ,consc ious of their great power, were not very part icular infinding causes for warfare , and did not even advance speciousreasons for declaring war. Thus , Adai r g ives as the t ruecause of a long war between the Creeks and Cheroki , thekill ing and scalping of two Chicasa hunters by a Shawanobrave.

” This man took refuge among the Cheroki people,and war was declared to them by the Creeks , because theythen had concluded a war al l iance with the Chicasa (H istory,p .

I t is rather improbable that a declarat ion of war alwayspreceded the at tack , for the advance in to the hosti leterri tory was made clandes tinely ’ ; but the resolution ofstart ing upon the warpath was heralded in the towns with

1 E. P etitot, Tchiglit, preface p . xi.

3 The Timucua of Florida declared war by sticking up arrows in the

ground around the town or camp of the enemy on the evening before theattack (Renede L audonniére, Histoire

WAR- CUSTOMS AND TACTICS.

great ceremonies . Of thesewe shal l speak under the headingConfederacy .

The C reeks of old were i n the habi t of carrying on thei rwarfare ch iefly in small bodies , l ike other Indian tribes .Smal l commands are bet ter enabled to surprise the enemy orhis camps in clandestine or n ight at tacks , or to cu t off host ilewarriors , than large ones . There are instances that theCreeks formed war- part ies of four men only . Their leader

was then styled imlsi, immissi or “ the one carrying i t forthem ,

” th is term referring to the bat tle- charm or war- physic .

War- par t ies of forty to S ixty men are mentioned also .

When warriors started for the field of honor ” in larger

or smal ler bodies , they were led by a commander (paka'

dsha)who S imul taneously was an ahopaya or hopaya, elzarmer at

a distance.

” Men of this order had , l ike other warriors , toundergo , while quite young , a severe cou rse of ini t iat ionin to manhood

,which also compr ised instruct ions in herb

physicking . To become in i tiated they camped away fromother people, and had for their only compan ion the old con

j uror,who for four months in i t iated them and taught them

the incantat ions intended to act as charms upon the enemy .

To begin with,a fas t of ei ther four or eight days and the

eat ing of certain bitter weeds was prescr ibed , to purify thesystem and to prepare the youth for a ready comprehensionof the objects of tu i t ion . The Whole process was somet imesrepeated for another four months, in the spring of the yearfollowing , and differed in every town . The knowledge thusacquired , i t was bel ieved , imparted to the person a ful l conj ur ing power and charmer ’s influence over the antagonist

,

and enabled him to conquer the host ile warriors at a d istance

( hupa- i) and before reaching them , or to make them comenear enough for easy capture.

When the Great Warrior started on the warpath he gavenot ice to the part ic ipants where he would st r ike camp thatn ight , and then set out , somet imes with one or two men

THE CREEK INDIANS.

only. A war-whoop and the discharge of his gun were thesignals of his departure, and were responded to by h is followers by act ing in the same manner . The other warriors tookthei r t ime, and went to rejoin him one o r two days after.A man taking part in a war- expedi t ion was cal led hu ‘ l i -a‘la.

A war party always proceeded in Indian file, each manstepping into the footprints of the foregoing , to prevent theenemy from knowing their number. This explains also theepisode of the legend referring to the t racks lost in the bottomof the river, q . v.

1 The tracks , footpri n ts, strokes of hatchetsvisible on the bark of trees , etc.

,differed in every American

tribe . Among the G reeks the las t man in the file oftensought to cover the tracks by placing grass upon them . Aconsiderable force of scouts hovered around the march ingfile, to prevent su rprises ; the leader marched at the head ofthe file.

The attack was made in t rue Indian and savage fashion ,before daybreak . The warriors c rept up as si lently as possible, tried to dart their m issiles from secret spots , and

never exposed thei r bodies to the enemy when they couldcover them by some eminence or rock , tree or bush . Theleader took a posit ion in the rear . The Chicasa Indianscon tinually taunted the colonial troops upon the fearles s butuseless exposure of their men to the bat t le- fire of the waryIndian braves. Milfort relates that his men fought nude,because they had noticed that the fragments of cloth ingentering the body with the poin t of the miss ile rendered thewound much more dangerous than the miss ile i tsel f.When making prisoners the Creeks habitual ly spared only

the l ives of children , kill ing mercilessly the ad ult males andfemales . They even burn t many of them at the stake, andMilfort claims that this barbaric custom was abandonedonly through his influence (Mem. , pp . 21 9

1 Milfort , Mém. , p . 21 7. 218. Walking through watercourses necessarily destroyed all vestiges of a marching body of warriors.

THE CREEK INDIANS. 0

been observed in Floridaas early as I 564 by Renede L audonniere.

ORGANIZ ATION OF THE CONFEDERACY.

The Creek confederacy , or “ league of the Muscogulgee

was a purely pol i tical organi z at ion connecting the variousand disparate elements , which composed i t , for commonact ion against external aggression . I t had no direct influenceon the social organiz at ion of the tribes , and the most appro

priate term for this , and other Indian confederacies as wel l ,is that of war- confederacy , war- league or symmachy. InC reek the Maskoki confederacy is called ist i Maské ki imi tihalatka.

To cal l th is loose assemblage of towns and tr ibes a mil itarydemocracy , in the sense that the majority of the votes decideda quest ion brought before the people in a manner that wasbinding for the c i t iz ens , is entirely wrong and misleading ,for Indians regard thei r act ions subject to thei r own decisionsonly

,or, at the utmost , to those of thei r ind ividual gens .

Every Creek town or ind ividual could go on the warpath orstay at home, i n Spi te of any wish or decree issued by thechiefs or assembled warriors . The young warriors , anxiousto obtain fame and war- t i tles , joined the war- part ies on thecal l of a leader. In quest ions of war unanimity was seldomat tained in the counci l of a town , much less in the wholenat ion i t is not recollected by the oldest man, that morethan one- hal f of the nat ion went to war at the same t ime or‘ took the war- talk .

’

“When the miko and his councillors are of opinion that

the town has been injured , the Great Warrior l i fts the warhatchet , atas i , against the offending nat ion . But as soon as

i t is taken up , the miko and h is council may in terpose, andby their prudent counsels stop i t , and proceed to adjust themisunderstanding by negot iat ion . If the Great Warrior persists and goes out ,

’

he is followed by all who are for war.

”

These words , quoted from the “ Sketch of the United

ORGANIZ ATION OF THE CONFEDERACY 169

States agen t , B . Hawkins, plainly show, that the initiative

fo r war rested with the c ivil authori ty , and not with the

mili tary . But i t is possible that Hawkins speaks of white or

peace- towns only,and not of the red towns (p . H e

cont inues as follows“ Peace is always determined on and concluded by the

miko and counci llors , and peace- talks are always addressedto the cabin of the miko . In some cases , where the resen tment of the warriors has run high , the miko and council havebeen much embarrassed .

”

All this proves that every town had the privilege to beginwarfare for i tsel f, independen t of the confederacy , providedthat the C ivil government consen ted to the undertaking .

Th is fact plainly shows the perfect independence of the

Indian tr ibe from the war- confederacy , and forms a strikingcont ras t to our ideas of a central iz ed state power. In someinstances the Creek towns left thei r defensive posi t ion to act

on the offensive principle, but they were not sustained thenby the Maskoki confederacy .

The chief of the confederacy had to advise only,and not

to command ; he was of influence only when endowed withsuperio r talent and pol i tical abil i ty . The chief and princ ipalwarriors had annual meet ings in the publ ic square of somecent ral town , on publ ic affairs ; they drank assi , exchangedtobacco , and then proceeded to debate. Time and place of

these convent ions were fixed by a chief, and the space of timebetween warning and that of assembly was cal led brokendays . ” Major C . Swan , after whose report this passage isquoted (Schoolcraft V , 279 ) states that the ti tle of the chief ofthe confederacywas the great oeloved man, while Milfort , whowas himsel f invested with the charge of great warrior of thenat ion , styles h im L e Tas tanégy ou grand chef de guerre,

”

adding , however , that i n his t ime hewas the highest authori tyin civil and military affai rs (Mémoire, Note to p . The

English,lg

‘

rench and Spaniards frequen tly called him the


Emperor of the Upper and Lower Creeks , a term which isnot ent irely misappl ied when taken in i ts original sense ofmil i tary commander

,

”the z

’

nzperator of the Romans .At a later period the meet ing of the confederacy usually

took place at Tukabatchi, which had become the largestcommuni ty. From the above i t results , however , that theCreeks had no capital town in the sense as we use this term .

Col. B . Hawkins, who at tempted to int roduce some un ityamong the towns for the purpose of fac il itat ing the transac

t ion of business of the nat ion , and their in tercourse with theUnited States Government , proposed various measures , as theclassing of the towns into nine districts ; these were adoptedat Tukabatchi by the ch iefs of the nat ion , on November a7th,1 799 -

1

The small degree of respect which the Creek towns paidto internat ional treat ies ( sitimfatchita) or other solemn engagements made with the whi tes , as sales of terri to ry

, etc . ,is

another proof for the looseness of the powerful Creek confederacy .

” After giving a l ist of six influential headmen ofd ifferent towns , Maj or C . Swan declares that a treaty madewith these chiefs would probably be communicated to all thepeople of the coun try, and be bel ieved and rel ied upon

( Schoolcraft V, 26 Subsequen t events have shown this tobe founded on a misapprehension of the Indian character,which is that of the most outspoken i ndividual ity.

Major C . Swan , who only t raveled through the country toleave i t again , makes the fol lowing in teresting statementconcerning the poli tical and social s tatus of the disparatetribes composing the Creek confederacy ( 1 79 1 ; in Schoolcraft V,

259 . 260)“Their numbers have increased faster by the acquisi t ion

of foreign subjects than by the increase of the original stock .

I t appears long to have been a maxim of thei r policy to giveequal l iberty and protect ion to t ribes conquered by them

1 Cf. his Sketch, pp. 51 . 52. 67 . 68.


Siz e, facing inward , and enclosing a square area of aboutth irty feet on each side.

1 They were general ly made to facethe east , west, north and south .

These buildings, which had the appearance of sheds,con

s isted of a wooden frame, supported on posts set‘

in the

ground and covered with slabs . They were made of the

same mater ial as their dwell ing houses , but differed by havingthe front facing the square open , and the walls of the backsides had an open Space of two feet or more next to the eaves ,to admit a circulat ion of air. Each house was divided in tothree apartments , separated by low part i t ions of clay , makinga total of twelve part i t ions . These apartments , called cabins

( topa) had th ree’ seats , or rather platforms, being broad

enough to sleep upon ; the firs t of them was about two feetfrom the ground , the second eight feet above the fi rs t

, and

the th ird or back seat eigh t feet above the second . Over thewhole of these seats was spread a covering of cane-mats

, as

large as carpets . They were provided wi th new coveringsevery year, just before the busk and since the old coverswere not removed , they had i n the majori ty of the squares

eight to twelve coverings , laid one above the other . Milfortstates that each cabin could seat from forty to sixty persons

(Mémoire, p.

Caleb Swan , who , in his above description of the cabinsin the square, copied the original seen at Odshi-apOfa orLittle Talass ie, where he stopped , differs in several part ienlars, (

especially in the al lotment of the cabins to the authori

t ies, from Hawkins , who res ided in Rawita. Swan assigns

the eas tern building to the beloved men, the southern to thewarriors , the northern to the second men, etc . , wh i le the

wes tern building served for keeping the apparatus for cookingblack drink , war physic , and to store lumber. According to

1 Hawkins s ays : Forty by sixteen feet, eight feet pitch, the entranceat each corner (p .

1 Hawkins : two seats.

THE PUBLIC SQUARE . 173

Hawkins, the western building , fronting eas t,con tained the

mikos and high - ranked people ; the no rthern build ing wasthe warriors ’ ; the southern that of the beloved men,

and the

eas tern that of the young people and their associates . “ The

cabin of the great ch ief faces east ,” says Milfort , p . 203 ,

“ toindicate that he has to watch the in terests of his nat ion con

tinually. The three cabins of themikalgi or old men, facingwest , are the only ones pain ted White, and are always ornamented with guirlands (at Kawita) . On the post, or on a

plank over each cabin , are pain ted the emblems of the gensto which i t is al lot ted ; thus the buffalo gens have the buffalopain ted on i t .From the roofs were dangling on the inside heterogeneous

emblems of peace and trophies of war, as eagles ’ feathers,

swans ’ wings , wooden scalp ing kn ives , war clubs , red -pain tedwands

,bunches of hoops on wh ich to dry thei r scalps , bundles

of a war- physic called snake- root ( sinika in Cheroki) , baskets , etc . Rude paint ings of warriors ’ heads wi th horns ,horned rat tlesnakes , horned al l igators , etc . , were visibleupon the smooth posts and t imbers suppor t ing the greathouse. In the “ pain ted squares ” of some of the red or war

towns the posts and smooth t imber were painted red , withwhite or black edges , th is being considered as a mark of

high dist inc t ion . Other pr ivileged towns possessed a coveredsquare, by wh ich term is mean t a bridging over of the entrancespaces left between the four build ings by means of canes laidon poles.In the cent re of the area of the “ great house a perpetual

fire was burning , fed by four logs , and kept up by publ icmin is trants especial ly appointed for the purpose. The insidearea is cal led impaSkOfa,

“ dedicated ground .

"

The “ square ” was hung over with green boughs , in signOf mourn ing , when a man died in the town no blackd rink was then taken for four days. When an Indian waskilled who belonged to a town which had a square, black


drink had to be taken on the outside of the square, and everyceremony was suspended unti l the outrage was atoned for .

To each great house belonged a black d r ink cook , and from

the young warriors two or three men were appointed to

at tend to those who took th is l iquid every morning ; theycalled the townspeople to this ceremony by beat ing drums

(C . Swan) .After the close of thei r council -meet ing in the counci l

house, the miko , h is counci l lors and warriors repaired to

the ch ief’s cabin in the “ great house.

” They met thereevery day, drank the ass i or black drink , cont inued del iberat ions on public and domestic affai rs , at tended to complaintsand redressed them ; then conversed about news whilesmoking

, or amused themselves at playing rol l the bullet ”

in a sort of ten- pin al ley . The name of th is game is ‘ l i - itchallitchka. Bartram

,p. 453 , states that the chief's cabin

at Atas i was of a different construct ion from the three otherbuildings .But bes ides being the cent ral point of the town for all

meet ings of a public character , the great house was the fes tiveplace for the annual busk and the daily dance i t occasional lyserved as a sleeping place for Indians pass ing through the

town on their t ravels . The special locat ions al lot ted to the

persons in author i ty and the gentes on the cabin - sheds aredescr ibed under the heading : The annual busk .

The council- lzouse or tchuké fa ‘ lako stood on a circularmound or eminence, in close contigui ty to the northeastcorner of the “ great house I t is var iously cal led bytravelers : hot - house, sudatory, assembly- room

,win ter counci l

house, mountain - house, l or , from its circular shape , rotunda.

I ts appearance is generally described as that of a huge coneplaced on an octagonal frame about twelve feet high , andcovered with tufts of bark . Its d iameter was from twenty - five

ato thirty feet , and in the larger towns the building could1 Adair, History , p . 421 .


the drinking of the as si -decoct and other ceremonies ,‘and

then conduc ted to the great house .

