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The Maskoki Family of Tribes
Among the various
nationalities of the Gulf territories the
Maskoki family of tribes occupied a central
and commanding position. Not only the large
extent of territory held by them, but also
their numbers, their prowess in war, and a
certain degree of mental culture and
self-esteem made of the Maskoki one of the
most important groups in Indian history.
From their ethnologic condition of later
times, we infer that these tribes have
extended for many centuries back in time,
from the Atlantic to the Mississippi and
beyond that river, and from the Apalachian
ridge to the Gulf of Mexico. With short
intermissions they kept up warfare with all
the circumiacent Indian communities, and
also among each other. All the various
dispositions of the human mind are
represented in the Maskoki tribes. We have
the cruel and lurking
Chicasa, the powerful
and ingenious but treacherous and
corruptible Cha’hta, the magnanimous and
hospitable, proud and revengeful
Creek, the
aggressive
Alibamu, the quarrel some
Yamassi,
and the self-willed, independent
Seminole,
jealous of the enjoyment of his savage
freedom in the swamps and everglades of the
semi-tropical peninsula.
The irresolute and
egotistic policy of these tribes often
caused serious difficulties to the
government of the English and French
colonies, and some of them constantly
wavered in their adhesion between the French
and the English cause. The American
government overcame their opposition easily
whenever a conflict presented itself (the
Seminole war forms an exception), because,
like all the Indians, they never knew how to
unite against a common foe.
The two main branches
of the stock, the Creek and the Cha’hta
Indians, were constantly at war, and the
remembrance of their deadly conflicts has
now passed to their descendants in the form
of folklore. The two differ
anthropologically in their exterior, the
people of the western or Cha’hta branch
being thick-set and heavy, that of the
eastern or Creek connection more lithe and
tall. Pragmatism is not frequent among them,
and the complexion of both is a rather dark
cinnamon, with the southern olive tinge. The
general intelligence of this gifted race
renders it susceptible for civilization,
endows it with eloquence, but does not
always restrain it from the outbursts of the
wildest passion.
Among the tribes of the
Maskoki family, we notice the following
ethnographic practices: the use of the red
and white colors as symbols of war and
peace, an extensive system of totemic gentes,
the use of the Ilex cassine for the
manufacture of the black drink, the erection
of artificial mounds, the belief in a deity
called "Master of Life," and original
sun-worship. The eastern tribes all had an
annual festival in the town square, called a
fast (púskita in Creek), and some traces of
it may be found also among the western
connection. In the eastern and western
branch (also among the
Naktche people) the
children belong to the gens of the mother, a
custom which differs from that of the
Yuchi
and dates from high antiquity. No instances
of anthropophagy are recorded, but the
custom of scalping seems to have been
indigenous among them. The early
Timucua
scalped their enemies and dried the scalps
over their campfires. The artificial
flattening of the foreheads of male infants
seems to have prevailed in the western
branch only, but some kind of skull
deformation could be observed throughout the
Gulf territories. The re-interment of dead
bodies, after cleaning their bones from the
adhering muscles several months after death,
is recorded more especially for the western
branch, but was probably observed among all
tribes in various modifications.
None of the customs
just enumerated was peculiar to the Maskoki
tribes, but common throughout the south,
many of them being found in the north also.
They were mentioned here only, to give in
their totality a fair ethnographic picture
of the Maskoki nationality.
The genealogy of the
Maskoki tribes cannot be established on
anthropological that is racial,
characteristics; these Indians formerly
incorporated so many alien elements into
their towns, and have become so largely
mixed with half-castes in the nineteenth
century, that a division on racial grounds
has become almost impossible.
Hence, the only
characteristic by which a subdivision of the
family can be attempted, is that of
language. Following their ancient
topographic location from east to west, we
obtain the following synopsis:
First branch, or
Maskoki proper. The Creek, Maskokálgi or
Maskoki proper, settled on Coosa,
Tallapoosa, Upper and Middle Chatahuchi
rivers. From these branched off by
segmentation the Creek portion of the Seminoles, of the
Yamassi and of the little
Yamacraw community.
Second, or Apalachian
branch. This southeastern division, which
may be called also a parte potiori the Hitchiti connection, anciently comprised the
tribes on the Lower Chatahuchi river and,
east from there, the extinct
Apalachi, the
Mikasuki, and the Hitchiti portion of the Seminoles,
Yamassi and
Yamacraws.
Third, or
Alibamu
branch comprised the Alibamu villages on the
river of that name; to them belonged the Koassáti and Witumka on Coosa River, its
northern affluent.
Fourth, Western or
Cha’hta branch. From the main people, the
Cha’hta, settled in the middle portions of
the State of Mississippi, the
Chicasa,
Pascagoula, Biloxi, Huma and other tribes
once became separated through segmentation.
The strongest evidence for a community of origin of the
Maskoki tribes is furnished by the fact that
their dialects belong to one linguistic
family. The numerous incorporations of
foreign elements have not been able to alter
the purity of their language; the number of
intrusive words is very small, and the
grammar has repelled every foreign
intrusion. This is the inference we draw
from their best studied dialects, for with
some of them, as with Abika, we are not
acquainted at all, and with others very
imperfectly. The principal dialects of the
family greatly differ from each other;
Cha’hta, for instance, is unintelligible to
the Creek, Koassáti and Hitchiti people, and
the speech of each of these three tribes is
not understood by the two others. When
Albert Gallatin published his vocabularies
of Cha’hta and Creek, he was uncertain at
first whether they were related to each
other or not. On the other side, the
difference between Cha’hta and Chicasa, and
between Creek and Seminole, is so
insignificant that these dialects may be
considered as practically identical. The
degree of dialectic difference points
approximately to the date of the separation
of the respective communities, and untold
centuries must have elapsed since the two
main branches of the family were torn
asunder, for Cha’hta differs about as much
from Creek as the literary German does from
Icelandic.
The Tribal Divisions Of
The Maskoki Family:
Notes About Book:
Source: Gatschet, Albert S., A Migration Legend of the Creek Indians.
Pub.
D.G. Brinton, Philadelphia, 1884.
Notes about Online Publication: This manuscript has been ocr'd and heavily
edited. Many of the Native American words have been reproduced as clearly as
online publication will allow us, but not all are exactly the way they were in
the original work. The structure of this manuscript has been changed to allow
better online presentation.
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