(1)Tribal synonymy(page 15): Very few Indian tribes are known to us under the names by which they call themselves. One reason for this is the fact that the whites have usually heard of a tribe from its neighbors, speaking other languages, before coming upon the tribe itself. Many of the popular tribal names were originally nicknames bestowed by neighboring tribes, frequently referring to some peculiar custom, and in a large number of cases would be strongly repudiated by the people designated by them. As a rule each tribe had a different name in every surrounding Indian language, besides those given by Spanish, French, Dutch, or English settlers.Yûñ′wiyă′—This word is compounded fromyûñwĭ(person) andyă(real or principal). The assumption of superiority is much in evidence in Indian tribal names; thus, the Iroquois, Delawares, and Pawnee call themselves, respectively, Oñwe-hoñwe, Leni-lenape′, and Tsariksi-tsa′riks, all of which may be rendered “men of men,” “men surpassing other men,” or “real men.”Kĭtu′hwagĭ—This word, which can not be analyzed, is derived from Kĭtu′hwă, the name of an ancient Cherokee settlement formerly on Tuckasegee river, just above the present Bryson City, in Swain county, North Carolina. It is noted in 1730 as one of the “seven mother towns” of the tribe. Its inhabitants were called Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ (people of Kituhwa), and seem to have exercised a controlling influence over those of all the towns on the waters of Tuckasegee and the upper part of Little Tennessee, the whole body being frequently classed together as Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ. The dialect of these towns held a middle place linguistically between those spoken to the east, on the heads of Savannah, and to the west, on Hiwassee, Cheowah, and the lower course of Little Tennessee. In various forms the word was adopted by the Delawares, Shawano, and other northern Algonquian tribes as a synonym for Cherokee, probably from the fact that the Kituhwa people guarded the Cherokee northern frontier. In the form Cuttawa it appears on the French map of Vaugondy in 1755. From a similarity of spelling, Schoolcraft incorrectly makes it a synonym for Catawba, while Brinton incorrectly asserts that it is an Algonquian term, fancifully rendered, “inhabitants of the great wilderness.” Among the western Cherokee it is now the name of a powerful secret society, which had its origin shortly before the War of the Rebellion.Cherokee—This name occurs in fully fifty different spellings. In the standard recognized form, which dates back at least to 1708, it has given name to counties in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, within the ancient territory of the tribe, and to as many as twenty other geographic locations within the United States. In the Eastern or Lower dialect, with which the English settlers first became familiar, the form is Tsa′răgĭ′, whence we get Cherokee. In the other dialects the form is Tsa′lăgĭ′. It is evidently foreign to the tribe, as is frequently the case in tribal names, and in all probability is of Choctaw origin, having come up from the south through the medium of the Mobilian trade jargon. It will be noted that De Soto, whose chroniclers first use the word, in the form Chalaque, obtained his interpreters from the Gulf coast of Florida. Fontanedo, writing about the year 1575, mentions other inland tribes known to the natives of Florida under names which seem to beof Choctaw origin; for instance, the Canogacole, interpreted “wicked people,” the final part being apparently the Choctaw wordoklaorogula, “people”, which appears also in Pascagoula, Bayou Goula, and Pensacola. Shetimasha, Atakapa, and probably Biloxi, are also Choctaw names, although the tribes themselves are of other origins. As the Choctaw held much of the Gulf coast and were the principal traders of that region, it was natural that explorers landing among them should adopt their names for the more remote tribes.The name seems to refer to the fact that the tribe occupied a cave country. In the “Choctaw Leksikon” of Allen Wright, 1880, page 87, we findcholuk, a noun, signifying a hole, cavity, pit, chasm, etc., and as an adjective signifying hollow. In the manuscript Choctaw dictionary of Cyrus Byington, in the library of the Bureau of American Ethnology, we findchiluk, noun, a hole, cavity, hollow, pit, etc., with a statement that in its usual application it means a cavity or hollow, and not a hole through anything. As an adjective, the same form is given as signifying hollow, having a hole, asiti chiluk, a hollow tree;aboha chiluk, an empty house;chiluk chukoa, to enter a hole. Other noun forms given arechulukandachilukin the singular andchilukoain the plural, all signifying hole, pit, or cavity. Verbal forms arechilukikbi, to make a hole, andchilukba, to open and form a fissure.In agreement with the genius of the Cherokee language the root form of the tribal name takes nominal or verbal prefixes according to its connection with the rest of the sentence, and is declined, or rather conjugated, as follows:Singular—first person,tsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, I (am) a Cherokee; second person,hi-Tsa′lăgĭ, thou art a Cherokee; third person,a-Tsa′lăgĭ, he is a Cherokee.Dual—first person,âsti-Tsa′lăgĭ, we two are Cherokee; second person,sti-Tsa′lăgĭ, you two are Cherokee; third person,ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ, they two are Cherokee.Plural—first person,atsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, we (several) are Cherokee; second person,hitsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, you (several) are Cherokee; third person,ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ, they (several) are Cherokee. It will be noticed that the third person dual and plural are alike.Oyataʼgeʻronoñʼ, etc.—The Iroquois (Mohawk) form is given by Hewitt as O-yataʼ-geʻronoñʼ, of which the root isyataʼ, cave,ois the assertive prefix,geis the locative at, andronoñʼis the tribal suffix, equivalent to (English)-itesor people. The word, which has several dialectic forms, signifies “inhabitants of the cave country,” or “cave-country people,” rather than “people who dwell in caves,” as rendered by Schoolcraft. The same radixyataʼoccurs also in the Iroquois name for the opossum, which is a burrowing animal. As is well known, the Allegheny region is peculiarly a cave country, the caves having been used by the Indians for burial and shelter purposes, as is proved by numerous remains found in them. It is probable that the Iroquois simply translated the name (Chalaque) current in the South, as we find is the case in the West, where the principal plains tribes are known under translations of the same names in all the different languages. The Wyandot name for the Cherokee, Wataiyo-ronoñʼ, and their Catawba name, Mañterañ′, both seem to refer to coming out of the ground, and may have been originally intended to convey the same idea of cave people.Rickahockan—This name is used by the German explorer, Lederer, in 1670, as the name of the people inhabiting the mountains to the southwest of the Virginia settlements. On his map he puts them in the mountains on the southern head streams of Roanoke river, in western North Carolina. He states that, according to his Indian informants, the Rickahockan lived beyond the mountains in a land of great waves, which he interpreted to mean the sea shore (!), but it is more likely that the Indians were trying to convey, by means of the sign language, the idea of a succession of mountain ridges. The name was probably of Powhatan origin, and is evidently identical with Rechahecrian of the Virginia chronicles of about the same period, therin the latter form being perhaps a misprint. It may be connected with Righkahauk, indicated on Smith’s map of Virginia, in 1607, as the name of a town within thePowhatan territory, and still preserved in Rockahock, the name of an estate on lower Pamunkey river. We have too little material of the Powhatan language to hazard an interpretation, but it may possibly contain the root of the word for sand, which appears aslekawa,nikawa,negaw,rigawa,rekwa, etc., in various eastern Algonquian dialects, whence Rockaway (sand), and Recgawawank (sandy place). The Powhatan form, as given by Strachey, isracawh(sand). He gives alsorocoyhook(otter),reihcahahcoik, hidden under a cloud, overcast,rickahoneorreihcoan(a comb), andrickewh(to divide in halves).Talligewi—As Brinton well says: “No name in the Lenape′ legends has given rise to more extensive discussion than this.” On Colden’s map in his “History of the Five Nations,” 1727, we find the “Alleghens” indicated upon Allegheny river. Heckewelder, who recorded the Delaware tradition in 1819, says: “Those people, as I was told, called themselves Talligeu or Talligewi. Colonel John Gibson, however, a gentleman who has a thorough knowledge of the Indians, and speaks several of their languages, is of the opinion that they were not called Talligewi, but Alligewi; and it would seem that he is right from the traces of their name which still remain in the country, the Allegheny river and mountains having indubitably been named after them. The Delawares still call the former Alligewi Sipu (the river of the Alligewi)”—Indian Nations, p. 48, ed. 1876. Loskiel, writing on the authority of Zeisberger, says that the Delawares knew the whole country drained by the Ohio under the name of Alligewinengk, meaning “the land in which they arrived from distant places,” basing his interpretation upon an etymology compounded fromtallioralli, there,icku, to that place, andewak, they go, with a locative final. Ettwein, another Moravian writer, says the Delawares called “the western country” Alligewenork, meaning a warpath, and called the river Alligewi Sipo. This definition would make the word come frompallitonoralliton, to fight, to make war,ewak, they go, and a locative, i. e., “they go there to fight.” Trumbull, an authority on Algonquian languages, derives the river name fromwulik, good, best,hanne, rapid stream, andsipu, river, of which rendering its Iroquois name,Ohio, is nearly an equivalent. Rafinesque renders Talligewi as “there found,” fromtalli, there, and some other root, not given (Brinton, Walam Olum, pp. 229–230, 1885).It must be noted that the names Ohio and Alligewi (or Allegheny) were not applied by the Indians, as with us, to different parts of the same river, but to the whole stream, or at least the greater portion of it from its head downward. Although Brinton sees no necessary connection between the river name and the traditional tribal name, the statement of Heckewelder, generally a competent authority on Delaware matters, makes them identical.In the traditional tribal name, Talligewi or Alligewi,wiis an assertive verbal suffix, so that the form properly means “he is a Tallige,” or “they are Tallige.” This comes very near to Tsa′lăgĭ′, the name by which the Cherokee call themselves, and it may have been an early corruption of that name. In Zeisberger’s Delaware dictionary, however, we findwalohorwalok, signifying a cave or hole, while in the “Walam Olum” we haveoligonunkrendered “at the place of caves,” the region being further described as a buffalo land on a pleasant plain, where the Lenape′, advancing seaward from a less abundant northern region, at last found food (Walam Olum, pp. 194–195). Unfortunately, like other aboriginal productions of its kind among the northern tribes, the Lenape chronicle is suggestive rather than complete and connected. With more light it may be that seeming discrepancies would disappear and we should find at last that the Cherokee, in ancient times as in the historic period, were always the southern vanguard of the Iroquoian race, always primarily a mountain people, but with their flank resting upon the Ohio and its great tributaries, following the trend of the Blue ridge and the Cumberland as they slowly gave way before the pressure from the north until they were finally cut off from the parent stock by the wedge of Algonquian invasion, but always, whether in the northor in the south, keeping their distinctive title among the tribes as the “people of the cave country.”As the Cherokee have occupied a prominent place in history for so long a period their name appears in many synonyms and diverse spellings. The following are among the principal of these:SYNONYMSTsa′lăgĭ′(plural,Ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ′). Proper form in the Middle and Western Cherokee dialects.Tsa′răgĭ′.Proper form in the Eastern or Lower Cherokee dialect.Achalaque.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 1847 (incorrectly quoting Garcilaso).Chalakee.Nuttall, Travels, 124, 1821.Chalaque.Gentleman of Elvas, 1557; Publications of Hakluyt Society, IX, 60, 1851.Chalaquies.Barcia, Ensayo, 335, 1723.Charakeys.Homann heirs’ map, about 1730.Charikees.Document of 1718,fideRivers, South Carolina, 55, 1856.Charokees.Governor Johnson, 1720,fideRivers, Early History South Carolina, 93, 1874.Cheelake.Barton, New Views, xliv, 1798.Cheerake.Adair, American Indians, 226, 1775.Cheerakee.Ibid., 137.Cheeraque’s. Moore, 1704, in Carroll, Hist. Colls. South Carolina,II, 576, 1836.Cheerokee.Ross (?), 1776, in Historical Magazine, 2d series,II, 218, 1867.Chel-a-ke.Long, Expedition to Rocky Mountains,II, lxx, 1823.Chelakees.Gallatin, Trans. Am. Antiq. Soc.,II, 90, 1836.Chelaques.Nuttall, Travels, 247, 1821.Chelekee.Keane, in Stanford’s Compendium, 506, 1878.Chellokee.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,II, 204, 1852.Cheloculgee.White, Statistics of Georgia, 28, 1849 (given as plural form of Creek name).Chelokees.Gallatin, Trans. Am. Antiq. Soc.,II, 104, 1836.Cheokees.Johnson, 1772, in New York Doc. Col. Hist.,VIII, 314, 1857 (misprint forCherokees).Cheraguees.Coxe, Carolina,II, 1741.Cherakees.Ibid., map, 1741.Cherakis.Chauvignerie, 1736,fideSchoolcraft, Indian Tribes,III, 555, 1853.Cheraquees.Coxe, Carolana, 13, 1741.Cheraquis.Penicaut, 1699, in Margry,V, 404, 1883.Cherickees.Clarke, 1739, in New York Doc. Col. Hist.,VI, 148, 1855.Cherikee.Albany conference, 1742, ibid., 218.Cherokee.Governor Johnson, 1708, in Rivers, South Carolina, 238, 1856.Cherookees.Croghan, 1760, in Mass. Hist. Soc. Colls., 4th series,IX, 372, 1871.Cheroquees.Campbell, 1761, ibid., 416.Cherrackees.Evans, 1755, in Gregg, Old Cheraws, 15, 1867.Cherrokees.Treaty of 1722,fideDrake, Book of Indians, bk. 4, 32, 1848.Cherrykees.Weiser, 1748,fideKauffman, Western Pennsylvania, appendix, 18, 1851.Chirakues.Randolph, 1699, in Rivers, South Carolina, 449, 1856.Chirokys.Writer about 1825, Annales de la Prop. de la Foi,II, 384, 1841.Chorakis.Document of 1748, New York Doc. Col. Hist.,X, 143, 1858.Chreokees.Pike, Travels, 173, 1811 (misprint, transposed).Shanaki.Gatschet, Caddo MS, Bureau Am. Ethn., 1882 (Caddo name).Shan-nack.Marcy, Red River, 273, 1854 (Wichita name).Shannaki.Gatschet, Fox MS, Bureau Am. Ethn., 1882 (Fox name: plural form,Shannakiak).Shayage.Gatschet, Kaw MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1878 (Kaw name).Sulluggoes.Coxe, Carolana, 22, 1741.Tcalke.Gatschet, Tonkawa MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1882 (Tonkawa name,Chal-ke).Tcerokiec.Gatschet, Wichita MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1882 (Wichita name,Cherokish).Tchatakes.La Salle, 1682, in Margry,II, 197, 1877 (misprint).Tsalakies.Gallatin, Trans. Am. Antiq. Soc.,II, 90, 1836.Tsallakee.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 310, 1847.Tsä-ló-kee.Morgan, Ancient Society, 113, 1878.Tschirokesen.Wrangell, Ethn. Nachrichten,XIII, 1839 (German form).Tsûlahkĭ.Grayson, Creek MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1885 (Creek name; plural form,Tsălgăl′giorTsûlgûl′gi—Mooney).Tzerrickey.Urlsperger,fideGatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 26, 1884.Tzulukis.Rafinesque, Am. Nations,I, 123, 1836.Zolucans.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 23, 1824.Zulocans.Talligeu.Heckewelder, 1819, Indian Nations, 48, reprint of 1876 (traditional Delaware name; singular,Tallige′orAllige′(see preceding explanation).Talligewi.Alligewi.Alleg.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,V, 133, 1855.Allegans.Colden, map, 1727,fideSchoolcraft, ibid.,III, 525, 1853.Allegewi.Schoolcraft, ibid.,V, 133, 1855.Alleghans.Colden, 1727, quoted in Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 147, 1847.Alleghanys.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 34, 1824.Alleghens.Colden, map, 1727,fideSchoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 305, 1847.Allegwi.Squier, in Beach, Indian Miscellany, 26, 1877.Alli.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,V, 133, 1855.Allighewis.Keane, in Stanford’s Compendium, 500, 1878.Talagans.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 28, 1824.Talega.Brinton, Walam Olum, 201, 1885.Tallagewy.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,II, 36, 1852.Tallegwi.Rafinesque,fideMercer, Lenape Stone, 90, 1885.Talligwee.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 310, 1847.Tallike.Brinton, Walam Olum, 230, 1885.Kĭtu′hwagĭ(plural,Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ. See preceding explanation).Cuttawa.Vaugondy, map,Partie de l’Amérique, Septentrionale 1755.Gatohua.Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 28, 1884.Gattochwa.Katowa(plural,Katowagi).Ketawaugas.Haywood, Natural and Aboriginal Tennessee, 233, 1823.Kittuwa.Brinton, Walam Olum, 16, 1885 (Delaware name).Kuttoowauw.Aupaumut, 1791,fideBrinton, ibid., 16 (Mahican name).Oyataʼgeʻronoñʼ.Hewitt, oral information (Iroquois (Mohawk) name. See preceding explanation).Ojadagochroene.Livingston, 1720, in New York Doc. Col. Hist.,V, 567, 1855.Ondadeonwas.Bleeker, 1701, ibid.,IV, 918, 1854.Oyadackuchraono.Weiser, 1753, ibid.,VI, 795, 1855.Oyadagahroenes.Letter of 1713, ibid.,V, 386, 1855 (incorrectly stated to be the Flat-heads, i. e., either Catawbas or Choctaws).Oyadage′ono.Gatschet, Seneca MS, 1882, Bur. Am. Ethn. (Seneca name).O-ya-dä′-go-o-no.Morgan, League of Iroquois, 337, 1851.Oyaudah.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 448, 1847 (Seneca name).Uwata′-yo-ro′-no.Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend, 28, 1884 (Wyandot name).Uyada.Ibid. (Seneca name).We-yau-dah.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 253, 1847.Wa-tai-yo-ro-noñ′’.Hewitt, Wyandot MS, 1893, Bur. Am. Ethn. (Wyandot name).Rickahockans.Lederer, 1672, Discoveries, 26, reprint of 1891 (see preceding explanation).Rickohockans.Map, ibid.Rechahecrians.Drake, Book of Indians, book 4, 22, 1848 (from old Virginia documents).Rechehecrians.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 36, 1824.Mâñterâñ′.Gatschet, Catawba MS, 1881, Bur. Am. Ethn. (Catawba name. See preceding explanation).Entarironnon.Potier, Racines Huronnes et Grammaire, MS, 1751 (Wyandot names. The first, according to Hewitt, is equivalent to “ridge, or mountain, people”).Ochieʻtarironnon.Tʼkwen-tah-e-u-ha-ne.Beauchamp, in Journal Am. Folklore,V, 225, 1892 (given as the Onondaga name and rendered, “people of a beautiful red color”).Canogacole(?).Fontanedo, about 1575, Memoir, translated in French Hist. Colls., II, 257, 1875 (rendered “wicked people”).(2)Mobilian trade language(page 16): This trade jargon, based upon Choctaw, but borrowing also from all the neighboring dialects and even from the more northern Algonquian languages, was spoken and understood among all the tribes of the Gulf states, probably as far west as Matagorda bay and northward along both banks of the Mississippi to the Algonquian frontier about the entrance of the Ohio. It was called Mobilienne by the French, from Mobile, the great trading center of the Gulf region. Along the Mississippi it was sometimes known also as the Chickasaw trade language, the Chickasaw being a dialect of the Choctaw language proper. Jeffreys, in 1761, compares this jargon in its uses to the lingua franca of the Levant, and it was evidently by the aid of this intertribal medium that De Soto’s interpreter from Tampa bay could converse with all the tribes they met until they reached the Mississippi. Some of the names used by Fontanedo about 1575 for the tribes northward from Appalachee bay seem to be derived from this source, as in later times were the names of the other tribes of the Gulf region, without regard to linguistic affinities, including among others the Taensa, Tunica, Atakapa, and Shetimasha, representing as many different linguistic stocks. In his report upon the southwestern tribes in 1805, Sibley says that the “Mobilian” was spoken in addition to their native languages by all the Indians who had come from the east side of the Mississippi. Among those so using it he names the Alabama, Apalachi, Biloxi, Chactoo, Pacana, Pascagula, Taensa, and Tunica. Woodward, writing from Louisiana more than fifty years later, says: “There is yet a language the Texas Indians call the Mobilian tongue, that has been the trading language of almost all the tribes that have inhabited the country. I know white men that now speak it. There is a man now living near me that is fifty years of age, raised in Texas, that speaks the language well. It is a mixture of Creek, Choctaw, Chickasay, Netches [Natchez], and Apelash [Apalachi]”—Reminiscences, 79. For further information see also Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend, and Sibley, Report.The Mobilian trade jargon was not unique of its kind. In America, as in other parts of the world, the common necessities of intercommunication have resulted in the formation of several such mongrel dialects, prevailing, sometimes over wide areas. In some cases, also, the language of a predominant tribe serves as the common medium for all the tribes of a particular region. In South America we find the lingoa geral, based upon the Tupi′ language, understood for everyday purposes by all the tribes of the immense central region from Guiana to Paraguay, including almost the whole Amazon basin. On the northwest coast we find the well-known “Chinook jargon,” which takes its name from a small tribe formerly residing at the mouth of the Columbia, in common use among all the tribes from California far upinto Alaska, and eastward to the great divide of the Rocky mountains. In the southwest the Navaho-Apache language is understood by nearly all the Indians of Arizona and New Mexico, while on the plains the Sioux language in the north and the Comanche in the south hold almost the same position. In addition to these we have also the noted “sign language,” a gesture system used and perfectly understood as a fluent means of communication among all the hunting tribes of the plains from the Saskatchewan to the Rio Grande.(3)Dialects(page 17): The linguistic affinity of the Cherokee and northern Iroquoian dialects, although now well established, is not usually obvious on the surface, but requires a close analysis of words, with a knowledge of the laws of phonetic changes, to make it appear. The superficial agreement is perhaps most apparent between the Mohawk and the Eastern (Lower) Cherokee dialects, as both of these lack the labials entirely and userinstead ofl. In the short table given below the Iroquois words are taken, with slight changes in the alphabet used, from Hewitt’s manuscripts, the Cherokee from those of the author:MohawkCherokee (Eastern)personoñgweʼyûñwĭfireotsiʼraʼatsi′ra (atsi′la)waterawĕñʼăwă′ (ămă′)stoneonĕñyaʼnûñyû′arrowkaʼnoñʼkûnĭ′pipekanoñnăwĕñʼkănûñ′năwûhand (arm)owe′yaʼuwâ′yĭmilkunĕñʼtaʼunûñ′tĭfivewĭskhĭskĭtobacco[tcărhûʼ, Tuscarora]tsârû (tsâlû)fishotcoñʼtaʼû′tsûtĭ′ghostoʼskĕñnaʼasgi′nasnakeĕñnătûñi′nădû′Comparison of Cherokee dialectsEastern (Lower)MiddleWestern (Upper)fireatsi′raatsi′laatsi′lawaterăwă′ămă′ămă′doggiʼrĭ′giʼlĭ′giʼlĭ′hairgitsû′gitsû′gitlû′hawktsă′nuwă′tsă′nuwă′tlă′nuwă′leechtsanu′sĭ′tsanu′sĭ′tlanu′sĭ′battsa′wehă′tsa′mehă′tla′mehă′panthertsûñtû′tsĭtsûñtû′tsĭtlûñtû′tsĭjaytsayʼkû′tsayʼkû′tlayʼkû′martin (bird)tsutsû′tsutsû′tlutlû′war-clubatăsû′atăsû′atăsĭ′heartunăhŭ′unăhŭ′unăhwĭ′where?ga′tsûga′tsûha′tlûhow much?hûñgû′hûñgû′hila′gûkeystugi′stĭstugi′stĭstui′stĭI pick it up (long)tsĭnigi′ûtsĭnigi′ûtsĭne′ûmy fatheragidâ′tăagidâ′tăedâ′tămy mothera′gitsĭ′a′gitsĭ′etsĭ′my father’s fatheragini′sĭagini′sĭeni′sĭmy mother’s fatheragidu′tŭagidu′tŭedu′tŭIt will be noted that the Eastern and Middle dialects are about the same, excepting for the change ofltor, and the entire absence of the labialmfrom the Eastern dialect, while the Western differs considerably from the others, particularly in the greater frequency of the liquidland the softening of the gutturalg, the changes tending to render it the most musical of all the Cherokee dialects. It is also the standard literary dialect. In addition to these three principal dialects there are some peculiar forms and expressions in use by a few individuals which indicate the former existence of one or more other dialects now too far extinct to be reconstructed. As in most other tribes, the ceremonial forms used by the priesthood are so filled with archaic and figurative expressions as to be almost unintelligible to the laity.(4)Iroquoian tribes and migrations(p.17): The Iroquoian stock, taking its name from the celebrated Iroquois confederacy, consisted formerly of from fifteen to twenty tribes, speaking nearly as many different dialects, and including, among others, the following:Wyandot, or Huron.Ontario, Canada.Tionontati, or Tobacco nation.Attiwan′daron, or Neutral nation.Tohotaenrat.Wenrorono.Mohawk.Iroquois, or Five Nations, New York.Oneida.Onondaga.Cayuga.Seneca.Erie. Northern Ohio, etc.Conestoga, or Susquehanna. Southern Pennsylvania and Maryland.Nottoway.Southern Virginia.Meherrin?.Tuscarora. Eastern North Carolina.Cherokee. Western Carolina, etc.Tradition and history alike point to the St. Lawrence region as the early home of this stock. Upon this point all authorities concur. Says Hale, in his paper on Indian Migrations (p. 4): “The constant tradition of the Iroquois represents their ancestors as emigrants from the region north of the Great lakes, where they dwelt in early times with their Huron brethren. This tradition is recorded with much particularity by Cadwallader Colden, surveyor-general of New York, who in the early part of the last century composed his well known ‘History of the Five Nations.’ It is told in a somewhat different form by David Cusick, the Tuscarora historian, in his ‘Sketches of Ancient History of the Six Nations,’ and it is repeated by Mr. L. H. Morgan in his now classical work, ‘The League of the Iroquois,’ for which he procured his information chiefly among the Senecas. Finally, as we learn from the narrative of the Wyandot Indian, Peter Clarke, in his book entitled ‘Origin and Traditional History of the Wyandotts,’ the belief of the Hurons accords in this respect with that of the Iroquois. Both point alike to the country immediately north of the St. Lawrence, and especially to that portion of it lying east of Lake Ontario, as the early home of the Huron-Iroquois nations.” Nothing is known of the traditions of the Conestoga or the Nottoway, but the tradition of the Tuscarora, as given by Cusick and other authorities, makes them a direct offshoot from the northern Iroquois, with whom they afterward reunited. The traditions of the Cherokee also, as we have seen, bring them from the north, thus completing the cycle. “The striking fact has become evident that the course of migration of the Huron-Cherokee family has been from the northeast to the southwest—that is, from eastern Canada, on the Lower St. Lawrence, to the mountains of northern Alabama.”—Hale, Indian Migrations, p. 11.The retirement of the northern Iroquoian tribes from the St. Lawrence region wasdue to the hostility of their Algonquian neighbors, by whom the Hurons and their allies were forced to take refuge about Georgian bay and the head of Lake Ontario, while the Iroquois proper retreated to central New York. In 1535 Cartier found the shores of the river from Quebec to Montreal occupied by an Iroquoian people, but on the settlement of the country seventy years later the same region was found in possession of Algonquian tribes. The confederation of the five Iroquois nations, probably about the year 1540, enabled them to check the Algonquian invasion and to assume the offensive. Linguistic and other evidence shows that the separation of the Cherokee from the parent stock must have far antedated this period.(5)Walam Olum(p.18): The name signifies “red score,” from the Delawarewalam, “painted,” more particularly “painted red,” andolum, “a score, tally-mark.” The Walam Olum was first published in 1836 in a work entitled “The American Nations,” by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque, a versatile and voluminous, but very erratic, French scholar, who spent the latter half of his life in this country, dying in Philadelphia in 1840. He asserted that it was a translation of a manuscript in the Delaware language, which was an interpretation of an ancient sacred metrical legend of the Delawares, recorded in pictographs cut upon wood, obtained in 1820 by a medical friend of his among the Delawares then living in central Indiana. He says himself: “These actualolumwere first obtained in 1820 as a reward for a medical cure, deemed a curiosity, and were unexplicable. In 1822 were obtained from another individual the songs annexed thereto in the original language, but no one could be found by me able to translate them. I had therefore to learn the language since, by the help of Zeisberger, Heckewelder, and a manuscript dictionary, on purpose to translate them, which I only accomplished in 1833.” On account of the unique character of the alleged Indian record and Rafinesque’s own lack of standing among his scientific contemporaries, but little attention was paid to the discovery until Brinton took up the subject a few years ago. After a critical sifting of the evidence from every point of view he arrived at the conclusion that the work is a genuine native production, although the manuscript rendering is faulty, partly from the white scribe’s ignorance of the language and partly from the Indian narrator’s ignorance of the meaning of the archaic forms. Brinton’s edition (q. v.), published from Rafinesque’s manuscript, gives the legend in triplicate form—pictograph, Delaware, and English translation, with notes and glossary, and a valuable ethnologic introduction by Brinton himself.It is not known that any of the original woodcut pictographs of the Walam Olum are now in existence, although a statement of Rafinesque implies that he had seen them. As evidence of the truth of his statement, however, we have the fact that precisely similar pictographic series cut upon birch bark, each pictograph representing a line or couplet of a sacred metrical recitation, are now known to be common among the Ojibwa, Menomini, and other northern tribes. In 1762 a Delaware prophet recorded his visions in hieroglyphics cut upon a wooden stick, and about the year 1827 a Kickapoo reformer adopted the same method to propagate a new religion among the tribes. One of these “prayer sticks” is now in the National Museum, being all that remains of a large basketful delivered to a missionary in Indiana by a party of Kickapoo Indians in 1830 (see plate and description, pp. 665, 697et seq.in the author’s Ghost-dance Religion, Fourteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology).(6)Fish river(p.18): Namæsi Sipu (Heckewelder, Indian Nations, 49), or Namassipi (Walam Olum, p. 198). Deceived by a slight similarity of sound, Heckewelder makes this river identical with the Mississippi, but as Schoolcraft shows (Notes on Iroquois, p. 316) the true name of the Mississippi is simply Misi-sipi, “great river,” and “fish river” would be a most inappropriate name for such a turbulent current, where only the coarser species can live. The mere fact that there can be a question of identity among experts familiar with Indian nomenclature would indicate that itwas not one of the larger streams. Although Heckewelder makes the Alligewi, as he prefers to call them, flee down the Mississippi after their final defeat, the Walam Olum chronicle says only “all the Talega go south.” It was probably a gradual withdrawal, rather than a sudden and concerted flight (see Hale, Indian Migrations, pp. 19–22).