”

When the nat ives gathered in th is struc ture for sweat ing ,ei ther for promoting their heal th or as a rel igious ceremony ,they developed steam by throwing water on heated stones ,then danced around the fire, and wen t to plunge into the

chill ing waves of the river flowing past thei r town .

The play -

ground occupied the northwestern angle of thepublic square, and formed an oblong segment of i t , of ratheri rregular shape. I t was made dist inct from the rest of thesquare by one or two low embankmen ts or terraces ; i n itscentre stood , on a low circular mound , a fou r- sided pole or

pillar, somet imes forty feet high . A mark fas tened on i tstop served at appoin ted times as a target to shoot at withrifles or arrows . Around the pole the floor of the yard wasbeaten sol id .

The play -

ground , ta'dshu in Creek , was cal led by the white

traders chunkey- yard , chunk-yard , from the pr incipal game

played in it . This game, the chunkey or tchungke-game,consisted in throwing a pole after the chunke, a roundedstone which was set roll ing upon i ts edge . Cf. Adai r , H ist . ,p . 401 . 402. There was also a sort of bal l play in use amongthe C reeks and many other Indian tribes , by which a bal l

(puku) was aimed at an objec t suspended on the top of a

high pole, or, as i t is played now , at the top of two twinpoles (puk -abi) , called somet imes

“ maypoles . In summert ime dances were also performed in th is yard , and Bart ramsaw “

at the corner of each far ther end a slave- post or strongstake, where the captives that are burnt al ive are bound .

”

1 Milfort , Mémoire, p . 21 1 .3 Travels , p . 518.

THE ANNUAL BUSK. 177

THE ANNUAL BUSK .

The solemn annual fest ival held by the Creek people of

anc ien t and modern days is the puskita, a word now passedin to p rovincial Engl ish (busk) ; i ts real mean ing is that ofa fas t. In the more importan t towns i t las ted eight days ; intowns ofminor note four days only , and i ts celebrat ion difl eredin each town in some part iculars . The day on which to begin i twas fixed by the miko and his council , and depended on the

maturi ty of the maiz e crop and on various other ci rcumstances .I ts celebrat ion took place mainly in the “ great house ” '

of the public square, and from Hawkins ’ description , whosaw i t celebrated in Kasiz ta,

’ we extract the following particulars :

In the morn ing of thefirst day the warriors clean the areaof the great house and sprinkle it with wlzite sand

,at the

time when the black drink is being prepared . The fire inthe cent re is made by fric t ion , very early in the day , by aministrant especial ly appoin ted for the purpose, called the

fire-maker. Four logs , as long as the span of both arms , arebrought to the cen tre of the area by the warriors

,and laid

down end to end , so as to form a cross . Each end of thisc ross poin ts to one of the cardinal poin ts of the compass .At the spot where

'

the logs converge, the newfire is kindledand the logs are consumed du r ing the first four days of the

puskita. The women of the turkey gens dance the turkeydance, pinna Opanga, while the powerful emet ic pa'ssa isbeing brewed . I t is drank from noon to mid - afternoon ,after which the tadpole-dance, tokiulka Opanga, is dancedby four males and four females, who are called the tokiulkaor tadpoles . In the even ing the men dance the danceOf the hiniha : biniha opanga, and cont inue it t il l dayl ight .The s econd day begins with the performance of the gun

dance , ftch’

ha opanga, danced by females about ten o 'clock1 Remember well that Kasixta is a wlzite or peace town .

THE CREEK INDIANS.

in the forenoo'

n.

l At noon the men approach the new fire,

rub some of i ts ashes on the chin , neck and bel ly , jump headforemost in to the river, and then return to the great house.

Meanwhile the females prepare the newmaiz e for the feas t ,and the men on arriving rub some of i t between their hands ,then on their face and breast , after which feast ing begins .The tlzird day the men pas s by si t ting in the square.

On the fourtlz day the women rise early to obtai n a sparkof the new fire ; they bring i t to thei r own hearths , whichwere previously cleaned and sprinkled with sand , and thenkindle thei r fi res on them . When the first four logs are

consumed , themen repeat the ceremony of rubbing the as heson their ch in

,neck and bel ly , and then plunge in to water.

Subsequently they taste sal t and dance the long dance, opangatchapko .

The fiftlz day is devoted to the bringing in of four otherlogs , which are disposed and kindled as aforementioned , andthen the men drink as si .On the six/l: and seventh day the men remain in the

“ greathouse.

”

The ceremonies of the eight): or las t day in the square and

outside of i t are of a pecul iarly impressive character . Fourteen species of physic plants are placed in two pots contain ingwater, then stirred and beaten up in i t . After the aliktchalgi

or conjurers have blown in to the mixture through a smal lreed , the men dr ink of the l iquid and rub it over their jointst il l afternoon . The names of the medical plants were as

follows :I . miko huyanI

’tcha.

2 . tOla or sweet bay.

3 . atchina or cedar ( the leaves of it) .

4. kapapaska, a sh rub with red berries .

1 The dance is cal led so , because the men fire off guns during itsperformance ; another name for this dance is tapntska opanga ; cf.

tapodshfdshas 1 am slzooting .


reaches the water’s edge. After the crowdsias thickly con

gregated at the bank , each person places a grain of “ oldman ’s tobacco on the head and others in each ear. Then ,at a signal repeated four t imes , they throw some of i t in tothe river, and every man , at a l ike signal , plunges in to thewater

,to pick up four stones from the bottom . With these

they cross themselves on their breas ts four t imes , each t imethrowing one of the stones back in to the river and utteringthe death -whoop . Then they wash themselves , take up thecane with the feathers , return to the great house, where t heyst ick i t up , then walk through the town visi t ing .

The mad dance, opanga hadsho, is performed after n ightfal l , and th is terminates the long ceremony .

The celebrat ion of the puskita had a favorable influenceupon the minds of the people, for i t was a signal of amnes ty ,absolving the Indian of all crimes , murder excepted , and

seemed to bury guil t i tsel f in oblivion . All fo rmer quarrel sand hatred were forgotten and man restored to himself andto the communi ty . Indians renewing past quarrels after thissolemn fest ival , were severely reprimanded by others . Thischange of mind was symbol iz ed by the custom of the womenof breaking to pieces all the household utensi ls of the pas tyear , and replacing them by new ones ; the men refi tted all

their property so as to look new,and i t was considered

extremely disgraceful , even for the most indigent , to eat any

of the new maiz e before the annual busk ( Sketch , pp . 75

The foregoing sketch would be incomplete without theaddit ion of another account of a four days ’ puskita, wh ich C .

Swan witnessed at Odshi-apé fa, near the confluence of theCoosa and Tal lapoosa rivers ; i t explains and amplifies manyof the incidents related by Hawkins .

1 For further particulars of the medicine- plants, see the items in theNotes and in the Creek Glossary .

THE ANNUAL BUSK. 181

The accoun t inserted in Swan ’s art icle (Schoolcraft, IndiansV

,267. 268) is Signed

“Anthony Alex . M’

G illivray, whowas

then a chief of the nat ion , and related by marriage to Milfor t .We gather from his statements , that at Odshi-apOfa or

H ickory Ground ,” which is a w/zite town also , the priest ,

or fire-maker of the town ” had the privilege of determin ing

the days of the busk , and that in doing so he was led by theripening of the maiz e- crop and by the growth of the cassineshrub . At the break of the first day he wen t to the square,unat tended by others , dressed in w/zite leather moccasins andstockings

,with a w/zite dressed deer- skin over h is shoulders

,

and produced there the new fire, by the fric t ion of two drypieces of wood . When the spark was blaz ing up , four youngmen en tered the area at the open ings of i ts four co rners

, eachholding a st ick of wood they approached the newfire withh igh reverence, and placed the ends of thei r st icks to i t “ ina very formal manner . ” Then fou r other young men cameforward in the same manner , each holding an ear of the

newly - ripened Indian corn , which the conjurer took fromthem and with formal i t ies threw into the fire. Then fourother men entered the square in the same manner , car

rying branches of the new cassine, some of which the priestthrew into the fire

,the rest being immediately parched

and cooked for ceremonial use. The myster ious jargon whichhe muttered dur ing this ceremon ial actwas supposed to form a

conversat ion with the great mas ter of breath .

”

The male populat ion having in the meant ime gathered inthe cabins

,the prepared black drink is served to them , and

sparks of the new fire are carried and left outside the buildings for publ ic use. The women bring i t to thei r homes ,wh ich they have cleaned and decorated the day before forthe occasion by extinguishing the old fi res and removingthei r ashes th roughout the town . They are fo rbidden tostep in to the square, but dance with the ch i ldren on i tsou tside. On the second day the men take thei r war- physic ,

THE CREEK INDIANS.

a decoction of the but ton - snake root , in Quch quanti t ies aswould produce strong spasmodic efl

'

ects . The t/zird day isspent by the older men i n the square, in taking black drink ,etc. ,

by the young men in hun ting or fish ing for the las t dayof the fest ival . The females pass the first three days inbath ing, and i t is unlawful for the males to touch any of themeven with the t ip of the finger. Both sexes are compel ledto abstain rigidly from any food , especially from salt. The

foartlz day all clas ses congregate in the “ great house ”

promiscuously ; the game killed on the prev ious day isgiven to the publ ic , and the women are cooking the provisions brought in from all sides , over the new fire. After thisconvivial day the evening dances conclude the annual festivi ty. Any provisions left over are given to the “fire-maker.Less ci rcumstantial descriptions of th is curious ceremony ,

which is frequently cal led from analogy the “ green corndance,

”are contained in Adai r ’ s H istory, Argumen t VIII , in

Bartram ,Travels , pp . 507 . 508, i n Milfort and many other

writers . I t appears from all that the busk is not a solsti t ialcelebrat ion , but a rejo icing over the first fruits of the year.The new year begins wi th the busk , which is celebrated inAugust or late in July . Every town celebrated its busk at aperiod independent from that of the other towns, whenevertheir crops had come to maturity.

Rel igious ideas were connected with the fest ival , for thebenefi ts imparted to mankind by the new frui ts were the giftsof the sun , which was symboliz ed by the fire burn ing in thecentre of the square. The new fire meant the new l i fe,physical and moral , which had to begin with the new year .Everything had to be new or renewed ; even the garmentsworn heretofore were given to the flames . The pardongranted to offenders gave them a chance to begin a new

and bet ter course of l ife. I t was unlawful to pass betweenthe fire in the area and the rising sun , for th is would haveinterrupted the mys t ic communicat ion exist ing between the


put to death hersel f. l This may have been the pract ice in afew Creek tribes, but i t is doubtful that such was the generallaw in all, except in regard to illegit imate offspring .

The occupat ions of Creek women are described by Cpt .B . Romans, p . 9 6 in the following succ inct form

The women are employed , besides the cul t ivation of theearth , in d ressing the victuals , preparing , scraping , brain ing ,rubbing and smoaking the Roe- Skins , making macksens of

them ,spinn ing buffaloe wool , making sal t , preparing cass ine

d rink, drying the clzamcerops and passifl ora , making coldflour for t ravel ing , gathering nuts and making their milk ;l ikewise in making baskets brooms , pots, bowls and otherearthen and wooden vessels .1nitiation.

— Indian parents bring up their ch i ld ren in a

manner wh ich better deserves the name of t rain ing than thatof educat ion . They think children become bes t fi t ted forfuture l i fe when they can, for a certain period of thei r ages

,

roam around at will and act at thei r own pleas u re. They donot reprobate or pun ish them for any wanton act they maycommit ; hence the l icentiousness of both sexes up to the

t ime of marriage, and the comparat ive want of d isc iplineamong warriors on thei r exped it ions . But the boys weretaugh t to harden thei r const i tut ions against the inclemenciesof the seasons and the privat ions in war, and this resul t theymost successfully at tained by the so- called initiation, and alsoby cont inued bodily exercise before and after that solemnperiod of thei r l ives . B . Romans ( I 775) Sketches the t rainingof the Creek youths in the following words (p . C reeksmake the boys swim in the coldest weather ; make them fre

quently undergo scratch ing from head to foot , through theskin , with broken glass or gar-fish teeth’, so as to make themall in a gore of blood , and then was h them with cold water ;

1 Milfort, Mem., p . 251 .

1 Also practiced once a year upon the Shetimasha warriors, on their

knee- joints, by men expressly appointed to this manipulation.

FURTHER ETHNOGRAPHIC NOTES. 185

th is is with them the arcanum against all diseases bu t whenthey design i t as a punishment to the boys , they dry - scratchthem , i. e.

,they apply no water after the operat ion , which

renders i t very pain ful . They endeavo r to teachthem all manner of cruel ty toward brutes , etc .

This sort of treatmen t must have been abundantly productive of rheumat ism and other affect ions , though we havemany instances of Creek Indians reaching a high age. Of

the initiation which the Creek boys underwen t before at tain ingtheir seventeenth year, B . Hawkins gives a ful l and circumstantial accoun t

,which Shows that supersti t ions had en tered

in to the customs of pr ivate l ife of the Creeks as deeply asthey had in to those of other Indian tribes .The ceremony of ini t iat ing youth in to manhood , says B .

Hawkins’, is usually performed at the age from fifteen toseventeen , and is called puskita (fasting) , l ike the busk of

the nat ion . A youth of the proper age gathers two handfulsof the sowatchko plant

,which in toxicates and maddens , and

eats this very'

b itter root for a whole day, after which hesteeps the leaves in water and dr inks from this . After sunsethe eats two or three spoonfuls of boiled gri ts .2 H e remainsin a house for four days , dur ing which the above performancesare repeated . Putting on a newpair ofmoccasins (stillipaiz a) ,he leaves the cabin , and du r ing twelve moons abstains fromeat ing the meat of young bucks , of turkey - cocks , fowls , peasand sal t , and is also forbidden to pick his ears and to scratchhis head wi th his fingers , but must use a smal l spl in ter toperform these operat ions . Boiled gri ts— the only foodallowed to him during the fi rst four moons— may be

cooked for h im by a l i t tle girl , but on a fire kindledespec ially for his own use. From the fi fth month any

person may cook for him ,but he has to serve himself fi rs t ,

using one pan and spoon only . Every new moon he

1 Sketch Of the Creek Country,pp . 78. 79 .

1 Maize pounded into grits .

18

THE CREEK INDIANS.

drinks the pa’ssa or button - snake root , an emet ic,for four

days,and takes no food except some boiled gri ts , humpita

hatki , in the evening . At the commencement of the twel fthlunat ion he performs for four days the same ri tes as he didat the beginning of the in i tiat ion , but on the fifth he leavesthe cabin , gathers maiz e- cobs, burns them to ashes, and withthese rubs his whole body. At the end of the moon heel ic its transpirat ion by Sleeping under blankets , then goesin to cold water, an act which ends the ceremony . The herbmedicines are admin istered to him by the ist i paka

’

dsha‘ lako or “ great leader ,

” who , when speaking of h im ,says :

pusidshedshe’

yi sanatchumitcha’

tcha- is,’ “ I am pass ing him

through the physicking process repeatedly, or : naki omalgaimaki‘ la

’

dshayi sa‘ l i t Omas , tchi, “ I am teaching him all the

mat ters proper for him to think of.” If he has a dream

during this course of ini t iat ion , he has to drink from the

pa’ssa, and dares not touch any persons , save boys who are

under a l ike course . This course is sometimes shortened to

a fewmon ths, even to twelve days only , but the performancesare the same.

