While we know our northern friends may not feel it, in the South, Spring is
here. So we thought we'd share a few of our gardening sites appropriate
for this time of the year. Along with gardening, there's grilling, and getting
ready to diet so that you can fit back into that bathing suit this summer!
On the east bank of the Angelina River, a little north of a direct west line
from the Nacogdoche village, was that of the Hainai.1
This tribe, whose lands lay on both sides of the Angelina,2
was the head of the Hasinai confederacy, and for that reason was sometimes
called Hasinai. It is to this tribe, also, that the name Texas was usually
applied when it was restricted to a single one. Within its territory was the
chief temple of the group, presided over by the great Xinesi, or high priest.3
At its main village the mission of La Puríssima Conce'pión was founded in 1716.
After the Relación of Jesus Maria, our first sources of specific information on
the location of this village are the diaries. Ramon tells us that he entered the
"Pueblo de los Ainai" just east of the Angelina River, and that nine leagues
east-south-east of this village he reached the "Pueblo de los Nacogdoches."4
The missionary fathers who accompanied Ramon, in their Representation made at
the same time reported the distance as eight leagues east-south-east. Pena
(1721) says the distance was eight leagues east-north-east from the presidio
founded near the mission, and nine from the mission. Rivera (1727) found the
mission just east of the "Rio de los Aynays," or the Angelina, and nine leagues
west of the Nacogdoches mission.5 These witnesses
tally in the main with each other and also, be it noted, with the testimony of
the San Antonio Road, as its route is now identified in the old surveys.
According to the best information obtainable it ran from Nacogdoches a little
north of west to the Angelina, passing it about at Linwood Crossing.6
Espinosa tells us that he founded the mission of Concepción a mile or two east
of the place where the highway crossed the Angelina, near two springs, in the
middle of the Hainai village. This site could not have been far from Linwood
Crossing.7
This Hainai tribe, as has been stated, was evidently the one which Jesus Maria
called the Cachaé or Cataye. He said that between the Nacachau and the
Nacogdoche, about midway, was the lodge of the Great Xinesi, and if we get his
meaning here that immediately northeast of this lodge was the Cachaé tribe. From
other data we learn that the Xinesi's house was within or on the borders of the
Hainai territory, about three leagues from the Concepción mission, and
apparently west of the Angelina.8 The Cachaé thus
correspond, in location and relations, to the Hainai, while, moreover, the
latter are the only tribe that appear in this locality after 1716. Considering
with these facts the probability that Jesus Maria would hardly have left the
head tribe un-mentioned in so formal a description as is his, and the fact that
the Hainai is clearly the head tribe, it seems reasonably certain that the
Cachaé and the Hainai were identical.
1. I follow the spelling of
Mooney which has been adopted by the Bureau
of American Ethnology. The more common
Spanish forms were Aynay and Ainai. English
writers frequently spell it Ioni.
2. Espinosa, Crónica
Apostólica, 425; Diario, 1716; MS. entry for
July 12; Mezières, Carta, Mem. de Nueva
España, XXVIII, 241.
3. Jesus Maria, Relación;
Espinosa, Crónica Apostólica, 423.
4. Derrotero, entries for
July 7 and 8. Original in the Archive
General y Pãblico, Mexico. The copy in
Memorias de Nueva España (XXVII, 157-8)
changes "Ainai" to "Asinay" and
"Nacogdoches" to "Nacodoches." It is such
errors as the former, evidently, that gave
rise to the idea that there was an Asinay
tribe. Similarly, the Memorias copy of the
Repre-sentaci6n of the "Padres Misioneros"'
dated July 22, 1716 (Vol. XXVII, 163) states
that the mission of Concepci6n was founded
for the "Asinays," whereas the original of
that document, as of Espinosa's diary, reads
"Ainai." This error has been copied and
popularized.
5.Ramtin, Derrotero, in
Memorias de Nueva España, XXVII, 158; the
"Padres Misioneros," Representaci6n, Ibid.,
163; Peña, Diario, Ibid., XXVIII, 43-44;
Rivera, Diario, leg. 2142.
6. Maps of Cherokee and
Nacogdoches counties (1879), by I. C. Walsh,
Commissioner of the General Land Office of
Texas, compiled from official data.
7. Espinosa, Diario, entries
for July 6 and 7; Ramón, Derrotero, op. cit.
This site
includes some historical materials that may imply negative stereotypes
reflecting the culture or language of a particular period or place. These
items are presented as part of the historical record and should not be
interpreted to mean that the WebMasters in any way endorse the stereotypes
implied .
The Native Tribes About The East Texas Mission's, Quarterly of the Texas
State Historical Association, By Herbert E. Bolton, April 1908