(7)First appearance of whites(p.19): It is possible that this may refer to one of the earlier adventurers who coasted along the North Atlantic in the first decades after the discovery of America, among whom were Sebastian Cabot, in 1498; Verrazano, in 1524; and Gomez, in 1525. As these voyages were not followed up by permanent occupation of the country it is doubtful if they made any lasting impression upon Indian tradition. The author has chosen to assume, with Brinton and Rafinesque, that the Walam Olum reference is to the settlement of the Dutch at New York and the English in Virginia soon after 1600.(8)De Soto’s route(p.26): On May 30, 1539, Hernando de Soto, of Spain, with 600 armed men and 213 horses, landed at Tampa bay, on the west coast of Florida, in search of gold. After more than four years of hardship and disappointed wandering from Florida to the great plains of the West and back again to the Mississippi, where De Soto died and his body was consigned to the great river, 311 men, all that were left of the expedition, arrived finally at Pánuco, in Mexico, on September 10, 1543.For the history of this expedition, the most important ever undertaken by Spain within eastern United States, we have four original authorities. First is the very brief, but evidently truthful (Spanish) report of Biedma, an officer of the expedition, presented to the King in 1544, immediately after the return to Spain. Next in order, but of first importance for detail and general appearance of reliability, is the narrative of an anonymous Portuguese cavalier of the expedition, commonly known as the Gentleman of Elvas, originally published in the Portuguese language in 1557. Next comes the (Spanish) narrative of Garcilaso, written, but not published, in 1587. Unlike the others, the author was not an eyewitness of what he describes, but made up his account chiefly from the oral recollections of an old soldier of the expedition more than forty years after the event, this information being supplemented from papers written by two other soldiers of De Soto. As might be expected, the Garcilaso narrative, although written in flowery style, abounds in exaggeration and trivial incident, and compares unfavorably with the other accounts, while probably giving more of the minor happenings. The fourth original account is an unfinished (Spanish) report by Ranjel, secretary of the expedition, written soon after reaching Mexico, and afterward incorporated with considerable change by Oviedo, in his “Historia natural y general de las Indias.” As this fourth narrative remained unpublished until 1851 and has never been translated, it has hitherto been entirely overlooked by the commentators, excepting Winsor, who notes it incidentally. In general it agrees well with the Elvas narrative and throws valuable light upon the history of the expedition.The principal authorities, while preserving a general unity of narrative, differ greatly in detail, especially in estimates of numbers and distances, frequently to such an extent that it is useless to attempt to reconcile their different statements. In general the Gentleman of Elvas is most moderate in his expression, while Biedma takes a middle ground and Garcilaso exaggerates greatly. Thus the first named gives De Soto 600 men, Biedma makes the number 620, while Garcilaso says 1,000. At a certain stage of the journey the Portuguese Gentleman gives De Soto 700 Indians as escort, Biedma says 800, while Garcilaso makes it 8,000. At the battle of Mavilla the Elvas account gives 18 Spaniards and 2,500 Indians killed, Biedma says 20 Spaniards killed, without giving an estimate of the Indians, while Garcilaso has 82 Spaniards and over 11,000 Indians killed. In distances there is as great discrepancy. Thus Biedma makes the distance from Guaxule to Chiaha four days, Garcilaso has it six days, and Elvas seven days. As to the length of an average day’s march we find itestimated all the way from “four leagues, more or less” (Garcilaso) to “every day seven or eight leagues” (Elvas). In another place the Elvas chronicler states that they usually made five or six leagues a day through inhabited territories, but that in crossing uninhabited regions—as that between Canasagua and Chiaha, they marched every day as far as possible for fear of running out of provisions. One of the most glaring discrepancies appears in regard to the distance between Chiaha and Coste. Both the Portuguese writer and Garcilaso put Chiaha upon an island—a statement which in itself is at variance with any present conditions,—but while the former makes the island a fraction over a league in length the latter says that it was five leagues long. The next town was Coste, which Garcilaso puts immediately at the lower end of the same island while the Portuguese Gentleman represents it as seven days distant, although he himself has given the island the shorter length.Notwithstanding a deceptive appearance of exactness, especially in the Elvas and Ranjel narratives, which have the form of a daily journal, the conclusion is irresistible that much of the record was made after dates had been forgotten, and the sequence of events had become confused. Considering all the difficulties, dangers, and uncertainties that constantly beset the expedition, it would be too much to expect the regularity of a ledger, and it is more probable that the entries were made, not from day to day, but at irregular intervals as opportunity presented at the several resting places. The story must be interpreted in the light of our later knowledge of the geography and ethnology of the country traversed.Each of the three principal narratives has passed through translations and later editions of more or less doubtful fidelity to the original, the English edition in some cases being itself a translation from an earlier French or Dutch translation. English speaking historians of the expedition have usually drawn their material from one or the other of these translations, without knowledge of the original language, of the etymologies of the Indian names or the relations of the various tribes mentioned, or of the general system of Indian geographic nomenclature. One of the greatest errors has been the attempt to give in every case a fixed local habitation to a name which in some instances is not a proper name at all, and in others is merely a descriptive term or a duplicate name occurring at several places in the same tribal territory. Thus Tali is simply the Creek wordtalua, town, and not a definite place name as represented by a mistake natural in dealing through interpreters with an unknown Indian language. Tallise and Tallimuchase are respectively “Old town” and “New town” in Creek, and there can be no certainty that the same names were applied to the same places a century later. Canasagua is a corruption of a Cherokee name which occurs in at least three other places in the old Cherokee country in addition to the one mentioned in the narrative, and almost every old Indian local name was thus repeated several times, as in the case of such common names as Short creek, Whitewater, Richmond, or Lexington among ourselves. The fact that only one name of the set has been retained on the map does not prove its identity with the town of the old chronicle. Again such loose terms as “a large river,” “a beautiful valley,” have been assumed to mean something more definitely localized than the wording warrants. The most common error in translation has been the rendering of the Spanish “despoblado” as “desert.” There are no deserts in the Gulf states, and the word means simply an uninhabited region, usually the debatable strip between two tribes.There have been many attempts to trace De Soto’s route. As nearly every historian who has written of the southern states has given attention to this subject it is unnecessary to enumerate them all. Of some thirty works consulted by the author, in addition to the original narratives already mentioned, not more than two or three can be considered as speaking with any authority, the rest simply copying from these without investigation. The first attempt to locate the route definitely was made by Meek (Romantic Passages, etc.) in 1839 (reprinted in 1857), his conclusions beingbased upon his general knowledge of the geography of the region. In 1851 Pickett tried to locate the route, chiefly, he asserts, from Indian tradition as related by mixed-bloods. How much dependence can be placed upon Indian tradition as thus interpreted three centuries after the event it is unnecessary to say. Both these writers have brought De Soto down the Coosa river, in which they have been followed without investigation by Irving, Shea and others, but none of these was aware of the existence of a Suwali tribe, or correctly acquainted with the Indian nomenclature of the upper country, or of the Creek country as so well summarized by Gatschet in his Creek Migration Legend. They are also mistaken in assuming that only De Soto passed through the country, whereas we now know that several Spanish explorers and numerous French adventurers traversed the same territory, the latest expeditions of course being freshest in Indian memory. Jones in his “De Soto’s March Through Georgia” simply dresses up the earlier statements in more literary style, sometimes changing surmises to positive assertions, without mentioning his authorities. Maps of the supposed route, all bringing De Soto down the Coosa instead of the Chattahoochee, have been published in Irving’s Conquest of Florida, the Hakluyt Society’s edition of the Gentleman of Elva’s account, and in Buckingham Smith’s translation of the same narrative, as well as in several other works. For the eastern portion, with which we have to deal, all of these are practically duplicates of one another. On several old Spanish and French maps the names mentioned in the narrative seem to have been set down merely to fill space, without much reference to the text of the chronicle. For a list and notices of principal writers who have touched upon this subject see the appendix to Shea’s chapter on “Ancient Florida” in Winsor’s Narrative and Critical History of America,II; Boston, 1886. We shall speak only of that part of the route which lay near the Cherokee mountains.The first location which concerns us in the narrative is Cofitachiqui, the town from which De Soto set out for the Cherokee country. The name appears variously as Cofitachequi (Ranjel), Cofitachique (Biedma), Cofachiqui (Garcilaso), Cutifa-Chiqui (by transposition, Elvas), Cofetaçque (Vandera), Catafachique (Williams) and Cosatachiqui (misprint, Brooks MSS), and the Spaniards first heard of the region as Yupaha from a tribe farther to the south. The correct form appears to be that first given, which Gatschet, from later information than that quoted in his Creek Migration Legend, makes a Hitchitee word about equivalent to “Dogwood town,” fromcofi, “dogwood,”cofita, “dogwood thicket,” andchiki, “house,” or collectively “town.” McCulloch puts the town upon the headwaters of the Ocmulgee; Williams locates it on the Chattahoochee; Gallatin on the Oconee or the Savannah; Meek and Monette, following him, probably in the fork of the Savannah and the Broad; Pickett, with Jones and others following him, at Silver bluff on the east (north) bank of the Savannah, in Barnwell county, South Carolina, about 25 miles by water below the present Augusta. It will thus be seen that at the very outset of our inquiry the commentators differ by a distance equal to more than half the width of the state of Georgia. It will suffice here to say, without going into the argument, that the author is inclined to believe that the Indian town was on or near Silver bluff, which was noted for its extensive ancient remains as far back as Bartram’s time (Travels, 313), and where the noted George Galphin established a trading post in 1736. The original site has since been almost entirely worn away by the river. According to the Indians of Cofitachiqui, the town, which was on the farther (north) bank of the stream, was two day’s journey from the sea, probably by canoe, and the sailors with the expedition believed the river to be the same one that entered at St. Helena, which was a very close guess. The Spaniards were shown here European articles which they were told had been obtained from white men who had entered the river’s mouth many years before. These they conjectured to have been the men with Ayllon, who had landed on that coast in 1520 and again in 1524. The town was probably the ancient capital of the Uchee Indians, who, before their absorption bythe Creeks, held or claimed most of the territory on both banks of Savannah river from the Cherokee border to within about forty miles of Savannah and westward to the Ogeechee and Cannouchee rivers (see Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 17–24). The country was already on the decline in 1540 from a recent fatal epidemic, but was yet populous and wealthy, and was ruled by a woman chief whose authority extended for a considerable distance. The town was visited also by Pardo in 1567 and again by Torres in 1628, when it was still a principal settlement, as rich in pearls as in De Soto’s time (Brooks MSS, in the archives of the Bureau of American Ethnology).Somewhere in southern Georgia De Soto had been told of a rich province called Coça (Coosa, the Creek country) toward the northwest. At Cofitachiqui he again heard of it and of one of its principal towns called Chiaha (Chehaw) as being twelve days inland. Although on first hearing of it he had kept on in the other direction in order to reach Cofitachiqui, he now determined to go there, and made the queen a prisoner to compel her to accompany him a part of the way as guide. Coça province was, though he did not know it, almost due west, and he was in haste to reach it in order to obtain corn, as his men and horses were almost worn out from hunger. It is apparent, however, that the unwilling queen, afraid of being carried beyond her own territories, led the Spaniards by a roundabout route in the hope of making her escape, as she finally did, or perhaps of leaving them to starve and die in the mountains, precisely the trick attempted by the Indians upon another Spanish adventurer, Coronado, entering the great plains from the Pacific coast in search of golden treasure in the same year.Instead therefore of recrossing the river to the westward, the Spaniards, guided by the captive queen, took the direction of the north (“la vuelta del norte”—Biedma), and, after passing through several towns subject to the queen, came in seven days to “the province of Chalaque” (Elvas). Elvas, Garcilaso, and Ranjel agree upon the spelling, but the last named makes the distance only two days from Cofitachiqui. Biedma does not mention the country at all. The trifling difference in statement of five days in seven need not trouble us, as Biedma makes the whole distance from Cofitachiqui to Xuala eight days, and from Guaxule to Chiaha four days, where Elvas makes it, respectively, twelve and seven days. Chalaque is, of course, Cherokee, as all writers agree, and De Soto was now probably on the waters of Keowee river, the eastern head stream of Savannah river, where the Lower Cherokee had their towns. Finding the country bare of corn, he made no stay.Proceeding six days farther they came next to Guaquili, where they were kindly received. This name occurs only in the Ranjel narrative, the other three being entirely silent in regard to such a halting place. The name has a Cherokee sound (Wakili), but if we allow for a dialectic substitution oflforrit may be connected with such Catawba names as Congaree, Wateree, and Sugeree. It was probably a village of minor importance.They came next to the province of Xuala, or Xualla, as the Elvas narrative more often has it. In a French edition it appears as Chouala. Ranjel makes it three days from Guaquili or five from Chalaque. Elvas also makes it five days from Chalaque, while Biedma makes it eight days from Cofitachiqui, a total discrepancy of four days from the last-named place. Biedma describes it as a rough mountain country, thinly populated, but with a few Indian houses, and thinks that in these mountains the great river of Espiritu Santo (the Mississippi) had its birth. Ranjel describes the town as situated in a plain in the vicinity of rivers and in a country with greater appearance of gold mines than any they had yet seen. The Portuguese gentleman describes it as having very little corn, and says that they reached it from Cofitachiqui over a hilly country. In his final chapter he states that the course from Cofitachiqui to this place was from south to north, thus agreeing with Biedma. According to Garcilaso (pp. 136–137) it was fifty leagues by the road along which the Spaniards had come from Cofitachiqui to the first valley of the province of Xuala,with but few mountains on the way, and the town itself was situated close under a mountain (“a la falda de una sierra”) beside a small but rapid stream which formed the boundary of the territory of Cofitachiqui in this direction. From Ranjel we learn that on the same day after leaving this place for the next “province” the Spaniards crossed a very high mountain ridge (“una sierra muy alta”).Without mentioning the name, Pickett (1851) refers to Xuala as “a town in the present Habersham county, Georgia,” but gives no reason for this opinion. Rye and Irving, of the same date, arguing from a slight similarity of name, think it may have been on the site of a former Cherokee town, Qualatchee, on the head of Chattahoochee river in Georgia. The resemblance, however, is rather farfetched, and moreover this same name is found on Keowee river in South Carolina. Jones (De Soto in Georgia, 1880) interprets Garcilaso’s description to refer to “Nacoochee valley, Habersham county”—which should be White county—and the neighboring Mount Yonah, overlooking the fact that the same description of mountain, valley, and swift flowing stream might apply equally well to any one of twenty other localities in this southern mountain country. With direct contradiction Garcilaso says that the Spaniards rested here fifteen days because they found provisions plentiful, while the Portuguese Gentleman says that they stopped but two days because they found so little corn! Ranjel makes them stop four days and says they found abundant provisions and assistance.However that may have been, there can be no question of the identity of the name. As the province of Chalaque is the country of the Cherokee, so the province of Xuala is the territory of the Suwali or Sara Indians, better known later as Cheraw, who lived in early times in the piedmont country about the head of Broad river in North Carolina, adjoining the Cherokee, who still remember them under the name of Ani′-Suwa′li. A principal trail to their country from the west led up Swannanoa river and across the gap which, for this reason, was known to the Cherokee as Suwa′li-nuñnâ, “Suwali trail,” corrupted by the whites to Swannanoa. Lederer, who found them in the same general region in 1670, calls this gap the “Suala pass” and the neighboring mountains the Sara mountains, “which,” he says, “The Spaniards make Suala.” They afterward shifted to the north and finally returned and were incorporated with the Catawba (see Mooney, Siouan Tribes of the East, bulletin of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1894).Up to this point the Spaniards had followed a north course from Cofitachiqui (Biedma and Elvas), but they now turned to the west (Elvas, final chapter). On the same day on which they left Xuala they crossed “a very high mountain ridge,” and descended the next day to a wide meadow bottom (“savana”), through which flowed a river which they concluded was a part of the Espiritu Santo, the Mississippi (Ranjel). Biedma speaks of crossing a mountain country and mentions the river, which he also says they thought to be a tributary of the Mississippi. Garcilaso says that this portion of their route was through a mountain country without inhabitants (“despoblado”) and the Portuguese gentleman describes it as being over “very rough and high ridges.” In five days of such travel—for here, for a wonder, all the narratives agree—they came to Guaxule. This is the form given by Garcilaso and the Gentleman of Elvas; Biedma has Guasula, and Ranjel Guasili or Guasuli. The translators and commentators have given us such forms as Guachoule, Quaxule, Quaxulla, and Quexale. According to the Spanish method of writing Indian words the name was pronounced Washulé or Wasuli, which has a Cherokee sound, although it can not be translated. Buckingham Smith (Narratives, p. 222) hints that the Spaniards may have changed Guasili to Guasule, because of the similarity of the latter form to a town name in southern Spain. Such corruptions of Indian names are of frequent occurrence. Garcilaso speaks of it as a “province and town,” while Biedma and Ranjel call it simply a town (“pueblo”). Before reaching this place the Indian queen had managed to make her escape. All the chroniclers tell of the kind receptionwhich the Spaniards met here, but the only description of the town itself is from Garcilaso, who says that it was situated in the midst of many small streams which came down from the mountains round about, that it consisted of three hundred houses, which is probably an exaggeration, though it goes to show that the village was of considerable size, and that the chief’s house, in which the principal officers were lodged, was upon a high hill (“un cerro alto”), around which was a roadway (“paseadero”) wide enough for six men to walk abreast. By the “chief’s house” we are to understand the town-house, while from various similar references in other parts of the narrative there can be no doubt that the “hill” upon which it stood was an artificial mound. In modern Spanish writing such artificial elevations are more often calledlomas, but these early adventurers may be excused for not noting the distinction. Issuing from the mountains round about the town were numerous small streams, which united to form the river which the Spaniards henceforth followed from here down to Chiaha, where it was as large as the Guadalquivir at Sevilla (Garcilaso).Deceived by the occurrence, in the Portuguese narrative, of the name Canasagua, which they assumed could belong in but one place, earlier commentators have identified this river with the Coosa, Pickett putting Guaxule somewhere upon its upper waters, while Jones improves upon this by making the site “identical, or very nearly so, with Coosawattee Old town, in the southeastern corner of Murray county,” Georgia. As we shall show, however, the name in question was duplicated in several states, and a careful study of the narratives, in the light of present knowledge of the country, makes it evident that the river was not the Coosa, but the Chattahoochee.Turning our attention once more to Xuala, the most northern point reached by De Soto, we have seen that this was the territory of the Suwala or Sara Indians, in the eastern foothills of the Alleghenies, about the head waters of Broad and Catawba rivers, in North Carolina. As the Spaniards turned here to the west they probably did not penetrate far beyond the present South Carolina boundary. The “very high mountain ridge” which they crossed immediately after leaving the town was in all probability the main chain of the Blue ridge, while the river which they found after descending to the savanna on the other side, and which they guessed to be a branch of the Mississippi, was almost as certainly the upper part of the French Broad, the first stream flowing in an opposite direction from those which they had previously encountered. They may have struck it in the neighborhood of Hendersonville or Brevard, there being two gaps, passable for vehicles, in the main ridge eastward from the first-named town. The uninhabited mountains through which they struggled for several days on their way to Chiaha and Coça (the Creek country) in the southwest were the broken ridges in which the Savannah and the Little Tennessee have their sources, and if they followed an Indian trail they may have passed through the Rabun gap, near the present Clayton, Georgia. Guaxule, and not Xuala, as Jones supposes, was in Nacoochee valley, in the present White county, Georgia, and the small streams which united to form the river down which the Spaniards proceeded to Chiaha were the headwaters of the Chattahoochee. The hill upon which the townhouse was built must have been the great Nacoochee mound, the most prominent landmark in the valley, on the east bank of Sautee creek, in White county, about twelve miles northwest of Clarkesville. This is the largest mound in upper Georgia, with the exception of the noted Etowah mound near Cartersville, and is the only one which can fill the requirements of the case. There are but two considerable mounds in western North Carolina, that at Franklin and a smaller one on Oconaluftee river, on the present East Cherokee reservation, and as both of these are on streams flowing away from the Creek country, this fact alone would bar them from consideration. The only large mounds in upper Georgia are this one at Nacoochee and the group on the Etowah river, near Cartersville. The largest of the Etowah group is some fifty feet in height and is ascended on one side by means of a roadwayabout fifty feet wide at the base and narrowing gradually to the top. Had this been the mound of the narrative it is hardly possible that the chronicler would have failed to notice also the two other mounds of the group or the other one on the opposite side of the river, each of these being from twenty to twenty-five feet in height, to say nothing of the great ditch a quarter of a mile in length which encircles the group. Moreover, Cartersville is at some distance from the mountains, and the Etowah river at this point does not answer the description of a small rushing mountain stream. There is no considerable mound at Coosawatee or in any of the three counties adjoining.The Nacoochee mound has been cleared and cultivated for many years and does not now show any appearance of a roadway up the side, but from its great height we may be reasonably sure that some such means of easy ascent existed in ancient times. In other respects it is the only mound in the whole upper country which fills the conditions. The valley is one of the most fertile spots in Georgia and numerous ancient remains give evidence that it was a favorite center of settlement in early days. At the beginning of the modern historic period it was held by the Cherokee, who had there a town called Nacoochee, but their claim was disputed by the Creeks. The Gentleman of Elvas states that Guaxule was subject to the queen of Cofitachiqui, but this may mean only that the people of the two towns or tribes were in friendly alliance. The modern name is pronouncedNaguʻtsĭ′by the Cherokee, who say, however, that it is not of their language. The terminal may be the Creekudshi, “small,” or it may have a connection with the name of the Uchee Indians.From Guaxule the Spaniards advanced to Canasoga (Ranjel) or Canasagua (Elvas), one or two days’ march from Guaxule, according to one or the other authority. Garcilaso and Biedma do not mention the name. As Garcilaso states that from Guaxule to Chiaha the march was down the bank of the same river, which we identify with the Chattahoochee, the town may have been in the neighborhood of the present Gainesville. As we have seen, however, it is unsafe to trust the estimates of distance. Arguing from the name, Meek infers that the town was about Conasauga river in Murray county, and that the river down which they marched to reach it was “no doubt the Etowah,” although to reach the first named river from the Etowah it would be necessary to make another sharp turn to the north. From the same coincidence Pickett puts it on the Conasauga, “in the modern county of Murray, Georgia,” while Jones, on the same theory, locates it “at or near the junction of the Connasauga and Coosawattee rivers, in originally Cass, now Gordon county.” Here his modern geography as well as his ancient is at fault, as the original Cass county is now Bartow, the name having been changed in consequence of a local dislike for General Cass. The whole theory of a march down the Coosa river rests upon this coincidence of the name. The same name however, pronouncedGănsâ′gĭby the Cherokee, was applied by them to at least three different locations within their old territory, while the one mentioned in the narrative would make the fourth. The others were (1) on Oostanaula river, opposite the mouth of the Conasauga, where afterward was New Echota, in Gordon county, Georgia; (2) on Canasauga creek, in McMinn county, Tennessee; (3) on Tuckasegee river, about two miles above Webster, in Jackson county, North Carolina. At each of these places are remains of ancient settlement. It is possible that the name of Kenesaw mountain, near Marietta, in Cobb county, Georgia, may be a corruption ofGănsâ′gĭ, and if so, the Canasagua of the narrative may have been somewhere in this vicinity on the Chattahoochee. The meaning of the name is lost.On leaving Canasagua they continued down the same river which they had followed from Guaxule (Garcilaso), and after traveling several days through an uninhabited (“despoblado”) country (Elvas) arrived at Chiaha, which was subject to the great chief of Coça (Elvas). The name is spelled Chiaha by Ranjel and the Gentlemanof Elvas, Chiha by Biedma in the Documentos, China by a misprint in an English rendering, and Ychiaha by Garcilaso. It appears as Chiha on an English map of 1762 reproduced in Winsor, Westward Movement, page 31, 1897. Gallatin spells it Ichiaha, while Williams and Fairbanks, by misprint, make it Chiapa. According to both Ranjel and Elvas the army entered it on the 5th of June, although the former makes it four days from Canasagua, while the other makes it five. Biedma says it was four days from Guaxule, and, finally, Garcilaso says it was six days and thirty leagues from Guaxule and on the same river, which was, here at Chiaha, as large as the Guadalquivir at Sevilla. As we have seen, there is a great discrepancy in the statements of the distance from Cofitachiqui to this point. All four authorities agree that the town was on an island in the river, along which they had been marching for some time (Garcilaso, Ranjel), but while the Elvas narrative makes the island “two crossbow shot” in length above the town and one league in length below it, Garcilaso calls it a “great island more than five leagues long.” On both sides of the island the stream was very broad and easily waded (Elvas). Finding welcome and food for men and horses the Spaniards rested here nearly a month (June 5–28, Ranjel; twenty-six or twenty-seven days, Biedma; thirty days, Elvas). In spite of the danger from attack De Soto allowed his men to sleep under trees in the open air, “because it was very hot and the people should have suffered great extremity if it had not been so” (Elvas). This in itself is evidence that the place was pretty far to the south, as it was yet only the first week in June. The town was subject to the chief of the great province of Coça, farther to the west. From here onward they began to meet palisaded towns.On the theory that the march was down Coosa river, every commentator hitherto has located Chiaha at some point upon this stream, either in Alabama or Georgia. Gallatin (1836) says that it “must have been on the Coosa, probably some distance below the site of New Echota.” He notes a similarity of sound between Ichiaha and “Echoy” (Itseyĭ), a Cherokee town name. Williams (1837) says that it was on Mobile (i. e., the Alabama or lower Coosa river). Meek (1839) says “there can be little doubt that Chiaha was situated but a short distance above the junction of the Coosa and Chattooga rivers,” i. e., not far within the Alabama line. He notes the occurrence of a “Chiaha” (Chehawhaw) creek near Talladega, Alabama. In regard to the island upon which the town was said to have been situated he says: “There is no such island now in the Coosa. It is probable that the Spaniards either mistook the peninsula formed by the junction of two rivers, the Coosa and Chattooga, for an island, or that those two rivers were originally united so as to form an island near their present confluence. We have heard this latter supposition asserted by persons well acquainted with the country.”—Romantic Passages, p. 222, 1857. Monette (1846) puts it on Etowah branch of the Coosa, probably in Floyd county, Georgia. Pickett (1851), followed in turn by Irving, Jones, and Shea, locates it at “the site of the modern Rome.” The “island” is interpreted to mean the space between the two streams above the confluence.