The purpose of the in it iat ion of boys , corresponding to

the first-menstruat ion ri tes of females , was the spiri tual aswel l as the physical strengthen ing of the individual . Whilethe physical exposures and privat ions were thought to renderhim strong in body and fearless in battle, the dreams comingupon him

,in consequence of the exhaustion by hunger and

madden ing by all sorts of physic , were supposed to furnishhim visions

,which would reveal to him enchant ing views for

future l ife, material r iches and the ways to acquire them , the

principles of bravery and pers is tence , the modes of charmingenemies and game at a distance, of obtain ing scalps , and prospeets of general happiness and of a respected posit ion in his

t ribe.

’

1 Slightly altered from the words given by Hawkins.1 Cf.what is said of the initiation of the ahopayi and imfsi, pp. 159 . 165.

THE CREEK INDIANS .

from which the nat ion had sprung forth , arid all this solelyon the s trength of the bel ief which these bead - strings hadinspired in his ‘companions .Further notices on Creek ethnology may be found in

B . F. Frenclz, H ist . Collect . of Lou isiana, III I 2S— I 39 , in theNotes ;

”

also in Urlsperger’

s Nachricht , Vol . I , chapter

5, 859- 868, a pas sage describing especial ly Yamassi customs .

NOTES ON CREEK H ISTORY.

To offer a history of the Creek tribe from its discoverydown to our epoch to the readers does not lie within the

scope of this volume, and for want of sufficien t documentsi llustrat ing the earl ier periods i t could be presen ted in a

fragmentary manner only . But a few notes on the subject ,especially on the Oglethorpe treat ies , will be of interes t tothe reader.In the year following their departure from the West Indies

the troops led by H . de Soto traversed a port ion ofthe Creek territory , taken in i ts extent as known to us fromthe end of the eigh teen th century . D e Soto ’s presence isproved by the mention of Creek tribes bearing Creek namesin the reports of his three chroniclers . The most circumstantial report in topography is that of the Kn igh t of E lvas .

H e states that de Soto ’s army usual ly marched five to s ixleagues a day in peopled countries , but when pas sing throughdeserted lands proceeded faster. From Ch iaha H . de Sotoreached Coste in seven days . From Tal i , probably contiguous to Coste, he marched for six days , through manytowns

,to Coca, arr iving there July 26th, I 540 . Leaving th is

town after a stay of twenty-five days , he reached Tallimuchaseon the same day, Ytava on the next , and had to remain theresix days , on account of a freshet in the r iver . Having crossed

the river he reached Ullibahali town , fort ified by a woodenwall , and on the next day stopped at a town subject to thelord of Ullibahali, to reach Toasi the day after . Then

NOTES ON CREEK HISTORY. 189

he t raversed the Tallise “ pro v ince, peopled with manytowns, and en tered the great pueblo of Tallise on September1 8 th , to stay there twenty days . Many other towns werevisible on the opposi te side of the maine r iver ,

”on which

Tallisil stood . On leaving this pueblo he reached Casiste on

the same day, and Tuscalusa, whose chief was lord of manyterri tories , after another march of two days . From therePiache

,on a great river , was reached in two days , and Mavila

in three days from Piache. D e Soto arrived in Mavila on

Oc tober 1 8th, and the whole distance from Coca to Tuscalusais computed by the Knight of E lvas at Sixty leagues , thedirect ion of the route being from north to south . In th ispart icular Biedma differs from him .

The villages of Ch iaha (Chisca, Ychiaha, China, var. lect .)and of Coste (Costehe, Acostehe) provinces were fortifiedand stood on river - islands . This lat ter c ircumstance makesi t probable that they lay on Tennessee r iver, and hence wereheld by Cheroki Indians . Tal i is ei ther the C reek term tal idry, ex siccated, or the Cha

’h ta tal i rock. Coca, then in a

flourish ing condit ion , is the town of Kusa. Tal l i -muchasi ,or “ Newtown ,

” near Coca, is clearly a Creek term , and sois Ytava, I tawa, which I take for the imperfectly art iculateditalua, tribe. Toas i is, I think , the toWn of Tawasa, wh ichwas one of the Alibamu villages, q . v. , and lay on the southernShore of the Alabama river.Tallisi is undoubtedly Talua- hassi , old town , but which

one of the numerous settlements of this name it may havebeen is now impossible to determine. Cas iste resemblesKas f

’

hta, but cannot have been Kasfz ta on Chatahuchi r iver ,for de Soto reached Tuskalusa or “ Black Warrior ,

” which Itake to be a town on the river of that name, within two daysfrom Cas is te, travel ing west .2 Piache, i f Creek, could be

1 Italis f, var. lect.1 For Casiste compare KOSisti, a term appearing in Creek war- titles ;.

its signification is unknown.


api-udshi little pole, small free. Garc ilaso (fl la Vega states

that Tascalusa was on the same river as Tallisi and belowi t . The documents Of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuriesfrequently give names of local i t ies and tribes to the localchiefs, as was done here in the case of Tascalusa, Mavila,Alimamu and others . Chiaha is a Cheroki name, and isexplained elsewhere as

“ place of ot ters . ” Some moderncri t ics bel ieve that de Soto ’s army did not cross the mountains into what is now North Carol ina and Tennessee, the“ over- hil l seats of the Cheroki people, but only skirted thesouthern Slope of the Apalachian ridge by passing throughNorthern Georgia west in to Northern Alabama

,and then

descending Coosa river . In order to determine de Soto ’sroute in these parts , we have to decide fi rs t , whether thedays and direct ions of the compass noted by his chron iclersdeserve more credence than the local names t ransmitted incases when both form confl ic ting statements . The names oflocal i t ies could not be pure inven tions they prove by themselves , that tribes speaking Creek or Maskoki proper wereencoun tered by the adven turous leader in the same tractswhere we find them at the beginn ing of th is n ineteenth century . I t follows from th is that the Creek immigrat ion fromthe west or northwest , i f such an even t ever occurred withinthe las t two thousand years , mus t have preceded the t ime of

de Soto ’s visi t by a long lapse of t ime. Thus the termsitalua, talOfa, talass i belong to the Creek dialect only ; hadH . de Soto been in a country speaking a H i tchit i dialect , hewould have heard , instead of these , the term Okli, and

instead of talua mutchas i : Okli himashi. ‘

In 1 559 another Spanish leader, Tristan de Luna, disembarked in or near Mobile bay, then wen t north in quest ofgold and treasure, reached Nanipacna, or

“ pueblo SantaCruz de Nanipacna,

”and from there arrived , after experi

1 When stopping at Ullibahali, he was in the country of the Alibamu,

for Ola, (11a is the term for town in their dialect . Cf. p . 85 (Note).


The first Brit ish treaty with the Creeks was?) concluded byJames Oglethorpe, Governor Of the Carol inas . H e set out

May 1 4th , 1 733 , from Charleston , his residence, and onMay 1 8th met in council the representatives of the LowerCreek tr ibes at Savannah . Dur ing the meet ing many factsof interest were el ici ted . The C reeks then claimed the territory extending from the Savannah r iver to the Flin t river ,and south to St . Augustine, stat ing that their former numberOf ten tribes had been reduced to eigh t . Wikatchampa, theOkOni miko , proclaimed that his t ribe would peaceably cedeto the Bri t ish all lands not needed by themselves . The

Yamacraw chief Tomochichi, then banished from one Of the

Lower Creek towns, spoke in favor of making a treaty withthe foreigners , and Yahola ‘ lako , miko of Kawita, allowedTomochichi and his relat ives “ to cal l the kindred , that lovethem , out of each of the Creek towns , that they may cometogether and make one town . We must pray you to recal lthe Yamasees, that they may be buried in peace among theirancestors , and that they may see their graves before theydie ; and our own nat ion (of the Lower Creeks) shall berestored again to i ts ten towns . The t reaty of land - cession ,commerce and al l iance was signed May z rst, and rat ified bythe t rustees Of the colony of Georgia, October 1 8 th , 1 733 .

It st ipulated a cession of the lands between the Savannahand Altamaha rivers , and of some islands on the Atlant iccoast , to the Bri t ish ; i t further st ipulated promises to en terin to a commercial treaty at a later date, to place themselvesunder the general government of Great Bri tain , to l ive inpeace with the colonies , to capture runaway slaves and del iverthem at Charleston , Savannah or P alachukla garr ison for a

considerat ion . The treaty was confi rmed by pledges on theside of the Creeks , which consisted in a bundle of buckskinsfor each town , whereas the English made presents of arms ,garments , etc . in return . The Indians expressed a desire Of teceiving instruct ion through teachers , and the success Obtained


in concluding th is fi rst t reatywas main ly at tr ibuted to the influence of Tomochichi upon h is fel low- count rymen . The eigh tt ribes represented were Kawita, Kas il ta, Osutchi, Chiaha, H itch i t i , Apalatchukla, Okoni , Yufala. The “ two lost towns ”

were cer tainly not those Of the Séwokli and Yuchi , al thoughthese do not figure in the l is t . Only one of the headmensigning the t reaty of 1 733 figures in the prooemium O four legend (writ ten in

“Tomaumi, head warr ior O fYufala, with three warr iors he is ident ical wi th TamOkmi,war captain of the Eufantees ( i n 1 7 Chekilli is not

men t ioned .

The above treaty is printed in : Pol it ical State of GreatB ri tain

,vol . 46, p . 23 7 sqq ; extract in C . C . Jones , Tomo

ch ichi , pp . 27—3 7 .

Although encouraged by this first successful meet ing withthe Creeks , the colonists knew so wel l the fickleness of theInd ian character that they were distrust ful Of the steadinessof their promises , and thus sought to renew the fr iendly relat ions with them as Often as possible.

A conven t ion was arranged with the chiefs of the LowerC reeks at Savannah in 1 735, dur ing which the legend Of theKas il ta migrat ion was del ivered , but it does not appearwhether any new treaty stipulat ions were mooted or not atthat meet ing .

Just after h is return from England , Governor Oglethorpeagain came to Savannah on October 1 3 th , 1 738 , to meet i ncouncil the mikos of Chiaha, Okmulgi, Otchisi and Apa

latchukla, who were accompan ied by thirty warriors and fiftytwo at tendants . They assured him Of thei r firm and continuedat tachment to the crown , and not ified him that deput ies ofthe remain ing towns would come down to see him , and thatone thousand warriors of thei rs were at his disposal . Theyalso reques ted that brass weights and sealed measures shouldbe deposi ted with the mikos of each town , to preclude the

t raders set tled among them from cheat ing.

THE CREEK INDIANS.

On the 1 7th of July, 1 739 , Oglethorpe withoa large ret inuestarted to meet the Creeks in their own coun try , at Kawita.

H e t raveled up Savannah river to the Yuchi town , twentyfive miles above Ebenez er, then followed the in land t rail ,for two hundred miles , without meet ing any Indians . The

counci l lasted from August 1 1 th to z rst, and terminated

in a t reaty, by which the towns renewed thei r feal ty ” tothe king of Great Bri tain , and confirmed their cessionsOf terri tory , while Oglethorpe engaged that the Bri t ishshould not encroach upon their reserved lands, and thattheir traders should deal fai rly and honestly with the Indian s .The towns on Coosa and Tal lapoosa rivers part ic ipated inthe treaty .

1

I t may be regarded as a consequence of th is compact , thatCreek warriors joined the Bri tish as auxi l iar ies in the expe

dition against St . Augustine in 1 742.

Important and detailed information on the relat ions of theCreeks and all other Southern tribes with the Bri t ish andFrench set tlers of colon ial t imes may be found in the documents preserved at the State Paper Office, London . The

contents of such papers as relate more especially to SouthCarol ina are hinted at in numerous abstracts of them givenin a catalogue in Collections of Soul}: Carolina fz

'tlftort

'

eal

Society , Vols . I , I I , Charleston , 8vo (Vol . II published incf. II , 272. 29 7

—298 . 3 1 5—3 1 7 . 3 22, etc . Compare

also W . de Brahm 's wri t ings , mentioned in : Appendices .An incomplete and unsat isfactory, though curious l ist of

the elements then ( 1 77 1 ) composing the Maskoki confede

racy and of i ts western allies is contained in B . Romans , Eas tand West Florida (p . go) . The passage fi rst al ludes to the

Seminoles as all ies , and then con t inues : They are a mixtureof the remains Of the Cawittas , Talepoosas , Coosas , Apalachias , Conshacs or Coosades , Oakmulgis , Oconis , Okchoys ,Alibamons , Natchez , Weetumkus , Bakanas , Taénsas , Chacsi

1 Cf. C. C. Jones , Tomochichi, pp . 1 13—1 1 9 .


nessee river, except a large body of Creeks near the influx ofH iwassee r iver (and some Shawanese on Cumberland river) .They had set tled “

at the island on the Creek path ,” meaning

a ford Of the Great Tennessee r iver , also cal led “the Creek

c rossing , near the Alabama State border. At fi rst they l ivedat peace with them ,

but subsequently at tacked them , to dr ivethem out of the coun try . By stratagem they d rew them fromtheir island , with all the canoes in their possession , to a placewhere others lay in ambush for them , engaged them in bat tle,took away their canoes to pass over to the island , and

destroyed there all the property of the t ribe. The enfeebledCreeks then left the count ry and went to the Coosa r iver .The B road river , a wes tern afl

‘luent of Savannah river,

formed for many years the boundary between the Cherokiand the eas tern Creeks . It figures as such in Monson ’s mapOf 1 773 .

The Creeks remained under the influence of the Bri t ishgovernment un til after the American Revolut ionary war, andin many confl ic ts showed their host il i ty to the thirteen statesst ruggl ing for independence. Thus they acted in the Bri tishin terest when they made a n ight at tack on General Wayne’sarmy, in 1 782, led by G uristersigo , near the Savannah river .An at tack on Buchanan ’s stat ion was made by Creek and

Cheroki warriors near Nashville, Tenn .,in 1 79 2. Treat ies

were concluded with them by the United States at New

York, August 7th, 1 790, and at Coleraine, Georgia, June 29 th,

1 79 6. An art icle of these st ipulated the retu rn of capturedwhites

,and of negro slaves and property to thei r owners in

Georgia. Trading and military posts were es tabl ished amongthem, and an agen t of the Government began to reside in oneOf thei r towns . Further cess ions of Creek lands are recordedfor 1 802 and

Inst igated by the impassionate speeches of Tecumseh , theShawano leader , the Upper Creeks, assisted by a fewYuch iand Séwokli Indians, revolted in 1 8 1 3 and massacred the


American garrison at Fort Mimms , near Mobile bay , Alabama

, on August 3oth Of that year . General A . Jackson ’s

army subdued the revolt, . after many bloody victories, in

the bat tle of the Horse- Shoe Bend , and by taking Pensacola,the seapo rt from which the Spaniards had supplied the

insurrect ion with arms . A peace treaty was concluded on

August 9 th, 1 8 1 4, embodying the cession of the Creek landswest of Coosa river . Surrounded as they were by wh i teset tlemen ts on all sides , this revol t , known also as the Red

St ick War, was the last consequent ial sign of reaction of

the aboriginal Creek mind against civil iz ing influences .Previous to the departure from thei r lands in the Gulf

States to the Indian Terri tory ( 1 836 scat teringbands Of the Creeks joined the Seminoles in 1 836, whileothers took arms against the United States to at tack the

border set tlements and villages in Geo rgia and Alabama.

