# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Indians, North American

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​INDIANS, NORTH AMERICAN. The name of “American Indians” for the aborigines of America had its origin in the use by Columbus, in a letter (February 1493) written soon after the discovery of the New World, of the term Indios (i.e. natives of India) for the hitherto The name “American Indians.” unknown human beings, some of whom he brought back to Europe with him. He believed, as did the people of his age in general, that the islands which he had discovered by sailing westward across the Atlantic were actually a part of India, a mistaken idea which later served to suggest many absurd theories of the origin of the aborigines, their customs, languages, culture, &c. From Spanish the word, with its incorrect connotation, passed into French (Indien), Italian and Portuguese (Indio), German (Indianer), Dutch (Indiane), &c. When the New World came to be known as America, the natives received, in English especially, the name “American Indians,” to distinguish them from the “Indians” of south-eastern Asia and the East Indies. The appellation “Americans” was for a long time used in English to designate, not the European colonists, but the aborigines, and when, in 1891, Dr D. G. Brinton published his notable monograph on the Indians he entitled it The American Race, recalling the early employment of the term. The awkwardness of such a term as “American Indian,” both historically and linguistically, led Major J. W. Powell, the founder of the Bureau of American Ethnology, to put forward as a substitute “Amerind,” an arbitrary curtailment which had the advantage of lending itself easily to form words necessary and useful in ethnological writings, e.g. pre-Amerind, post-Amerind, pseudo-Amerind, Amerindish, Amerindize, &c. Purists have objected strenuously to “Amerind,” but the word already has a certain vogue in both English and French. Indeed, Professor A. H. Keane does not hesitate, in The World’s Peoples (London, 1908), to use “Amerinds” in lieu of “American Indians.” Other popular terms for the American Indians, which have more or less currency, are “Red race,” “Red men,” “Redskins,” the last not in such good repute as the corresponding German Rothäute, or French Peaux-rouges, which have scientific standing. The term “American Indians” covers all the aborigines of the New World past and present, so far as is known, although some European writers, especially in France, still seek to separate from the “Redskins” the Aztecs, Mayas, Peruvians, &c., and some American authorities would (anatomically at least) rank the Eskimo as distinct from the Indian proper. When the name “Indian” came to be used by the European colonists and their descendants, they did not confine it to “wild men,” but applied it to many things that were wild, strange, non-European in the new environment (see Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1902, pp. 107-116; Handbook of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. pp. 605-607). Thus more than one hundred popular names of plants in use in American English (e.g. “Indian corn,” “Indian pink,” &c.) contain references to the Indian in this way; also many other things, such as “Indian file,” “Indian ladder,” “Indian gift,” “Indian pudding,” “Indian summer.” The Canadian-French, who termed the Indian sauvage (i.e. “savage”), remembered him linguistically in botte sauvage (moccasin), traîne sauvage (toboggan). The term “Siwash,” in use in the Chinook jargon of the North Pacific coast, and also in the English of that region, for “Indian” is merely a corruption of this Canadian-French appellation. In the literature relating to the Pacific coast there is mention even of “Siwash Indians.” Throughout Canada and the United States the term “Indian” occurs in hundreds of place-names of all sorts (“Indian River,” “Indian Head,” “Indian Bay,” “Indian Hill,” and the like). There are besides these Indiana and its capital Indianapolis. In Newfoundland “Red Indian,” as the special term for the Beothuks, forms part of a number of place-names. Pope’s characterization of the American aborigine,
| “ | Lo! the poor Indian, whose untutor'd mind |
| | Sees God in clouds, or hears Him in the wind,” |
is responsible for the creation in the mind of the people of a “Mr Lo,” who figures in newspaper lore, cartoons, &c. The reputations, deserved and undeserved, of certain Indian tribes north of Mexico have been such that their names have passed into English or into the languages of other civilized nations of Europe as synonyms for “ruffian,” “thug,” “rowdy,” &c. Recently “les Apaches” have been the terror of certain districts of Paris, as were the “Mohocks” (Mohawks) for certain parts of London toward the close of the 18th century.