(1)Tribal synonymy(page 15): Very few Indian tribes are known to us under the names by which they call themselves. One reason for this is the fact that the whites have usually heard of a tribe from its neighbors, speaking other languages, before coming upon the tribe itself. Many of the popular tribal names were originally nicknames bestowed by neighboring tribes, frequently referring to some peculiar custom, and in a large number of cases would be strongly repudiated by the people designated by them. As a rule each tribe had a different name in every surrounding Indian language, besides those given by Spanish, French, Dutch, or English settlers.Yûñ′wiyă′—This word is compounded fromyûñwĭ(person) andyă(real or principal). The assumption of superiority is much in evidence in Indian tribal names; thus, the Iroquois, Delawares, and Pawnee call themselves, respectively, Oñwe-hoñwe, Leni-lenape′, and Tsariksi-tsa′riks, all of which may be rendered “men of men,” “men surpassing other men,” or “real men.”Kĭtu′hwagĭ—This word, which can not be analyzed, is derived from Kĭtu′hwă, the name of an ancient Cherokee settlement formerly on Tuckasegee river, just above the present Bryson City, in Swain county, North Carolina. It is noted in 1730 as one of the “seven mother towns” of the tribe. Its inhabitants were called Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ (people of Kituhwa), and seem to have exercised a controlling influence over those of all the towns on the waters of Tuckasegee and the upper part of Little Tennessee, the whole body being frequently classed together as Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ. The dialect of these towns held a middle place linguistically between those spoken to the east, on the heads of Savannah, and to the west, on Hiwassee, Cheowah, and the lower course of Little Tennessee. In various forms the word was adopted by the Delawares, Shawano, and other northern Algonquian tribes as a synonym for Cherokee, probably from the fact that the Kituhwa people guarded the Cherokee northern frontier. In the form Cuttawa it appears on the French map of Vaugondy in 1755. From a similarity of spelling, Schoolcraft incorrectly makes it a synonym for Catawba, while Brinton incorrectly asserts that it is an Algonquian term, fancifully rendered, “inhabitants of the great wilderness.” Among the western Cherokee it is now the name of a powerful secret society, which had its origin shortly before the War of the Rebellion.Cherokee—This name occurs in fully fifty different spellings. In the standard recognized form, which dates back at least to 1708, it has given name to counties in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, within the ancient territory of the tribe, and to as many as twenty other geographic locations within the United States. In the Eastern or Lower dialect, with which the English settlers first became familiar, the form is Tsa′răgĭ′, whence we get Cherokee. In the other dialects the form is Tsa′lăgĭ′. It is evidently foreign to the tribe, as is frequently the case in tribal names, and in all probability is of Choctaw origin, having come up from the south through the medium of the Mobilian trade jargon. It will be noted that De Soto, whose chroniclers first use the word, in the form Chalaque, obtained his interpreters from the Gulf coast of Florida. Fontanedo, writing about the year 1575, mentions other inland tribes known to the natives of Florida under names which seem to beof Choctaw origin; for instance, the Canogacole, interpreted “wicked people,” the final part being apparently the Choctaw wordoklaorogula, “people”, which appears also in Pascagoula, Bayou Goula, and Pensacola. Shetimasha, Atakapa, and probably Biloxi, are also Choctaw names, although the tribes themselves are of other origins. As the Choctaw held much of the Gulf coast and were the principal traders of that region, it was natural that explorers landing among them should adopt their names for the more remote tribes.The name seems to refer to the fact that the tribe occupied a cave country. In the “Choctaw Leksikon” of Allen Wright, 1880, page 87, we findcholuk, a noun, signifying a hole, cavity, pit, chasm, etc., and as an adjective signifying hollow. In the manuscript Choctaw dictionary of Cyrus Byington, in the library of the Bureau of American Ethnology, we findchiluk, noun, a hole, cavity, hollow, pit, etc., with a statement that in its usual application it means a cavity or hollow, and not a hole through anything. As an adjective, the same form is given as signifying hollow, having a hole, asiti chiluk, a hollow tree;aboha chiluk, an empty house;chiluk chukoa, to enter a hole. Other noun forms given arechulukandachilukin the singular andchilukoain the plural, all signifying hole, pit, or cavity. Verbal forms arechilukikbi, to make a hole, andchilukba, to open and form a fissure.In agreement with the genius of the Cherokee language the root form of the tribal name takes nominal or verbal prefixes according to its connection with the rest of the sentence, and is declined, or rather conjugated, as follows:Singular—first person,tsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, I (am) a Cherokee; second person,hi-Tsa′lăgĭ, thou art a Cherokee; third person,a-Tsa′lăgĭ, he is a Cherokee.Dual—first person,âsti-Tsa′lăgĭ, we two are Cherokee; second person,sti-Tsa′lăgĭ, you two are Cherokee; third person,ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ, they two are Cherokee.Plural—first person,atsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, we (several) are Cherokee; second person,hitsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, you (several) are Cherokee; third person,ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ, they (several) are Cherokee. It will be noticed that the third person dual and plural are alike.Oyataʼgeʻronoñʼ, etc.—The Iroquois (Mohawk) form is given by Hewitt as O-yataʼ-geʻronoñʼ, of which the root isyataʼ, cave,ois the assertive prefix,geis the locative at, andronoñʼis the tribal suffix, equivalent to (English)-itesor people. The word, which has several dialectic forms, signifies “inhabitants of the cave country,” or “cave-country people,” rather than “people who dwell in caves,” as rendered by Schoolcraft. The same radixyataʼoccurs also in the Iroquois name for the opossum, which is a burrowing animal. As is well known, the Allegheny region is peculiarly a cave country, the caves having been used by the Indians for burial and shelter purposes, as is proved by numerous remains found in them. It is probable that the Iroquois simply translated the name (Chalaque) current in the South, as we find is the case in the West, where the principal plains tribes are known under translations of the same names in all the different languages. The Wyandot name for the Cherokee, Wataiyo-ronoñʼ, and their Catawba name, Mañterañ′, both seem to refer to coming out of the ground, and may have been originally intended to convey the same idea of cave people.Rickahockan—This name is used by the German explorer, Lederer, in 1670, as the name of the people inhabiting the mountains to the southwest of the Virginia settlements. On his map he puts them in the mountains on the southern head streams of Roanoke river, in western North Carolina. He states that, according to his Indian informants, the Rickahockan lived beyond the mountains in a land of great waves, which he interpreted to mean the sea shore (!), but it is more likely that the Indians were trying to convey, by means of the sign language, the idea of a succession of mountain ridges. The name was probably of Powhatan origin, and is evidently identical with Rechahecrian of the Virginia chronicles of about the same period, therin the latter form being perhaps a misprint. It may be connected with Righkahauk, indicated on Smith’s map of Virginia, in 1607, as the name of a town within thePowhatan territory, and still preserved in Rockahock, the name of an estate on lower Pamunkey river. We have too little material of the Powhatan language to hazard an interpretation, but it may possibly contain the root of the word for sand, which appears aslekawa,nikawa,negaw,rigawa,rekwa, etc., in various eastern Algonquian dialects, whence Rockaway (sand), and Recgawawank (sandy place). The Powhatan form, as given by Strachey, isracawh(sand). He gives alsorocoyhook(otter),reihcahahcoik, hidden under a cloud, overcast,rickahoneorreihcoan(a comb), andrickewh(to divide in halves).Talligewi—As Brinton well says: “No name in the Lenape′ legends has given rise to more extensive discussion than this.” On Colden’s map in his “History of the Five Nations,” 1727, we find the “Alleghens” indicated upon Allegheny river. Heckewelder, who recorded the Delaware tradition in 1819, says: “Those people, as I was told, called themselves Talligeu or Talligewi. Colonel John Gibson, however, a gentleman who has a thorough knowledge of the Indians, and speaks several of their languages, is of the opinion that they were not called Talligewi, but Alligewi; and it would seem that he is right from the traces of their name which still remain in the country, the Allegheny river and mountains having indubitably been named after them. The Delawares still call the former Alligewi Sipu (the river of the Alligewi)”—Indian Nations, p. 48, ed. 1876. Loskiel, writing on the authority of Zeisberger, says that the Delawares knew the whole country drained by the Ohio under the name of Alligewinengk, meaning “the land in which they arrived from distant places,” basing his interpretation upon an etymology compounded fromtallioralli, there,icku, to that place, andewak, they go, with a locative final. Ettwein, another Moravian writer, says the Delawares called “the western country” Alligewenork, meaning a warpath, and called the river Alligewi Sipo. This definition would make the word come frompallitonoralliton, to fight, to make war,ewak, they go, and a locative, i. e., “they go there to fight.” Trumbull, an authority on Algonquian languages, derives the river name fromwulik, good, best,hanne, rapid stream, andsipu, river, of which rendering its Iroquois name,Ohio, is nearly an equivalent. Rafinesque renders Talligewi as “there found,” fromtalli, there, and some other root, not given (Brinton, Walam Olum, pp. 229–230, 1885).It must be noted that the names Ohio and Alligewi (or Allegheny) were not applied by the Indians, as with us, to different parts of the same river, but to the whole stream, or at least the greater portion of it from its head downward. Although Brinton sees no necessary connection between the river name and the traditional tribal name, the statement of Heckewelder, generally a competent authority on Delaware matters, makes them identical.In the traditional tribal name, Talligewi or Alligewi,wiis an assertive verbal suffix, so that the form properly means “he is a Tallige,” or “they are Tallige.” This comes very near to Tsa′lăgĭ′, the name by which the Cherokee call themselves, and it may have been an early corruption of that name. In Zeisberger’s Delaware dictionary, however, we findwalohorwalok, signifying a cave or hole, while in the “Walam Olum” we haveoligonunkrendered “at the place of caves,” the region being further described as a buffalo land on a pleasant plain, where the Lenape′, advancing seaward from a less abundant northern region, at last found food (Walam Olum, pp. 194–195). Unfortunately, like other aboriginal productions of its kind among the northern tribes, the Lenape chronicle is suggestive rather than complete and connected. With more light it may be that seeming discrepancies would disappear and we should find at last that the Cherokee, in ancient times as in the historic period, were always the southern vanguard of the Iroquoian race, always primarily a mountain people, but with their flank resting upon the Ohio and its great tributaries, following the trend of the Blue ridge and the Cumberland as they slowly gave way before the pressure from the north until they were finally cut off from the parent stock by the wedge of Algonquian invasion, but always, whether in the northor in the south, keeping their distinctive title among the tribes as the “people of the cave country.”As the Cherokee have occupied a prominent place in history for so long a period their name appears in many synonyms and diverse spellings. The following are among the principal of these:SYNONYMSTsa′lăgĭ′(plural,Ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ′). Proper form in the Middle and Western Cherokee dialects.Tsa′răgĭ′.Proper form in the Eastern or Lower Cherokee dialect.Achalaque.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 1847 (incorrectly quoting Garcilaso).Chalakee.Nuttall, Travels, 124, 1821.Chalaque.Gentleman of Elvas, 1557; Publications of Hakluyt Society, IX, 60, 1851.Chalaquies.Barcia, Ensayo, 335, 1723.Charakeys.Homann heirs’ map, about 1730.Charikees.Document of 1718,fideRivers, South Carolina, 55, 1856.Charokees.Governor Johnson, 1720,fideRivers, Early History South Carolina, 93, 1874.Cheelake.Barton, New Views, xliv, 1798.Cheerake.Adair, American Indians, 226, 1775.Cheerakee.Ibid., 137.Cheeraque’s. Moore, 1704, in Carroll, Hist. Colls. South Carolina,II, 576, 1836.Cheerokee.Ross (?), 1776, in Historical Magazine, 2d series,II, 218, 1867.Chel-a-ke.Long, Expedition to Rocky Mountains,II, lxx, 1823.Chelakees.Gallatin, Trans. Am. Antiq. Soc.,II, 90, 1836.Chelaques.Nuttall, Travels, 247, 1821.Chelekee.Keane, in Stanford’s Compendium, 506, 1878.Chellokee.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,II, 204, 1852.Cheloculgee.White, Statistics of Georgia, 28, 1849 (given as plural form of Creek name).Chelokees.Gallatin, Trans. Am. Antiq. Soc.,II, 104, 1836.Cheokees.Johnson, 1772, in New York Doc. Col. Hist.,VIII, 314, 1857 (misprint forCherokees).Cheraguees.Coxe, Carolina,II, 1741.Cherakees.Ibid., map, 1741.Cherakis.Chauvignerie, 1736,fideSchoolcraft, Indian Tribes,III, 555, 1853.Cheraquees.Coxe, Carolana, 13, 1741.Cheraquis.Penicaut, 1699, in Margry,V, 404, 1883.Cherickees.Clarke, 1739, in New York Doc. Col. Hist.,VI, 148, 1855.Cherikee.Albany conference, 1742, ibid., 218.Cherokee.Governor Johnson, 1708, in Rivers, South Carolina, 238, 1856.Cherookees.Croghan, 1760, in Mass. Hist. Soc. Colls., 4th series,IX, 372, 1871.Cheroquees.Campbell, 1761, ibid., 416.Cherrackees.Evans, 1755, in Gregg, Old Cheraws, 15, 1867.Cherrokees.Treaty of 1722,fideDrake, Book of Indians, bk. 4, 32, 1848.Cherrykees.Weiser, 1748,fideKauffman, Western Pennsylvania, appendix, 18, 1851.Chirakues.Randolph, 1699, in Rivers, South Carolina, 449, 1856.Chirokys.Writer about 1825, Annales de la Prop. de la Foi,II, 384, 1841.Chorakis.Document of 1748, New York Doc. Col. Hist.,X, 143, 1858.Chreokees.Pike, Travels, 173, 1811 (misprint, transposed).Shanaki.Gatschet, Caddo MS, Bureau Am. Ethn., 1882 (Caddo name).Shan-nack.Marcy, Red River, 273, 1854 (Wichita name).Shannaki.Gatschet, Fox MS, Bureau Am. Ethn., 1882 (Fox name: plural form,Shannakiak).Shayage.Gatschet, Kaw MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1878 (Kaw name).Sulluggoes.Coxe, Carolana, 22, 1741.Tcalke.Gatschet, Tonkawa MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1882 (Tonkawa name,Chal-ke).Tcerokiec.Gatschet, Wichita MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1882 (Wichita name,Cherokish).Tchatakes.La Salle, 1682, in Margry,II, 197, 1877 (misprint).Tsalakies.Gallatin, Trans. Am. Antiq. Soc.,II, 90, 1836.Tsallakee.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 310, 1847.Tsä-ló-kee.Morgan, Ancient Society, 113, 1878.Tschirokesen.Wrangell, Ethn. Nachrichten,XIII, 1839 (German form).Tsûlahkĭ.Grayson, Creek MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1885 (Creek name; plural form,Tsălgăl′giorTsûlgûl′gi—Mooney).Tzerrickey.Urlsperger,fideGatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 26, 1884.Tzulukis.Rafinesque, Am. Nations,I, 123, 1836.Zolucans.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 23, 1824.Zulocans.Talligeu.Heckewelder, 1819, Indian Nations, 48, reprint of 1876 (traditional Delaware name; singular,Tallige′orAllige′(see preceding explanation).Talligewi.Alligewi.Alleg.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,V, 133, 1855.Allegans.Colden, map, 1727,fideSchoolcraft, ibid.,III, 525, 1853.Allegewi.Schoolcraft, ibid.,V, 133, 1855.Alleghans.Colden, 1727, quoted in Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 147, 1847.Alleghanys.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 34, 1824.Alleghens.Colden, map, 1727,fideSchoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 305, 1847.Allegwi.Squier, in Beach, Indian Miscellany, 26, 1877.Alli.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,V, 133, 1855.Allighewis.Keane, in Stanford’s Compendium, 500, 1878.Talagans.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 28, 1824.Talega.Brinton, Walam Olum, 201, 1885.Tallagewy.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,II, 36, 1852.Tallegwi.Rafinesque,fideMercer, Lenape Stone, 90, 1885.Talligwee.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 310, 1847.Tallike.Brinton, Walam Olum, 230, 1885.Kĭtu′hwagĭ(plural,Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ. See preceding explanation).Cuttawa.Vaugondy, map,Partie de l’Amérique, Septentrionale 1755.Gatohua.Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 28, 1884.Gattochwa.Katowa(plural,Katowagi).Ketawaugas.Haywood, Natural and Aboriginal Tennessee, 233, 1823.Kittuwa.Brinton, Walam Olum, 16, 1885 (Delaware name).Kuttoowauw.Aupaumut, 1791,fideBrinton, ibid., 16 (Mahican name).Oyataʼgeʻronoñʼ.Hewitt, oral information (Iroquois (Mohawk) name. See preceding explanation).Ojadagochroene.Livingston, 1720, in New York Doc. Col. Hist.,V, 567, 1855.Ondadeonwas.Bleeker, 1701, ibid.,IV, 918, 1854.Oyadackuchraono.Weiser, 1753, ibid.,VI, 795, 1855.Oyadagahroenes.Letter of 1713, ibid.,V, 386, 1855 (incorrectly stated to be the Flat-heads, i. e., either Catawbas or Choctaws).Oyadage′ono.Gatschet, Seneca MS, 1882, Bur. Am. Ethn. (Seneca name).O-ya-dä′-go-o-no.Morgan, League of Iroquois, 337, 1851.Oyaudah.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 448, 1847 (Seneca name).Uwata′-yo-ro′-no.Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend, 28, 1884 (Wyandot name).Uyada.Ibid. (Seneca name).We-yau-dah.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 253, 1847.Wa-tai-yo-ro-noñ′’.Hewitt, Wyandot MS, 1893, Bur. Am. Ethn. (Wyandot name).Rickahockans.Lederer, 1672, Discoveries, 26, reprint of 1891 (see preceding explanation).Rickohockans.Map, ibid.Rechahecrians.Drake, Book of Indians, book 4, 22, 1848 (from old Virginia documents).Rechehecrians.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 36, 1824.Mâñterâñ′.Gatschet, Catawba MS, 1881, Bur. Am. Ethn. (Catawba name. See preceding explanation).Entarironnon.Potier, Racines Huronnes et Grammaire, MS, 1751 (Wyandot names. The first, according to Hewitt, is equivalent to “ridge, or mountain, people”).Ochieʻtarironnon.Tʼkwen-tah-e-u-ha-ne.Beauchamp, in Journal Am. Folklore,V, 225, 1892 (given as the Onondaga name and rendered, “people of a beautiful red color”).Canogacole(?).Fontanedo, about 1575, Memoir, translated in French Hist. Colls., II, 257, 1875 (rendered “wicked people”).(2)Mobilian trade language(page 16): This trade jargon, based upon Choctaw, but borrowing also from all the neighboring dialects and even from the more northern Algonquian languages, was spoken and understood among all the tribes of the Gulf states, probably as far west as Matagorda bay and northward along both banks of the Mississippi to the Algonquian frontier about the entrance of the Ohio. It was called Mobilienne by the French, from Mobile, the great trading center of the Gulf region. Along the Mississippi it was sometimes known also as the Chickasaw trade language, the Chickasaw being a dialect of the Choctaw language proper. Jeffreys, in 1761, compares this jargon in its uses to the lingua franca of the Levant, and it was evidently by the aid of this intertribal medium that De Soto’s interpreter from Tampa bay could converse with all the tribes they met until they reached the Mississippi. Some of the names used by Fontanedo about 1575 for the tribes northward from Appalachee bay seem to be derived from this source, as in later times were the names of the other tribes of the Gulf region, without regard to linguistic affinities, including among others the Taensa, Tunica, Atakapa, and Shetimasha, representing as many different linguistic stocks. In his report upon the southwestern tribes in 1805, Sibley says that the “Mobilian” was spoken in addition to their native languages by all the Indians who had come from the east side of the Mississippi. Among those so using it he names the Alabama, Apalachi, Biloxi, Chactoo, Pacana, Pascagula, Taensa, and Tunica. Woodward, writing from Louisiana more than fifty years later, says: “There is yet a language the Texas Indians call the Mobilian tongue, that has been the trading language of almost all the tribes that have inhabited the country. I know white men that now speak it. There is a man now living near me that is fifty years of age, raised in Texas, that speaks the language well. It is a mixture of Creek, Choctaw, Chickasay, Netches [Natchez], and Apelash [Apalachi]”—Reminiscences, 79. For further information see also Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend, and Sibley, Report.The Mobilian trade jargon was not unique of its kind. In America, as in other parts of the world, the common necessities of intercommunication have resulted in the formation of several such mongrel dialects, prevailing, sometimes over wide areas. In some cases, also, the language of a predominant tribe serves as the common medium for all the tribes of a particular region. In South America we find the lingoa geral, based upon the Tupi′ language, understood for everyday purposes by all the tribes of the immense central region from Guiana to Paraguay, including almost the whole Amazon basin. On the northwest coast we find the well-known “Chinook jargon,” which takes its name from a small tribe formerly residing at the mouth of the Columbia, in common use among all the tribes from California far upinto Alaska, and eastward to the great divide of the Rocky mountains. In the southwest the Navaho-Apache language is understood by nearly all the Indians of Arizona and New Mexico, while on the plains the Sioux language in the north and the Comanche in the south hold almost the same position. In addition to these we have also the noted “sign language,” a gesture system used and perfectly understood as a fluent means of communication among all the hunting tribes of the plains from the Saskatchewan to the Rio Grande.(3)Dialects(page 17): The linguistic affinity of the Cherokee and northern Iroquoian dialects, although now well established, is not usually obvious on the surface, but requires a close analysis of words, with a knowledge of the laws of phonetic changes, to make it appear. The superficial agreement is perhaps most apparent between the Mohawk and the Eastern (Lower) Cherokee dialects, as both of these lack the labials entirely and userinstead ofl. In the short table given below the Iroquois words are taken, with slight changes in the alphabet used, from Hewitt’s manuscripts, the Cherokee from those of the author:MohawkCherokee (Eastern)personoñgweʼyûñwĭfireotsiʼraʼatsi′ra (atsi′la)waterawĕñʼăwă′ (ămă′)stoneonĕñyaʼnûñyû′arrowkaʼnoñʼkûnĭ′pipekanoñnăwĕñʼkănûñ′năwûhand (arm)owe′yaʼuwâ′yĭmilkunĕñʼtaʼunûñ′tĭfivewĭskhĭskĭtobacco[tcărhûʼ, Tuscarora]tsârû (tsâlû)fishotcoñʼtaʼû′tsûtĭ′ghostoʼskĕñnaʼasgi′nasnakeĕñnătûñi′nădû′Comparison of Cherokee dialectsEastern (Lower)MiddleWestern (Upper)fireatsi′raatsi′laatsi′lawaterăwă′ămă′ămă′doggiʼrĭ′giʼlĭ′giʼlĭ′hairgitsû′gitsû′gitlû′hawktsă′nuwă′tsă′nuwă′tlă′nuwă′leechtsanu′sĭ′tsanu′sĭ′tlanu′sĭ′battsa′wehă′tsa′mehă′tla′mehă′panthertsûñtû′tsĭtsûñtû′tsĭtlûñtû′tsĭjaytsayʼkû′tsayʼkû′tlayʼkû′martin (bird)tsutsû′tsutsû′tlutlû′war-clubatăsû′atăsû′atăsĭ′heartunăhŭ′unăhŭ′unăhwĭ′where?ga′tsûga′tsûha′tlûhow much?hûñgû′hûñgû′hila′gûkeystugi′stĭstugi′stĭstui′stĭI pick it up (long)tsĭnigi′ûtsĭnigi′ûtsĭne′ûmy fatheragidâ′tăagidâ′tăedâ′tămy mothera′gitsĭ′a′gitsĭ′etsĭ′my father’s fatheragini′sĭagini′sĭeni′sĭmy mother’s fatheragidu′tŭagidu′tŭedu′tŭIt will be noted that the Eastern and Middle dialects are about the same, excepting for the change ofltor, and the entire absence of the labialmfrom the Eastern dialect, while the Western differs considerably from the others, particularly in the greater frequency of the liquidland the softening of the gutturalg, the changes tending to render it the most musical of all the Cherokee dialects. It is also the standard literary dialect. In addition to these three principal dialects there are some peculiar forms and expressions in use by a few individuals which indicate the former existence of one or more other dialects now too far extinct to be reconstructed. As in most other tribes, the ceremonial forms used by the priesthood are so filled with archaic and figurative expressions as to be almost unintelligible to the laity.(4)Iroquoian tribes and migrations(p.17): The Iroquoian stock, taking its name from the celebrated Iroquois confederacy, consisted formerly of from fifteen to twenty tribes, speaking nearly as many different dialects, and including, among others, the following:Wyandot, or Huron.Ontario, Canada.Tionontati, or Tobacco nation.Attiwan′daron, or Neutral nation.Tohotaenrat.Wenrorono.Mohawk.Iroquois, or Five Nations, New York.Oneida.Onondaga.Cayuga.Seneca.Erie. Northern Ohio, etc.Conestoga, or Susquehanna. Southern Pennsylvania and Maryland.Nottoway.Southern Virginia.Meherrin?.Tuscarora. Eastern North Carolina.Cherokee. Western Carolina, etc.Tradition and history alike point to the St. Lawrence region as the early home of this stock. Upon this point all authorities concur. Says Hale, in his paper on Indian Migrations (p. 4): “The constant tradition of the Iroquois represents their ancestors as emigrants from the region north of the Great lakes, where they dwelt in early times with their Huron brethren. This tradition is recorded with much particularity by Cadwallader Colden, surveyor-general of New York, who in the early part of the last century composed his well known ‘History of the Five Nations.’ It is told in a somewhat different form by David Cusick, the Tuscarora historian, in his ‘Sketches of Ancient History of the Six Nations,’ and it is repeated by Mr. L. H. Morgan in his now classical work, ‘The League of the Iroquois,’ for which he procured his information chiefly among the Senecas. Finally, as we learn from the narrative of the Wyandot Indian, Peter Clarke, in his book entitled ‘Origin and Traditional History of the Wyandotts,’ the belief of the Hurons accords in this respect with that of the Iroquois. Both point alike to the country immediately north of the St. Lawrence, and especially to that portion of it lying east of Lake Ontario, as the early home of the Huron-Iroquois nations.” Nothing is known of the traditions of the Conestoga or the Nottoway, but the tradition of the Tuscarora, as given by Cusick and other authorities, makes them a direct offshoot from the northern Iroquois, with whom they afterward reunited. The traditions of the Cherokee also, as we have seen, bring them from the north, thus completing the cycle. “The striking fact has become evident that the course of migration of the Huron-Cherokee family has been from the northeast to the southwest—that is, from eastern Canada, on the Lower St. Lawrence, to the mountains of northern Alabama.”—Hale, Indian Migrations, p. 11.The retirement of the northern Iroquoian tribes from the St. Lawrence region wasdue to the hostility of their Algonquian neighbors, by whom the Hurons and their allies were forced to take refuge about Georgian bay and the head of Lake Ontario, while the Iroquois proper retreated to central New York. In 1535 Cartier found the shores of the river from Quebec to Montreal occupied by an Iroquoian people, but on the settlement of the country seventy years later the same region was found in possession of Algonquian tribes. The confederation of the five Iroquois nations, probably about the year 1540, enabled them to check the Algonquian invasion and to assume the offensive. Linguistic and other evidence shows that the separation of the Cherokee from the parent stock must have far antedated this period.(5)Walam Olum(p.18): The name signifies “red score,” from the Delawarewalam, “painted,” more particularly “painted red,” andolum, “a score, tally-mark.” The Walam Olum was first published in 1836 in a work entitled “The American Nations,” by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque, a versatile and voluminous, but very erratic, French scholar, who spent the latter half of his life in this country, dying in Philadelphia in 1840. He asserted that it was a translation of a manuscript in the Delaware language, which was an interpretation of an ancient sacred metrical legend of the Delawares, recorded in pictographs cut upon wood, obtained in 1820 by a medical friend of his among the Delawares then living in central Indiana. He says himself: “These actualolumwere first obtained in 1820 as a reward for a medical cure, deemed a curiosity, and were unexplicable. In 1822 were obtained from another individual the songs annexed thereto in the original language, but no one could be found by me able to translate them. I had therefore to learn the language since, by the help of Zeisberger, Heckewelder, and a manuscript dictionary, on purpose to translate them, which I only accomplished in 1833.” On account of the unique character of the alleged Indian record and Rafinesque’s own lack of standing among his scientific contemporaries, but little attention was paid to the discovery until Brinton took up the subject a few years ago. After a critical sifting of the evidence from every point of view he arrived at the conclusion that the work is a genuine native production, although the manuscript rendering is faulty, partly from the white scribe’s ignorance of the language and partly from the Indian narrator’s ignorance of the meaning of the archaic forms. Brinton’s edition (q. v.), published from Rafinesque’s manuscript, gives the legend in triplicate form—pictograph, Delaware, and English translation, with notes and glossary, and a valuable ethnologic introduction by Brinton himself.It is not known that any of the original woodcut pictographs of the Walam Olum are now in existence, although a statement of Rafinesque implies that he had seen them. As evidence of the truth of his statement, however, we have the fact that precisely similar pictographic series cut upon birch bark, each pictograph representing a line or couplet of a sacred metrical recitation, are now known to be common among the Ojibwa, Menomini, and other northern tribes. In 1762 a Delaware prophet recorded his visions in hieroglyphics cut upon a wooden stick, and about the year 1827 a Kickapoo reformer adopted the same method to propagate a new religion among the tribes. One of these “prayer sticks” is now in the National Museum, being all that remains of a large basketful delivered to a missionary in Indiana by a party of Kickapoo Indians in 1830 (see plate and description, pp. 665, 697et seq.in the author’s Ghost-dance Religion, Fourteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology).(6)Fish river(p.18): Namæsi Sipu (Heckewelder, Indian Nations, 49), or Namassipi (Walam Olum, p. 198). Deceived by a slight similarity of sound, Heckewelder makes this river identical with the Mississippi, but as Schoolcraft shows (Notes on Iroquois, p. 316) the true name of the Mississippi is simply Misi-sipi, “great river,” and “fish river” would be a most inappropriate name for such a turbulent current, where only the coarser species can live. The mere fact that there can be a question of identity among experts familiar with Indian nomenclature would indicate that itwas not one of the larger streams. Although Heckewelder makes the Alligewi, as he prefers to call them, flee down the Mississippi after their final defeat, the Walam Olum chronicle says only “all the Talega go south.” It was probably a gradual withdrawal, rather than a sudden and concerted flight (see Hale, Indian Migrations, pp. 19–22).