These were soon ann ih ilated by General Scot t . The t reatyof cession is dated Apri l 4th, 1 832, and the lands then grantedto them in their new homes embraced an area Of seven mill ions of acres . On October 1 1 th, 1 832, the Apalachicolat ribe renewed a pr ior agreemen t to remove to the west ofMississippi river

,and to surrender their inherited lands at

the mouth of the Apalachicola river . Only 744 Creeksremained east O f the Mississippi river.At the outbreak Of the Secession war, in 1 86 1 , the Creeks

separated in to two host i le part ies . Ch ief H opO‘li yahola

with about 8000 Creeks adhered fi rmly to the Union cause,

and at the head Of about 800 Of his warr iors , aided by auxiliary troops , he defeated the Confederate party in one engagement but in a second act ion he was defeated , and with h isfollowers fled in to Kansas . Both rencont res took place i nthe terri tory Of the Cheroki Indians , in November and

December,1 86 1 .

The s tat ist ic dates Of the Creek populat ion given beforeB . Hawkins' t ime are mere est imates . In 1 732 Governor


Oglethorpe reported 1 300 warriors in eight towns of theLower Creeks (Schoolcraft V, 263 . and in 1 79 1 all

the Creek “ gun -men ” were est imated to number between

5000 and 6000 the same number is given for these in the

census of 1 832 ( Schoolcraft V , 262 sqq . ; VI , l ivingin fifty

- two towns, the whole populat ion being betweenand In the same year the Cha’hta populat ion wasconjectured to amount to (Schoolcraft VI , TheReport of the U . S . Commissioner of Indian Afl

'

airs for 1 88 1gives a Creek populat ion of set tled uponacres Of land one half of these are t il lable, but onlyacres were cul t ivated during that year by these Indians .

THE CREEK DIALECTof Maskoki is a harmonious , clearly vocal iz ed form of speech ,averse to nasal izat ion . In forms i t is exceedingly rich , buti ts syn tax is very simple and undeveloped . An archaic form ,

cal led the female language, exists outside of the commonCreek , and main ly d iffers from i t in the endings of the verbs .

PHONETICS .

Creek possesses all sounds of the general Maskoki alphabet ;but here and in H i tchit i the gutturals g , k , 1 are often pronounced with the tongue res t ing upon the fore or alveolarpart of the palate. The al ternat ing processes observed herealso occur in most other Indian and il l iterate languages : tch,dsh al ternate with ts , ds , h with k , 1 ; g wi th the other gutturals , b with p , d with t , 5. with e, O with II . The accen tshifts for rhetoric and syntact ic causes , and many unaccentedsyllables are pronounced long . In the pronunciat ion of thenat ives there is a sort of singing modulat ion , which likes tolengthen the last syllables of a sentence .

‘ Syllables not finalgenerally terminate in a vowel .

1 Thus the Creek verbal ending - is , though short by itself, generallybecomes - is, when concluding a sentence ; also the Hitchiti ending -wats,-tawats .

THE CREEK INDIANS.

atchfila old, pl . atchfIlagihi‘ l i good, bi‘ lagitchat i red, tchataki

yiktchi strong , yiktchaki

The majori ty of the adject ives and of the attribut ive verbsder ived from them form derivat ives , which in some instancesmay be cal led distributive, in others frequentat ive and i terat ive forms . They are formed by a part ial redupl icat ion of

the radix, when the basis is monosyllabic, or often of the las tsyllable of the basis , when the word is polysyllabic . Examples :las t i black, las lati black here and black tbere; verb ified

lanis , laslanis it is black.

ballui Iziglx, halhawi eat}: of Men: l2n .

sufki deep , sufsuki deep eaclz, or deep in spots .

sulgi many , sulsugimany of eaclr.

hOlwaki bad, holwahOki each bad.

l ikwi rotten ; llk’

howi (an imals), likliwi (vegetables) .kotchfikni short, kotchuntchoki slwrt in spots .

silkosi narrow,sflsikosi narrowinplaces , from silki strip.

Adjectives are made negat ive by appending the pr ivat ivepart icle -

go,-

gu,-kO, -ku z itskisus i having a motber , itskisu

siko motherless ; hi‘ l i good, hf‘ligo not good, bad .

Gradat ion of adjec tives and of attribut ive verbs formedfrom these can be effected in difl

'

erent ways , which are moreperfec t and expressive here than in those Indian languageswhich can express gradat ion only by syn tactic means .A comparat ive is formed by prefixing isim isin isi

apheretically sim sin si to the adjec tive or the at tributiveverb , the two objec ts compared standing usual ly before theadject ive or verb . This prefix is composed of the part icleisi is and the possess ive pronoun im in i of the thirdperson ( s . and and corresponds somewhat to ourtlaan, as . The object compared stands in the absolute case.

THE CREEK DIALECT. 201

kat’

tcha yaha isin‘lakit Omis tlzepantlzer (kat’

tcha) is larger

(‘ lako large) tlzan tlze wolf (yaha Omis is so) .

tchatu tchatu-

z unap-hatki ( i-)sintchalatuit Omis iron ( tchatu)

is barder t/zan silver .

ma tchi'

panat ma hOktudshi ( i- )simmahis tbis boy is taller

tlzan t/zat girl.

A superlati ve is formed by placing i‘lI apheretically‘ l i

before the comparat ive mahi tall, isimmahi taller t/zan,

i‘lisfmmahi,‘ lisfmmahi,

‘lisfmahi tallest of , l i t .“st il l tal ler

than the tal ler ones . ”

ma tsuku halhawat i‘lisihalluit Omis tbis house is tlze b igbest;l i t . “ higher than the high ones.”

A superlat ive may be expressed also by using the comparat ive instead : ma tchipanat anhopuitaki omalgan isimmahis“ that boy is the tallest of all my child ren l i t . “ that boy istal ler than all my children .

”Or the superlat ive is expressed

by the augmentat ive adverb mahi very , quite, greatly , largely

yiktchi mahi , t/ze strongest, which at the same t ime means :very strong , quite strong ;

‘ lako mahi largest and very large

mah imahi tallest and very tall ; the lat ter also being expressedby a lengthening of the vowel : ma'hi very tall.Minuitive gradat ion is effected by inversion of the sense

i n the sentence and the use Of the comparat ive ; they say“S ilver is costl ier than iron ,

” instead Of saying “ i ron isless costly than silver.”

What we cal l preposi tions are general ly nominal forms inCreek , inflected like nouns and placed after thei r complements as pos tpositions , govern ing the absolute casefmapa, subj . (Inapat, Obj . unapan above, on tlze top of ;

‘ lan iunapa (or :

‘ lani yuksa) on tlze top of tlze mountain.

tchuku-Ofan léiikiis I stay witlzin, in the lzozcse ; - 6fan,

- Ofa,-fifa, - Of is also temporal suflix : wlzen, wlzile, dun

'

ng

yao‘lolopi

-Ofan in this y ear.

inukua atigin ak’

hui‘ l lze stands in tbe water up to (atfgin)lzis neck.

14

THE CREEK INDIANS .

tsa‘lki a‘ lazkan on account of my fat/zer.

tchukuilidshan, under the lzous e.

itu ilfdshan, itu tchiskan under tlze tree.

Numerals. The cardinal numeral has a ful l form end ingin - in

, and another abbreviated from it used in coun tingObjects, and not extending beyond ten ; an ordinal

,with

prefix - isa is apheret. sa S a distr ibutive substi tut ing -akinto - in of the card inal , and an adverbial form in - a.

hammai ihatitchfskafirst

bO’

kO sahokOlat second

tut’

tchi satut’

tchinat

O’st i sO

'

stat

tcha’hgi satcha’

hglbat

ipa ( i)sipakatkolapakin k61apa iskolapakat

tchinapakin tchinapa tchinapakat

Ostapakin Ostapa isfistapakat

pal in pa ispalat

pal i -hoké lin pal i -hoké lin ispali-hokOlat

tchukpihamgin tchukpi hamgin istchukpi hamgatD istributives . Adverbials.

hamgakin and hamgahakin ahamkutcha once

one to melt

hokolakin and hokolahakin ahokOla twice

two to eaclz

tut'

tchinakin atut’

tchina

fis takin O’sta

tcha’

hgipakin tcha’

hgiba

ipakakin and ipahakin ipakakolapakakin kolapaka

tchinapahakin and tchinapakakin tchinapaka

Ostapahakin and Os tapakakin fistapaz a

palakin and palahakin palapal i -hokolakin pé li

-bokolatchfikpi hamgakin tchukpi hamgat


is ta’mat

, pl . istamataki?wbois tOmat P abbr . istat ( s . and pl .) wbicb t wbicb one2

hia, ya, i- a tbis (close by) ; subj . hiat , obj . hian ( in Chero

kiz hia tbis , tbis one) .ma, mat, man tbis ( further off) .asa

,asat, asan tbat ( far off ) .

Verb. The Creek verb is of the polysyn thet ic type , andinflects by means of prefixes, infixes and (chiefly by) suffixes .I t possesses an affi rmat ive, negat ive, in terrogat ive and distrib

ut ive form , wh ich lat ter is used as a form for the plural ofthe subjec t in the in transit ive verbs ; i t also has a large number of conversat ional forms usual ly derived by con traction ,ell ipses, etc .

,from the regular or standard forms ; and in

some of i ts inflect ions also a reverent ial besides the commonform . I t is rich in modes , verbals and voices and may becalled extremely r ich in tense- forms, when we compare to i tthe poverty of many other American languages .The verb incorporates the d irec t and indirect pronominal

object and inflects for person . In certain conjugat ional formsthe personal aflix is a prefix, in others a suflix . The historictense

,a sort of aorist , is formed by the infix -h and a change

of the radical vowel occurs at t imes , though not so often asi n Cha’hta. In transi t ive verbs show special forms , accordingto the number of the subjec t ( singular, dual , plural) . Veryfrequently these lat ter forms are made from difl

'

erent roots ,as wil l be seen from the instances given below. Many transit ive verbs have, when thei r object stands in the plural

, a

(distribut ive) form differ ing enti rely or part ially from the one

referring to an object in the singular a few others Show th ischange, when their subject passes from the singular to the

plural number . ' Other transi tive verbs are combining thetwo inflect ions just described .

Adjectives can be verb ified and then appear in the shapeof at tr ibutive verbs : hanki , pl . hauhaki bollow; haukas I am

hollow,haukis it is ballow, hauhakis tbey are bollow. No


real substant ive verb being extant, i ts wan t is suppl ied byOmz

'

is , mom’as , tOyz'

is I am so, I am sucb ; these are conju

gated regularly, and when connected with the verbals in - t

- at,- it

,- ut) of any verb , compose a per iph rast ic conjugat ion

wh ich displays i tsel f in an almost infini te number of forms .From all th is i t becomes evident , that the C reek verb sur

passes in i ts large power of polysynthesis the Algonkin , D akota and Kalapuya verb , and in the r ichness Of i ts formsapproaches Closely to the Iroquois verb

,which is poorer in

tenses , but has an impersonal conjugat ion and fourteen persons to each tense of the fini te verb . C reek is l ikely tosurpass also the Basque verb , wh ich has become proverbialfor the almost infini te number of i ts in tricate verb forms . 1

I propose to give below the inflect ion of the C reek verb inits general outl ines only , as far as necessary to give an ideaof the subject . The Creek conjugat ion is regular throughoutin i ts standard forms , though the conversat ional form has

in t roduced modificat ions .Infl ection of isi ta to tabe, carry , bold (one Object) and of

tchawita to tabe (more than one object) . Only th ree tenseswere given here as examples of tchawita, al though it has as

many modes, tenses and other forms as isi ta.

ACTIVE VOICE .

Afi rmative conjugation.

D eclarative mode.

P resent : isa- is , or 1555 I am tabing , 2 s . isitchkis , 3 s . isis ;I pl . isis , isis , 2 pl . isa

'tchkis , 3 pl . isakis .

tchawa- is or tchawas am tabing (more than one

2 s . tchawitchkis , 3 s . tchawis ; 1 pl . tchawis , 2 pl .tchawa

’

tchkis , 3 pl . tchawa’

kis .

Ybepreterit tenses f’

hsfis ] toob , 2 s . f’hsitchkis , 3 s . i

'hsis

1 pl . i’hsis , 2 pl . i’hsa’tchkis , 3 pl . i’

hsa’

z kis .

1 L’invincible vencido is the title of the first conj ugational system of

Basque , as published by L arramendi.


tcha’hwas 1 toob (pl . of 2 s . tcha’hwitchkis , etc .

isiiyangis , bave taben, 2 s . isitchkangis , 3 s . isangis , -kis ;1 pl . isiyankis , 2 pl . isakatchkankis , 3 pl . isakankis .

tchawayangis bave taben (pl . of 2 s . tchawitchkankis , etc .

isayatis 1 toob ( indefinite, aorist or historic pas t tense), 2 s .isitchkatis , 3 s . isat is ; 1 pl. is iatIs , 2 pl . isatchkatis ,

3 pl . isakatis .

isayantas 1 tooh ( long ago) , 2 s . isitchkantas , 3 s . fsantas ,etc .

isaimatas 1 bad taben, 2 s . isitchkimatas , 3 s . isimatas , etc .

J heficture tenses isa‘lis [ sha ll take, 2 s . is ftchka‘ lis , etc .

isa ‘lanas 1 am going to take, 2 s. isa ‘lanitchkis , 3 s.isa ‘lanis , etc .

isipayatita‘ lis 1 shall have taken, 2 s. isipitchkatita

‘ lis , 3 s .isipatita

‘lis , etc.

Conditional orwhitenetivemode.

(Omati , Omat if , when, connected wi th the verbal in -n.)P resent : 1551) 6mat( i) if 1 take, 2 s . is itchkin Omat , 3 s.fsin Omat , etc .

P reterit : isa'

yatin Omat zf l bad taken,2 s . isitchkatin

Omat , etc .

Future . isa‘lanan Omati’

h if I am going to tabe, 2 s .isa ‘lanitchkin Omati

’

h, etc .

isayis 1 can tabe, 2 s . fs itchkls , 3 s . isls , is i - is , etc .

isa ‘lanayat talkis [ mus t tabe, [ have to take, 2 s . isa‘lanitcha

talkis .

fsaxant OmatinOmas [ ought tohave taben, 2 s . isazantOmatinOmitchkis .

isiwaftayis [ may tahe, 2 s . lsitchkiwaltls , 3 s. isi wal tis .isa ‘laniwaftayis probably 1 shall tabe (at some future t ime) ,

2 s . isa‘lanitchkiwi ltls , or whitayis .

isayi titayls (abbr . tayis) I , am able to tabe, 2 s . is itchkititayls .


Interrogative conjugation ( specimen) .

fséiya?do [ tabe 7 2 s . isitska P, 3 5 . 15a?1 pl . isiyaP 2 pl .isatska P 3 pl . isa

’

kaP

tchaw'

ayaP do [ tabet (pl . of etc .

N egative conjugation

isakus 1 do not tahe ; 2 s . isitskigus , 3 s . isigus 1 pl . isigus ,2 pl . isatskigus , 3 pl . isagigus .

tchawakus I do not tabe (pl . of etc .

