Keyauwee Tribe: Meaning unknown.
Keyauwee Connections. From the historical affiliations of Keyauwee, they are presumed to have been of the Siouan linguistic family.
Keyauwee Location. About the points of meeting of the present Guilford, Davidson, and Randolph Counties. (See also South Carolina.)
Keyauwee Villages. No separately named villages are known.
Keyauwee History. The Keyauwee do not appear to have been noted by white men before 1701 when Lawson (1860) found them in a palisaded village about 30 miles northeast of Yadkin River near the present Highpoint, Guilford County. At that time they were preparing to join the Saponi and Tutelo Indians for better protection against their enemies, and, shortly afterward, together with the last mentioned tribes, the Occaneechi, and the Shakori, they moved toward the settlements about Albemarle Sound. As mentioned already, Governor Spotswood’s project to settle this tribe together with the Eno and Cheraw at Enotown on the frontier of North Carolina was foiled by the opposition of the latter colony. The Keyauwee then moved southward to the Pee Dee along with the Cheraw, and perhaps the Eno and Shakori. In the Jefferys Atlas of 1761 their town appears close to the boundary line between the two Carolinas. They do not reappear in any the historical records but probably united ultimately in part with the Catawba, while some of their descendants are represented among the Robeson County Indians, often miscalled Croatan.
Keyauwee Population. Mooney (1928) estimates 500 Keyauwee in 1600. In 1701 they are said to have numbered approximately as many as the Saponi, but the population of that tribe also is unknown. Shortly afterward it is stated that the Keyauwee, Tutelo, Saponi, Occaneechi, and Shakori totaled 750 souls. This is all the information that we have.