(7)First appearance of whites(p.19): It is possible that this may refer to one of the earlier adventurers who coasted along the North Atlantic in the first decades after the discovery of America, among whom were Sebastian Cabot, in 1498; Verrazano, in 1524; and Gomez, in 1525. As these voyages were not followed up by permanent occupation of the country it is doubtful if they made any lasting impression upon Indian tradition. The author has chosen to assume, with Brinton and Rafinesque, that the Walam Olum reference is to the settlement of the Dutch at New York and the English in Virginia soon after 1600.(8)De Soto’s route(p.26): On May 30, 1539, Hernando de Soto, of Spain, with 600 armed men and 213 horses, landed at Tampa bay, on the west coast of Florida, in search of gold. After more than four years of hardship and disappointed wandering from Florida to the great plains of the West and back again to the Mississippi, where De Soto died and his body was consigned to the great river, 311 men, all that were left of the expedition, arrived finally at Pánuco, in Mexico, on September 10, 1543.For the history of this expedition, the most important ever undertaken by Spain within eastern United States, we have four original authorities. First is the very brief, but evidently truthful (Spanish) report of Biedma, an officer of the expedition, presented to the King in 1544, immediately after the return to Spain. Next in order, but of first importance for detail and general appearance of reliability, is the narrative of an anonymous Portuguese cavalier of the expedition, commonly known as the Gentleman of Elvas, originally published in the Portuguese language in 1557. Next comes the (Spanish) narrative of Garcilaso, written, but not published, in 1587. Unlike the others, the author was not an eyewitness of what he describes, but made up his account chiefly from the oral recollections of an old soldier of the expedition more than forty years after the event, this information being supplemented from papers written by two other soldiers of De Soto. As might be expected, the Garcilaso narrative, although written in flowery style, abounds in exaggeration and trivial incident, and compares unfavorably with the other accounts, while probably giving more of the minor happenings. The fourth original account is an unfinished (Spanish) report by Ranjel, secretary of the expedition, written soon after reaching Mexico, and afterward incorporated with considerable change by Oviedo, in his “Historia natural y general de las Indias.” As this fourth narrative remained unpublished until 1851 and has never been translated, it has hitherto been entirely overlooked by the commentators, excepting Winsor, who notes it incidentally. In general it agrees well with the Elvas narrative and throws valuable light upon the history of the expedition.The principal authorities, while preserving a general unity of narrative, differ greatly in detail, especially in estimates of numbers and distances, frequently to such an extent that it is useless to attempt to reconcile their different statements. In general the Gentleman of Elvas is most moderate in his expression, while Biedma takes a middle ground and Garcilaso exaggerates greatly. Thus the first named gives De Soto 600 men, Biedma makes the number 620, while Garcilaso says 1,000. At a certain stage of the journey the Portuguese Gentleman gives De Soto 700 Indians as escort, Biedma says 800, while Garcilaso makes it 8,000. At the battle of Mavilla the Elvas account gives 18 Spaniards and 2,500 Indians killed, Biedma says 20 Spaniards killed, without giving an estimate of the Indians, while Garcilaso has 82 Spaniards and over 11,000 Indians killed. In distances there is as great discrepancy. Thus Biedma makes the distance from Guaxule to Chiaha four days, Garcilaso has it six days, and Elvas seven days. As to the length of an average day’s march we find itestimated all the way from “four leagues, more or less” (Garcilaso) to “every day seven or eight leagues” (Elvas). In another place the Elvas chronicler states that they usually made five or six leagues a day through inhabited territories, but that in crossing uninhabited regions—as that between Canasagua and Chiaha, they marched every day as far as possible for fear of running out of provisions. One of the most glaring discrepancies appears in regard to the distance between Chiaha and Coste. Both the Portuguese writer and Garcilaso put Chiaha upon an island—a statement which in itself is at variance with any present conditions,—but while the former makes the island a fraction over a league in length the latter says that it was five leagues long. The next town was Coste, which Garcilaso puts immediately at the lower end of the same island while the Portuguese Gentleman represents it as seven days distant, although he himself has given the island the shorter length.Notwithstanding a deceptive appearance of exactness, especially in the Elvas and Ranjel narratives, which have the form of a daily journal, the conclusion is irresistible that much of the record was made after dates had been forgotten, and the sequence of events had become confused. Considering all the difficulties, dangers, and uncertainties that constantly beset the expedition, it would be too much to expect the regularity of a ledger, and it is more probable that the entries were made, not from day to day, but at irregular intervals as opportunity presented at the several resting places. The story must be interpreted in the light of our later knowledge of the geography and ethnology of the country traversed.Each of the three principal narratives has passed through translations and later editions of more or less doubtful fidelity to the original, the English edition in some cases being itself a translation from an earlier French or Dutch translation. English speaking historians of the expedition have usually drawn their material from one or the other of these translations, without knowledge of the original language, of the etymologies of the Indian names or the relations of the various tribes mentioned, or of the general system of Indian geographic nomenclature. One of the greatest errors has been the attempt to give in every case a fixed local habitation to a name which in some instances is not a proper name at all, and in others is merely a descriptive term or a duplicate name occurring at several places in the same tribal territory. Thus Tali is simply the Creek wordtalua, town, and not a definite place name as represented by a mistake natural in dealing through interpreters with an unknown Indian language. Tallise and Tallimuchase are respectively “Old town” and “New town” in Creek, and there can be no certainty that the same names were applied to the same places a century later. Canasagua is a corruption of a Cherokee name which occurs in at least three other places in the old Cherokee country in addition to the one mentioned in the narrative, and almost every old Indian local name was thus repeated several times, as in the case of such common names as Short creek, Whitewater, Richmond, or Lexington among ourselves. The fact that only one name of the set has been retained on the map does not prove its identity with the town of the old chronicle. Again such loose terms as “a large river,” “a beautiful valley,” have been assumed to mean something more definitely localized than the wording warrants. The most common error in translation has been the rendering of the Spanish “despoblado” as “desert.” There are no deserts in the Gulf states, and the word means simply an uninhabited region, usually the debatable strip between two tribes.There have been many attempts to trace De Soto’s route. As nearly every historian who has written of the southern states has given attention to this subject it is unnecessary to enumerate them all. Of some thirty works consulted by the author, in addition to the original narratives already mentioned, not more than two or three can be considered as speaking with any authority, the rest simply copying from these without investigation. The first attempt to locate the route definitely was made by Meek (Romantic Passages, etc.) in 1839 (reprinted in 1857), his conclusions beingbased upon his general knowledge of the geography of the region. In 1851 Pickett tried to locate the route, chiefly, he asserts, from Indian tradition as related by mixed-bloods. How much dependence can be placed upon Indian tradition as thus interpreted three centuries after the event it is unnecessary to say. Both these writers have brought De Soto down the Coosa river, in which they have been followed without investigation by Irving, Shea and others, but none of these was aware of the existence of a Suwali tribe, or correctly acquainted with the Indian nomenclature of the upper country, or of the Creek country as so well summarized by Gatschet in his Creek Migration Legend. They are also mistaken in assuming that only De Soto passed through the country, whereas we now know that several Spanish explorers and numerous French adventurers traversed the same territory, the latest expeditions of course being freshest in Indian memory. Jones in his “De Soto’s March Through Georgia” simply dresses up the earlier statements in more literary style, sometimes changing surmises to positive assertions, without mentioning his authorities. Maps of the supposed route, all bringing De Soto down the Coosa instead of the Chattahoochee, have been published in Irving’s Conquest of Florida, the Hakluyt Society’s edition of the Gentleman of Elva’s account, and in Buckingham Smith’s translation of the same narrative, as well as in several other works. For the eastern portion, with which we have to deal, all of these are practically duplicates of one another. On several old Spanish and French maps the names mentioned in the narrative seem to have been set down merely to fill space, without much reference to the text of the chronicle. For a list and notices of principal writers who have touched upon this subject see the appendix to Shea’s chapter on “Ancient Florida” in Winsor’s Narrative and Critical History of America,II; Boston, 1886. We shall speak only of that part of the route which lay near the Cherokee mountains.The first location which concerns us in the narrative is Cofitachiqui, the town from which De Soto set out for the Cherokee country. The name appears variously as Cofitachequi (Ranjel), Cofitachique (Biedma), Cofachiqui (Garcilaso), Cutifa-Chiqui (by transposition, Elvas), Cofetaçque (Vandera), Catafachique (Williams) and Cosatachiqui (misprint, Brooks MSS), and the Spaniards first heard of the region as Yupaha from a tribe farther to the south. The correct form appears to be that first given, which Gatschet, from later information than that quoted in his Creek Migration Legend, makes a Hitchitee word about equivalent to “Dogwood town,” fromcofi, “dogwood,”cofita, “dogwood thicket,” andchiki, “house,” or collectively “town.” McCulloch puts the town upon the headwaters of the Ocmulgee; Williams locates it on the Chattahoochee; Gallatin on the Oconee or the Savannah; Meek and Monette, following him, probably in the fork of the Savannah and the Broad; Pickett, with Jones and others following him, at Silver bluff on the east (north) bank of the Savannah, in Barnwell county, South Carolina, about 25 miles by water below the present Augusta. It will thus be seen that at the very outset of our inquiry the commentators differ by a distance equal to more than half the width of the state of Georgia. It will suffice here to say, without going into the argument, that the author is inclined to believe that the Indian town was on or near Silver bluff, which was noted for its extensive ancient remains as far back as Bartram’s time (Travels, 313), and where the noted George Galphin established a trading post in 1736. The original site has since been almost entirely worn away by the river. According to the Indians of Cofitachiqui, the town, which was on the farther (north) bank of the stream, was two day’s journey from the sea, probably by canoe, and the sailors with the expedition believed the river to be the same one that entered at St. Helena, which was a very close guess. The Spaniards were shown here European articles which they were told had been obtained from white men who had entered the river’s mouth many years before. These they conjectured to have been the men with Ayllon, who had landed on that coast in 1520 and again in 1524. The town was probably the ancient capital of the Uchee Indians, who, before their absorption bythe Creeks, held or claimed most of the territory on both banks of Savannah river from the Cherokee border to within about forty miles of Savannah and westward to the Ogeechee and Cannouchee rivers (see Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 17–24). The country was already on the decline in 1540 from a recent fatal epidemic, but was yet populous and wealthy, and was ruled by a woman chief whose authority extended for a considerable distance. The town was visited also by Pardo in 1567 and again by Torres in 1628, when it was still a principal settlement, as rich in pearls as in De Soto’s time (Brooks MSS, in the archives of the Bureau of American Ethnology).Somewhere in southern Georgia De Soto had been told of a rich province called Coça (Coosa, the Creek country) toward the northwest. At Cofitachiqui he again heard of it and of one of its principal towns called Chiaha (Chehaw) as being twelve days inland. Although on first hearing of it he had kept on in the other direction in order to reach Cofitachiqui, he now determined to go there, and made the queen a prisoner to compel her to accompany him a part of the way as guide. Coça province was, though he did not know it, almost due west, and he was in haste to reach it in order to obtain corn, as his men and horses were almost worn out from hunger. It is apparent, however, that the unwilling queen, afraid of being carried beyond her own territories, led the Spaniards by a roundabout route in the hope of making her escape, as she finally did, or perhaps of leaving them to starve and die in the mountains, precisely the trick attempted by the Indians upon another Spanish adventurer, Coronado, entering the great plains from the Pacific coast in search of golden treasure in the same year.Instead therefore of recrossing the river to the westward, the Spaniards, guided by the captive queen, took the direction of the north (“la vuelta del norte”—Biedma), and, after passing through several towns subject to the queen, came in seven days to “the province of Chalaque” (Elvas). Elvas, Garcilaso, and Ranjel agree upon the spelling, but the last named makes the distance only two days from Cofitachiqui. Biedma does not mention the country at all. The trifling difference in statement of five days in seven need not trouble us, as Biedma makes the whole distance from Cofitachiqui to Xuala eight days, and from Guaxule to Chiaha four days, where Elvas makes it, respectively, twelve and seven days. Chalaque is, of course, Cherokee, as all writers agree, and De Soto was now probably on the waters of Keowee river, the eastern head stream of Savannah river, where the Lower Cherokee had their towns. Finding the country bare of corn, he made no stay.Proceeding six days farther they came next to Guaquili, where they were kindly received. This name occurs only in the Ranjel narrative, the other three being entirely silent in regard to such a halting place. The name has a Cherokee sound (Wakili), but if we allow for a dialectic substitution oflforrit may be connected with such Catawba names as Congaree, Wateree, and Sugeree. It was probably a village of minor importance.They came next to the province of Xuala, or Xualla, as the Elvas narrative more often has it. In a French edition it appears as Chouala. Ranjel makes it three days from Guaquili or five from Chalaque. Elvas also makes it five days from Chalaque, while Biedma makes it eight days from Cofitachiqui, a total discrepancy of four days from the last-named place. Biedma describes it as a rough mountain country, thinly populated, but with a few Indian houses, and thinks that in these mountains the great river of Espiritu Santo (the Mississippi) had its birth. Ranjel describes the town as situated in a plain in the vicinity of rivers and in a country with greater appearance of gold mines than any they had yet seen. The Portuguese gentleman describes it as having very little corn, and says that they reached it from Cofitachiqui over a hilly country. In his final chapter he states that the course from Cofitachiqui to this place was from south to north, thus agreeing with Biedma. According to Garcilaso (pp. 136–137) it was fifty leagues by the road along which the Spaniards had come from Cofitachiqui to the first valley of the province of Xuala,with but few mountains on the way, and the town itself was situated close under a mountain (“a la falda de una sierra”) beside a small but rapid stream which formed the boundary of the territory of Cofitachiqui in this direction. From Ranjel we learn that on the same day after leaving this place for the next “province” the Spaniards crossed a very high mountain ridge (“una sierra muy alta”).Without mentioning the name, Pickett (1851) refers to Xuala as “a town in the present Habersham county, Georgia,” but gives no reason for this opinion. Rye and Irving, of the same date, arguing from a slight similarity of name, think it may have been on the site of a former Cherokee town, Qualatchee, on the head of Chattahoochee river in Georgia. The resemblance, however, is rather farfetched, and moreover this same name is found on Keowee river in South Carolina. Jones (De Soto in Georgia, 1880) interprets Garcilaso’s description to refer to “Nacoochee valley, Habersham county”—which should be White county—and the neighboring Mount Yonah, overlooking the fact that the same description of mountain, valley, and swift flowing stream might apply equally well to any one of twenty other localities in this southern mountain country. With direct contradiction Garcilaso says that the Spaniards rested here fifteen days because they found provisions plentiful, while the Portuguese Gentleman says that they stopped but two days because they found so little corn! Ranjel makes them stop four days and says they found abundant provisions and assistance.However that may have been, there can be no question of the identity of the name. As the province of Chalaque is the country of the Cherokee, so the province of Xuala is the territory of the Suwali or Sara Indians, better known later as Cheraw, who lived in early times in the piedmont country about the head of Broad river in North Carolina, adjoining the Cherokee, who still remember them under the name of Ani′-Suwa′li. A principal trail to their country from the west led up Swannanoa river and across the gap which, for this reason, was known to the Cherokee as Suwa′li-nuñnâ, “Suwali trail,” corrupted by the whites to Swannanoa. Lederer, who found them in the same general region in 1670, calls this gap the “Suala pass” and the neighboring mountains the Sara mountains, “which,” he says, “The Spaniards make Suala.” They afterward shifted to the north and finally returned and were incorporated with the Catawba (see Mooney, Siouan Tribes of the East, bulletin of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1894).Up to this point the Spaniards had followed a north course from Cofitachiqui (Biedma and Elvas), but they now turned to the west (Elvas, final chapter). On the same day on which they left Xuala they crossed “a very high mountain ridge,” and descended the next day to a wide meadow bottom (“savana”), through which flowed a river which they concluded was a part of the Espiritu Santo, the Mississippi (Ranjel). Biedma speaks of crossing a mountain country and mentions the river, which he also says they thought to be a tributary of the Mississippi. Garcilaso says that this portion of their route was through a mountain country without inhabitants (“despoblado”) and the Portuguese gentleman describes it as being over “very rough and high ridges.” In five days of such travel—for here, for a wonder, all the narratives agree—they came to Guaxule. This is the form given by Garcilaso and the Gentleman of Elvas; Biedma has Guasula, and Ranjel Guasili or Guasuli. The translators and commentators have given us such forms as Guachoule, Quaxule, Quaxulla, and Quexale. According to the Spanish method of writing Indian words the name was pronounced Washulé or Wasuli, which has a Cherokee sound, although it can not be translated. Buckingham Smith (Narratives, p. 222) hints that the Spaniards may have changed Guasili to Guasule, because of the similarity of the latter form to a town name in southern Spain. Such corruptions of Indian names are of frequent occurrence. Garcilaso speaks of it as a “province and town,” while Biedma and Ranjel call it simply a town (“pueblo”). Before reaching this place the Indian queen had managed to make her escape. All the chroniclers tell of the kind receptionwhich the Spaniards met here, but the only description of the town itself is from Garcilaso, who says that it was situated in the midst of many small streams which came down from the mountains round about, that it consisted of three hundred houses, which is probably an exaggeration, though it goes to show that the village was of considerable size, and that the chief’s house, in which the principal officers were lodged, was upon a high hill (“un cerro alto”), around which was a roadway (“paseadero”) wide enough for six men to walk abreast. By the “chief’s house” we are to understand the town-house, while from various similar references in other parts of the narrative there can be no doubt that the “hill” upon which it stood was an artificial mound. In modern Spanish writing such artificial elevations are more often calledlomas, but these early adventurers may be excused for not noting the distinction. Issuing from the mountains round about the town were numerous small streams, which united to form the river which the Spaniards henceforth followed from here down to Chiaha, where it was as large as the Guadalquivir at Sevilla (Garcilaso).Deceived by the occurrence, in the Portuguese narrative, of the name Canasagua, which they assumed could belong in but one place, earlier commentators have identified this river with the Coosa, Pickett putting Guaxule somewhere upon its upper waters, while Jones improves upon this by making the site “identical, or very nearly so, with Coosawattee Old town, in the southeastern corner of Murray county,” Georgia. As we shall show, however, the name in question was duplicated in several states, and a careful study of the narratives, in the light of present knowledge of the country, makes it evident that the river was not the Coosa, but the Chattahoochee.Turning our attention once more to Xuala, the most northern point reached by De Soto, we have seen that this was the territory of the Suwala or Sara Indians, in the eastern foothills of the Alleghenies, about the head waters of Broad and Catawba rivers, in North Carolina. As the Spaniards turned here to the west they probably did not penetrate far beyond the present South Carolina boundary. The “very high mountain ridge” which they crossed immediately after leaving the town was in all probability the main chain of the Blue ridge, while the river which they found after descending to the savanna on the other side, and which they guessed to be a branch of the Mississippi, was almost as certainly the upper part of the French Broad, the first stream flowing in an opposite direction from those which they had previously encountered. They may have struck it in the neighborhood of Hendersonville or Brevard, there being two gaps, passable for vehicles, in the main ridge eastward from the first-named town. The uninhabited mountains through which they struggled for several days on their way to Chiaha and Coça (the Creek country) in the southwest were the broken ridges in which the Savannah and the Little Tennessee have their sources, and if they followed an Indian trail they may have passed through the Rabun gap, near the present Clayton, Georgia. Guaxule, and not Xuala, as Jones supposes, was in Nacoochee valley, in the present White county, Georgia, and the small streams which united to form the river down which the Spaniards proceeded to Chiaha were the headwaters of the Chattahoochee. The hill upon which the townhouse was built must have been the great Nacoochee mound, the most prominent landmark in the valley, on the east bank of Sautee creek, in White county, about twelve miles northwest of Clarkesville. This is the largest mound in upper Georgia, with the exception of the noted Etowah mound near Cartersville, and is the only one which can fill the requirements of the case. There are but two considerable mounds in western North Carolina, that at Franklin and a smaller one on Oconaluftee river, on the present East Cherokee reservation, and as both of these are on streams flowing away from the Creek country, this fact alone would bar them from consideration. The only large mounds in upper Georgia are this one at Nacoochee and the group on the Etowah river, near Cartersville. The largest of the Etowah group is some fifty feet in height and is ascended on one side by means of a roadwayabout fifty feet wide at the base and narrowing gradually to the top. Had this been the mound of the narrative it is hardly possible that the chronicler would have failed to notice also the two other mounds of the group or the other one on the opposite side of the river, each of these being from twenty to twenty-five feet in height, to say nothing of the great ditch a quarter of a mile in length which encircles the group. Moreover, Cartersville is at some distance from the mountains, and the Etowah river at this point does not answer the description of a small rushing mountain stream. There is no considerable mound at Coosawatee or in any of the three counties adjoining.The Nacoochee mound has been cleared and cultivated for many years and does not now show any appearance of a roadway up the side, but from its great height we may be reasonably sure that some such means of easy ascent existed in ancient times. In other respects it is the only mound in the whole upper country which fills the conditions. The valley is one of the most fertile spots in Georgia and numerous ancient remains give evidence that it was a favorite center of settlement in early days. At the beginning of the modern historic period it was held by the Cherokee, who had there a town called Nacoochee, but their claim was disputed by the Creeks. The Gentleman of Elvas states that Guaxule was subject to the queen of Cofitachiqui, but this may mean only that the people of the two towns or tribes were in friendly alliance. The modern name is pronouncedNaguʻtsĭ′by the Cherokee, who say, however, that it is not of their language. The terminal may be the Creekudshi, “small,” or it may have a connection with the name of the Uchee Indians.From Guaxule the Spaniards advanced to Canasoga (Ranjel) or Canasagua (Elvas), one or two days’ march from Guaxule, according to one or the other authority. Garcilaso and Biedma do not mention the name. As Garcilaso states that from Guaxule to Chiaha the march was down the bank of the same river, which we identify with the Chattahoochee, the town may have been in the neighborhood of the present Gainesville. As we have seen, however, it is unsafe to trust the estimates of distance. Arguing from the name, Meek infers that the town was about Conasauga river in Murray county, and that the river down which they marched to reach it was “no doubt the Etowah,” although to reach the first named river from the Etowah it would be necessary to make another sharp turn to the north. From the same coincidence Pickett puts it on the Conasauga, “in the modern county of Murray, Georgia,” while Jones, on the same theory, locates it “at or near the junction of the Connasauga and Coosawattee rivers, in originally Cass, now Gordon county.” Here his modern geography as well as his ancient is at fault, as the original Cass county is now Bartow, the name having been changed in consequence of a local dislike for General Cass. The whole theory of a march down the Coosa river rests upon this coincidence of the name. The same name however, pronouncedGănsâ′gĭby the Cherokee, was applied by them to at least three different locations within their old territory, while the one mentioned in the narrative would make the fourth. The others were (1) on Oostanaula river, opposite the mouth of the Conasauga, where afterward was New Echota, in Gordon county, Georgia; (2) on Canasauga creek, in McMinn county, Tennessee; (3) on Tuckasegee river, about two miles above Webster, in Jackson county, North Carolina. At each of these places are remains of ancient settlement. It is possible that the name of Kenesaw mountain, near Marietta, in Cobb county, Georgia, may be a corruption ofGănsâ′gĭ, and if so, the Canasagua of the narrative may have been somewhere in this vicinity on the Chattahoochee. The meaning of the name is lost.On leaving Canasagua they continued down the same river which they had followed from Guaxule (Garcilaso), and after traveling several days through an uninhabited (“despoblado”) country (Elvas) arrived at Chiaha, which was subject to the great chief of Coça (Elvas). The name is spelled Chiaha by Ranjel and the Gentlemanof Elvas, Chiha by Biedma in the Documentos, China by a misprint in an English rendering, and Ychiaha by Garcilaso. It appears as Chiha on an English map of 1762 reproduced in Winsor, Westward Movement, page 31, 1897. Gallatin spells it Ichiaha, while Williams and Fairbanks, by misprint, make it Chiapa. According to both Ranjel and Elvas the army entered it on the 5th of June, although the former makes it four days from Canasagua, while the other makes it five. Biedma says it was four days from Guaxule, and, finally, Garcilaso says it was six days and thirty leagues from Guaxule and on the same river, which was, here at Chiaha, as large as the Guadalquivir at Sevilla. As we have seen, there is a great discrepancy in the statements of the distance from Cofitachiqui to this point. All four authorities agree that the town was on an island in the river, along which they had been marching for some time (Garcilaso, Ranjel), but while the Elvas narrative makes the island “two crossbow shot” in length above the town and one league in length below it, Garcilaso calls it a “great island more than five leagues long.” On both sides of the island the stream was very broad and easily waded (Elvas). Finding welcome and food for men and horses the Spaniards rested here nearly a month (June 5–28, Ranjel; twenty-six or twenty-seven days, Biedma; thirty days, Elvas). In spite of the danger from attack De Soto allowed his men to sleep under trees in the open air, “because it was very hot and the people should have suffered great extremity if it had not been so” (Elvas). This in itself is evidence that the place was pretty far to the south, as it was yet only the first week in June. The town was subject to the chief of the great province of Coça, farther to the west. From here onward they began to meet palisaded towns.On the theory that the march was down Coosa river, every commentator hitherto has located Chiaha at some point upon this stream, either in Alabama or Georgia. Gallatin (1836) says that it “must have been on the Coosa, probably some distance below the site of New Echota.” He notes a similarity of sound between Ichiaha and “Echoy” (Itseyĭ), a Cherokee town name. Williams (1837) says that it was on Mobile (i. e., the Alabama or lower Coosa river). Meek (1839) says “there can be little doubt that Chiaha was situated but a short distance above the junction of the Coosa and Chattooga rivers,” i. e., not far within the Alabama line. He notes the occurrence of a “Chiaha” (Chehawhaw) creek near Talladega, Alabama. In regard to the island upon which the town was said to have been situated he says: “There is no such island now in the Coosa. It is probable that the Spaniards either mistook the peninsula formed by the junction of two rivers, the Coosa and Chattooga, for an island, or that those two rivers were originally united so as to form an island near their present confluence. We have heard this latter supposition asserted by persons well acquainted with the country.”—Romantic Passages, p. 222, 1857. Monette (1846) puts it on Etowah branch of the Coosa, probably in Floyd county, Georgia. Pickett (1851), followed in turn by Irving, Jones, and Shea, locates it at “the site of the modern Rome.” The “island” is interpreted to mean the space between the two streams above the confluence.