N egative- interrogative conjugation

isa'ko P do [ not tahe t 2 s . isitskigoP 3 s . is i'

gOP 1 pl . isi’go P2 pl . isatskigOP 3 pl . isagigOP ( suffix -

gO often nasal iz edin to -

gO“,

-kO° ,

tchawa’ko P do [ not take t etc .

Conjugationwith indirect object

imfsas I take for somebody , I take from somebody , 2 s .imfsitchkis , 3 s . imfsis ; 1 pl . imis Is , 2 pl . imisatchkis ,

3 pl . imisa'kis .

intchawés I tabefor somebody (pl . of etc.

is ipas I take for myseb‘, 2 s . islpitchkis , 3 s . is lpis 1 pl .

isipIs , 2 pl . isfpatskis , 3 pl . isakipis .

tchawipas I takefor my self (pl . of etc.

PASSIVE VOICE .

It is formed from the ac tive voice by inserting ho hu

after the bas is of the verb . From 1555 I tabe is formedtchas

'hé yfis ( for tcha- is -hé yas) I am taken ; - s being the on ly

sound of the radix remain ing .

P resent : tchas’

hOyas I am tahen, 1 am being taben ; 2 s .tchis

’

hOyas , 3 s . is’

hOyfis 1 pl . putcha-uhé yas , 2 pl .tchitcha-uhoyakas , 3 pl . tcha- abOyés .

P ast : tchas’

hOhyis , I was taben.

Future : tchas’

hoya‘lanis , [ shall be taben.

P art. pass . partie. i’

hs ik pl . of obj . a’hwak tahen.


OTHER VOICES .

R eciprocal voice : ititchawis we tahe each other .

u’

hlatkéis [ fall on, upon : itu’hlatkas attach, have a

R efl ective voice i- isfis tube or carry my self .

yiklas [ pinch iyiklfis [ pinchmy self .

Causative voice. This form had bet ter be cal led a derivat ive form than a voice, as will appear from the fol lowinginstances

isipuidsh'

as [ cause to tahe.

puskas fas t ; puskipuidshéis mabe fast, puska’

dshas

mahe, cause tofast; puskidsh’a’

dsh'

as [ cause tofast

for initiation.

hatkis it is white, hatidshiis whiten.

ki‘liis bnow,ki‘lidshas inform, appriz e, i-nki

‘ lkuidshiis [ explain mys elf.

hui‘liis stand,hui‘lidshéis s et up, place, mahe

Impersonal voice. A paradigm of an impersonal verb , ihfl ected with i ts pronominal object , is as follows

isanhi‘ lis it is goodforme (hi‘ l i good ) , 2 s . istchinhi

‘lis ,

3 S . isinhi‘lis ispunhi‘lis it is good for us , 2 pl .

istchinhf‘lagis , 3 pl . isinhi‘ lagis .

OTHER CONJUG ATIONAL FORMS .

Paradigms of verbs inflec ted with the subject-pronoun

standing ei ther separate or incorporatedanitOmi s do, amthe causeof antalgOsis [ amalone (foranit

algosis)tchimit Omadshksh tchintalgOsis thou art alone

imit Omis intalgOsis

pOmit émIs we do puntalgos is and puntalgosakis

tchintégit Omadsbksh tchintalgosakis

( i)mitagit Omls intalgosakis


Objective orcompound conjugatiofi.

A transi t ive verb connected with i ts direct pronominalobject runs as follows

yiklita topinch, the pinching.

tchiyikléis [ pinch thee.

yiklz’

is [ pinch him, her , it, or [ pinch one objec t .tchiyiklayas [ pinchye.

yiklay éis [ pinch them, or several objects .tchayiklitchkis thoupinchest me.

puyiklitchkis thoupinchest us .

yiklis he, shepinches (another) .

yiklakOs , contr. yiklaks [ do notpinch him, her ,

yiklayakOs [ do notpinch them.

tchiyfklakOs [ do notpinch thee.

tchiyfklayi?do [ pinch thee t

yiklfiya?do [ pinch him, her, it t

yiklakayaP do [ pinch them I

A transi tive verb connected with i ts indirect pronominalobject conjugates in the same manner, unless there is in i tthe ideafor the benefit of, orfor the detrimentof, orfrom,

awayfrom somebody or someth ing connec ted wi th i t . In th iscase the pronoun im in i is prefixed paradigm givenabove.

kiildshita to say ,the saying , ki idshiis say .

tchiki idshés ( for tchikaidshéi- is) [ say to thee.

kaidshii- is , ki idshas [ say to him, her, it ( to one person) .

tchiki fdshaki’- is [ say toye.

khidshakfifi is [ say to them ( to several persons) .tchakafdshis he, she says to me.

tchfké idshis he, she say s to thee.

kfiidshis he, she says to ( to another) .

pukafdshis he say s to us .

tchikiiidshagis he say s toye.

ki idshagis he s ays to them ( to several persons) .tchiké idshiis we say to thee.

THE CREEK INDIANS .

principal sentences are uniformly expressed y groups ofwords

, the verb Of wh ich stands in the - t or - n verbal , wh ichnearest corresponds to our part iciple in - ing , or to having

( h . gone, carried) , somet imes five or six of them , followed at

the close by a finite verb . Instances of th is our Creek textaffords almost on every page. This sort of incapsulat iongreatly embarrasses in terpreters in the rendering of Creektexts in any of the modern European languages , wh ich havea tendency towards analyt ic and an aversion to synthet ics tructure of the sentence, and therefore use conjunctionsfreely . A conjunct ion corresponding in every respect to ourand exists in none of the Maskoki dialects .The syn tax is remarkably simple and uni form the mul ti

plicity of grammat ic forms precludes the format ion of manysyntact ic rules , j ust as i n Sanscri t . The posi t ion of the wordsin the sentence is : subjec t , object , verb . The adjec tivewhen used at tributively stands after the noun qual ified .

LEXICAL AFFINITIES .

Several Creek words possess a striking resemblance withwords of equal or related significat ion , pertain ing to otherlanguages . Some of them are undoubtedly borrowed , whileothers may rest on a fortui tous resemblance. A few of themwere pointed out by H . Hale, in Amer. Antiquarian V , 1 20 .

I consider as being borrowed from Cheroki :Cr. atas i war- club, in Cher . atsa, at

’ sa occurs in the Cher .war- name : At ’sa utegi the one throwing away the

war - club. I t contains the idea of being bent,crooked

inataatassini the snahe is crawling .

Cr. tchfi’skapost- oab , H . tchiski ; Cher. tchuskO.

Cr. yénasa, Cha’h ta yanash bison, buf alo; Cher. yanasa.

The C reek sulitawa soldier and the Cha’hta shulush shoe

were borrowed from the French terms soldat and soulier

( from L at. subtalare) .Alike in Creek and Cheroki , but of uncertain provenience


are tsr'

Ila, tchulafox ,

in Yuchi Sé tchoni hia,i- a this , this one

(pron . dem.) Compare also Cr . nin i road, trail with Cher .na

nnOhi, néi- énOhi road. The C r . words tiwa hair , scalp ,

and

wahu winged elm are said to be borrowed from foreign languages . I t wil l be noticed , that names of plants , and

especial ly of an imals hunted by man Often spread overseveral cont iguous l inguistic areas .The Maskoki dialects , it must be acknowledged , have re

mained remarkably free from foreign admixture.

SECON D OR SP ECIAL P ART

THE KASI’

HTA MIGRATION LEGEND .

INDIAN M IGRATION LEGENDS .

There are events in the history of a people, which are

remembered with difliculty or displeasure and therefore soondrop from the memory ofmen. But there are other inc identswhich pass from father to son through many generat ions , andthe remembrance of them , though al tered in many part icularsand variously recounted , seems to be undying . Events ofthis kind are migrat ions , long warfare or dec is ive bat tles ,which resulted ei ther in defeat or vic tory , all iances wi thcognate or friendly tribes , t imes of abundance, of famines

and epidemics. To be of eas y remembrance, there must besometh ing connected with these events which forcibly strikesthe imaginat ion and in later t imes stands out as the principalfact , while minor features of i ts occurrence disappear orbecome subject to al terat ions in the progress of t ime.

This also shows the process , how historic legends and

tradit ions are forming among uncultured nat ions,which are

possessed of imperfect means only for the t ransmission o fideas to posteri ty . Whenever this tradi tionary lore is wri ttendown by a civil iz ed people, then the gathering of these tales ,hal f mythic and hal f historic , forms a commencemen t ofhistoriography , and by later generat ions is regarded as valuedmaterial for clearing up the dawn of h is tory.

The historic legends of the different nat ions vary exceedingly in thei r contents , at leas t as much as do the nat ions

214

THE CREEK INDIANS.

is the embodiment of the idea that a great ,gowerful spiri tgives l i fe, or what is synonymous with i t , breath to them

( to persons, an imals) , and takes i t off from them at will

( isakita life, breath; im pron . poss . 3d person , isa’

is tabe,

when the Object stands in the singular) ; isi, issi taber , holder .

The Master of Life, also cal led Suta- lé ikati,“ resident in the

sky,

” is not a pure abstract ion , but has to be brought in toconnection with the sun -worship of all Americans

,wh ich

again became associated with the cul t of the fire- flame. The

idea that the Creeks knew anything of the devil of the Chr ist ian rel igion is a pure invention of the missionaries ; beingchristianiz ed , they cal l h im now : ist i futchigo “

the man

act ing perversely ,”

tasoyla’

ya, or : ist i niklé - idsha atsu'

li “ the

Old person - burner (ani niklé - idshas burn somebody , some

thing) ; the Yuch i cal l h im“ the swinging man,

” just as theycall a ghost “ a hun ting man.

”The Shetimasha name for

the devil is néka, which properly means conjurer , sorcerer

and witchcraft.

In the eyes of the missionaries and Ch r ist ian set tlers, the

paramount importance and abstract character of the Masterof Breath made h im appear as the cen tre of an almost monotheist ic rel igion but on closer inves t igat ion i t will be foundthat the Creeks bel ieved in many geni i and mythic animalsbesides , two of which were the ist i - papa and the snake, whichfurnished the snake horn as awar- tal isman . It would be singular indeed , if the Creeks were the only Indians of Amer icawho bel ieved solely in the Great Sp iri t and not also in a

number of lesser conceptions of imaginat ion , as dwarfs , giants,ogres , fairies , hobgoblins and earth - spiri ts .The myths referr ing to the origin of nat ions often standin close connection with myths accounting for the ages ofthe world or success ive creat ions, with migrat ion legends , andwith cul ture-myths, explain ing the origin of certain institut ions , manufac tures and ar ts .Many of these myths are etymological

, as that of the

INDIAN MIGRATION LEGENDS . 217

Greeks , stat ing that they originated from stones thrown byDeucal ion beh ind himsel f (Mag s tone, and lack people) ; thatof Adam ,

being created from earth ; adam , in Hebrew ,

signifies person and manhind, adorn , adum ,fem. adumah red ,

ruddy , bay- colored, adamah earth, ground, land, from i ts red

dish color,admoni red-haired.

Although the origin from the earth is certainly the mostnatural that could sugges t i tsel f to primi t ive man, there are

a number of nat ions claiming proven ience from the sky

( the Tukabatchi were let down from the sky in a gourd orcalabash) : from the sun (Yuchi) , from the moon , from the

sea, from the ashes of fire (Shawano) , from eggs (Quichhua)or certain plants .The Aht, on the wes tern coast of Vancouver Island , allege

that animals were firs t produced at Cape Flat tery, WashingtonTerr i tory, and from the union of some of these with a star

,

which fel l from heaven , came the fi rst men ,and from them

sprang all the race of Ni t in -ab t, Klayok- ab t and Mékah or

Klass -ab t Indians . lWherever a myth ic origin from an animal , espec ial ly from

a wild beast , is c laimed for man ,i t is usual ly done to explai n

the to tem of the gens to which the o riginators of the talebelong .

Among the nat ions tracing thei r mythic origin to the earth,

or what amounts to the same th ing, to caves , deep holes ,hil ls or mountains

,are the Porno of Nor thern Cal iforn ia, who

bel ieve that thei r ancestors , the coyote-men , were createddirectly from a knoll of red earth , 2 sti l l v isible in thei rcoun try ; the Nahua, whose seven tribes issued from Chicomoz toc or the Seven Caves . ”

A tribe of the Yokat group , the Tinluf in Southern Cal ifornia, claims that thei r forefathers issued from badger -bur

1 J . G . Swan, the Makah Indians, p . 56, in Smithsonian Contributions .

1 Stephen Powers, Tribes of California, p . 156.

16


rows, and they derive thei r tribal name frgm these holes ,

which are extremely frequent through their coun try .

1

Six families represent ing the Six Nat ions of the Iroquoisare called out to the upper world from a cave on the OswegoR iver by the Holder of the Heavens ,

”Tarenyawagon .

’

Tradi tions on early migrat ions, which have originated inthe people to which they refer and bear the imp rint of genuineness , not that of a late fabricat ion by conjurers or mixedbloods, usually contain indicat ions of importance which are

confirmed by archaeologic and l inguistic researches . The

tradit ion of the Hebrews , which tel ls of their immigrat ioninto Palest ine from the coun tries of the north across the

Euphrates , is substan tiated by their t ribal name ibri “one

who has cros sed . The Hel lenic , especially Doric tradi tionof an immigrat ion from Thrace and Macedonia throughEpirus and Thessal ia in to Greece is confi rmed by lingu ist icand h istoric facts , but the Roman legend concern ing the

descent of the founders of the E ternal Ci ty from Troywas acknowledged to be a pious fraud by the ancients themselves .The Indians of the upper and middle part of the peninsula

of Cal i forn ia claim descen t from the Yuma populat ion northof them ; the Tinné -Apache of New Mexico and the G ilariver

,Ariz ona, also po int to an ancient home in the far

north,and both tradi t ions are confirmed by the affini t ies of

thei r dialects. In many ins tances,though by no means in

all, the migrat ions are seen to fol low the d i rect ion of thelongitudinal axis of the cont inent . In North America anotherl ine ofmigrat ion is observed besides , that from west to eas tnevertheless , the Yuch i and some Dakota and I roquois t ribeshave moved in a direction exactly opposi te.

1 Communicated by D r. Walter J. Hoffman. Powers writes the nameTin-lin-neh.

1 The myth is given below in full ; taken from E. Johnson, Legends ,etc. PP 43. 59 9 °


i t . When the pole incl ined towards the efist, th is was thesignal for them to proceed on their journey it steadily inclined east unti l they reached Nanni Waya. There theyset tled .

