Creek Towns

The editor has preferred to risk some repetition of material already published in the Forty-second Annual Report of the Bureau and other papers rather than the omission of material that might be of service for a fuller understanding of the ancient Creek organization. Wherever the pronoun I appears it is the editor who is speaking, but it will not be difficult to separate the few comments that he has added.

Towns¹

     At the time when Porter and Perryman were interviewed (1881-82) they stated that there were 49 towns, each occupying a distinct territory, but that they had increased greatly after white contact and that tradition said there were originally but 18. These were all divided into two classes, one called the Italwalgi (Itulwulki) and the other the Kipayalgi (Kipayulki, Kipoywulki, Kupahyulki).² This last is also given as Tipayulki but this form seems to be erroneous. The towns called Italwalgi had control of important matters relating to civil government. Their badge was white, the emblem of peace and wisdom. The towns (or tribes) called Kipayalgi had charge of military affairs, and their badge was red, the emblem of war and prowess. In many respects the former had executive functions, while those of the latter were legislative and judicial. The colors mentioned were painted on doorposts and on various articles, and were used in bodily decoration. All of the people of a town, whether of White or Red clans, belonged as a whole to one of these two classes. Although the White towns were entitled to the civil offices, sometimes the Red towns obtained such dominion and power during war that they kept them when peace came. For instance, the White towns had civil control of the Creeks from time immemorial up to the Revolution of 1776, and then the Red towns obtained power and kept it until 1861. Since the Civil War, 1861-65, the White towns have again been in control.  The White towns took sides under McGillivary with the British and this may have caused the change of power to the Red towns. The following list of the eighteen original towns with their daughter towns and the division of the nation to which each belonged is given by Perryman, but the more usual spellings of the town names leave been substituted.

White Towns

¹ See Forty-second Ann. Rept. Bur. Amer. Ethn., Washington, 1928; also F. G. Speck, Ethnology of the Yuchi Indians, Anthropological Publications of the University of Pennsylvania Museum, vol. 1, No. 1, Philadelphia, 1909 ; and F. G. Speck, The Creek Indians of Taskigi Town, in Memoirs of the American Anthropological Association, n. s. vol. II, pt. 2.
² Italwalgi seems to mean "his own towns" and Kipayalgi or Inkipayalgi, "his opposites," and it is believed that the applications of these would change with the individual. Perryman and Porter belonged to a White town and therefore their Italwalgi ,sere Whites and their Kipayalgi were Reds. Had they belonged to a Red town the appellations would have shifted accordingly.
³  This Is certainly wrong. The Tuskegee were connected with the Alabama and Koasati

NOTE: In the words Italwalgi and Kipayalgi there should be a dot over the a.

     Towns confederated with the Creeks but speaking other languages were the following
     1. Yuchi (adopted by the Kasihta).
     2. Alabama.
     3. Koasati.
     4. Hitchiti.

     The Yuchi language was very different from the Creek. The others resembled one another and were similar to Choctaw.
The following tribes were. conquered by the. Creeks or were remnants of peoples incorporated with them:

1. Apalachicola.
2. Yamasalgi.
3. Nokfilalgi.
4. Natchez.

     These four were thought. to be extinct but the first continued under the, name Talwa łako, and there are a few Natchez even today. Perryman thought that the Alabama, Hitchiti, and Koasati had sprung from the Apalachicola and he is, indeed, supported by their languages. A note says that Alabama, Hitchiti, Koasati, and Natchez were like Choctaw but that is not. true of Natchez, though Natchez is remotely connected with the Muskhogean tongues.
     The information above given corresponds in almost every detail with that which I obtained 30 years later, but, as already stated, Koasati was in no way connected with the Tukpafka group of towns, and the same may be said of Tuskegee. I did not learn of a town corresponding to Tallahassee from which the Tukpafka group are supposed to have come, and Perryman was clearly wrong, or misunderstood in separating Łałogalga from Okchai and Asilanabi. The relationship of these three is so well recognized that not a suggestion of any difference in origin reached me. On the other hand, I am not certain that Wiwohka belonged with them, though the connection is probable. It will be noticed that, although the group to which Kaialedji and Hatchee-tcaba belongs is made coordinate with Tukabahchee, it is stated specifically that the former came from the latter, but the information I received regarding Tal-muchasi would separate it from Atasi and align it with the Okfuskee towns. This I believe to be correct, because the connection is stated by Hawkins. Atasi, as well as Kaialedji, is commonly believed to lave sprung from Tukabahchee. Either Perryman did not know that Apalachicola and Talwa łako were names for the same town or, what is more probable, he was misunderstood. The Yamasee were connected with the Hitchiti in language, and Gatschet was given to understand that Nokfilalgi was a name for the Timucua of Florida.
     A town was usually designated as a "fire,'' for a council fire was always kindled in it in a prescribed place, and the houses of the village had to be built within a drumbeat of that. The man who had charge of the fire was an important official and was called Tutka-titca, signifying "five maker." Each town had a certain amount of land under cultivation and whenever a child was born it, was proportionately increased, an extra allotment. being made. At the annual festival a census was taken by means of sticks (the "broken days") and if it showed all increase in population, more land was taken in. This, of course, applies to the time when there was plenty of waste land around the towns If they found they were decreasing--I suppose this means decreasing seriously-they attributed the calamity to the tythe (tie) snake and removed.
     Towns, like clans, were perpetuated matrilineally, each person belonging to the town of his or her mother.

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