(1)Tribal synonymy(page 15): Very few Indian tribes are known to us under the names by which they call themselves. One reason for this is the fact that the whites have usually heard of a tribe from its neighbors, speaking other languages, before coming upon the tribe itself. Many of the popular tribal names were originally nicknames bestowed by neighboring tribes, frequently referring to some peculiar custom, and in a large number of cases would be strongly repudiated by the people designated by them. As a rule each tribe had a different name in every surrounding Indian language, besides those given by Spanish, French, Dutch, or English settlers.Yûñ′wiyă′—This word is compounded fromyûñwĭ(person) andyă(real or principal). The assumption of superiority is much in evidence in Indian tribal names; thus, the Iroquois, Delawares, and Pawnee call themselves, respectively, Oñwe-hoñwe, Leni-lenape′, and Tsariksi-tsa′riks, all of which may be rendered “men of men,” “men surpassing other men,” or “real men.”Kĭtu′hwagĭ—This word, which can not be analyzed, is derived from Kĭtu′hwă, the name of an ancient Cherokee settlement formerly on Tuckasegee river, just above the present Bryson City, in Swain county, North Carolina. It is noted in 1730 as one of the “seven mother towns” of the tribe. Its inhabitants were called Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ (people of Kituhwa), and seem to have exercised a controlling influence over those of all the towns on the waters of Tuckasegee and the upper part of Little Tennessee, the whole body being frequently classed together as Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ. The dialect of these towns held a middle place linguistically between those spoken to the east, on the heads of Savannah, and to the west, on Hiwassee, Cheowah, and the lower course of Little Tennessee. In various forms the word was adopted by the Delawares, Shawano, and other northern Algonquian tribes as a synonym for Cherokee, probably from the fact that the Kituhwa people guarded the Cherokee northern frontier. In the form Cuttawa it appears on the French map of Vaugondy in 1755. From a similarity of spelling, Schoolcraft incorrectly makes it a synonym for Catawba, while Brinton incorrectly asserts that it is an Algonquian term, fancifully rendered, “inhabitants of the great wilderness.” Among the western Cherokee it is now the name of a powerful secret society, which had its origin shortly before the War of the Rebellion.Cherokee—This name occurs in fully fifty different spellings. In the standard recognized form, which dates back at least to 1708, it has given name to counties in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, within the ancient territory of the tribe, and to as many as twenty other geographic locations within the United States. In the Eastern or Lower dialect, with which the English settlers first became familiar, the form is Tsa′răgĭ′, whence we get Cherokee. In the other dialects the form is Tsa′lăgĭ′. It is evidently foreign to the tribe, as is frequently the case in tribal names, and in all probability is of Choctaw origin, having come up from the south through the medium of the Mobilian trade jargon. It will be noted that De Soto, whose chroniclers first use the word, in the form Chalaque, obtained his interpreters from the Gulf coast of Florida. Fontanedo, writing about the year 1575, mentions other inland tribes known to the natives of Florida under names which seem to beof Choctaw origin; for instance, the Canogacole, interpreted “wicked people,” the final part being apparently the Choctaw wordoklaorogula, “people”, which appears also in Pascagoula, Bayou Goula, and Pensacola. Shetimasha, Atakapa, and probably Biloxi, are also Choctaw names, although the tribes themselves are of other origins. As the Choctaw held much of the Gulf coast and were the principal traders of that region, it was natural that explorers landing among them should adopt their names for the more remote tribes.The name seems to refer to the fact that the tribe occupied a cave country. In the “Choctaw Leksikon” of Allen Wright, 1880, page 87, we findcholuk, a noun, signifying a hole, cavity, pit, chasm, etc., and as an adjective signifying hollow. In the manuscript Choctaw dictionary of Cyrus Byington, in the library of the Bureau of American Ethnology, we findchiluk, noun, a hole, cavity, hollow, pit, etc., with a statement that in its usual application it means a cavity or hollow, and not a hole through anything. As an adjective, the same form is given as signifying hollow, having a hole, asiti chiluk, a hollow tree;aboha chiluk, an empty house;chiluk chukoa, to enter a hole. Other noun forms given arechulukandachilukin the singular andchilukoain the plural, all signifying hole, pit, or cavity. Verbal forms arechilukikbi, to make a hole, andchilukba, to open and form a fissure.In agreement with the genius of the Cherokee language the root form of the tribal name takes nominal or verbal prefixes according to its connection with the rest of the sentence, and is declined, or rather conjugated, as follows:Singular—first person,tsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, I (am) a Cherokee; second person,hi-Tsa′lăgĭ, thou art a Cherokee; third person,a-Tsa′lăgĭ, he is a Cherokee.Dual—first person,âsti-Tsa′lăgĭ, we two are Cherokee; second person,sti-Tsa′lăgĭ, you two are Cherokee; third person,ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ, they two are Cherokee.Plural—first person,atsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, we (several) are Cherokee; second person,hitsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, you (several) are Cherokee; third person,ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ, they (several) are Cherokee. It will be noticed that the third person dual and plural are alike.Oyataʼgeʻronoñʼ, etc.—The Iroquois (Mohawk) form is given by Hewitt as O-yataʼ-geʻronoñʼ, of which the root isyataʼ, cave,ois the assertive prefix,geis the locative at, andronoñʼis the tribal suffix, equivalent to (English)-itesor people. The word, which has several dialectic forms, signifies “inhabitants of the cave country,” or “cave-country people,” rather than “people who dwell in caves,” as rendered by Schoolcraft. The same radixyataʼoccurs also in the Iroquois name for the opossum, which is a burrowing animal. As is well known, the Allegheny region is peculiarly a cave country, the caves having been used by the Indians for burial and shelter purposes, as is proved by numerous remains found in them. It is probable that the Iroquois simply translated the name (Chalaque) current in the South, as we find is the case in the West, where the principal plains tribes are known under translations of the same names in all the different languages. The Wyandot name for the Cherokee, Wataiyo-ronoñʼ, and their Catawba name, Mañterañ′, both seem to refer to coming out of the ground, and may have been originally intended to convey the same idea of cave people.Rickahockan—This name is used by the German explorer, Lederer, in 1670, as the name of the people inhabiting the mountains to the southwest of the Virginia settlements. On his map he puts them in the mountains on the southern head streams of Roanoke river, in western North Carolina. He states that, according to his Indian informants, the Rickahockan lived beyond the mountains in a land of great waves, which he interpreted to mean the sea shore (!), but it is more likely that the Indians were trying to convey, by means of the sign language, the idea of a succession of mountain ridges. The name was probably of Powhatan origin, and is evidently identical with Rechahecrian of the Virginia chronicles of about the same period, therin the latter form being perhaps a misprint. It may be connected with Righkahauk, indicated on Smith’s map of Virginia, in 1607, as the name of a town within thePowhatan territory, and still preserved in Rockahock, the name of an estate on lower Pamunkey river. We have too little material of the Powhatan language to hazard an interpretation, but it may possibly contain the root of the word for sand, which appears aslekawa,nikawa,negaw,rigawa,rekwa, etc., in various eastern Algonquian dialects, whence Rockaway (sand), and Recgawawank (sandy place). The Powhatan form, as given by Strachey, isracawh(sand). He gives alsorocoyhook(otter),reihcahahcoik, hidden under a cloud, overcast,rickahoneorreihcoan(a comb), andrickewh(to divide in halves).Talligewi—As Brinton well says: “No name in the Lenape′ legends has given rise to more extensive discussion than this.” On Colden’s map in his “History of the Five Nations,” 1727, we find the “Alleghens” indicated upon Allegheny river. Heckewelder, who recorded the Delaware tradition in 1819, says: “Those people, as I was told, called themselves Talligeu or Talligewi. Colonel John Gibson, however, a gentleman who has a thorough knowledge of the Indians, and speaks several of their languages, is of the opinion that they were not called Talligewi, but Alligewi; and it would seem that he is right from the traces of their name which still remain in the country, the Allegheny river and mountains having indubitably been named after them. The Delawares still call the former Alligewi Sipu (the river of the Alligewi)”—Indian Nations, p. 48, ed. 1876. Loskiel, writing on the authority of Zeisberger, says that the Delawares knew the whole country drained by the Ohio under the name of Alligewinengk, meaning “the land in which they arrived from distant places,” basing his interpretation upon an etymology compounded fromtallioralli, there,icku, to that place, andewak, they go, with a locative final. Ettwein, another Moravian writer, says the Delawares called “the western country” Alligewenork, meaning a warpath, and called the river Alligewi Sipo. This definition would make the word come frompallitonoralliton, to fight, to make war,ewak, they go, and a locative, i. e., “they go there to fight.” Trumbull, an authority on Algonquian languages, derives the river name fromwulik, good, best,hanne, rapid stream, andsipu, river, of which rendering its Iroquois name,Ohio, is nearly an equivalent. Rafinesque renders Talligewi as “there found,” fromtalli, there, and some other root, not given (Brinton, Walam Olum, pp. 229–230, 1885).It must be noted that the names Ohio and Alligewi (or Allegheny) were not applied by the Indians, as with us, to different parts of the same river, but to the whole stream, or at least the greater portion of it from its head downward. Although Brinton sees no necessary connection between the river name and the traditional tribal name, the statement of Heckewelder, generally a competent authority on Delaware matters, makes them identical.In the traditional tribal name, Talligewi or Alligewi,wiis an assertive verbal suffix, so that the form properly means “he is a Tallige,” or “they are Tallige.” This comes very near to Tsa′lăgĭ′, the name by which the Cherokee call themselves, and it may have been an early corruption of that name. In Zeisberger’s Delaware dictionary, however, we findwalohorwalok, signifying a cave or hole, while in the “Walam Olum” we haveoligonunkrendered “at the place of caves,” the region being further described as a buffalo land on a pleasant plain, where the Lenape′, advancing seaward from a less abundant northern region, at last found food (Walam Olum, pp. 194–195). Unfortunately, like other aboriginal productions of its kind among the northern tribes, the Lenape chronicle is suggestive rather than complete and connected. With more light it may be that seeming discrepancies would disappear and we should find at last that the Cherokee, in ancient times as in the historic period, were always the southern vanguard of the Iroquoian race, always primarily a mountain people, but with their flank resting upon the Ohio and its great tributaries, following the trend of the Blue ridge and the Cumberland as they slowly gave way before the pressure from the north until they were finally cut off from the parent stock by the wedge of Algonquian invasion, but always, whether in the northor in the south, keeping their distinctive title among the tribes as the “people of the cave country.”As the Cherokee have occupied a prominent place in history for so long a period their name appears in many synonyms and diverse spellings. The following are among the principal of these:SYNONYMSTsa′lăgĭ′(plural,Ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ′). Proper form in the Middle and Western Cherokee dialects.Tsa′răgĭ′.Proper form in the Eastern or Lower Cherokee dialect.Achalaque.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 1847 (incorrectly quoting Garcilaso).Chalakee.Nuttall, Travels, 124, 1821.Chalaque.Gentleman of Elvas, 1557; Publications of Hakluyt Society, IX, 60, 1851.Chalaquies.Barcia, Ensayo, 335, 1723.Charakeys.Homann heirs’ map, about 1730.Charikees.Document of 1718,fideRivers, South Carolina, 55, 1856.Charokees.Governor Johnson, 1720,fideRivers, Early History South Carolina, 93, 1874.Cheelake.Barton, New Views, xliv, 1798.Cheerake.Adair, American Indians, 226, 1775.Cheerakee.Ibid., 137.Cheeraque’s. Moore, 1704, in Carroll, Hist. Colls. South Carolina,II, 576, 1836.Cheerokee.Ross (?), 1776, in Historical Magazine, 2d series,II, 218, 1867.Chel-a-ke.Long, Expedition to Rocky Mountains,II, lxx, 1823.Chelakees.Gallatin, Trans. Am. Antiq. Soc.,II, 90, 1836.Chelaques.Nuttall, Travels, 247, 1821.Chelekee.Keane, in Stanford’s Compendium, 506, 1878.Chellokee.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,II, 204, 1852.Cheloculgee.White, Statistics of Georgia, 28, 1849 (given as plural form of Creek name).Chelokees.Gallatin, Trans. Am. Antiq. Soc.,II, 104, 1836.Cheokees.Johnson, 1772, in New York Doc. Col. Hist.,VIII, 314, 1857 (misprint forCherokees).Cheraguees.Coxe, Carolina,II, 1741.Cherakees.Ibid., map, 1741.Cherakis.Chauvignerie, 1736,fideSchoolcraft, Indian Tribes,III, 555, 1853.Cheraquees.Coxe, Carolana, 13, 1741.Cheraquis.Penicaut, 1699, in Margry,V, 404, 1883.Cherickees.Clarke, 1739, in New York Doc. Col. Hist.,VI, 148, 1855.Cherikee.Albany conference, 1742, ibid., 218.Cherokee.Governor Johnson, 1708, in Rivers, South Carolina, 238, 1856.Cherookees.Croghan, 1760, in Mass. Hist. Soc. Colls., 4th series,IX, 372, 1871.Cheroquees.Campbell, 1761, ibid., 416.Cherrackees.Evans, 1755, in Gregg, Old Cheraws, 15, 1867.Cherrokees.Treaty of 1722,fideDrake, Book of Indians, bk. 4, 32, 1848.Cherrykees.Weiser, 1748,fideKauffman, Western Pennsylvania, appendix, 18, 1851.Chirakues.Randolph, 1699, in Rivers, South Carolina, 449, 1856.Chirokys.Writer about 1825, Annales de la Prop. de la Foi,II, 384, 1841.Chorakis.Document of 1748, New York Doc. Col. Hist.,X, 143, 1858.Chreokees.Pike, Travels, 173, 1811 (misprint, transposed).Shanaki.Gatschet, Caddo MS, Bureau Am. Ethn., 1882 (Caddo name).Shan-nack.Marcy, Red River, 273, 1854 (Wichita name).Shannaki.Gatschet, Fox MS, Bureau Am. Ethn., 1882 (Fox name: plural form,Shannakiak).Shayage.Gatschet, Kaw MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1878 (Kaw name).Sulluggoes.Coxe, Carolana, 22, 1741.Tcalke.Gatschet, Tonkawa MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1882 (Tonkawa name,Chal-ke).Tcerokiec.Gatschet, Wichita MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1882 (Wichita name,Cherokish).Tchatakes.La Salle, 1682, in Margry,II, 197, 1877 (misprint).Tsalakies.Gallatin, Trans. Am. Antiq. Soc.,II, 90, 1836.Tsallakee.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 310, 1847.Tsä-ló-kee.Morgan, Ancient Society, 113, 1878.Tschirokesen.Wrangell, Ethn. Nachrichten,XIII, 1839 (German form).Tsûlahkĭ.Grayson, Creek MS, Bur. Am. Ethn., 1885 (Creek name; plural form,Tsălgăl′giorTsûlgûl′gi—Mooney).Tzerrickey.Urlsperger,fideGatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 26, 1884.Tzulukis.Rafinesque, Am. Nations,I, 123, 1836.Zolucans.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 23, 1824.Zulocans.Talligeu.Heckewelder, 1819, Indian Nations, 48, reprint of 1876 (traditional Delaware name; singular,Tallige′orAllige′(see preceding explanation).Talligewi.Alligewi.Alleg.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,V, 133, 1855.Allegans.Colden, map, 1727,fideSchoolcraft, ibid.,III, 525, 1853.Allegewi.Schoolcraft, ibid.,V, 133, 1855.Alleghans.Colden, 1727, quoted in Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 147, 1847.Alleghanys.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 34, 1824.Alleghens.Colden, map, 1727,fideSchoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 305, 1847.Allegwi.Squier, in Beach, Indian Miscellany, 26, 1877.Alli.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,V, 133, 1855.Allighewis.Keane, in Stanford’s Compendium, 500, 1878.Talagans.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 28, 1824.Talega.Brinton, Walam Olum, 201, 1885.Tallagewy.Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes,II, 36, 1852.Tallegwi.Rafinesque,fideMercer, Lenape Stone, 90, 1885.Talligwee.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 310, 1847.Tallike.Brinton, Walam Olum, 230, 1885.Kĭtu′hwagĭ(plural,Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ. See preceding explanation).Cuttawa.Vaugondy, map,Partie de l’Amérique, Septentrionale 1755.Gatohua.Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 28, 1884.Gattochwa.Katowa(plural,Katowagi).Ketawaugas.Haywood, Natural and Aboriginal Tennessee, 233, 1823.Kittuwa.Brinton, Walam Olum, 16, 1885 (Delaware name).Kuttoowauw.Aupaumut, 1791,fideBrinton, ibid., 16 (Mahican name).Oyataʼgeʻronoñʼ.Hewitt, oral information (Iroquois (Mohawk) name. See preceding explanation).Ojadagochroene.Livingston, 1720, in New York Doc. Col. Hist.,V, 567, 1855.Ondadeonwas.Bleeker, 1701, ibid.,IV, 918, 1854.Oyadackuchraono.Weiser, 1753, ibid.,VI, 795, 1855.Oyadagahroenes.Letter of 1713, ibid.,V, 386, 1855 (incorrectly stated to be the Flat-heads, i. e., either Catawbas or Choctaws).Oyadage′ono.Gatschet, Seneca MS, 1882, Bur. Am. Ethn. (Seneca name).O-ya-dä′-go-o-no.Morgan, League of Iroquois, 337, 1851.Oyaudah.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 448, 1847 (Seneca name).Uwata′-yo-ro′-no.Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend, 28, 1884 (Wyandot name).Uyada.Ibid. (Seneca name).We-yau-dah.Schoolcraft, Notes on Iroquois, 253, 1847.Wa-tai-yo-ro-noñ′’.Hewitt, Wyandot MS, 1893, Bur. Am. Ethn. (Wyandot name).Rickahockans.Lederer, 1672, Discoveries, 26, reprint of 1891 (see preceding explanation).Rickohockans.Map, ibid.Rechahecrians.Drake, Book of Indians, book 4, 22, 1848 (from old Virginia documents).Rechehecrians.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 36, 1824.Mâñterâñ′.Gatschet, Catawba MS, 1881, Bur. Am. Ethn. (Catawba name. See preceding explanation).Entarironnon.Potier, Racines Huronnes et Grammaire, MS, 1751 (Wyandot names. The first, according to Hewitt, is equivalent to “ridge, or mountain, people”).Ochieʻtarironnon.Tʼkwen-tah-e-u-ha-ne.Beauchamp, in Journal Am. Folklore,V, 225, 1892 (given as the Onondaga name and rendered, “people of a beautiful red color”).Canogacole(?).Fontanedo, about 1575, Memoir, translated in French Hist. Colls., II, 257, 1875 (rendered “wicked people”).(2)Mobilian trade language(page 16): This trade jargon, based upon Choctaw, but borrowing also from all the neighboring dialects and even from the more northern Algonquian languages, was spoken and understood among all the tribes of the Gulf states, probably as far west as Matagorda bay and northward along both banks of the Mississippi to the Algonquian frontier about the entrance of the Ohio. It was called Mobilienne by the French, from Mobile, the great trading center of the Gulf region. Along the Mississippi it was sometimes known also as the Chickasaw trade language, the Chickasaw being a dialect of the Choctaw language proper. Jeffreys, in 1761, compares this jargon in its uses to the lingua franca of the Levant, and it was evidently by the aid of this intertribal medium that De Soto’s interpreter from Tampa bay could converse with all the tribes they met until they reached the Mississippi. Some of the names used by Fontanedo about 1575 for the tribes northward from Appalachee bay seem to be derived from this source, as in later times were the names of the other tribes of the Gulf region, without regard to linguistic affinities, including among others the Taensa, Tunica, Atakapa, and Shetimasha, representing as many different linguistic stocks. In his report upon the southwestern tribes in 1805, Sibley says that the “Mobilian” was spoken in addition to their native languages by all the Indians who had come from the east side of the Mississippi. Among those so using it he names the Alabama, Apalachi, Biloxi, Chactoo, Pacana, Pascagula, Taensa, and Tunica. Woodward, writing from Louisiana more than fifty years later, says: “There is yet a language the Texas Indians call the Mobilian tongue, that has been the trading language of almost all the tribes that have inhabited the country. I know white men that now speak it. There is a man now living near me that is fifty years of age, raised in Texas, that speaks the language well. It is a mixture of Creek, Choctaw, Chickasay, Netches [Natchez], and Apelash [Apalachi]”—Reminiscences, 79. For further information see also Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend, and Sibley, Report.The Mobilian trade jargon was not unique of its kind. In America, as in other parts of the world, the common necessities of intercommunication have resulted in the formation of several such mongrel dialects, prevailing, sometimes over wide areas. In some cases, also, the language of a predominant tribe serves as the common medium for all the tribes of a particular region. In South America we find the lingoa geral, based upon the Tupi′ language, understood for everyday purposes by all the tribes of the immense central region from Guiana to Paraguay, including almost the whole Amazon basin. On the northwest coast we find the well-known “Chinook jargon,” which takes its name from a small tribe formerly residing at the mouth of the Columbia, in common use among all the tribes from California far upinto Alaska, and eastward to the great divide of the Rocky mountains. In the southwest the Navaho-Apache language is understood by nearly all the Indians of Arizona and New Mexico, while on the plains the Sioux language in the north and the Comanche in the south hold almost the same position. In addition to these we have also the noted “sign language,” a gesture system used and perfectly understood as a fluent means of communication among all the hunting tribes of the plains from the Saskatchewan to the Rio Grande.(3)Dialects(page 17): The linguistic affinity of the Cherokee and northern Iroquoian dialects, although now well established, is not usually obvious on the surface, but requires a close analysis of words, with a knowledge of the laws of phonetic changes, to make it appear. The superficial agreement is perhaps most apparent between the Mohawk and the Eastern (Lower) Cherokee dialects, as both of these lack the labials entirely and userinstead ofl. In the short table given below the Iroquois words are taken, with slight changes in the alphabet used, from Hewitt’s manuscripts, the Cherokee from those of the author:MohawkCherokee (Eastern)personoñgweʼyûñwĭfireotsiʼraʼatsi′ra (atsi′la)waterawĕñʼăwă′ (ămă′)stoneonĕñyaʼnûñyû′arrowkaʼnoñʼkûnĭ′pipekanoñnăwĕñʼkănûñ′năwûhand (arm)owe′yaʼuwâ′yĭmilkunĕñʼtaʼunûñ′tĭfivewĭskhĭskĭtobacco[tcărhûʼ, Tuscarora]tsârû (tsâlû)fishotcoñʼtaʼû′tsûtĭ′ghostoʼskĕñnaʼasgi′nasnakeĕñnătûñi′nădû′Comparison of Cherokee dialectsEastern (Lower)MiddleWestern (Upper)fireatsi′raatsi′laatsi′lawaterăwă′ămă′ămă′doggiʼrĭ′giʼlĭ′giʼlĭ′hairgitsû′gitsû′gitlû′hawktsă′nuwă′tsă′nuwă′tlă′nuwă′leechtsanu′sĭ′tsanu′sĭ′tlanu′sĭ′battsa′wehă′tsa′mehă′tla′mehă′panthertsûñtû′tsĭtsûñtû′tsĭtlûñtû′tsĭjaytsayʼkû′tsayʼkû′tlayʼkû′martin (bird)tsutsû′tsutsû′tlutlû′war-clubatăsû′atăsû′atăsĭ′heartunăhŭ′unăhŭ′unăhwĭ′where?ga′tsûga′tsûha′tlûhow much?hûñgû′hûñgû′hila′gûkeystugi′stĭstugi′stĭstui′stĭI pick it up (long)tsĭnigi′ûtsĭnigi′ûtsĭne′ûmy fatheragidâ′tăagidâ′tăedâ′tămy mothera′gitsĭ′a′gitsĭ′etsĭ′my father’s fatheragini′sĭagini′sĭeni′sĭmy mother’s fatheragidu′tŭagidu′tŭedu′tŭIt will be noted that the Eastern and Middle dialects are about the same, excepting for the change ofltor, and the entire absence of the labialmfrom the Eastern dialect, while the Western differs considerably from the others, particularly in the greater frequency of the liquidland the softening of the gutturalg, the changes tending to render it the most musical of all the Cherokee dialects. It is also the standard literary dialect. In addition to these three principal dialects there are some peculiar forms and expressions in use by a few individuals which indicate the former existence of one or more other dialects now too far extinct to be reconstructed. As in most other tribes, the ceremonial forms used by the priesthood are so filled with archaic and figurative expressions as to be almost unintelligible to the laity.(4)Iroquoian tribes and migrations(p.17): The Iroquoian stock, taking its name from the celebrated Iroquois confederacy, consisted formerly of from fifteen to twenty tribes, speaking nearly as many different dialects, and including, among others, the following:Wyandot, or Huron.Ontario, Canada.Tionontati, or Tobacco nation.Attiwan′daron, or Neutral nation.Tohotaenrat.Wenrorono.Mohawk.Iroquois, or Five Nations, New York.Oneida.Onondaga.Cayuga.Seneca.Erie. Northern Ohio, etc.Conestoga, or Susquehanna. Southern Pennsylvania and Maryland.Nottoway.Southern Virginia.Meherrin?.Tuscarora. Eastern North Carolina.Cherokee. Western Carolina, etc.Tradition and history alike point to the St. Lawrence region as the early home of this stock. Upon this point all authorities concur. Says Hale, in his paper on Indian Migrations (p. 4): “The constant tradition of the Iroquois represents their ancestors as emigrants from the region north of the Great lakes, where they dwelt in early times with their Huron brethren. This tradition is recorded with much particularity by Cadwallader Colden, surveyor-general of New York, who in the early part of the last century composed his well known ‘History of the Five Nations.’ It is told in a somewhat different form by David Cusick, the Tuscarora historian, in his ‘Sketches of Ancient History of the Six Nations,’ and it is repeated by Mr. L. H. Morgan in his now classical work, ‘The League of the Iroquois,’ for which he procured his information chiefly among the Senecas. Finally, as we learn from the narrative of the Wyandot Indian, Peter Clarke, in his book entitled ‘Origin and Traditional History of the Wyandotts,’ the belief of the Hurons accords in this respect with that of the Iroquois. Both point alike to the country immediately north of the St. Lawrence, and especially to that portion of it lying east of Lake Ontario, as the early home of the Huron-Iroquois nations.” Nothing is known of the traditions of the Conestoga or the Nottoway, but the tradition of the Tuscarora, as given by Cusick and other authorities, makes them a direct offshoot from the northern Iroquois, with whom they afterward reunited. The traditions of the Cherokee also, as we have seen, bring them from the north, thus completing the cycle. “The striking fact has become evident that the course of migration of the Huron-Cherokee family has been from the northeast to the southwest—that is, from eastern Canada, on the Lower St. Lawrence, to the mountains of northern Alabama.”—Hale, Indian Migrations, p. 11.The retirement of the northern Iroquoian tribes from the St. Lawrence region wasdue to the hostility of their Algonquian neighbors, by whom the Hurons and their allies were forced to take refuge about Georgian bay and the head of Lake Ontario, while the Iroquois proper retreated to central New York. In 1535 Cartier found the shores of the river from Quebec to Montreal occupied by an Iroquoian people, but on the settlement of the country seventy years later the same region was found in possession of Algonquian tribes. The confederation of the five Iroquois nations, probably about the year 1540, enabled them to check the Algonquian invasion and to assume the offensive. Linguistic and other evidence shows that the separation of the Cherokee from the parent stock must have far antedated this period.(5)Walam Olum(p.18): The name signifies “red score,” from the Delawarewalam, “painted,” more particularly “painted red,” andolum, “a score, tally-mark.” The Walam Olum was first published in 1836 in a work entitled “The American Nations,” by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque, a versatile and voluminous, but very erratic, French scholar, who spent the latter half of his life in this country, dying in Philadelphia in 1840. He asserted that it was a translation of a manuscript in the Delaware language, which was an interpretation of an ancient sacred metrical legend of the Delawares, recorded in pictographs cut upon wood, obtained in 1820 by a medical friend of his among the Delawares then living in central Indiana. He says himself: “These actualolumwere first obtained in 1820 as a reward for a medical cure, deemed a curiosity, and were unexplicable. In 1822 were obtained from another individual the songs annexed thereto in the original language, but no one could be found by me able to translate them. I had therefore to learn the language since, by the help of Zeisberger, Heckewelder, and a manuscript dictionary, on purpose to translate them, which I only accomplished in 1833.” On account of the unique character of the alleged Indian record and Rafinesque’s own lack of standing among his scientific contemporaries, but little attention was paid to the discovery until Brinton took up the subject a few years ago. After a critical sifting of the evidence from every point of view he arrived at the conclusion that the work is a genuine native production, although the manuscript rendering is faulty, partly from the white scribe’s ignorance of the language and partly from the Indian narrator’s ignorance of the meaning of the archaic forms. Brinton’s edition (q. v.), published from Rafinesque’s manuscript, gives the legend in triplicate form—pictograph, Delaware, and English translation, with notes and glossary, and a valuable ethnologic introduction by Brinton himself.It is not known that any of the original woodcut pictographs of the Walam Olum are now in existence, although a statement of Rafinesque implies that he had seen them. As evidence of the truth of his statement, however, we have the fact that precisely similar pictographic series cut upon birch bark, each pictograph representing a line or couplet of a sacred metrical recitation, are now known to be common among the Ojibwa, Menomini, and other northern tribes. In 1762 a Delaware prophet recorded his visions in hieroglyphics cut upon a wooden stick, and about the year 1827 a Kickapoo reformer adopted the same method to propagate a new religion among the tribes. One of these “prayer sticks” is now in the National Museum, being all that remains of a large basketful delivered to a missionary in Indiana by a party of Kickapoo Indians in 1830 (see plate and description, pp. 665, 697et seq.in the author’s Ghost-dance Religion, Fourteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology).(6)Fish river(p.18): Namæsi Sipu (Heckewelder, Indian Nations, 49), or Namassipi (Walam Olum, p. 198). Deceived by a slight similarity of sound, Heckewelder makes this river identical with the Mississippi, but as Schoolcraft shows (Notes on Iroquois, p. 316) the true name of the Mississippi is simply Misi-sipi, “great river,” and “fish river” would be a most inappropriate name for such a turbulent current, where only the coarser species can live. The mere fact that there can be a question of identity among experts familiar with Indian nomenclature would indicate that itwas not one of the larger streams. Although Heckewelder makes the Alligewi, as he prefers to call them, flee down the Mississippi after their final defeat, the Walam Olum chronicle says only “all the Talega go south.” It was probably a gradual withdrawal, rather than a sudden and concerted flight (see Hale, Indian Migrations, pp. 19–22).