”

This story does not mention any crossing by the Cha’hta

of the turbid waters of the mighty Miss issippi , but accountsquite satisfactorily for the myster ious inclinat ion of the pole,for the prophet must have been careful to suspend the satchelwi th the war- physic always on the eas tern side, so as to havethe pole brought down in that d irect ion by the weight. of thepouch . The tale contains a similar motive as that of thefoundat ion of the c i tadel at Thebes by Kadmus , who wasordered by an oracle to follow a wandering hei fer un ti l i twould settle in the grass , and then to found a ci ty on the spo t .Follows the account of the Chicasa migration , as told by

thei r Old men to the United States agent stat ioned amongthem ,

and prin ted in Schoolcraft, Indians , I , 309 sqBy tradi tion they say they came from theWest a par t of

their tribe remained in the Wes t . When about to start eas tward they were provided with a large dog as a guard and a

pole as guide the dog would give them notice whenever an

enemy was near at hand , and thus enable them to make thei rarrangements to receive them . The pole they would plantin the ground every n igh t , and the next morning they wouldlook at i t , and go in the direct ion i t leaned . They cont inuedtheir journey in th is way unt il they crossed the great Mississippi river, and on the waters of the Alabama river arrivedin the country about where Huntsville, Alabama, now is .There the pole was unset tled for several days, but finally i tsettled and poin ted in a southwest direc t ion . They thenstarted on that course, plant ing the pole every night , unt i lthey arrived at what is called the Ch ickasaw Old Fields , 1

1 The Chicasa Old Fields were, as I am informed by Mr. C . C . Royce ,on the eastern bank of Tennessee river, at the is lands , L at. 34° 35’ andLong. 86°

INDIAN MIGRATION LEGENDS. 221

where the pole s tood perfectly erec t . All then came to theconclusion that that was the Promised Land , and there theyaccordingly remained unt il they emigrated west of the StateofArkansas , in the years 1 83 7 and“Wh ile the pole was in an unset tled condi tion , a par t Of

their tr ibe moved on eas t , and got wi th the Creek Indians ,but so soon as the major i ty of the t r ibe set t led at the Old

Fields, they sent for the party that had gone east,who

answered that they were very t i red , and would res t wherethey were awhile. This Clan was cal led Cush - eh- tah. Theyhave never joined the paren t tr ibe, but they always remainedas fr iends unti l they had in tercourse with the whi tes ; thenthey became a separate nat ion .

”

“ The great dog was lost in the Mississippi , and theyalways bel ieved that the dog had got in to a large sink- holeand there remained ; the Ch ickasaws said they could hearthe dog howl just before the evening came. Whenever any

of their warr iors get scalps , they give them to the boys togo and throw them in to the sink where the dog was . Afterthrowing the scalps , the boys would run off in great frigh t

,

and i f one should fall in runn ing ; the Ch ickasaws were cer

tain he would be killed or taken pr isoner by thei r enemies .Some of the hal f- breeds , and nearly all of the ful l -bloodsnow bel ieve i t . ”

“ In travel ing from the West to the Promised Land in theEas t , they have no recol lec t ion of crossing any large watercourse except the Mississippi river ; they had to fight thei rway through enemies on all sides , but cannot now rememberthe names of them . When they left the West , they werein fo rmed that they might look for whi tes and that theywould come from the Eas t ; that they should be on thei rguard to avoid them , lest they should br ing all manner ofvice among them .

”

The end of th is relation looks rather suspicious for i tsant iquity , or may be a later addit ion . The throwing of the


scalps in to the sink has to be considered as agort of sacrifice,al though i t is difficul t to say which power of nature the dogrepresen ted . The howling of the dog before evening and

the direction of the pole seem to indicate the state of the

weather and the moisture of the ground , wh ich could giveorigin to fevers . That the passage “

the dog was lost i nthe Mississippi ,

” should read the dog was lost in the State

of M'

s-

s issippi,” is plainly shown by the sentences following

the statement .The migrat ion legends now curren t among the Al ibamu

and the H itch i t i are but shor t in form and have been referredto under the respect ive headings .

M IGRATION LEGENDS OF THE CREEK TRIBES .

The following legends of the Creek Indians are the onlyones I have been able to obtain , al though it may be takenfor certain , that every one of the larger centres of the Creeknat ion had i ts own story about th is . The legend in Urlsperger and in Hawkins are both from Kas i’hta . Milfort’s

was probably gi ven to h im at Odshi- apOfa, and a fragment ofthe Tukabatchi legend is inserted under Tukabatchi, p . 1 47 .

Migration L egend as recounted to C01. B enj . Hawkins by Tashdy a

Afiho, of Apatd - i, a branch village of Xasi’

hta . Shetch

There are i n the forks (akfa'

tski) ofRed R iver or U- i tchat i,

wes t of Mississippi R iver , U- i ukufki, two mounds of earth .

At this place the Kasiy ta , Kawita and Ch icasa found themselves

,and were at a loss for fire. They were here visi ted by

the hayoyalgi, four men who came from the corners of theworld . One of them asked the Indians , where they wouldhave their fire They poin ted to a spot ; i t was madeand they sat down around it . The hayoyalgi directed thatthey should pay part icular at tent ion to the fire , that i t wouldpreserve them and let Isakita imiss i, the holder of breath ,


Kawita tcha‘laha, my elder brothers . Abika ‘called Chicasaama’hmaya or my elders , my superiors , and Ch icasa somet imes uses the same term to Abika.

“ Th is being done they commenced thei r set tlements onCoosa and Tallapoosa rivers

,and crossing the falls of Talla

poosa, aboveTukabay tchi, they visi ted the Chatahutchi river ,and found a race of people with flat heads in possession ofthe mounds in the Kas iy ta fields . These people used bowsand arrows , with s trings made of sinews . The aliktchalgi

or great physic makers sen t some rats in the nigh t - t ime,which gnawed the strings, and in the morn ing they at tackedand defeated the flatheads . They crossed the river at the

island , near the mound , and took possession of the country .

After this they spread out eas twardly to Otchisi-hatchi orOkmulgi river, to Okoni river, to Ogttchi or How -

ge- chuh

r iver, to Chiska talofa hatchi or Savannah r iver , cal led somet imes SawanOgi. They met the white people on the seacoas t ,who drove them back to their presen t situat ion .

Kasiyta and Chicasa consider themselves as people of onefire, tutk - i tka hamkushi,

‘ from the earl iest accoun t of theirorigin . Kas iyta appoin ted the fi rs t miko for the Chicasa,

directed him to set tle i n the large field (si t down in the bigsavanna) , where they now are, and govern them . Some of

the Ch icasa straggled oh'

and set tled near Augusta, fromwhence they returned and set tled near Kasil ta, and thencerejo ined their own people. Kasiy ta and Ch icasa have re

mained friends ever since thei r firs t acquaintance.

”

Extract from : His tory of the Moskoquis , cal led to - day

Creeks a chapter in Mémoire ”

ofMilfor t , pp . 229—265

Everybody knows,that when the Spaniards conquered

1 Tutk - itka hamkushi : of one town, belonging to one tribe ; literally :of one bu

gning fire tutkafi re, itkis it burns , bamkin one,

- ushi,suffix

MIL EORT’

S M IGRATION LEGEND . 225

Mexico , they experienced but l i t tle difficulty in subduing thepeaceable nat ion inhabit ing those southwestern countr ies bymeans of their firearms , wh ich proved

.

to be far super ior tothe bows and arrows of thei r opponen ts , and against whichcou rage avai led almost nothing . The ruler Montez umasaw the impossibil i ty of resist ing , and called to h is aid the

neighboring t ribes . At that epoch the Moskoquis fo rmeda powerful separate republ ic in the northwes t of Mexico ;they succored him with a numerous body Of warr iors , butwere frigh tful ly decimated by the Spaniards , who dismem

bered Montez uma’s domain , and almost completely depopulated i t . The conquerors also extended their sceptre overthe terr i tory of theMoskoquis , who , disdain ing abject slavery ,preferred to leave thei r nat ive country to regain thei r formerindependence.

They directed thei r steps to the north , and having marchedabout one hund red leagues reached the headwaters of Redr iver in fifteen days . From there they fol lowed i ts cou rsethrough immense plains , blooming with flowers and verdureand stocked with game, for eight days . Innumerable flocksof aquat ic and other birds congregated around the sal t pondsof the prai r ie and on the waters of Red R iver. Encoun teringclumps of t rees upon their way , they stopped their march .

Scout ing part ies were dispatched to explore the surroundingsthey returned in a month , having discovered a fores t , theborders of which were si tuated on R ed river, and containedample subterranean dwel l ings . The Moskoquis went on , and

on reaching the spot , discovered that these dwel l ings werehollows made in the soft ground by buffaloes and other animals , wh ich had been att rac ted by the sal ty tas te of the earth .

The t ribe concluded to set tle at th is quiet place and began tosow the grains of maiz e which they had brought from thei rMexican home. Being in wan t of other tools , they managedto cut and trim pieces of wood with sharp - edged stones ;these wooden sticks were then charred and hardened in the


fire, to serve as agr icul tural implemen ts . fl iereupon theyfenced in the fields selected for plan ting by means of railsand pickets , so as to prevent the wild animals from eat ingthe maiz e- crop, and apportioned some of the land to eachfamily1 in the t ribe. While the young people of both sexeswere occupied at the agricul tural work , the old ones weresmoking their calumets . Thus many years were pas sed inhappy reti rement and abundance of material riches .But soon their des tin ies took a downward turn , and forced

them to expatriate themselves for a second time. A numberof their men were killed by the Albamo or Alibamu , and theyoung men sen t after them were unable to meet the host ilesand to chastise them . The mikos at tr ibuted this to the

want of un ity in thei r mil itary organiz at ion , and as a remedyfor i t inst i tuted the charge of Great Warrior or tustenuggi‘ lako . H is authori ty las ted at fi rst only during the war

expedi tion commanded by him , but wi thin that t ime hispower was unl imited , and he could not be cal led to any

account .L ed by a tustenuggi of thei r Choice, they pursued the Al i

bamu,and finally caught up with them near a fo rest on the

banks of the Missouri river . The war- ch ief ordered the windgens , to which he belonged , to cross the river first , thenfollowed the bear gens

,then the t iger gens , and so forth .

On thei r march the vanguard was formed by the young braves ,the rear-guard by the old men , and the non - combatants wereplaced in the centre. They surprised the Alibamu , who theninhabited subterranean dwell ings ( souterrains) , and massacreda large number of them then these ret reated in has te alongthe Missou ri river, descending on i ts right o r southern banks .When again closely pressed by the pursuing Moskoquis , whohad defeated them more than once, the Alibamu crossed overto the left side of the river ; but this d id not save them frompursui t

,fo r the Moskoquis followed them to the opposi te1 Family is probably meant forgens , or totem - clan.


vent a war between the two bodies of Indians , and succeededin arranging a truce of six months and in determining withaccu racy the hunting grounds of both . Leaders and warr iorsof the Moskoquis then descended the river and concluded a

last ing peace with the hostile t r ibe in the presence of the

French commander. They even invi ted the Alibamu to jointheir confederacy by offering them a tract of land on what i snow Alabama river , with the privilege of preserving thei r owncustoms. The Alibamu accepted the offer , set tled on the

land , buil t a town on i t , called Coussehaté , and since thenform an integral par t of the Moskoqui people, which nowassumed the name of Creeks.As a sequel to his wonderful story of the pu rsui t of the

Alibamu by the Creeks and the final peaceable set tl ing downof both , Milfort adds some poin ts on the early doings and

warrings of the C reeks , which had occurred but a l imi tednumber of years before his stay in the t ribe, and were re

coun ted to h im by one of the mikos from their memorialbeads , l ike the legendary migrat ionAbout the t ime of Coussehaté ’s foundat ion an Indian tribe

dismembered by the Iroquois and Hurons , the Tukabatchi,fl ed to the Creeks , and asked for shel ter . Lands were as

signed and the fugit ives buil t on i t a town , which theynamed after themselves , and where the general assembliesof the ent ire people are sometimes meet ing . Th is kind re

ception encou raged the Tasklgi and the Oxiailles (Oktchayi)who were also annoyed by their warl ike neighbors , to seek aplace of safety among the C reeks . Their request was grantedalso . The former set tled at the confluence of Coosa and

Tal lapoosa rivers , the Oxiailles ten leagues to the north ofthem , in a beautiful prair ie near a rivulet .Shortly after this event , the smal l t ribe of the Yuch i

( la petite nation des Udgis ) , partly dismembered by the

Brit ish, also fled to the Creek towns and were given a ter

ritory on Chatahutchi river. Likewise did a part of the

MI L FORT’

S MIGRATION LEGEND . 229

Chicas a apply for help ; they were assigned seats on Yaz ooriver , at the head of Loup r iver,

” 1and soon extended thei r

habitat ions up to the Cheroki boundar ies . A fewyears after ,the unhappy Naktche took refuge among the Chicasa, whoby protecting them underwen t the displeasure of the French

colonists . They at tacked the Ch icasa and in spi te of thei rsuperior art il lery were disas trously beaten near Loup river .A second at tack of theirs was warded off by the tribe

,by

acceding to the peace arrangements proposed by the French .

The Naktche then passed over to the Creeks and Obtainedlands on Coosa r iver they buil t there the towns of Natchezand of Ab ikudshi, near two high mountains having the ap

pearance of sugar- loaves . The head men of the Creeks wentto NewOrleans in order to arrange mat ters amicably withthe French and permi t ted them to erec t a fort at Taskigi,subsequently called Fort Toulouse, and the tribes were helpful in erect ing i t .Jealous of the erection of this advanced trade- post by thei r

heredi tary enemy, the Br i t ish asked for permission to builda for t on Ogitchi r iver, twen ty miles west ofAugusta, Georgia,but were roundly, and in unmistakable terms , refused by theC reek towns . After the loss of the Canadian provinces

,Fo r t

Toulouse was evacuated by the French . The Creeks,much

dismayed at the departure of thei r fr iends , and fi l led withaversion against the Bri t ish and Spaniards , were compel led toOpen thei r towns to the Engl ish traders , to obtai n the neededarticles of Eu ropean manufacture.

Follows the rec i tal of the incorporat ion of some famil ies ofApalachicola, Shawano and Cheroki Indians in to the com

munity of the Creeks (Mem. ,pp . 276 Unfor tunately

the statement concern ing the immigrat ion of the Cheroki iswithout any detai ls , and therefore is of no avai l in local iz ing

1 Better known as Neshoba river, State of Mississippi ; neshoba, Cha’htaterm forgray wolf.


the Cheroki towns or colonies within the%reek terri tory(p . The author states that the immigrat ion was causedby the pressu re exercised upon the tribe by the English and

Americans ; i t was therefore of a quite modern date, if Milfort can be trusted .

In 1 78 1 , on the I st of February , Milfort , great war- chiefof the Creeks , left h is home at Little Talassi, half a leagueabove the ancient Fort Toulouse, at the head of two hundredyoung braves , to visi t the legendary caves on Red r iver, fromwh ich the nat ion had issued in bygone t imes . They crossedthe terri tories held by the Upper Cha’h ta, passed throughMobile

,the confluence of Iberville bayou with Miss issippi

river, St . Bernard bay on the coas t , and following a northerndirection , finally reached a fores t on Red r iver , about 1 50

leagues above i ts j unct ion with Mississippi river . Theycrossed these woods , which were situated on an eminence onthe r iver side, and stood in face of the caves (cavernes ), theobjective poin t of the expedi t ion .

The noise of a fewgun - sho ts brought out of these spaciouscavi t ies a large number of bisons , wild oxen and wild horses ,wh ich ran

, frigh tened as they were by the unusual explosions ,head over heels , over precipices of more than eigh ty feet ofperpendicular heigh t in to the sl imy waters of Red river .The only descr iption Milfort gives of these caves goes toshow that there were several or many of them , si tuated inclose vicin i ty to each other, and that those seen could easi lycontain fifteen to twenty thousand famil ies . The party concluded to pass the inclemen t seas on in these grot toes , wh ichthey had reached about Christmas t ime. Here they hun ted ,

fished and danced unt il the end of March , 1 782, then startedfor the Missouri , and subsequently for home, wel l suppliedwith the products of the chase.


here as well as in the legend related by Tefiikiui we havefour hayoyalgi, four principal chieftaincies, four years ofwarfare, etc.

