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Taensa Indian Tribe
Location
Taensa. Meaning unknown, but
the name is evidently derived from that of one of the tribe's constituent
towns.
Connections
They were
one of the three known tribes of the Natchez division of
the Muskhogean stock.
Location
At the
western end of Lake St. Joseph, in Tensas Parish. (See
also Alabama.)
Villages
The only list of Taensa villages preserved was obtained
by Iberville through the medium of the Mobilian trade language and it is
uncertain how much of each name is a Mobilian translation. In four of them
we recognize the Mobilian word for people, okla. These villages are:
Taensas,
Ohytoucoulas
Nyhougoulas
Couthaougoula
Conchayon
Talaspa
Chaoucoula.
Gatschet
has endeavored to interpret all but one of them;
Taënsas by reference to tan'tci,
"corn";
Ohytoucoulas from u'ti, "chestnut";
Couthaougoula from uk'ha'tax, "lake";
Conchayon from ko'nshak, "reed";
Talaspa from ta"lapi, "five" or ta'‘lepa,
"hundred";
Chaoucoula from issi, "deer" or ha'tcbe, "river."
Most of
these seem in the highest degree doubtful. All of the
towns were situated close together in the place above
indicated.
History
It is
altogether probable that the Spaniards under De Soto
encountered the Taensa or bands afterward affiliated
with them, and the probability is strengthened by the
fact that La Salle in 1682 was shown some objects of
Spanish origin by the chief of the Taensa. However, La
Salle and his companions are the first Europeans known
to have met them. The French were treated with great
kindness and no war ever took place between the two
peoples. The Taensa were subsequently visited by Tonti
and by Iberville. When the latter was in their town in
1700 the temple was destroyed by fire, whereupon five
infants were thrown into the flames to appease the
supposedly offended deity. De Montigny undertook
missionary work among them for a brief period but soon
went to the Natchez as presenting a larger field and his
place was never filled. In 1706 the Taensa abandoned
their villages on account of the threatening attitude of
the Yazoo and
Chickasaw and settled
in the town of the Bayogoula whom they afterward destroyed or drove away
in the tragic manner above described. (See Bayogoula.) The Taensa appear
to have moved shortly to a spot in the vicinity of Edgard, St. John
Baptist Parish, and later to the Manchac. In 1715 they left this latter
place and moved to Mobile, where they were assigned a town site 2 leagues
from the French post at a place formerly by the Tawasa. Before 1744
they had crossed the Tensaw Rivers to which they gave their name, and made
a new settlement which they retained until Mobile was surrendered to the
British in 1763. Soon after that event, they moved to Red River. In April
1764, they asked permission to establish themselves on the Mississippi
River at the upper end of Bayou La Four but they seem never to gone there.
For more than 40 years they occupied a tract of land on the Red River
adjoining that of the Apalache. Early in the nineteenth
century both tribes sold their lands and moved to Bayou Boeuf. Still later
the Taensa seem to have moved further south to a small bayou at the
head of Grand Lake which still bears its name, where they intermarried
with the Chitimacha, Alabama, an Atakapa. Some Taensa blood is known to
run in the veins of certain Chitimacha, but as a tribe they are entirely
extinct.
Population
Mooney's estimate (1928) for the
Taensa and Avoyel the in 1650 is 800, and my own for 1698 slightly greater or
nearly the same, although De Montigny (in Shea, 1861), writing in 1699, gives
only 700. In 1700 Iberville estimated 120 cabins and 300 warriors, but in 1702
allows them 150 families. Somewhat later Le Page du Pratz (1758) says they had
about 100 cabins. In 1764 this tribe, with the Apalachee and Pakana Creeks,
counted about 200 all told. Sibley (1832) places the number of Taensa warriors
in 1805 at 25.
Connection in which they have
become noted
The Taensa were noted for:
(1) the peculiarity of their customs, which were like those of the
Natchez,
(2) the tragic destruction of the temple in 1700 and the human sacrifices
which followed.
(3) the perpetuation of their name in Tensas Parish, Tensas River, and
Tensas Bayou, La., and the Tensaw River and Tensaw Village in Baldwin
County, Ala.
Resources:
Notes About the Book:
Source: The Indian Tribes of North America, by John R. Swanton, 1953, Bureau of
American Ethnology, Bulletin 145, US Government Printing Office, Washington DC.
Online Publication: The manuscript was scanned and then ocr'd. Minimal editing
has been done, and readers can and should expect some errors in the textual
output.
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