(7)First appearance of whites(p.19): It is possible that this may refer to one of the earlier adventurers who coasted along the North Atlantic in the first decades after the discovery of America, among whom were Sebastian Cabot, in 1498; Verrazano, in 1524; and Gomez, in 1525. As these voyages were not followed up by permanent occupation of the country it is doubtful if they made any lasting impression upon Indian tradition. The author has chosen to assume, with Brinton and Rafinesque, that the Walam Olum reference is to the settlement of the Dutch at New York and the English in Virginia soon after 1600.(8)De Soto’s route(p.26): On May 30, 1539, Hernando de Soto, of Spain, with 600 armed men and 213 horses, landed at Tampa bay, on the west coast of Florida, in search of gold. After more than four years of hardship and disappointed wandering from Florida to the great plains of the West and back again to the Mississippi, where De Soto died and his body was consigned to the great river, 311 men, all that were left of the expedition, arrived finally at Pánuco, in Mexico, on September 10, 1543.For the history of this expedition, the most important ever undertaken by Spain within eastern United States, we have four original authorities. First is the very brief, but evidently truthful (Spanish) report of Biedma, an officer of the expedition, presented to the King in 1544, immediately after the return to Spain. Next in order, but of first importance for detail and general appearance of reliability, is the narrative of an anonymous Portuguese cavalier of the expedition, commonly known as the Gentleman of Elvas, originally published in the Portuguese language in 1557. Next comes the (Spanish) narrative of Garcilaso, written, but not published, in 1587. Unlike the others, the author was not an eyewitness of what he describes, but made up his account chiefly from the oral recollections of an old soldier of the expedition more than forty years after the event, this information being supplemented from papers written by two other soldiers of De Soto. As might be expected, the Garcilaso narrative, although written in flowery style, abounds in exaggeration and trivial incident, and compares unfavorably with the other accounts, while probably giving more of the minor happenings. The fourth original account is an unfinished (Spanish) report by Ranjel, secretary of the expedition, written soon after reaching Mexico, and afterward incorporated with considerable change by Oviedo, in his “Historia natural y general de las Indias.” As this fourth narrative remained unpublished until 1851 and has never been translated, it has hitherto been entirely overlooked by the commentators, excepting Winsor, who notes it incidentally. In general it agrees well with the Elvas narrative and throws valuable light upon the history of the expedition.The principal authorities, while preserving a general unity of narrative, differ greatly in detail, especially in estimates of numbers and distances, frequently to such an extent that it is useless to attempt to reconcile their different statements. In general the Gentleman of Elvas is most moderate in his expression, while Biedma takes a middle ground and Garcilaso exaggerates greatly. Thus the first named gives De Soto 600 men, Biedma makes the number 620, while Garcilaso says 1,000. At a certain stage of the journey the Portuguese Gentleman gives De Soto 700 Indians as escort, Biedma says 800, while Garcilaso makes it 8,000. At the battle of Mavilla the Elvas account gives 18 Spaniards and 2,500 Indians killed, Biedma says 20 Spaniards killed, without giving an estimate of the Indians, while Garcilaso has 82 Spaniards and over 11,000 Indians killed. In distances there is as great discrepancy. Thus Biedma makes the distance from Guaxule to Chiaha four days, Garcilaso has it six days, and Elvas seven days. As to the length of an average day’s march we find itestimated all the way from “four leagues, more or less” (Garcilaso) to “every day seven or eight leagues” (Elvas). In another place the Elvas chronicler states that they usually made five or six leagues a day through inhabited territories, but that in crossing uninhabited regions—as that between Canasagua and Chiaha, they marched every day as far as possible for fear of running out of provisions. One of the most glaring discrepancies appears in regard to the distance between Chiaha and Coste. Both the Portuguese writer and Garcilaso put Chiaha upon an island—a statement which in itself is at variance with any present conditions,—but while the former makes the island a fraction over a league in length the latter says that it was five leagues long. The next town was Coste, which Garcilaso puts immediately at the lower end of the same island while the Portuguese Gentleman represents it as seven days distant, although he himself has given the island the shorter length.Notwithstanding a deceptive appearance of exactness, especially in the Elvas and Ranjel narratives, which have the form of a daily journal, the conclusion is irresistible that much of the record was made after dates had been forgotten, and the sequence of events had become confused. Considering all the difficulties, dangers, and uncertainties that constantly beset the expedition, it would be too much to expect the regularity of a ledger, and it is more probable that the entries were made, not from day to day, but at irregular intervals as opportunity presented at the several resting places. The story must be interpreted in the light of our later knowledge of the geography and ethnology of the country traversed.Each of the three principal narratives has passed through translations and later editions of more or less doubtful fidelity to the original, the English edition in some cases being itself a translation from an earlier French or Dutch translation. English speaking historians of the expedition have usually drawn their material from one or the other of these translations, without knowledge of the original language, of the etymologies of the Indian names or the relations of the various tribes mentioned, or of the general system of Indian geographic nomenclature. One of the greatest errors has been the attempt to give in every case a fixed local habitation to a name which in some instances is not a proper name at all, and in others is merely a descriptive term or a duplicate name occurring at several places in the same tribal territory. Thus Tali is simply the Creek wordtalua, town, and not a definite place name as represented by a mistake natural in dealing through interpreters with an unknown Indian language. Tallise and Tallimuchase are respectively “Old town” and “New town” in Creek, and there can be no certainty that the same names were applied to the same places a century later. Canasagua is a corruption of a Cherokee name which occurs in at least three other places in the old Cherokee country in addition to the one mentioned in the narrative, and almost every old Indian local name was thus repeated several times, as in the case of such common names as Short creek, Whitewater, Richmond, or Lexington among ourselves. The fact that only one name of the set has been retained on the map does not prove its identity with the town of the old chronicle. Again such loose terms as “a large river,” “a beautiful valley,” have been assumed to mean something more definitely localized than the wording warrants. The most common error in translation has been the rendering of the Spanish “despoblado” as “desert.” There are no deserts in the Gulf states, and the word means simply an uninhabited region, usually the debatable strip between two tribes.There have been many attempts to trace De Soto’s route. As nearly every historian who has written of the southern states has given attention to this subject it is unnecessary to enumerate them all. Of some thirty works consulted by the author, in addition to the original narratives already mentioned, not more than two or three can be considered as speaking with any authority, the rest simply copying from these without investigation. The first attempt to locate the route definitely was made by Meek (Romantic Passages, etc.) in 1839 (reprinted in 1857), his conclusions beingbased upon his general knowledge of the geography of the region. In 1851 Pickett tried to locate the route, chiefly, he asserts, from Indian tradition as related by mixed-bloods. How much dependence can be placed upon Indian tradition as thus interpreted three centuries after the event it is unnecessary to say. Both these writers have brought De Soto down the Coosa river, in which they have been followed without investigation by Irving, Shea and others, but none of these was aware of the existence of a Suwali tribe, or correctly acquainted with the Indian nomenclature of the upper country, or of the Creek country as so well summarized by Gatschet in his Creek Migration Legend. They are also mistaken in assuming that only De Soto passed through the country, whereas we now know that several Spanish explorers and numerous French adventurers traversed the same territory, the latest expeditions of course being freshest in Indian memory. Jones in his “De Soto’s March Through Georgia” simply dresses up the earlier statements in more literary style, sometimes changing surmises to positive assertions, without mentioning his authorities. Maps of the supposed route, all bringing De Soto down the Coosa instead of the Chattahoochee, have been published in Irving’s Conquest of Florida, the Hakluyt Society’s edition of the Gentleman of Elva’s account, and in Buckingham Smith’s translation of the same narrative, as well as in several other works. For the eastern portion, with which we have to deal, all of these are practically duplicates of one another. On several old Spanish and French maps the names mentioned in the narrative seem to have been set down merely to fill space, without much reference to the text of the chronicle. For a list and notices of principal writers who have touched upon this subject see the appendix to Shea’s chapter on “Ancient Florida” in Winsor’s Narrative and Critical History of America,II; Boston, 1886. We shall speak only of that part of the route which lay near the Cherokee mountains.The first location which concerns us in the narrative is Cofitachiqui, the town from which De Soto set out for the Cherokee country. The name appears variously as Cofitachequi (Ranjel), Cofitachique (Biedma), Cofachiqui (Garcilaso), Cutifa-Chiqui (by transposition, Elvas), Cofetaçque (Vandera), Catafachique (Williams) and Cosatachiqui (misprint, Brooks MSS), and the Spaniards first heard of the region as Yupaha from a tribe farther to the south. The correct form appears to be that first given, which Gatschet, from later information than that quoted in his Creek Migration Legend, makes a Hitchitee word about equivalent to “Dogwood town,” fromcofi, “dogwood,”cofita, “dogwood thicket,” andchiki, “house,” or collectively “town.” McCulloch puts the town upon the headwaters of the Ocmulgee; Williams locates it on the Chattahoochee; Gallatin on the Oconee or the Savannah; Meek and Monette, following him, probably in the fork of the Savannah and the Broad; Pickett, with Jones and others following him, at Silver bluff on the east (north) bank of the Savannah, in Barnwell county, South Carolina, about 25 miles by water below the present Augusta. It will thus be seen that at the very outset of our inquiry the commentators differ by a distance equal to more than half the width of the state of Georgia. It will suffice here to say, without going into the argument, that the author is inclined to believe that the Indian town was on or near Silver bluff, which was noted for its extensive ancient remains as far back as Bartram’s time (Travels, 313), and where the noted George Galphin established a trading post in 1736. The original site has since been almost entirely worn away by the river. According to the Indians of Cofitachiqui, the town, which was on the farther (north) bank of the stream, was two day’s journey from the sea, probably by canoe, and the sailors with the expedition believed the river to be the same one that entered at St. Helena, which was a very close guess. The Spaniards were shown here European articles which they were told had been obtained from white men who had entered the river’s mouth many years before. These they conjectured to have been the men with Ayllon, who had landed on that coast in 1520 and again in 1524. The town was probably the ancient capital of the Uchee Indians, who, before their absorption bythe Creeks, held or claimed most of the territory on both banks of Savannah river from the Cherokee border to within about forty miles of Savannah and westward to the Ogeechee and Cannouchee rivers (see Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 17–24). The country was already on the decline in 1540 from a recent fatal epidemic, but was yet populous and wealthy, and was ruled by a woman chief whose authority extended for a considerable distance. The town was visited also by Pardo in 1567 and again by Torres in 1628, when it was still a principal settlement, as rich in pearls as in De Soto’s time (Brooks MSS, in the archives of the Bureau of American Ethnology).Somewhere in southern Georgia De Soto had been told of a rich province called Coça (Coosa, the Creek country) toward the northwest. At Cofitachiqui he again heard of it and of one of its principal towns called Chiaha (Chehaw) as being twelve days inland. Although on first hearing of it he had kept on in the other direction in order to reach Cofitachiqui, he now determined to go there, and made the queen a prisoner to compel her to accompany him a part of the way as guide. Coça province was, though he did not know it, almost due west, and he was in haste to reach it in order to obtain corn, as his men and horses were almost worn out from hunger. It is apparent, however, that the unwilling queen, afraid of being carried beyond her own territories, led the Spaniards by a roundabout route in the hope of making her escape, as she finally did, or perhaps of leaving them to starve and die in the mountains, precisely the trick attempted by the Indians upon another Spanish adventurer, Coronado, entering the great plains from the Pacific coast in search of golden treasure in the same year.Instead therefore of recrossing the river to the westward, the Spaniards, guided by the captive queen, took the direction of the north (“la vuelta del norte”—Biedma), and, after passing through several towns subject to the queen, came in seven days to “the province of Chalaque” (Elvas). Elvas, Garcilaso, and Ranjel agree upon the spelling, but the last named makes the distance only two days from Cofitachiqui. Biedma does not mention the country at all. The trifling difference in statement of five days in seven need not trouble us, as Biedma makes the whole distance from Cofitachiqui to Xuala eight days, and from Guaxule to Chiaha four days, where Elvas makes it, respectively, twelve and seven days. Chalaque is, of course, Cherokee, as all writers agree, and De Soto was now probably on the waters of Keowee river, the eastern head stream of Savannah river, where the Lower Cherokee had their towns. Finding the country bare of corn, he made no stay.Proceeding six days farther they came next to Guaquili, where they were kindly received. This name occurs only in the Ranjel narrative, the other three being entirely silent in regard to such a halting place. The name has a Cherokee sound (Wakili), but if we allow for a dialectic substitution oflforrit may be connected with such Catawba names as Congaree, Wateree, and Sugeree. It was probably a village of minor importance.They came next to the province of Xuala, or Xualla, as the Elvas narrative more often has it. In a French edition it appears as Chouala. Ranjel makes it three days from Guaquili or five from Chalaque. Elvas also makes it five days from Chalaque, while Biedma makes it eight days from Cofitachiqui, a total discrepancy of four days from the last-named place. Biedma describes it as a rough mountain country, thinly populated, but with a few Indian houses, and thinks that in these mountains the great river of Espiritu Santo (the Mississippi) had its birth. Ranjel describes the town as situated in a plain in the vicinity of rivers and in a country with greater appearance of gold mines than any they had yet seen. The Portuguese gentleman describes it as having very little corn, and says that they reached it from Cofitachiqui over a hilly country. In his final chapter he states that the course from Cofitachiqui to this place was from south to north, thus agreeing with Biedma. According to Garcilaso (pp. 136–137) it was fifty leagues by the road along which the Spaniards had come from Cofitachiqui to the first valley of the province of Xuala,with but few mountains on the way, and the town itself was situated close under a mountain (“a la falda de una sierra”) beside a small but rapid stream which formed the boundary of the territory of Cofitachiqui in this direction. From Ranjel we learn that on the same day after leaving this place for the next “province” the Spaniards crossed a very high mountain ridge (“una sierra muy alta”).Without mentioning the name, Pickett (1851) refers to Xuala as “a town in the present Habersham county, Georgia,” but gives no reason for this opinion. Rye and Irving, of the same date, arguing from a slight similarity of name, think it may have been on the site of a former Cherokee town, Qualatchee, on the head of Chattahoochee river in Georgia. The resemblance, however, is rather farfetched, and moreover this same name is found on Keowee river in South Carolina. Jones (De Soto in Georgia, 1880) interprets Garcilaso’s description to refer to “Nacoochee valley, Habersham county”—which should be White county—and the neighboring Mount Yonah, overlooking the fact that the same description of mountain, valley, and swift flowing stream might apply equally well to any one of twenty other localities in this southern mountain country. With direct contradiction Garcilaso says that the Spaniards rested here fifteen days because they found provisions plentiful, while the Portuguese Gentleman says that they stopped but two days because they found so little corn! Ranjel makes them stop four days and says they found abundant provisions and assistance.However that may have been, there can be no question of the identity of the name. As the province of Chalaque is the country of the Cherokee, so the province of Xuala is the territory of the Suwali or Sara Indians, better known later as Cheraw, who lived in early times in the piedmont country about the head of Broad river in North Carolina, adjoining the Cherokee, who still remember them under the name of Ani′-Suwa′li. A principal trail to their country from the west led up Swannanoa river and across the gap which, for this reason, was known to the Cherokee as Suwa′li-nuñnâ, “Suwali trail,” corrupted by the whites to Swannanoa. Lederer, who found them in the same general region in 1670, calls this gap the “Suala pass” and the neighboring mountains the Sara mountains, “which,” he says, “The Spaniards make Suala.” They afterward shifted to the north and finally returned and were incorporated with the Catawba (see Mooney, Siouan Tribes of the East, bulletin of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1894).Up to this point the Spaniards had followed a north course from Cofitachiqui (Biedma and Elvas), but they now turned to the west (Elvas, final chapter). On the same day on which they left Xuala they crossed “a very high mountain ridge,” and descended the next day to a wide meadow bottom (“savana”), through which flowed a river which they concluded was a part of the Espiritu Santo, the Mississippi (Ranjel). Biedma speaks of crossing a mountain country and mentions the river, which he also says they thought to be a tributary of the Mississippi. Garcilaso says that this portion of their route was through a mountain country without inhabitants (“despoblado”) and the Portuguese gentleman describes it as being over “very rough and high ridges.” In five days of such travel—for here, for a wonder, all the narratives agree—they came to Guaxule. This is the form given by Garcilaso and the Gentleman of Elvas; Biedma has Guasula, and Ranjel Guasili or Guasuli. The translators and commentators have given us such forms as Guachoule, Quaxule, Quaxulla, and Quexale. According to the Spanish method of writing Indian words the name was pronounced Washulé or Wasuli, which has a Cherokee sound, although it can not be translated. Buckingham Smith (Narratives, p. 222) hints that the Spaniards may have changed Guasili to Guasule, because of the similarity of the latter form to a town name in southern Spain. Such corruptions of Indian names are of frequent occurrence. Garcilaso speaks of it as a “province and town,” while Biedma and Ranjel call it simply a town (“pueblo”). Before reaching this place the Indian queen had managed to make her escape. All the chroniclers tell of the kind receptionwhich the Spaniards met here, but the only description of the town itself is from Garcilaso, who says that it was situated in the midst of many small streams which came down from the mountains round about, that it consisted of three hundred houses, which is probably an exaggeration, though it goes to show that the village was of considerable size, and that the chief’s house, in which the principal officers were lodged, was upon a high hill (“un cerro alto”), around which was a roadway (“paseadero”) wide enough for six men to walk abreast. By the “chief’s house” we are to understand the town-house, while from various similar references in other parts of the narrative there can be no doubt that the “hill” upon which it stood was an artificial mound. In modern Spanish writing such artificial elevations are more often calledlomas, but these early adventurers may be excused for not noting the distinction. Issuing from the mountains round about the town were numerous small streams, which united to form the river which the Spaniards henceforth followed from here down to Chiaha, where it was as large as the Guadalquivir at Sevilla (Garcilaso).Deceived by the occurrence, in the Portuguese narrative, of the name Canasagua, which they assumed could belong in but one place, earlier commentators have identified this river with the Coosa, Pickett putting Guaxule somewhere upon its upper waters, while Jones improves upon this by making the site “identical, or very nearly so, with Coosawattee Old town, in the southeastern corner of Murray county,” Georgia. As we shall show, however, the name in question was duplicated in several states, and a careful study of the narratives, in the light of present knowledge of the country, makes it evident that the river was not the Coosa, but the Chattahoochee.Turning our attention once more to Xuala, the most northern point reached by De Soto, we have seen that this was the territory of the Suwala or Sara Indians, in the eastern foothills of the Alleghenies, about the head waters of Broad and Catawba rivers, in North Carolina. As the Spaniards turned here to the west they probably did not penetrate far beyond the present South Carolina boundary. The “very high mountain ridge” which they crossed immediately after leaving the town was in all probability the main chain of the Blue ridge, while the river which they found after descending to the savanna on the other side, and which they guessed to be a branch of the Mississippi, was almost as certainly the upper part of the French Broad, the first stream flowing in an opposite direction from those which they had previously encountered. They may have struck it in the neighborhood of Hendersonville or Brevard, there being two gaps, passable for vehicles, in the main ridge eastward from the first-named town. The uninhabited mountains through which they struggled for several days on their way to Chiaha and Coça (the Creek country) in the southwest were the broken ridges in which the Savannah and the Little Tennessee have their sources, and if they followed an Indian trail they may have passed through the Rabun gap, near the present Clayton, Georgia. Guaxule, and not Xuala, as Jones supposes, was in Nacoochee valley, in the present White county, Georgia, and the small streams which united to form the river down which the Spaniards proceeded to Chiaha were the headwaters of the Chattahoochee. The hill upon which the townhouse was built must have been the great Nacoochee mound, the most prominent landmark in the valley, on the east bank of Sautee creek, in White county, about twelve miles northwest of Clarkesville. This is the largest mound in upper Georgia, with the exception of the noted Etowah mound near Cartersville, and is the only one which can fill the requirements of the case. There are but two considerable mounds in western North Carolina, that at Franklin and a smaller one on Oconaluftee river, on the present East Cherokee reservation, and as both of these are on streams flowing away from the Creek country, this fact alone would bar them from consideration. The only large mounds in upper Georgia are this one at Nacoochee and the group on the Etowah river, near Cartersville. The largest of the Etowah group is some fifty feet in height and is ascended on one side by means of a roadwayabout fifty feet wide at the base and narrowing gradually to the top. Had this been the mound of the narrative it is hardly possible that the chronicler would have failed to notice also the two other mounds of the group or the other one on the opposite side of the river, each of these being from twenty to twenty-five feet in height, to say nothing of the great ditch a quarter of a mile in length which encircles the group. Moreover, Cartersville is at some distance from the mountains, and the Etowah river at this point does not answer the description of a small rushing mountain stream. There is no considerable mound at Coosawatee or in any of the three counties adjoining.The Nacoochee mound has been cleared and cultivated for many years and does not now show any appearance of a roadway up the side, but from its great height we may be reasonably sure that some such means of easy ascent existed in ancient times. In other respects it is the only mound in the whole upper country which fills the conditions. The valley is one of the most fertile spots in Georgia and numerous ancient remains give evidence that it was a favorite center of settlement in early days. At the beginning of the modern historic period it was held by the Cherokee, who had there a town called Nacoochee, but their claim was disputed by the Creeks. The Gentleman of Elvas states that Guaxule was subject to the queen of Cofitachiqui, but this may mean only that the people of the two towns or tribes were in friendly alliance. The modern name is pronouncedNaguʻtsĭ′by the Cherokee, who say, however, that it is not of their language. The terminal may be the Creekudshi, “small,” or it may have a connection with the name of the Uchee Indians.From Guaxule the Spaniards advanced to Canasoga (Ranjel) or Canasagua (Elvas), one or two days’ march from Guaxule, according to one or the other authority. Garcilaso and Biedma do not mention the name. As Garcilaso states that from Guaxule to Chiaha the march was down the bank of the same river, which we identify with the Chattahoochee, the town may have been in the neighborhood of the present Gainesville. As we have seen, however, it is unsafe to trust the estimates of distance. Arguing from the name, Meek infers that the town was about Conasauga river in Murray county, and that the river down which they marched to reach it was “no doubt the Etowah,” although to reach the first named river from the Etowah it would be necessary to make another sharp turn to the north. From the same coincidence Pickett puts it on the Conasauga, “in the modern county of Murray, Georgia,” while Jones, on the same theory, locates it “at or near the junction of the Connasauga and Coosawattee rivers, in originally Cass, now Gordon county.” Here his modern geography as well as his ancient is at fault, as the original Cass county is now Bartow, the name having been changed in consequence of a local dislike for General Cass. The whole theory of a march down the Coosa river rests upon this coincidence of the name. The same name however, pronouncedGănsâ′gĭby the Cherokee, was applied by them to at least three different locations within their old territory, while the one mentioned in the narrative would make the fourth. The others were (1) on Oostanaula river, opposite the mouth of the Conasauga, where afterward was New Echota, in Gordon county, Georgia; (2) on Canasauga creek, in McMinn county, Tennessee; (3) on Tuckasegee river, about two miles above Webster, in Jackson county, North Carolina. At each of these places are remains of ancient settlement. It is possible that the name of Kenesaw mountain, near Marietta, in Cobb county, Georgia, may be a corruption ofGănsâ′gĭ, and if so, the Canasagua of the narrative may have been somewhere in this vicinity on the Chattahoochee. The meaning of the name is lost.On leaving Canasagua they continued down the same river which they had followed from Guaxule (Garcilaso), and after traveling several days through an uninhabited (“despoblado”) country (Elvas) arrived at Chiaha, which was subject to the great chief of Coça (Elvas). The name is spelled Chiaha by Ranjel and the Gentlemanof Elvas, Chiha by Biedma in the Documentos, China by a misprint in an English rendering, and Ychiaha by Garcilaso. It appears as Chiha on an English map of 1762 reproduced in Winsor, Westward Movement, page 31, 1897. Gallatin spells it Ichiaha, while Williams and Fairbanks, by misprint, make it Chiapa. According to both Ranjel and Elvas the army entered it on the 5th of June, although the former makes it four days from Canasagua, while the other makes it five. Biedma says it was four days from Guaxule, and, finally, Garcilaso says it was six days and thirty leagues from Guaxule and on the same river, which was, here at Chiaha, as large as the Guadalquivir at Sevilla. As we have seen, there is a great discrepancy in the statements of the distance from Cofitachiqui to this point. All four authorities agree that the town was on an island in the river, along which they had been marching for some time (Garcilaso, Ranjel), but while the Elvas narrative makes the island “two crossbow shot” in length above the town and one league in length below it, Garcilaso calls it a “great island more than five leagues long.” On both sides of the island the stream was very broad and easily waded (Elvas). Finding welcome and food for men and horses the Spaniards rested here nearly a month (June 5–28, Ranjel; twenty-six or twenty-seven days, Biedma; thirty days, Elvas). In spite of the danger from attack De Soto allowed his men to sleep under trees in the open air, “because it was very hot and the people should have suffered great extremity if it had not been so” (Elvas). This in itself is evidence that the place was pretty far to the south, as it was yet only the first week in June. The town was subject to the chief of the great province of Coça, farther to the west. From here onward they began to meet palisaded towns.On the theory that the march was down Coosa river, every commentator hitherto has located Chiaha at some point upon this stream, either in Alabama or Georgia. Gallatin (1836) says that it “must have been on the Coosa, probably some distance below the site of New Echota.” He notes a similarity of sound between Ichiaha and “Echoy” (Itseyĭ), a Cherokee town name. Williams (1837) says that it was on Mobile (i. e., the Alabama or lower Coosa river). Meek (1839) says “there can be little doubt that Chiaha was situated but a short distance above the junction of the Coosa and Chattooga rivers,” i. e., not far within the Alabama line. He notes the occurrence of a “Chiaha” (Chehawhaw) creek near Talladega, Alabama. In regard to the island upon which the town was said to have been situated he says: “There is no such island now in the Coosa. It is probable that the Spaniards either mistook the peninsula formed by the junction of two rivers, the Coosa and Chattooga, for an island, or that those two rivers were originally united so as to form an island near their present confluence. We have heard this latter supposition asserted by persons well acquainted with the country.”—Romantic Passages, p. 222, 1857. Monette (1846) puts it on Etowah branch of the Coosa, probably in Floyd county, Georgia. Pickett (1851), followed in turn by Irving, Jones, and Shea, locates it at “the site of the modern Rome.” The “island” is interpreted to mean the space between the two streams above the confluence.