The cause of the warr ing , or the pretense for i t , against“ some other Indians from the west is curiously similar tothe rivalry in ath let ic sports , which took place between the

western Iroquois and their subdivis ions , and final ly led to thedestruct ion of the Er ie or Ka

’

hkwa Indians (Cusick , Johnson) . The names of brothers , cousins , elders ,

” whichoccur here, are terms of intertribal courtesy , wh ich we findalso , perhaps in a more pronounced manner , among the NewYork Iroquois . The Creeks called the Delaware and ShawanoIndians grandfathers , because they regard their customs and

pract ices as older and more venerable than thei r own othersstate, because they occupied their countries further back int ime than the Creeks d id theirs .The facts subsequently related are given without such

chronological dates as we find with the'

previous ones , butthe narrator eviden tly t r ied to condense in to the space of afew years what i t took generat ions to accomplish . This isvery frequently observed in legendary tales . The Spreadingout of the people from the Tal lapoosa river to the Chatahutchi and from there to the Savannah must have involveda warfare, st ruggling , migrat ion and set tl ing down of severalcenturies , for the advance of the Maskoki p roper in th isd irection was tantamount to the formation of the Maskoki

confederacy by subduing or incorporat ing the tribes standingin their way, and to the st i ll more lengthy process of set tl ingamong them . What nat ion the flatheads or aborigines ofthe country may have belonged to , will be discussed in theremarks to Tchikillis ’ tale. That there were Creek - speakingIndians on the Atlantic coas t as early as 1 564, has been shown

conclusively in the article Yamassi but their expulsion fromthere by the white colonists occurred but one hundred and

fifty years later.

REMARKS ON MIGRATION LEGENDS . 233

A certain object ive purpose is inheren t in these legends ,which is more of a pract ical than Of a h istorical charac ter ;i t in tends to t race the tribal friendship exist ing between the

Kasiz ta and the Ch icasa, or a portion of the lat ter, to remoteages . I t must be remembered , that both speak differen tlanguages in tel l igible to each other only in a l imited number

of words . An al l iance comparable to th is also exists between

the Pima and Maricopa tribes of Ariz ona ; the languagesspoken by these even belong to differen t famil ies .The period when the Chicasa set tlement near Kasiy ta was

broken up by the return of the inmates to the old Chicasacoun try is not defin i tely known , but may be approximatelyset down in the beginning of the eighteenth century . Lateron awar broke out between the Creeks and Chicasa. Kasiy ta

town refused to march against the old al l ies , and “when theC reeks offered to make peace thei r offers were rejec ted

, til lthe Kasiyta in terposed thei r good Oflices . These had the

desired effect,and produced peace” (Hawkins

,p .

Remarhs to [Wilfort’s L egend .

Milfort’s “H istory of the Moskoquis ,”

as given above inan extract , is a singular mixture of recent fabricat ions and

distort ions of real histor ic even ts, with some poin ts traceableto genuine aboriginal folklore.

Nobody who has the slightest knowledge of the generalhistory of America will credit the statement that the Creeksever l ived in the nor thwestern part ofMexico at Montez uma’sand Cortez ’ t ime, since H . de Soto found them , twentyyears later , on the Coosa river ; and much less the other statemen t , that they succored Montez uma against the invader ’sarmy .

1 That they met the Al ibamu on the west side of Mississ ippi river is not imposs ible, but that they pursued themfor nearly a thousand miles up that river to the Missouri

,and

1 A Chicasa migration from Mexico to the Kappa or Ugaxpa settlements , on Arkansas river, is mentioned by Adair, History , p. 195.

16


then down again on the other or eas tern sidg of Mississippi,

is incredible to anybody acquainted with Indian customs andwarfare. The narrat ive of the Alibamu tribal origin givenunder : Alibamu , p . 86, locates the place where they issuedfrom the ground between the Cahawba and the Alabamarivers . That the Creeks arrived in Northern Alabama in orafter the t ime of the French colonizat ion of the Lower Mississippi lands, is another impossibil i ty, and the erec t ion of

Fort Toulouse preceded the second French war against theChicasa by more than twenty years, whereas Milfor t reptesents i t as having been a consequence of that war.I t is singular and puz z l ing that Maskoki legends make so

frequent ment ion of caves as the former abodes of thei r ownor of cognate tribes . Milfort relates , that the Al ibamu ,when in the Yaz oo coun try, l ived in caves . This may referto the Cha’hta coun try around Yaz oo Old Village (p .

in Neshoba county , Mississ ippi but if i t poin ts to the Yaz oor iver, we may think of the chief Alimamu (whose name standsfor the tribe i tsel f) , met with by H . de Soto , west of Chicaca,and beyond Chocchechuma. A part of the Cheroki ancientlydwel t in caves ; and concern ing the caverns from which theCreeks c laim to have issued , James Adai r gives the followinginteresting disclosure : I t is worthy of not ice, that the Muskohgeh cave, out of which one of their polit ic ians persuadedthem their ancestors formerly as cended to their present terrest r ial abode, l ies in the Nanne Hamgeh old town , inhabitedby the Mississippi-Nachee Indians ,

‘l which is one of the mostwestern parts of thei r old - inhabited country .

”

The ideathat their forefathers issued from caves was so deeply engraftedin the minds of these Indians , that some of them took any

conspicuous cave or any country rich in caves to be the

primordial habi tat of thei r race. This is also confirmed by

a conjurer’s tricky story al luded to by Adai r, H istory,pp . 1 95. 1 96 .

1 Cf. Abiku’dshi, p . 125. Adair, History, p . 195.


founded on authent ic information This speech was curi

ously written in red and black characters , on the skin of ayoung buffalo

,and translated into English , as soon as dcl iv

ered in the Indian language. The said skin wasset in a frame, and hung up in the Georgia Office, in Westminster . I t contained the Indians ’ grateful acknowledgmentsfor the honors and civi l i t ies paid to Tomochichi, etc .

Upon the request of Dr . Br in ton , Mr . Nicholas Triibnermade researches in the London Oflices for this pictured skin ,but did not succeed in finding i t . He discovered , however,a let ter wr i t ten by Tchikilli, dated March , 1 734, which isdeposited in the Publ ic Record Cmcc, Chancery Lane.

1

The chances of rediscovering the Engl ish original of thelegend are therefore almost as sl im as those of recovering thelost books of L ivy

’s H istory . But a t ranslat ion from the

English has been preserved in a German book of the period ,and the style of th is piece shows it to be an authentic andcomparat ively accurate rendering of the original . The G er

man book referred to is a collection of pamphlets treat ing ofc olonial affai rs , and publ ished from 1 735 to I 741 i ts fi rs t volume bears the t i tle : AusfuehrlicheN achrichtvon denSaltsburg

ischen Emigranterz, die sich in America niedergelas sen haben.

Worin, etc. etc. H erausgegeben van Samuel Urlsperger, H alle,

MD CCXXXV. The legend occupies pp . 869 to 8 76 of th is

first volume, and forms chapter six of the “j ournal of

von Reck , the t i tle of which is as follows : H errn P hilippG eorg Fricden

'

chs von R ech D iarium von Seiner P eise nach

G eorgien imj abr 1 735 . F . von Reck was the commissaryof those German - Protes tan t emigrants whom rel igious persecution had expelled from Salz burg , in Styria, their nat iveci ty.

1 Brinton, Ch.-M. Legend, pp. 5. 6.

ISTI MASKOKI AD SHULAG I—TATI INNAXUNAXAT OS

Né ki Tchikilli i sti Masko’ki Hatchapala

’

h Hatchata

tipa’

z ad immikut hamma’kit opunayatis Sawi

’na talOfan,

o’

h‘

lolopi 1 735, mémen i-atikOyatis mOh’men yanas

ha‘ lpi n uxhutsé’hudsatis .

Tchikilli i sti Masko'ki Hatchapala Hatchata tipakad

immikut ; Antitchi Kéwitalgi i’mmiko may/it ; Illidshi

mikko ; Osta Kas iz talgi immikko ; Témmidsho ht'

I‘

li

mikko ; Wé li Apala’

h‘

ltsuklé lgi ht'

I‘

li kapiténi; P uipa

édshi mikko ; Témhuitchi Yutchité lgi imifa mikko ;MitikéyiOkt

‘

I’nalgi inht

'

I‘

limikko ; Tuwidshédshimikko ;HuyaniTchiyahalgin Okmulgalgi tibaxad inhu

‘

limikko ;Stimalagué

’htchiOsots é lgi immikko Hupi

‘

li Sawoklalgi

immikko ; Iwanégi mikko ; Tamé kmi Yufantalgi inhu‘

li

kapiténi tun,tus tanozalgi pali - tut

’

tchinit apakin opunayit

Okafis :

MOmad nita O’dshin ikana idshé kuat hasi - aklatgatin

O’dshit 0’men hawaxladis ; mOmof man Kas i

’

htalgi ikandshéz uan a

’s o said anékuas in inké kida hayatis tché .

Mt'

I’

mOf ikanat tchapéka- ik it hopuitékin inléyadis ; ma

mo’man akuy i’

htchit i nha’—az lzitkos in apézadis ; mémas

apé lluat isafuli’

htchit matawan i- apOkatis . MOmas i sti

S tilgad i- upan fik

’

hunnatis mtimaxan h i‘ l it-Wé ’tis kOma

k ika.

Mfimitu istOmas i ’kana hubuitagi inlOyatid imomitchz'

i’

dshin,inhi‘likiit hasi -Os satifatchan apiyatis . up !)

MO’

hmit apiyit oi- ua okii ’fki tchikfit lipakfit waggin

us éz tchit, hips hayit figabin uhhayé tgadis . Is in hziyatgiapiyit ni

’ta hamgad yafgadin niwa tsa- atid waggin

237


u‘lé

’

htchadis . MOh’mit man apOgit u’

h‘lolopi hOkOlin

‘la

‘

lotas man pasatit pépit apé katis . Mt'

Imé s wi- ka’watinhi

‘

légikun inhi‘

lagigédis . Uyuwa tchadad iy t’

tksa fadsan

apiyadis , mOmOftini’tkiO

’kin impOhatis nakitoha kO’

hmet

ux’

hapiadis .

Mumad ikodshi tchatit ‘

lénin Os sit Omatit Okin hidshatis ; m6mad ma

‘ lani tinapan yahaikida Okid pohakatis

Nagitun Omad hi’

htchagis kzi ’z tchid i sti uz tt'

I tatis ;

mfimatin tOtka sakid hallu in aligapitOmatitmat yahaikida

(Skit Omin hidshakatis . I- a ‘

lz’

mi ‘

léni immikkun kaitchid

hodshifatis . Hayumz'

is tinitki imt'

mgis mo'men isti

impingalagi imi'

Ingat O’mi s .

Man i sti italoa ma‘

laz‘

laz a tut’

tchinin itihidshatis

m6mad ma ‘ lani tt'

ttka Os s i O’dshan ahitidshatit isfullin

itihidshatis ; m6’

hmet man imahilis sua Omas inhitchkin

naki ita- u S t'

tlkin ahupu‘

llinakatis .

Ha’s i -Os sati fatsan é tit tt'

Itka hé tkid immala’katis,

mémé s is tomitchakigé tis . VVahala fatsan atit tt'

Itka

okulé tid immalakatis,m6mas ma- o is tomidshikatis .

Akelatka fatchan atit tutka las tid immalakatis,ma- o

is tomidshikadis . IspOgi ht'

Inisa fatchan atit tt'

Itka tché

atitut lanit immalékatis . H ia tOtka‘ lani ahi’tki O’ds lii

ahitidshi isfullatid ituykalan ; hia tOtkan hayomi atikas

O’dshit O

’s . Ma- o yaha- iki O’

mz’

is Odshid Omis . ‘

L ani

t’

i napan pt'

tkab it {Iz ui‘

lit Omatit fik’

hi‘

lkigitt istuka’idhi

mahid Omatin is téi’mat is to’

hmit Omatin fik ’

hunnis maz zi s

sigatis . Istiidshi i’tski- s r’

rs ikOn ma itu n i‘

lanafaikit

ilihotchatis ; mO’

hmet ma pt'

tkabi i’

hs it ho l i apiyatéis

isffillatis . A’tas sa Omid Omatis . Hayomas Odshis ma

6mid,ito - t

'

1’

h matawat Omatis . H iatawan niki i- alt'

mga

ma‘

léz‘

laza O’stid yahaigit is tumits katad i- uzki

‘

lkuidshit

é dshin inhitchkadis ; ihatitchiska : pas sa ; sahokOlad


HofOni baki n tchis s i tché tit hi’tchkatis mémen ma fusuati‘

lkitO- aiti s kOmazatis .

Ma tchis s in itimpunayagit istumidshaké tit l lgi imilid

shagitayad itimpunéiyakatis . Ma ft'

Isua itcha- kuadziks in

i n ‘ l i apakin O’dshid Omatis .

Mémen ma tchi’s s it itsa kuadé ks i ifékan kalégit

inté dshatis is tOmit i s s i - imanaitchiko- tidayin hayatis ;

mOmenman ilidishazatis . Ma ft'

I suaft'

I suaOmal immikkun

kéiidshazatis . L amb i - u mikko ‘

lékid O’mi s kémagid

O’mi s ; mOmigaht

'

t‘

lidas apiyis adam b i‘ lka hakadas ft

'

I llis ;

mOmOf lamhi-hédshi kO’

htsaktsahidshid is ft'

I llid Omi s .Tché tad h6

‘

lit Omin hatgatit b i ‘ lka ahopakat Omi s

Ihu‘

lit tafa batki n isnihé idshit idshu’kuan hatidshit

awola’dshit lamhi Okit hakin Omat istOfan ili'

htchikos .

H ia négimt'

I’

hmOf iyupanma apé kati inkapal kit apiyit

nini hatkid wakin o‘

lé itchatis ; péhitas nak - omalgat

hatkuSi- é lgid Omatis . MOmen istit fulli- hi ‘ l it Omadin

idshakadis . Ma nini itahualapiztchit ané kuas in nodsha’d

shadis . Isafulixshit nini is tOmid Omad y ihidshazadis

mOmitisti istOmid ft'

illit Omati,ma ni’nin atizgit atchaka

piyaké tin isamumides O’

hmis kOmitOmadis . Man atihé igit

apiyit KolOs’

hatchi magidan ak’

hadapidshatis ; KolOs’

batch i kédshad tchadiI - algid ikodshid Omeka.

Ma hé ts i tayixtchit apiyit has i -Os sati fatchan Ké sa

mégida italluat apé kin i‘

limu‘laitchatis ; hian apOkin

o’

h‘

lolopi’ Ostad O‘ladis . Ké salgit Okatit i sti - papat tchatu

hat'

Ikin paikid i stin pumpas é tit omitutanks makatis .

Kos iztalgit Okatit illidshida kOmid hidshi- is mézadis ,

Ikanan ku ‘ la- it udshi ha‘ lp in ht’

Iyan hahid isfiz‘

lanatis .