The North American Indians have been the subject of numerous popular fallacies, some of which have gained world-wide currency. Here belongs a mass of pseudo-scientific and thoroughly unscientific literature embodying absurd and extravagant theories and speculations as to the origin of the aborigines Popular fallacies. and their “civilizations” which derive them (in most extraordinary ways sometimes), in recent or in remote antiquity, from all regions of the Old World Egypt and Carthage, Phoenicia and Canaan, Asia Minor and the Caucasus, Assyria and Babylonia, Persia and India, Central Asia and Siberia, China and Tibet, Korea, Japan, the East Indies, Polynesia, Greece and ancient Celtic Europe and even medieval Ireland and Wales. Favourite theories of this sort have made the North American aborigines the descendants of refugees from sunken Atlantis, Tatar warriors, Malayo-Polynesian sca-farers, Hittite immigrants from Syria, the “Lost Ten Tribes of Israel,” &c., or attributed their social, religious and political ideas and institutions to the advent of stray junks from Japan, Buddhist votaries from south-eastern Asia, missionaries from early Christian Europe, Norse vikings, Basque fishermen and the like.
Particularly interesting are the theories of “Welsh (or white) Indians” and the “Lost Ten Tribes.” The myth of the “Welsh Indians,” reputed to be the descendants of a colony founded about A.D. 1170 by Prince Madoc (well known from Southey’s poem), has been studied by James Mooney (Amer. Anthrop. iv., 1891, 393-394), who traces its development from statements in an article in The Turkish Spy, published in London about 1730. At first these “Welsh Indians,” who are subsequently described as speaking Welsh, possessing Welsh Bibles, beads, crucifixes, &c., are placed near the Atlantic coast and identified with the Tuscaroras, an Iroquoian tribe, but by 1776 they had retreated inland to the banks of the Missouri above St Louis. A few years later they were far up the Red river, continuing, as time went on, to recede farther and farther westward, being identified successively with the Mandans, in whose language Catlin thought he detected a Welsh element, the Moqui, a Pueblos tribe of north-eastern Arizona, and the Modocs (here the name was believed to re-echo Madoc) of south-western Oregon, until at last they vanished over the waters of the Pacific Ocean. The theory that the American Indians were the “Lost Ten Tribes of Israel” has not yet entirely disappeared from ethnological literature. Many of the identities and resemblances in ideas, customs and institutions between the American Indians and the ancient Hebrews, half-knowledge or distorted views of which ​formed the basis of the theory, are discussed, and their real significance pointed out by Colonel Garrick Mallery in his valuable address on “Israelite and Indian: A Parallel in Planes of Culture” (Proc. Amer. Assoc. Adv. Sci. vol. xxxviii., 1889, pp. 287-331). The whole subject has been discussed by Professor H. W. Henshaw in his “Popular Fallacies respecting the Indians” (Amer. Anthrop. vol. vii. n.s., 1905, pp. 104-113).
Of ways of classifying the races of mankind and their subdivisions the number is great, but that which measures them by their speech is both ancient and convenient. The multiplicity of languages among the American Indians was one of the first things that struck the earliest Linguistic stocks. investigators of a scientific turn of mind, no less than the missionaries who preceded them. The Abbé Hervas, the first serious student of the primitive tongues of the New World, from the classificatory point of view, noted this multiplicity of languages in his Catalogo delle lingue conosciute e notizia della loro affinità e diversità (Cesena, 1784); and after him Balbi, Adelung and others. About the same time in America Thomas Jefferson, who besides being a statesman was also a considerable naturalist (see Amer. Anthrop. ix. n.s., 1907, 499-509), was impressed by the same fact, and in his Notes on the State of Virginia observed that for one “radical language” in Asia there would be found probably twenty in America. Jefferson himself collected and arranged (the MSS. were afterwards lost) the vocabularies of about fifty Indian languages and dialects, and so deserves rank among the forerunners of the modern American school of comparative philologists. After Jefferson came Albert Gallatin, who had been his secretary of the treasury, as a student of American Indian languages in the larger sense. He had also himself collected a number of Indian vocabularies. Gallatin’s work is embodied in the well-known “Synopsis of the Indian Tribes within the United States East of the Rocky Mountains, and in the British and Russian Possessions in North America,” published in the Transactions and Collections of the American Antiquarian Society (ii. 1-422) for 1836. In this, really the first attempt in America to classify on a linguistic basis the chief Indian tribes of the better-known regions of North America, Gallatin enumerated the following twenty-nine separate divisions: Adaize, Algonkin-Lenape, Athapascas, Atnas, Attacapas, Blackfeet, Caddoes, Catawbas, Chahtas, Cherokees, Chetimachas, Chinooks, Eskimaux, Fall Indians, Iroquois, Kinai, Koulischen, Muskhogee, Natches, Pawnees, Queen Charlotte’s Island, Salish, Salmon River (Friendly Village), Shoshonees, Sioux, Straits of Fuca, Utchees, Wakash, Woccons. These do not all represent distinct linguistic stocks, as may be seen by comparison with the list given below; such peoples as the Caddo and Pawnee are now known to belong together, the Blackfeet are Algonkian, the Catawba Siouan, the Adaize Caddoan, the Natchez Muskogian, &c. But the monograph is a very good first attempt at classifying North American Indian languages.