(1)Tribal synonymy(page 15): Very few Indian tribes are known to us under the names by which they call themselves. One reason for this is the fact that the whites have usually heard of a tribe from its neighbors, speaking other languages, before coming upon the tribe itself. Many of the popular tribal names were originally nicknames bestowed by neighboring tribes, frequently referring to some peculiar custom, and in a large number of cases would be strongly repudiated by the people designated by them. As a rule each tribe had a different name in every surrounding Indian language, besides those given by Spanish, French, Dutch, or English settlers.
Yûñ′wiyă′—This word is compounded fromyûñwĭ(person) andyă(real or principal). The assumption of superiority is much in evidence in Indian tribal names; thus, the Iroquois, Delawares, and Pawnee call themselves, respectively, Oñwe-hoñwe, Leni-lenape′, and Tsariksi-tsa′riks, all of which may be rendered “men of men,” “men surpassing other men,” or “real men.”
Kĭtu′hwagĭ—This word, which can not be analyzed, is derived from Kĭtu′hwă, the name of an ancient Cherokee settlement formerly on Tuckasegee river, just above the present Bryson City, in Swain county, North Carolina. It is noted in 1730 as one of the “seven mother towns” of the tribe. Its inhabitants were called Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ (people of Kituhwa), and seem to have exercised a controlling influence over those of all the towns on the waters of Tuckasegee and the upper part of Little Tennessee, the whole body being frequently classed together as Ani′-Kĭtu′hwagĭ. The dialect of these towns held a middle place linguistically between those spoken to the east, on the heads of Savannah, and to the west, on Hiwassee, Cheowah, and the lower course of Little Tennessee. In various forms the word was adopted by the Delawares, Shawano, and other northern Algonquian tribes as a synonym for Cherokee, probably from the fact that the Kituhwa people guarded the Cherokee northern frontier. In the form Cuttawa it appears on the French map of Vaugondy in 1755. From a similarity of spelling, Schoolcraft incorrectly makes it a synonym for Catawba, while Brinton incorrectly asserts that it is an Algonquian term, fancifully rendered, “inhabitants of the great wilderness.” Among the western Cherokee it is now the name of a powerful secret society, which had its origin shortly before the War of the Rebellion.
Cherokee—This name occurs in fully fifty different spellings. In the standard recognized form, which dates back at least to 1708, it has given name to counties in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, within the ancient territory of the tribe, and to as many as twenty other geographic locations within the United States. In the Eastern or Lower dialect, with which the English settlers first became familiar, the form is Tsa′răgĭ′, whence we get Cherokee. In the other dialects the form is Tsa′lăgĭ′. It is evidently foreign to the tribe, as is frequently the case in tribal names, and in all probability is of Choctaw origin, having come up from the south through the medium of the Mobilian trade jargon. It will be noted that De Soto, whose chroniclers first use the word, in the form Chalaque, obtained his interpreters from the Gulf coast of Florida. Fontanedo, writing about the year 1575, mentions other inland tribes known to the natives of Florida under names which seem to beof Choctaw origin; for instance, the Canogacole, interpreted “wicked people,” the final part being apparently the Choctaw wordoklaorogula, “people”, which appears also in Pascagoula, Bayou Goula, and Pensacola. Shetimasha, Atakapa, and probably Biloxi, are also Choctaw names, although the tribes themselves are of other origins. As the Choctaw held much of the Gulf coast and were the principal traders of that region, it was natural that explorers landing among them should adopt their names for the more remote tribes.
The name seems to refer to the fact that the tribe occupied a cave country. In the “Choctaw Leksikon” of Allen Wright, 1880, page 87, we findcholuk, a noun, signifying a hole, cavity, pit, chasm, etc., and as an adjective signifying hollow. In the manuscript Choctaw dictionary of Cyrus Byington, in the library of the Bureau of American Ethnology, we findchiluk, noun, a hole, cavity, hollow, pit, etc., with a statement that in its usual application it means a cavity or hollow, and not a hole through anything. As an adjective, the same form is given as signifying hollow, having a hole, asiti chiluk, a hollow tree;aboha chiluk, an empty house;chiluk chukoa, to enter a hole. Other noun forms given arechulukandachilukin the singular andchilukoain the plural, all signifying hole, pit, or cavity. Verbal forms arechilukikbi, to make a hole, andchilukba, to open and form a fissure.
In agreement with the genius of the Cherokee language the root form of the tribal name takes nominal or verbal prefixes according to its connection with the rest of the sentence, and is declined, or rather conjugated, as follows:Singular—first person,tsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, I (am) a Cherokee; second person,hi-Tsa′lăgĭ, thou art a Cherokee; third person,a-Tsa′lăgĭ, he is a Cherokee.Dual—first person,âsti-Tsa′lăgĭ, we two are Cherokee; second person,sti-Tsa′lăgĭ, you two are Cherokee; third person,ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ, they two are Cherokee.Plural—first person,atsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, we (several) are Cherokee; second person,hitsi-Tsa′lăgĭ, you (several) are Cherokee; third person,ani′-Tsa′lăgĭ, they (several) are Cherokee. It will be noticed that the third person dual and plural are alike.
Oyataʼgeʻronoñʼ, etc.—The Iroquois (Mohawk) form is given by Hewitt as O-yataʼ-geʻronoñʼ, of which the root isyataʼ, cave,ois the assertive prefix,geis the locative at, andronoñʼis the tribal suffix, equivalent to (English)-itesor people. The word, which has several dialectic forms, signifies “inhabitants of the cave country,” or “cave-country people,” rather than “people who dwell in caves,” as rendered by Schoolcraft. The same radixyataʼoccurs also in the Iroquois name for the opossum, which is a burrowing animal. As is well known, the Allegheny region is peculiarly a cave country, the caves having been used by the Indians for burial and shelter purposes, as is proved by numerous remains found in them. It is probable that the Iroquois simply translated the name (Chalaque) current in the South, as we find is the case in the West, where the principal plains tribes are known under translations of the same names in all the different languages. The Wyandot name for the Cherokee, Wataiyo-ronoñʼ, and their Catawba name, Mañterañ′, both seem to refer to coming out of the ground, and may have been originally intended to convey the same idea of cave people.
Rickahockan—This name is used by the German explorer, Lederer, in 1670, as the name of the people inhabiting the mountains to the southwest of the Virginia settlements. On his map he puts them in the mountains on the southern head streams of Roanoke river, in western North Carolina. He states that, according to his Indian informants, the Rickahockan lived beyond the mountains in a land of great waves, which he interpreted to mean the sea shore (!), but it is more likely that the Indians were trying to convey, by means of the sign language, the idea of a succession of mountain ridges. The name was probably of Powhatan origin, and is evidently identical with Rechahecrian of the Virginia chronicles of about the same period, therin the latter form being perhaps a misprint. It may be connected with Righkahauk, indicated on Smith’s map of Virginia, in 1607, as the name of a town within thePowhatan territory, and still preserved in Rockahock, the name of an estate on lower Pamunkey river. We have too little material of the Powhatan language to hazard an interpretation, but it may possibly contain the root of the word for sand, which appears aslekawa,nikawa,negaw,rigawa,rekwa, etc., in various eastern Algonquian dialects, whence Rockaway (sand), and Recgawawank (sandy place). The Powhatan form, as given by Strachey, isracawh(sand). He gives alsorocoyhook(otter),reihcahahcoik, hidden under a cloud, overcast,rickahoneorreihcoan(a comb), andrickewh(to divide in halves).
Talligewi—As Brinton well says: “No name in the Lenape′ legends has given rise to more extensive discussion than this.” On Colden’s map in his “History of the Five Nations,” 1727, we find the “Alleghens” indicated upon Allegheny river. Heckewelder, who recorded the Delaware tradition in 1819, says: “Those people, as I was told, called themselves Talligeu or Talligewi. Colonel John Gibson, however, a gentleman who has a thorough knowledge of the Indians, and speaks several of their languages, is of the opinion that they were not called Talligewi, but Alligewi; and it would seem that he is right from the traces of their name which still remain in the country, the Allegheny river and mountains having indubitably been named after them. The Delawares still call the former Alligewi Sipu (the river of the Alligewi)”—Indian Nations, p. 48, ed. 1876. Loskiel, writing on the authority of Zeisberger, says that the Delawares knew the whole country drained by the Ohio under the name of Alligewinengk, meaning “the land in which they arrived from distant places,” basing his interpretation upon an etymology compounded fromtallioralli, there,icku, to that place, andewak, they go, with a locative final. Ettwein, another Moravian writer, says the Delawares called “the western country” Alligewenork, meaning a warpath, and called the river Alligewi Sipo. This definition would make the word come frompallitonoralliton, to fight, to make war,ewak, they go, and a locative, i. e., “they go there to fight.” Trumbull, an authority on Algonquian languages, derives the river name fromwulik, good, best,hanne, rapid stream, andsipu, river, of which rendering its Iroquois name,Ohio, is nearly an equivalent. Rafinesque renders Talligewi as “there found,” fromtalli, there, and some other root, not given (Brinton, Walam Olum, pp. 229–230, 1885).
It must be noted that the names Ohio and Alligewi (or Allegheny) were not applied by the Indians, as with us, to different parts of the same river, but to the whole stream, or at least the greater portion of it from its head downward. Although Brinton sees no necessary connection between the river name and the traditional tribal name, the statement of Heckewelder, generally a competent authority on Delaware matters, makes them identical.
In the traditional tribal name, Talligewi or Alligewi,wiis an assertive verbal suffix, so that the form properly means “he is a Tallige,” or “they are Tallige.” This comes very near to Tsa′lăgĭ′, the name by which the Cherokee call themselves, and it may have been an early corruption of that name. In Zeisberger’s Delaware dictionary, however, we findwalohorwalok, signifying a cave or hole, while in the “Walam Olum” we haveoligonunkrendered “at the place of caves,” the region being further described as a buffalo land on a pleasant plain, where the Lenape′, advancing seaward from a less abundant northern region, at last found food (Walam Olum, pp. 194–195). Unfortunately, like other aboriginal productions of its kind among the northern tribes, the Lenape chronicle is suggestive rather than complete and connected. With more light it may be that seeming discrepancies would disappear and we should find at last that the Cherokee, in ancient times as in the historic period, were always the southern vanguard of the Iroquoian race, always primarily a mountain people, but with their flank resting upon the Ohio and its great tributaries, following the trend of the Blue ridge and the Cumberland as they slowly gave way before the pressure from the north until they were finally cut off from the parent stock by the wedge of Algonquian invasion, but always, whether in the northor in the south, keeping their distinctive title among the tribes as the “people of the cave country.”
As the Cherokee have occupied a prominent place in history for so long a period their name appears in many synonyms and diverse spellings. The following are among the principal of these:
SYNONYMS
Zolucans.Rafinesque, in Marshall, Kentucky,I, 23, 1824.Zulocans.
Talligeu.Heckewelder, 1819, Indian Nations, 48, reprint of 1876 (traditional Delaware name; singular,Tallige′orAllige′(see preceding explanation).Talligewi.Alligewi.
Gatohua.Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 28, 1884.Gattochwa.Katowa(plural,Katowagi).
Entarironnon.Potier, Racines Huronnes et Grammaire, MS, 1751 (Wyandot names. The first, according to Hewitt, is equivalent to “ridge, or mountain, people”).Ochieʻtarironnon.
(2)Mobilian trade language(page 16): This trade jargon, based upon Choctaw, but borrowing also from all the neighboring dialects and even from the more northern Algonquian languages, was spoken and understood among all the tribes of the Gulf states, probably as far west as Matagorda bay and northward along both banks of the Mississippi to the Algonquian frontier about the entrance of the Ohio. It was called Mobilienne by the French, from Mobile, the great trading center of the Gulf region. Along the Mississippi it was sometimes known also as the Chickasaw trade language, the Chickasaw being a dialect of the Choctaw language proper. Jeffreys, in 1761, compares this jargon in its uses to the lingua franca of the Levant, and it was evidently by the aid of this intertribal medium that De Soto’s interpreter from Tampa bay could converse with all the tribes they met until they reached the Mississippi. Some of the names used by Fontanedo about 1575 for the tribes northward from Appalachee bay seem to be derived from this source, as in later times were the names of the other tribes of the Gulf region, without regard to linguistic affinities, including among others the Taensa, Tunica, Atakapa, and Shetimasha, representing as many different linguistic stocks. In his report upon the southwestern tribes in 1805, Sibley says that the “Mobilian” was spoken in addition to their native languages by all the Indians who had come from the east side of the Mississippi. Among those so using it he names the Alabama, Apalachi, Biloxi, Chactoo, Pacana, Pascagula, Taensa, and Tunica. Woodward, writing from Louisiana more than fifty years later, says: “There is yet a language the Texas Indians call the Mobilian tongue, that has been the trading language of almost all the tribes that have inhabited the country. I know white men that now speak it. There is a man now living near me that is fifty years of age, raised in Texas, that speaks the language well. It is a mixture of Creek, Choctaw, Chickasay, Netches [Natchez], and Apelash [Apalachi]”—Reminiscences, 79. For further information see also Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend, and Sibley, Report.
The Mobilian trade jargon was not unique of its kind. In America, as in other parts of the world, the common necessities of intercommunication have resulted in the formation of several such mongrel dialects, prevailing, sometimes over wide areas. In some cases, also, the language of a predominant tribe serves as the common medium for all the tribes of a particular region. In South America we find the lingoa geral, based upon the Tupi′ language, understood for everyday purposes by all the tribes of the immense central region from Guiana to Paraguay, including almost the whole Amazon basin. On the northwest coast we find the well-known “Chinook jargon,” which takes its name from a small tribe formerly residing at the mouth of the Columbia, in common use among all the tribes from California far upinto Alaska, and eastward to the great divide of the Rocky mountains. In the southwest the Navaho-Apache language is understood by nearly all the Indians of Arizona and New Mexico, while on the plains the Sioux language in the north and the Comanche in the south hold almost the same position. In addition to these we have also the noted “sign language,” a gesture system used and perfectly understood as a fluent means of communication among all the hunting tribes of the plains from the Saskatchewan to the Rio Grande.
(3)Dialects(page 17): The linguistic affinity of the Cherokee and northern Iroquoian dialects, although now well established, is not usually obvious on the surface, but requires a close analysis of words, with a knowledge of the laws of phonetic changes, to make it appear. The superficial agreement is perhaps most apparent between the Mohawk and the Eastern (Lower) Cherokee dialects, as both of these lack the labials entirely and userinstead ofl. In the short table given below the Iroquois words are taken, with slight changes in the alphabet used, from Hewitt’s manuscripts, the Cherokee from those of the author:
MohawkCherokee (Eastern)personoñgweʼyûñwĭfireotsiʼraʼatsi′ra (atsi′la)waterawĕñʼăwă′ (ămă′)stoneonĕñyaʼnûñyû′arrowkaʼnoñʼkûnĭ′pipekanoñnăwĕñʼkănûñ′năwûhand (arm)owe′yaʼuwâ′yĭmilkunĕñʼtaʼunûñ′tĭfivewĭskhĭskĭtobacco[tcărhûʼ, Tuscarora]tsârû (tsâlû)fishotcoñʼtaʼû′tsûtĭ′ghostoʼskĕñnaʼasgi′nasnakeĕñnătûñi′nădû′
Comparison of Cherokee dialects
Eastern (Lower)MiddleWestern (Upper)fireatsi′raatsi′laatsi′lawaterăwă′ămă′ămă′doggiʼrĭ′giʼlĭ′giʼlĭ′hairgitsû′gitsû′gitlû′hawktsă′nuwă′tsă′nuwă′tlă′nuwă′leechtsanu′sĭ′tsanu′sĭ′tlanu′sĭ′battsa′wehă′tsa′mehă′tla′mehă′panthertsûñtû′tsĭtsûñtû′tsĭtlûñtû′tsĭjaytsayʼkû′tsayʼkû′tlayʼkû′martin (bird)tsutsû′tsutsû′tlutlû′war-clubatăsû′atăsû′atăsĭ′heartunăhŭ′unăhŭ′unăhwĭ′where?ga′tsûga′tsûha′tlûhow much?hûñgû′hûñgû′hila′gûkeystugi′stĭstugi′stĭstui′stĭI pick it up (long)tsĭnigi′ûtsĭnigi′ûtsĭne′ûmy fatheragidâ′tăagidâ′tăedâ′tămy mothera′gitsĭ′a′gitsĭ′etsĭ′my father’s fatheragini′sĭagini′sĭeni′sĭmy mother’s fatheragidu′tŭagidu′tŭedu′tŭ
It will be noted that the Eastern and Middle dialects are about the same, excepting for the change ofltor, and the entire absence of the labialmfrom the Eastern dialect, while the Western differs considerably from the others, particularly in the greater frequency of the liquidland the softening of the gutturalg, the changes tending to render it the most musical of all the Cherokee dialects. It is also the standard literary dialect. In addition to these three principal dialects there are some peculiar forms and expressions in use by a few individuals which indicate the former existence of one or more other dialects now too far extinct to be reconstructed. As in most other tribes, the ceremonial forms used by the priesthood are so filled with archaic and figurative expressions as to be almost unintelligible to the laity.
(4)Iroquoian tribes and migrations(p.17): The Iroquoian stock, taking its name from the celebrated Iroquois confederacy, consisted formerly of from fifteen to twenty tribes, speaking nearly as many different dialects, and including, among others, the following:
Wyandot, or Huron.Ontario, Canada.Tionontati, or Tobacco nation.Attiwan′daron, or Neutral nation.Tohotaenrat.Wenrorono.
Mohawk.Iroquois, or Five Nations, New York.Oneida.Onondaga.Cayuga.Seneca.
Nottoway.Southern Virginia.Meherrin?.
Tradition and history alike point to the St. Lawrence region as the early home of this stock. Upon this point all authorities concur. Says Hale, in his paper on Indian Migrations (p. 4): “The constant tradition of the Iroquois represents their ancestors as emigrants from the region north of the Great lakes, where they dwelt in early times with their Huron brethren. This tradition is recorded with much particularity by Cadwallader Colden, surveyor-general of New York, who in the early part of the last century composed his well known ‘History of the Five Nations.’ It is told in a somewhat different form by David Cusick, the Tuscarora historian, in his ‘Sketches of Ancient History of the Six Nations,’ and it is repeated by Mr. L. H. Morgan in his now classical work, ‘The League of the Iroquois,’ for which he procured his information chiefly among the Senecas. Finally, as we learn from the narrative of the Wyandot Indian, Peter Clarke, in his book entitled ‘Origin and Traditional History of the Wyandotts,’ the belief of the Hurons accords in this respect with that of the Iroquois. Both point alike to the country immediately north of the St. Lawrence, and especially to that portion of it lying east of Lake Ontario, as the early home of the Huron-Iroquois nations.” Nothing is known of the traditions of the Conestoga or the Nottoway, but the tradition of the Tuscarora, as given by Cusick and other authorities, makes them a direct offshoot from the northern Iroquois, with whom they afterward reunited. The traditions of the Cherokee also, as we have seen, bring them from the north, thus completing the cycle. “The striking fact has become evident that the course of migration of the Huron-Cherokee family has been from the northeast to the southwest—that is, from eastern Canada, on the Lower St. Lawrence, to the mountains of northern Alabama.”—Hale, Indian Migrations, p. 11.
The retirement of the northern Iroquoian tribes from the St. Lawrence region wasdue to the hostility of their Algonquian neighbors, by whom the Hurons and their allies were forced to take refuge about Georgian bay and the head of Lake Ontario, while the Iroquois proper retreated to central New York. In 1535 Cartier found the shores of the river from Quebec to Montreal occupied by an Iroquoian people, but on the settlement of the country seventy years later the same region was found in possession of Algonquian tribes. The confederation of the five Iroquois nations, probably about the year 1540, enabled them to check the Algonquian invasion and to assume the offensive. Linguistic and other evidence shows that the separation of the Cherokee from the parent stock must have far antedated this period.
(5)Walam Olum(p.18): The name signifies “red score,” from the Delawarewalam, “painted,” more particularly “painted red,” andolum, “a score, tally-mark.” The Walam Olum was first published in 1836 in a work entitled “The American Nations,” by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque, a versatile and voluminous, but very erratic, French scholar, who spent the latter half of his life in this country, dying in Philadelphia in 1840. He asserted that it was a translation of a manuscript in the Delaware language, which was an interpretation of an ancient sacred metrical legend of the Delawares, recorded in pictographs cut upon wood, obtained in 1820 by a medical friend of his among the Delawares then living in central Indiana. He says himself: “These actualolumwere first obtained in 1820 as a reward for a medical cure, deemed a curiosity, and were unexplicable. In 1822 were obtained from another individual the songs annexed thereto in the original language, but no one could be found by me able to translate them. I had therefore to learn the language since, by the help of Zeisberger, Heckewelder, and a manuscript dictionary, on purpose to translate them, which I only accomplished in 1833.” On account of the unique character of the alleged Indian record and Rafinesque’s own lack of standing among his scientific contemporaries, but little attention was paid to the discovery until Brinton took up the subject a few years ago. After a critical sifting of the evidence from every point of view he arrived at the conclusion that the work is a genuine native production, although the manuscript rendering is faulty, partly from the white scribe’s ignorance of the language and partly from the Indian narrator’s ignorance of the meaning of the archaic forms. Brinton’s edition (q. v.), published from Rafinesque’s manuscript, gives the legend in triplicate form—pictograph, Delaware, and English translation, with notes and glossary, and a valuable ethnologic introduction by Brinton himself.
It is not known that any of the original woodcut pictographs of the Walam Olum are now in existence, although a statement of Rafinesque implies that he had seen them. As evidence of the truth of his statement, however, we have the fact that precisely similar pictographic series cut upon birch bark, each pictograph representing a line or couplet of a sacred metrical recitation, are now known to be common among the Ojibwa, Menomini, and other northern tribes. In 1762 a Delaware prophet recorded his visions in hieroglyphics cut upon a wooden stick, and about the year 1827 a Kickapoo reformer adopted the same method to propagate a new religion among the tribes. One of these “prayer sticks” is now in the National Museum, being all that remains of a large basketful delivered to a missionary in Indiana by a party of Kickapoo Indians in 1830 (see plate and description, pp. 665, 697et seq.in the author’s Ghost-dance Religion, Fourteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology).