MO’

hmit to - lopOtskin o’

htalaitchatis ma i sti - papa adshaka

yigotitayin hahit u’

hapiyadis , nO’

hmit s é - okan ma tchato

TCH IKIL L I’

S KASI’

HTA LEGEND. 241

hatikit i sti- papa paikan i‘limuhucikatis . Ma i sti - papa

tsabakihi‘

lit a- osa’- iyit é s s idshatis afOsalgat iti

‘

laputit.

I sti hémkits it ilatin ahI lit Omis omalgi mahatin mOnks

hO’

hmit,is tudshi itski- sOs ikOn imawaigakatis ikan -hatikin

awoléiidshit at Ofan. Man i sti -papa O’

hlitaigit igan - batik iinhayakatin u

’

hlataikin,tsulikiI sua ahit

’

hukin isnafkit

ilidshagatis . Ift'

Ini hay t'

Iméis is lli imfingat O’mis . Pal

hamgad tsatitun palhamgit Ok’

holatid Omis .

I sti -papa n ita iskulapzik’

omalgan i‘

laagit i sti pasatit

Omatis . Mt'

Inga ma ili’

htchuf mé tawan fik ’

hunnin n ita

kolapagi’

O‘ l in i

‘

liétchatis . Ma isagi‘

létchkan hO‘

litéis

apia‘

lanit i- ititakuitchat nith ipagin imapé skit iskulapa

katin apiy id Omatis . IfOnin i—ahu‘

lkas itchid isapi - in

Omad ihitskihi l i n ft’

Illid O’mis .

O’

h‘

lopi O’stad O‘ l i n Ké sa talOfa apOkati ingapéykit

apiyat hatchi NOfapi ké- etchid u

‘

laitchatis yOmad Kalas i

hatchi ka’hodshid hakitOs . Man u’

h‘

lolopi hokOlin

fik’

ht'

In- nadis . MOmid adshidé s Odshikoka néki yelfingan‘ la‘ l u n yOmen humpazatis , mOmIt itcha- kutéks ihaheidshit

in‘ l i - tati itchhasua intitin ‘lonOtutas

, yOman s iyokfanfa

édshit kt'

Iha- tukah’

lin is lé fka hayatis .

H ia apOkati inkapéz kit apiyad hatchi Watulahagi

makitan o‘

léiitchatis . Watulahaki Hatchi ké idshad

watulat tidayit latkid Omit héhokadin ahudshifit ut

yadis man ni’

hli hamgin nodshéi’dshatis Hadam apiyad

hatchi oiwa u’

hlatkid odshin u‘lei idshatis ; o

- ittimkan

hotchifadis,I‘ l in hayatki hé tchi hamgi n u

‘

laitchatis

Afosafiska ké ’dshid.

I‘ l in hayzitki ma hatchin tayiz tchit apiyad

‘léni halluit

laikin hu‘

lé itchadin- is tit apOkin hi’dshatis,nin i hatk i

hay i ftillangid O’mi s kématis . Mit’nga

‘ l i - habkin hahi - it

is itch’

hatis i sti hi‘lagit Omi n O’mad gi

‘

lidan kémidut.


MOméis ‘ li hatki tchatakue htchit i‘lé s idsh’

hatis mu hmen

immikfin hidshé ’dshayadin hi‘

likuedos makatis ;‘

lit

hat’

hagid i‘

lafulidshin 0’mad u

’

hapihi- id ihaliwa iimis séis

,

hupuitagi ihitchkuidshit i‘lasawasa natchkatis

,mt

'

Imé s

tchatidfiga u’

hapihiatskas ke'

iidshatis . MOmi istOmas i sti

is tOmid omzikat hitchitan kOmit u’

hapiyi s é satis mu’matin

sumitchipin o‘

léiitchatis .

Ninit O- i saku n akadapgid 0’min hidshayadis m6madit

ma nini tabala i‘

lt'

ts s igod Omin hidshit ma i sti t'

Iyuan

isaktchiyit Omiga i‘

lé sosa- igos kOmadis .

Main ‘lanit laigid O

’mi s mO’terell magitz'

it mii ’madit

a‘

lkasatt'

ilga nafht'

tgis ma- tikid hakid Omis,m6min mé isti

man apé git Omadshoks k t’

tmhuid Omis . H ti‘

lidfis apiy it

ft'

tllin Omofa hia inhagi is tamaitas po’

l k i algin pohagitft

'

Illid Omi s .

Ma tiyuan apa- idshidshit apiyit u hlatkid é dshin

O‘

laitchadin tché tu‘

l’ak‘

lagid Odshin hidshatis man

itcha-

z iidaks it o’

t mhin hidshadis ; m6mit ma i sti ni ni

hatki hziyi ft'

I llangid Omadshuksh kOmatis .

Isté ffi s i stan apiy it ft'

I llati hOman i sti hokOlin wilé ko

idshit ft'

Illid Omis . Hia ht'

Ima-wilzikad ‘ lani hall u in

o’

htchimhé kadin talOfat Odshin hidshatis,

‘

L i- hé tkin ma

talOfa is itch’

hatis mii ’mas ma i sti talOfa atizkad‘ li - i

tché tin as itch’

hatis .

MOmOf kasih’

talgi tchapak’

hozatis mu hmit ma italuan

isapingalidshinOmoftchOkO i s iti aipialis kOmatis . Tchadun

t'

Iyuan akpalatit taigagi titayin hahi- it u’

htayidshatis

mOh’mit talOfa imisatis ma i sti ika tapiks tagid omayatis

umalgan pasatit hokOlé sen ahus itcha’tchatis . As s itchiis épiyad i

’

fa batki n is’

hih’

tchit illidshatis . HokOlus i

ahO’skadin as sidshit isapiyad n ini hatkid wéggin

o‘

laitchadin talOfat odsatcht'

tkit ikodshin ih’

tchit,hia i sti

[THE L EG EN D .]

WHAT CHEK IL L I,THE HEAD- CH IEF OF THE UPPER AND

L OWER CREEK S SAID,IN A TALK HELD AT SAVANNAH ,

ANNO,I 735, AND WH ICH WAS HANDED OVER BY THE

INTERPRETER,WRITTEN UPON A BUFFALO - SK IN

,WAS

,

WORD FOR WORD,As FOLLOWS

Speech, which, in the y ear I 735 ,was delivered at Sa

vannah,in G eorgia , by Chehilli, Emperor of the

Upper and L ower Creehs ; Antiche, highest Chiefof the town of the Cowetas , Eliche, King ; Onsta

,

Head Chief of the Cussitaws , Tomechaw,War King ;

Wali,War Captain of the P alachucolas

,P oepiche,

King Tornehuichi,D og King of the Euchitaws

Mittahazqye, Head War Chief of the Ohonees , Tuwe

chiche,King ; I

'Vboyauni, Head War Chief of the

Chehaws and of the H ohrnulg e Nation S timelaco

weche,King of the Osoches Opithli, King of the

j awocolos Ewenauhi,King Tahrnohmi

,War Cap

tain of the Eusantees and thirty other Warriors .

At a certai n time,the Earth Opened in the West

,

where its mouth is . The earth Opened and the Cu ss i

taws came out of its mouth,and settled near by. But

‘the earth became angry and ate up thei r ch ildren ;therefore

,they moved further West. A part of them

,

however,tu rned back

,and came agai n to the same

place where they had been,and settled there. The

greater number remained behind , becau se they thought‘it best to do so.

TCH IKI L L I’

S KASI’

HTA LEGEND . 245

Thei r ch ildren,nevertheles s , were eaten by the

Earth,s o that

,fu l l of di s satisfaction

,they jou rneyed

toward the s un ri s e .“ ‘They came to a thi ck

,muddy

,s l imy river

,came

there,camped there

,rested th ere

,and stayed over

n ight there.

“ ‘The nex t day ,

they conti n u ed thei r jou rney and

came,i n one day ,

to a red,b l oody river. They l ived

by th is river, and ate of its fis h es for two years ; butth ere were low springs there ; and it did not pleas e

them to remai n . Theywent toward the end of th is

b loody river,and heard a noi s e as of th u nder. They

approached to s ee wh ence the no ise came . At fi rst,

they perceived a red smoke,and then a mo untain

which thu ndered ; and on the mou ntain,was a s ou nd

as of s inging. They s ent to see what th is was ; and‘it was a great fire which b laz ed upward , and made thiss inging noise. This mountain they named the K ingofMou ntain s . It th u nders to this day ; and men are

very much afraid of it.

They here met a peopl e of three different Nati ons .They had taken and saved some of the fi re from the

mou ntai n ; and,at this place, they alsO obtained a

knowledge of herbs and ofmany other th ings .

From the East,a wh ite fire came to them ; which ,

however,they wou ld not use.

FromWahalle,came a fi re whichwas b l u e ; neith er

did they use it.

From theWest,came a fire whichwas b lack ; nor

wou ld they use it.

At last, came a fire from the North,wh ich was red

and yel low. This they mi ngled with the fire they had


taken from the mou ntain and th is is the fire they use

to - day ; and this , too, s ometimes s ings .

On the mOuntain was a pole which was very restless and made a noise, nor cou ld any one say how it

cou ld be qu ieted. At length , they took a motherles s

chi ld,and s tru ck it agai n st the pole ; and th u s ki l led

the Child . They then took the pole,and carry it with

them when they go to war. It was l ike a wooden

tomahawk ,s uch as they now u se

,and of the same

wood . H ere,they al s o fou nd fou r herbs or roots

,

Which sang and disclo sed thei r virtues : Firs t,P as a w

,

the rattle- snake root ; Second,Mzcoweanochaw red

root ; Third ,Sowatchho, wh ich grows l ike wi ld lénnel ;

and Fourth,Eschalapootchhe, l ittl e tobacco .

‘ These herbs , especial ly the fi rst and third,they use

as the best medicine to pu rify themselves at thei r B u sk.

‘ At this B u sk , which is h eld yearly , th ey fast, andmake offerings of the first- fru its .

S ince they learned the virtues of these herbs,their

women , at certai n times , have a separate fire,and re

mai n apart from the men five,s ix

,and seven days

,for

the sake of pu rification . I f they negl ect this , thepower of the herbs wou ld depart ; and the women

wou ld not be healthy.

‘ About that time a dispute aros e,as to wh ich was

the Oldest andwhich shou ld ru le ; and they agreed, as

they were fou r Nation s , they wou ld set up fou r poles ,and make them red with clay

,which is yel low at first

,

but becomes red by bu rning. Theywou ld then go towar ; and whichever Nation shou ld first cover its pole,from top to bottom,

with the scalp s Of thei r en emi es,

shou ld be the oldest.


been there,in the bel ief that it might be better for

them to follow that path . They went along it, to a

creek,cal led Coloosebutche

,that is Coloose- c reek

,be

cau se it was rocky there and smoked.

They crossed it, going toward the s u nri s e , and came

to a people and a town named Coosaw. H ere th eyremained fo u r years . The CoosaWS complai ned thatthey were p reyed upon by a wi ld beas t

,which they

cal led man- eater or l ion,wh ich lived in a rock .

The Cus s itaws said they wou ld try to k il l the beast.They digged a pit and stretched over it a net made of

hicko ry- bark . They then laid a number of b ranches,

cro s swi se,s o that the l ion cou ld not follow them

,and

going to the place where h e lay ,th ey th rew a rattl e

into his den . The l ion ru shed forth,in great anger,

and pu rs ued th em th rough the branches . Then theythought it better that one s hou ld die rather than all

,

s o they took a motherless child,and th rew it before

the l ion , as he came near the pit. The li on rushed at it,and fel l i n the pit, over wh ich they th rew the net

,and

ki l led himwith blaz ing pinewood . H is bones,how

ever,they keep to this day ; on one s ide , they are red

,

on the other , bl u e .

The l ion u sed to come every s eventh day to k i l l thepeople . Therefo re , they remained there seven days afterthey had ki l led him. In remembrance of him

,when

they prepare forWar,they fast s ix days and start on

the s eventh . I f they take his bones with them,they

have good fo rtune .

After fou r years , they left the Coosaws , and came toa R iver wh ich they cal led Nowphawpe, now Callasi

hatche. There,they tarried two years ; and as they

TCH IKIL L I’S KASI

’HTA LEGEND . 249

had no corn,they l ived on roots and fishes , and made

bows,pointi ng the arrows with beaver teeth and fl i nt

stones,and for knives they u sed Spl it canes .

‘They left thi s place , and came to a creek

,cal led

Wattoolahawha hatche,Whooping- c reek

,s o cal led

from the whooping of c ranes,a great many being

there. They S lept there one night.

‘

They next came to a R iver,i n wh ich th ere was a

waterfal l thi s they named the Owatuaha - rzver.

‘

The nex t day ,they reached another River

,wh ich

they cal led the Aphoosa pheeshaw.

The fol lowing day ,they cro s sed it

,and came to a

h igh mou ntain , where were people who ,they bel ieved

,

were the same Who made the White path . They,

therefo re,made white arrows and s h ot them

,to see i f

they were good people. B ut the people took thei r

white arrows,pai nted them red

,and sh ot them back .

When they showed these to thei r Chief,he sai d that

was not a good S ign ; i f the arrows retu rned had beenwhite

,they co u ld have gone there and b rought food

for thei r ch ild ren,but as they were red they mu st not

go . Nevertheles s,s ome of them went to see What s o rt

ofpeople they were ; and fou nd thei r h o u ses deserted .

They al s o s aw a trai l wh ich led i nto the Rive r ; and

as they cou ld not see the trai l on the opposite bank,

‘th ey believed that the people had gone into the R iver ,and wou ld not agai n come fo rth .

At that place,is a mo u ntai n

,cal l ed Moterell

,which

makes a noise l ike beating on a drum ; and they th inkthis people l ive there. They hear th i s no ise on all

s ides , when they go to War.

‘

They went along the R ive r,ti l l they came to a

17


waterfal l,where they saw great rocks ; and on the

rocks were bows lying ; and they bel ieved the peoplewho made the wh ite path had been there.

“ ‘ They always have,on thei r j ou rneys

,two s couts

who go befo re the mai n body. These scouts as cended

a h igh mou ntai n and saw a town . They s hot wh itearrows into the town ; but the people of the town Shot

back red arrows .

Then the Cus s itaws became angry, and determinedto attack the town

,and each one have a hou se when

it was captu red .

They th rew stones into the R iver,u nti l they cou ld

cros s it,and took the town (the people had flattened

heads), and k i l l ed all but two persons . In pu rs u ingthese ,

they fou nd a white dog ,wh ich they S lew. They

fol lowed the two who escaped , u nti l th ey came again

to the wh ite path , and saw the smoke of a town,and

thought that this mu st be the people they had so l ongbeen seeking . This is the place where now the tribeof Palachucolas l ive , from whom Tomochichi is de

scended .

‘ The Cus s itaws contin u ed bloody-minded ; but the

P alachucolas gave th em black drink,as a s ign of

friendsh ip,and said to them : Our hearts are wh ite

,

and you rs mu st be white ,and you mu st lay down the

b loody tomahawk ,and Show you r bodies

,as a proof

that they shal l be white .Nevertheles s

,they were for the tomahawk ; but the

Palachucolas got it by pers uas io n , and bu ried it u nderthei r beds . The P alachucolas l ikewi se gave th em

wh ite feathers ; and asked to have a Chief i n common .

S i nce then they have always l ived together.

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