(6)Fish river(p.18): Namæsi Sipu (Heckewelder, Indian Nations, 49), or Namassipi (Walam Olum, p. 198). Deceived by a slight similarity of sound, Heckewelder makes this river identical with the Mississippi, but as Schoolcraft shows (Notes on Iroquois, p. 316) the true name of the Mississippi is simply Misi-sipi, “great river,” and “fish river” would be a most inappropriate name for such a turbulent current, where only the coarser species can live. The mere fact that there can be a question of identity among experts familiar with Indian nomenclature would indicate that itwas not one of the larger streams. Although Heckewelder makes the Alligewi, as he prefers to call them, flee down the Mississippi after their final defeat, the Walam Olum chronicle says only “all the Talega go south.” It was probably a gradual withdrawal, rather than a sudden and concerted flight (see Hale, Indian Migrations, pp. 19–22).
(7)First appearance of whites(p.19): It is possible that this may refer to one of the earlier adventurers who coasted along the North Atlantic in the first decades after the discovery of America, among whom were Sebastian Cabot, in 1498; Verrazano, in 1524; and Gomez, in 1525. As these voyages were not followed up by permanent occupation of the country it is doubtful if they made any lasting impression upon Indian tradition. The author has chosen to assume, with Brinton and Rafinesque, that the Walam Olum reference is to the settlement of the Dutch at New York and the English in Virginia soon after 1600.
(8)De Soto’s route(p.26): On May 30, 1539, Hernando de Soto, of Spain, with 600 armed men and 213 horses, landed at Tampa bay, on the west coast of Florida, in search of gold. After more than four years of hardship and disappointed wandering from Florida to the great plains of the West and back again to the Mississippi, where De Soto died and his body was consigned to the great river, 311 men, all that were left of the expedition, arrived finally at Pánuco, in Mexico, on September 10, 1543.
For the history of this expedition, the most important ever undertaken by Spain within eastern United States, we have four original authorities. First is the very brief, but evidently truthful (Spanish) report of Biedma, an officer of the expedition, presented to the King in 1544, immediately after the return to Spain. Next in order, but of first importance for detail and general appearance of reliability, is the narrative of an anonymous Portuguese cavalier of the expedition, commonly known as the Gentleman of Elvas, originally published in the Portuguese language in 1557. Next comes the (Spanish) narrative of Garcilaso, written, but not published, in 1587. Unlike the others, the author was not an eyewitness of what he describes, but made up his account chiefly from the oral recollections of an old soldier of the expedition more than forty years after the event, this information being supplemented from papers written by two other soldiers of De Soto. As might be expected, the Garcilaso narrative, although written in flowery style, abounds in exaggeration and trivial incident, and compares unfavorably with the other accounts, while probably giving more of the minor happenings. The fourth original account is an unfinished (Spanish) report by Ranjel, secretary of the expedition, written soon after reaching Mexico, and afterward incorporated with considerable change by Oviedo, in his “Historia natural y general de las Indias.” As this fourth narrative remained unpublished until 1851 and has never been translated, it has hitherto been entirely overlooked by the commentators, excepting Winsor, who notes it incidentally. In general it agrees well with the Elvas narrative and throws valuable light upon the history of the expedition.
The principal authorities, while preserving a general unity of narrative, differ greatly in detail, especially in estimates of numbers and distances, frequently to such an extent that it is useless to attempt to reconcile their different statements. In general the Gentleman of Elvas is most moderate in his expression, while Biedma takes a middle ground and Garcilaso exaggerates greatly. Thus the first named gives De Soto 600 men, Biedma makes the number 620, while Garcilaso says 1,000. At a certain stage of the journey the Portuguese Gentleman gives De Soto 700 Indians as escort, Biedma says 800, while Garcilaso makes it 8,000. At the battle of Mavilla the Elvas account gives 18 Spaniards and 2,500 Indians killed, Biedma says 20 Spaniards killed, without giving an estimate of the Indians, while Garcilaso has 82 Spaniards and over 11,000 Indians killed. In distances there is as great discrepancy. Thus Biedma makes the distance from Guaxule to Chiaha four days, Garcilaso has it six days, and Elvas seven days. As to the length of an average day’s march we find itestimated all the way from “four leagues, more or less” (Garcilaso) to “every day seven or eight leagues” (Elvas). In another place the Elvas chronicler states that they usually made five or six leagues a day through inhabited territories, but that in crossing uninhabited regions—as that between Canasagua and Chiaha, they marched every day as far as possible for fear of running out of provisions. One of the most glaring discrepancies appears in regard to the distance between Chiaha and Coste. Both the Portuguese writer and Garcilaso put Chiaha upon an island—a statement which in itself is at variance with any present conditions,—but while the former makes the island a fraction over a league in length the latter says that it was five leagues long. The next town was Coste, which Garcilaso puts immediately at the lower end of the same island while the Portuguese Gentleman represents it as seven days distant, although he himself has given the island the shorter length.
Notwithstanding a deceptive appearance of exactness, especially in the Elvas and Ranjel narratives, which have the form of a daily journal, the conclusion is irresistible that much of the record was made after dates had been forgotten, and the sequence of events had become confused. Considering all the difficulties, dangers, and uncertainties that constantly beset the expedition, it would be too much to expect the regularity of a ledger, and it is more probable that the entries were made, not from day to day, but at irregular intervals as opportunity presented at the several resting places. The story must be interpreted in the light of our later knowledge of the geography and ethnology of the country traversed.
Each of the three principal narratives has passed through translations and later editions of more or less doubtful fidelity to the original, the English edition in some cases being itself a translation from an earlier French or Dutch translation. English speaking historians of the expedition have usually drawn their material from one or the other of these translations, without knowledge of the original language, of the etymologies of the Indian names or the relations of the various tribes mentioned, or of the general system of Indian geographic nomenclature. One of the greatest errors has been the attempt to give in every case a fixed local habitation to a name which in some instances is not a proper name at all, and in others is merely a descriptive term or a duplicate name occurring at several places in the same tribal territory. Thus Tali is simply the Creek wordtalua, town, and not a definite place name as represented by a mistake natural in dealing through interpreters with an unknown Indian language. Tallise and Tallimuchase are respectively “Old town” and “New town” in Creek, and there can be no certainty that the same names were applied to the same places a century later. Canasagua is a corruption of a Cherokee name which occurs in at least three other places in the old Cherokee country in addition to the one mentioned in the narrative, and almost every old Indian local name was thus repeated several times, as in the case of such common names as Short creek, Whitewater, Richmond, or Lexington among ourselves. The fact that only one name of the set has been retained on the map does not prove its identity with the town of the old chronicle. Again such loose terms as “a large river,” “a beautiful valley,” have been assumed to mean something more definitely localized than the wording warrants. The most common error in translation has been the rendering of the Spanish “despoblado” as “desert.” There are no deserts in the Gulf states, and the word means simply an uninhabited region, usually the debatable strip between two tribes.
There have been many attempts to trace De Soto’s route. As nearly every historian who has written of the southern states has given attention to this subject it is unnecessary to enumerate them all. Of some thirty works consulted by the author, in addition to the original narratives already mentioned, not more than two or three can be considered as speaking with any authority, the rest simply copying from these without investigation. The first attempt to locate the route definitely was made by Meek (Romantic Passages, etc.) in 1839 (reprinted in 1857), his conclusions beingbased upon his general knowledge of the geography of the region. In 1851 Pickett tried to locate the route, chiefly, he asserts, from Indian tradition as related by mixed-bloods. How much dependence can be placed upon Indian tradition as thus interpreted three centuries after the event it is unnecessary to say. Both these writers have brought De Soto down the Coosa river, in which they have been followed without investigation by Irving, Shea and others, but none of these was aware of the existence of a Suwali tribe, or correctly acquainted with the Indian nomenclature of the upper country, or of the Creek country as so well summarized by Gatschet in his Creek Migration Legend. They are also mistaken in assuming that only De Soto passed through the country, whereas we now know that several Spanish explorers and numerous French adventurers traversed the same territory, the latest expeditions of course being freshest in Indian memory. Jones in his “De Soto’s March Through Georgia” simply dresses up the earlier statements in more literary style, sometimes changing surmises to positive assertions, without mentioning his authorities. Maps of the supposed route, all bringing De Soto down the Coosa instead of the Chattahoochee, have been published in Irving’s Conquest of Florida, the Hakluyt Society’s edition of the Gentleman of Elva’s account, and in Buckingham Smith’s translation of the same narrative, as well as in several other works. For the eastern portion, with which we have to deal, all of these are practically duplicates of one another. On several old Spanish and French maps the names mentioned in the narrative seem to have been set down merely to fill space, without much reference to the text of the chronicle. For a list and notices of principal writers who have touched upon this subject see the appendix to Shea’s chapter on “Ancient Florida” in Winsor’s Narrative and Critical History of America,II; Boston, 1886. We shall speak only of that part of the route which lay near the Cherokee mountains.
The first location which concerns us in the narrative is Cofitachiqui, the town from which De Soto set out for the Cherokee country. The name appears variously as Cofitachequi (Ranjel), Cofitachique (Biedma), Cofachiqui (Garcilaso), Cutifa-Chiqui (by transposition, Elvas), Cofetaçque (Vandera), Catafachique (Williams) and Cosatachiqui (misprint, Brooks MSS), and the Spaniards first heard of the region as Yupaha from a tribe farther to the south. The correct form appears to be that first given, which Gatschet, from later information than that quoted in his Creek Migration Legend, makes a Hitchitee word about equivalent to “Dogwood town,” fromcofi, “dogwood,”cofita, “dogwood thicket,” andchiki, “house,” or collectively “town.” McCulloch puts the town upon the headwaters of the Ocmulgee; Williams locates it on the Chattahoochee; Gallatin on the Oconee or the Savannah; Meek and Monette, following him, probably in the fork of the Savannah and the Broad; Pickett, with Jones and others following him, at Silver bluff on the east (north) bank of the Savannah, in Barnwell county, South Carolina, about 25 miles by water below the present Augusta. It will thus be seen that at the very outset of our inquiry the commentators differ by a distance equal to more than half the width of the state of Georgia. It will suffice here to say, without going into the argument, that the author is inclined to believe that the Indian town was on or near Silver bluff, which was noted for its extensive ancient remains as far back as Bartram’s time (Travels, 313), and where the noted George Galphin established a trading post in 1736. The original site has since been almost entirely worn away by the river. According to the Indians of Cofitachiqui, the town, which was on the farther (north) bank of the stream, was two day’s journey from the sea, probably by canoe, and the sailors with the expedition believed the river to be the same one that entered at St. Helena, which was a very close guess. The Spaniards were shown here European articles which they were told had been obtained from white men who had entered the river’s mouth many years before. These they conjectured to have been the men with Ayllon, who had landed on that coast in 1520 and again in 1524. The town was probably the ancient capital of the Uchee Indians, who, before their absorption bythe Creeks, held or claimed most of the territory on both banks of Savannah river from the Cherokee border to within about forty miles of Savannah and westward to the Ogeechee and Cannouchee rivers (see Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend,I, 17–24). The country was already on the decline in 1540 from a recent fatal epidemic, but was yet populous and wealthy, and was ruled by a woman chief whose authority extended for a considerable distance. The town was visited also by Pardo in 1567 and again by Torres in 1628, when it was still a principal settlement, as rich in pearls as in De Soto’s time (Brooks MSS, in the archives of the Bureau of American Ethnology).
Somewhere in southern Georgia De Soto had been told of a rich province called Coça (Coosa, the Creek country) toward the northwest. At Cofitachiqui he again heard of it and of one of its principal towns called Chiaha (Chehaw) as being twelve days inland. Although on first hearing of it he had kept on in the other direction in order to reach Cofitachiqui, he now determined to go there, and made the queen a prisoner to compel her to accompany him a part of the way as guide. Coça province was, though he did not know it, almost due west, and he was in haste to reach it in order to obtain corn, as his men and horses were almost worn out from hunger. It is apparent, however, that the unwilling queen, afraid of being carried beyond her own territories, led the Spaniards by a roundabout route in the hope of making her escape, as she finally did, or perhaps of leaving them to starve and die in the mountains, precisely the trick attempted by the Indians upon another Spanish adventurer, Coronado, entering the great plains from the Pacific coast in search of golden treasure in the same year.
Instead therefore of recrossing the river to the westward, the Spaniards, guided by the captive queen, took the direction of the north (“la vuelta del norte”—Biedma), and, after passing through several towns subject to the queen, came in seven days to “the province of Chalaque” (Elvas). Elvas, Garcilaso, and Ranjel agree upon the spelling, but the last named makes the distance only two days from Cofitachiqui. Biedma does not mention the country at all. The trifling difference in statement of five days in seven need not trouble us, as Biedma makes the whole distance from Cofitachiqui to Xuala eight days, and from Guaxule to Chiaha four days, where Elvas makes it, respectively, twelve and seven days. Chalaque is, of course, Cherokee, as all writers agree, and De Soto was now probably on the waters of Keowee river, the eastern head stream of Savannah river, where the Lower Cherokee had their towns. Finding the country bare of corn, he made no stay.
Proceeding six days farther they came next to Guaquili, where they were kindly received. This name occurs only in the Ranjel narrative, the other three being entirely silent in regard to such a halting place. The name has a Cherokee sound (Wakili), but if we allow for a dialectic substitution oflforrit may be connected with such Catawba names as Congaree, Wateree, and Sugeree. It was probably a village of minor importance.
They came next to the province of Xuala, or Xualla, as the Elvas narrative more often has it. In a French edition it appears as Chouala. Ranjel makes it three days from Guaquili or five from Chalaque. Elvas also makes it five days from Chalaque, while Biedma makes it eight days from Cofitachiqui, a total discrepancy of four days from the last-named place. Biedma describes it as a rough mountain country, thinly populated, but with a few Indian houses, and thinks that in these mountains the great river of Espiritu Santo (the Mississippi) had its birth. Ranjel describes the town as situated in a plain in the vicinity of rivers and in a country with greater appearance of gold mines than any they had yet seen. The Portuguese gentleman describes it as having very little corn, and says that they reached it from Cofitachiqui over a hilly country. In his final chapter he states that the course from Cofitachiqui to this place was from south to north, thus agreeing with Biedma. According to Garcilaso (pp. 136–137) it was fifty leagues by the road along which the Spaniards had come from Cofitachiqui to the first valley of the province of Xuala,with but few mountains on the way, and the town itself was situated close under a mountain (“a la falda de una sierra”) beside a small but rapid stream which formed the boundary of the territory of Cofitachiqui in this direction. From Ranjel we learn that on the same day after leaving this place for the next “province” the Spaniards crossed a very high mountain ridge (“una sierra muy alta”).
Without mentioning the name, Pickett (1851) refers to Xuala as “a town in the present Habersham county, Georgia,” but gives no reason for this opinion. Rye and Irving, of the same date, arguing from a slight similarity of name, think it may have been on the site of a former Cherokee town, Qualatchee, on the head of Chattahoochee river in Georgia. The resemblance, however, is rather farfetched, and moreover this same name is found on Keowee river in South Carolina. Jones (De Soto in Georgia, 1880) interprets Garcilaso’s description to refer to “Nacoochee valley, Habersham county”—which should be White county—and the neighboring Mount Yonah, overlooking the fact that the same description of mountain, valley, and swift flowing stream might apply equally well to any one of twenty other localities in this southern mountain country. With direct contradiction Garcilaso says that the Spaniards rested here fifteen days because they found provisions plentiful, while the Portuguese Gentleman says that they stopped but two days because they found so little corn! Ranjel makes them stop four days and says they found abundant provisions and assistance.
However that may have been, there can be no question of the identity of the name. As the province of Chalaque is the country of the Cherokee, so the province of Xuala is the territory of the Suwali or Sara Indians, better known later as Cheraw, who lived in early times in the piedmont country about the head of Broad river in North Carolina, adjoining the Cherokee, who still remember them under the name of Ani′-Suwa′li. A principal trail to their country from the west led up Swannanoa river and across the gap which, for this reason, was known to the Cherokee as Suwa′li-nuñnâ, “Suwali trail,” corrupted by the whites to Swannanoa. Lederer, who found them in the same general region in 1670, calls this gap the “Suala pass” and the neighboring mountains the Sara mountains, “which,” he says, “The Spaniards make Suala.” They afterward shifted to the north and finally returned and were incorporated with the Catawba (see Mooney, Siouan Tribes of the East, bulletin of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1894).
Up to this point the Spaniards had followed a north course from Cofitachiqui (Biedma and Elvas), but they now turned to the west (Elvas, final chapter). On the same day on which they left Xuala they crossed “a very high mountain ridge,” and descended the next day to a wide meadow bottom (“savana”), through which flowed a river which they concluded was a part of the Espiritu Santo, the Mississippi (Ranjel). Biedma speaks of crossing a mountain country and mentions the river, which he also says they thought to be a tributary of the Mississippi. Garcilaso says that this portion of their route was through a mountain country without inhabitants (“despoblado”) and the Portuguese gentleman describes it as being over “very rough and high ridges.” In five days of such travel—for here, for a wonder, all the narratives agree—they came to Guaxule. This is the form given by Garcilaso and the Gentleman of Elvas; Biedma has Guasula, and Ranjel Guasili or Guasuli. The translators and commentators have given us such forms as Guachoule, Quaxule, Quaxulla, and Quexale. According to the Spanish method of writing Indian words the name was pronounced Washulé or Wasuli, which has a Cherokee sound, although it can not be translated. Buckingham Smith (Narratives, p. 222) hints that the Spaniards may have changed Guasili to Guasule, because of the similarity of the latter form to a town name in southern Spain. Such corruptions of Indian names are of frequent occurrence. Garcilaso speaks of it as a “province and town,” while Biedma and Ranjel call it simply a town (“pueblo”). Before reaching this place the Indian queen had managed to make her escape. All the chroniclers tell of the kind receptionwhich the Spaniards met here, but the only description of the town itself is from Garcilaso, who says that it was situated in the midst of many small streams which came down from the mountains round about, that it consisted of three hundred houses, which is probably an exaggeration, though it goes to show that the village was of considerable size, and that the chief’s house, in which the principal officers were lodged, was upon a high hill (“un cerro alto”), around which was a roadway (“paseadero”) wide enough for six men to walk abreast. By the “chief’s house” we are to understand the town-house, while from various similar references in other parts of the narrative there can be no doubt that the “hill” upon which it stood was an artificial mound. In modern Spanish writing such artificial elevations are more often calledlomas, but these early adventurers may be excused for not noting the distinction. Issuing from the mountains round about the town were numerous small streams, which united to form the river which the Spaniards henceforth followed from here down to Chiaha, where it was as large as the Guadalquivir at Sevilla (Garcilaso).
Deceived by the occurrence, in the Portuguese narrative, of the name Canasagua, which they assumed could belong in but one place, earlier commentators have identified this river with the Coosa, Pickett putting Guaxule somewhere upon its upper waters, while Jones improves upon this by making the site “identical, or very nearly so, with Coosawattee Old town, in the southeastern corner of Murray county,” Georgia. As we shall show, however, the name in question was duplicated in several states, and a careful study of the narratives, in the light of present knowledge of the country, makes it evident that the river was not the Coosa, but the Chattahoochee.
Turning our attention once more to Xuala, the most northern point reached by De Soto, we have seen that this was the territory of the Suwala or Sara Indians, in the eastern foothills of the Alleghenies, about the head waters of Broad and Catawba rivers, in North Carolina. As the Spaniards turned here to the west they probably did not penetrate far beyond the present South Carolina boundary. The “very high mountain ridge” which they crossed immediately after leaving the town was in all probability the main chain of the Blue ridge, while the river which they found after descending to the savanna on the other side, and which they guessed to be a branch of the Mississippi, was almost as certainly the upper part of the French Broad, the first stream flowing in an opposite direction from those which they had previously encountered. They may have struck it in the neighborhood of Hendersonville or Brevard, there being two gaps, passable for vehicles, in the main ridge eastward from the first-named town. The uninhabited mountains through which they struggled for several days on their way to Chiaha and Coça (the Creek country) in the southwest were the broken ridges in which the Savannah and the Little Tennessee have their sources, and if they followed an Indian trail they may have passed through the Rabun gap, near the present Clayton, Georgia. Guaxule, and not Xuala, as Jones supposes, was in Nacoochee valley, in the present White county, Georgia, and the small streams which united to form the river down which the Spaniards proceeded to Chiaha were the headwaters of the Chattahoochee. The hill upon which the townhouse was built must have been the great Nacoochee mound, the most prominent landmark in the valley, on the east bank of Sautee creek, in White county, about twelve miles northwest of Clarkesville. This is the largest mound in upper Georgia, with the exception of the noted Etowah mound near Cartersville, and is the only one which can fill the requirements of the case. There are but two considerable mounds in western North Carolina, that at Franklin and a smaller one on Oconaluftee river, on the present East Cherokee reservation, and as both of these are on streams flowing away from the Creek country, this fact alone would bar them from consideration. The only large mounds in upper Georgia are this one at Nacoochee and the group on the Etowah river, near Cartersville. The largest of the Etowah group is some fifty feet in height and is ascended on one side by means of a roadwayabout fifty feet wide at the base and narrowing gradually to the top. Had this been the mound of the narrative it is hardly possible that the chronicler would have failed to notice also the two other mounds of the group or the other one on the opposite side of the river, each of these being from twenty to twenty-five feet in height, to say nothing of the great ditch a quarter of a mile in length which encircles the group. Moreover, Cartersville is at some distance from the mountains, and the Etowah river at this point does not answer the description of a small rushing mountain stream. There is no considerable mound at Coosawatee or in any of the three counties adjoining.
The Nacoochee mound has been cleared and cultivated for many years and does not now show any appearance of a roadway up the side, but from its great height we may be reasonably sure that some such means of easy ascent existed in ancient times. In other respects it is the only mound in the whole upper country which fills the conditions. The valley is one of the most fertile spots in Georgia and numerous ancient remains give evidence that it was a favorite center of settlement in early days. At the beginning of the modern historic period it was held by the Cherokee, who had there a town called Nacoochee, but their claim was disputed by the Creeks. The Gentleman of Elvas states that Guaxule was subject to the queen of Cofitachiqui, but this may mean only that the people of the two towns or tribes were in friendly alliance. The modern name is pronouncedNaguʻtsĭ′by the Cherokee, who say, however, that it is not of their language. The terminal may be the Creekudshi, “small,” or it may have a connection with the name of the Uchee Indians.
From Guaxule the Spaniards advanced to Canasoga (Ranjel) or Canasagua (Elvas), one or two days’ march from Guaxule, according to one or the other authority. Garcilaso and Biedma do not mention the name. As Garcilaso states that from Guaxule to Chiaha the march was down the bank of the same river, which we identify with the Chattahoochee, the town may have been in the neighborhood of the present Gainesville. As we have seen, however, it is unsafe to trust the estimates of distance. Arguing from the name, Meek infers that the town was about Conasauga river in Murray county, and that the river down which they marched to reach it was “no doubt the Etowah,” although to reach the first named river from the Etowah it would be necessary to make another sharp turn to the north. From the same coincidence Pickett puts it on the Conasauga, “in the modern county of Murray, Georgia,” while Jones, on the same theory, locates it “at or near the junction of the Connasauga and Coosawattee rivers, in originally Cass, now Gordon county.” Here his modern geography as well as his ancient is at fault, as the original Cass county is now Bartow, the name having been changed in consequence of a local dislike for General Cass. The whole theory of a march down the Coosa river rests upon this coincidence of the name. The same name however, pronouncedGănsâ′gĭby the Cherokee, was applied by them to at least three different locations within their old territory, while the one mentioned in the narrative would make the fourth. The others were (1) on Oostanaula river, opposite the mouth of the Conasauga, where afterward was New Echota, in Gordon county, Georgia; (2) on Canasauga creek, in McMinn county, Tennessee; (3) on Tuckasegee river, about two miles above Webster, in Jackson county, North Carolina. At each of these places are remains of ancient settlement. It is possible that the name of Kenesaw mountain, near Marietta, in Cobb county, Georgia, may be a corruption ofGănsâ′gĭ, and if so, the Canasagua of the narrative may have been somewhere in this vicinity on the Chattahoochee. The meaning of the name is lost.
On leaving Canasagua they continued down the same river which they had followed from Guaxule (Garcilaso), and after traveling several days through an uninhabited (“despoblado”) country (Elvas) arrived at Chiaha, which was subject to the great chief of Coça (Elvas). The name is spelled Chiaha by Ranjel and the Gentlemanof Elvas, Chiha by Biedma in the Documentos, China by a misprint in an English rendering, and Ychiaha by Garcilaso. It appears as Chiha on an English map of 1762 reproduced in Winsor, Westward Movement, page 31, 1897. Gallatin spells it Ichiaha, while Williams and Fairbanks, by misprint, make it Chiapa. According to both Ranjel and Elvas the army entered it on the 5th of June, although the former makes it four days from Canasagua, while the other makes it five. Biedma says it was four days from Guaxule, and, finally, Garcilaso says it was six days and thirty leagues from Guaxule and on the same river, which was, here at Chiaha, as large as the Guadalquivir at Sevilla. As we have seen, there is a great discrepancy in the statements of the distance from Cofitachiqui to this point. All four authorities agree that the town was on an island in the river, along which they had been marching for some time (Garcilaso, Ranjel), but while the Elvas narrative makes the island “two crossbow shot” in length above the town and one league in length below it, Garcilaso calls it a “great island more than five leagues long.” On both sides of the island the stream was very broad and easily waded (Elvas). Finding welcome and food for men and horses the Spaniards rested here nearly a month (June 5–28, Ranjel; twenty-six or twenty-seven days, Biedma; thirty days, Elvas). In spite of the danger from attack De Soto allowed his men to sleep under trees in the open air, “because it was very hot and the people should have suffered great extremity if it had not been so” (Elvas). This in itself is evidence that the place was pretty far to the south, as it was yet only the first week in June. The town was subject to the chief of the great province of Coça, farther to the west. From here onward they began to meet palisaded towns.
On the theory that the march was down Coosa river, every commentator hitherto has located Chiaha at some point upon this stream, either in Alabama or Georgia. Gallatin (1836) says that it “must have been on the Coosa, probably some distance below the site of New Echota.” He notes a similarity of sound between Ichiaha and “Echoy” (Itseyĭ), a Cherokee town name. Williams (1837) says that it was on Mobile (i. e., the Alabama or lower Coosa river). Meek (1839) says “there can be little doubt that Chiaha was situated but a short distance above the junction of the Coosa and Chattooga rivers,” i. e., not far within the Alabama line. He notes the occurrence of a “Chiaha” (Chehawhaw) creek near Talladega, Alabama. In regard to the island upon which the town was said to have been situated he says: “There is no such island now in the Coosa. It is probable that the Spaniards either mistook the peninsula formed by the junction of two rivers, the Coosa and Chattooga, for an island, or that those two rivers were originally united so as to form an island near their present confluence. We have heard this latter supposition asserted by persons well acquainted with the country.”—Romantic Passages, p. 222, 1857. Monette (1846) puts it on Etowah branch of the Coosa, probably in Floyd county, Georgia. Pickett (1851), followed in turn by Irving, Jones, and Shea, locates it at “the site of the modern Rome.” The “island” is interpreted to mean the space between the two streams above the confluence.