Gallatin’s coloured map of the distribution of the Indian tribes in question is also a pioneer piece of work. In 1840 George Bancroft, in the third volume of his History of the Colonization of the United States, discussed the Indian tribes east of the Mississippi, listing the following eight families: Algonquin, Catawba, Cherokee, Huron-Iroquois, Mobilian (Choctaw and Muskhogee), Natchez, Sioux or Dahcota, Uchee. He gives also a linguistic map, modified somewhat from that of Gallatin. The next work of great importance in American comparative philology is Horatio Hale’s monograph forming the sixth volume (Phila., 1846), Ethnography and Philology, of the publications of the “United States Exploring Expedition, during the years 1838, 1839, 1840, 1842, under the Command of Charles Wilkes, U.S. Navy,” which added much to our knowledge of the languages of the Indians of the Pacific coast regions. Two years later Gallatin published in the second volume of the Transactions of the American Ethnological Society (New York) a monograph entitled “Hale’s Indians of North-west America, and Vocabularies of North America,” in which he recognized the following additional groups: Arrapahoes, Jakon, Kalapuya, Kitunaha, Lutuami, Palainih, Sahaptin, Saste, Waiilatpu. In 1853 he contributed a brief paper to the third volume of Schoolcraft’s Information Respecting the History, Condition and Prospects of the Indian Tribes of the United States, adding to the “families” already recognized by him the following: Cumanches, Gros Ventres, Kaskaias, Kiaways, Natchitoches, Towiacks, Ugaljachmutzi. Some modifications in the original list were also made. During the period 1853–1877 many contributions to the classification of the Indian languages of North America, those of the west and the north-west in particular, were made by Gibbs, Latham, Turner, Buschmann, Hayden, Dall, Powers, Powell and Gatschet. The next important step, and the most scientific, was taken by Major J. W. Powell, who contributed to the Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1885–1886 (Washington, 1891) his classic monograph (pp. 1-142) on “Indian Linguistic Families of America North of Mexico.” In 1891 also appeared Dr D. G. Brinton’s The American Race: A Linguistic Classification and Ethnographic Description of the Native Tribes of North and South America (New York, p. 392). With these two works the adoption of language as the means of distinction and classification of the American aborigines north of Mexico for scientific purposes became fixed. Powell, using the vocabulary as the test of relationship or difference, enumerated, in the area considered, 58 separate linguistic stocks, or families of speech, each “as distinct from one another in their vocabularies and apparently in their origin as from the Aryan or the Scythian families” (p. 26).
The 58 distinct linguistic stocks of American Indians north of Mexico, recognized by Powell, were as follows: (1) Adaizan; (2) Algonquian; (3) Athapascan; (4) Attacapan; (5) Beothukan; (6) Caddoan; (7) Chimakuan; (8) Chimarikan; (9) Chimmesyan; (10) Chinookan; (11) Chitimachan; (12) Chumashan; (13) Coahuiltecan; (14) Copehan; (15) Costanoan; (16) Eskimauan; (17) Esselenian; (18) Iroquoian; (19) Kalapooian; (20) Karankawan; (21) Keresan; (22) Kiowan; (23) Kitunahan; (24) Koluschan; (25) Kulanapan; (26) Kusan; (27) Lutuamian; (28) Mariposan; (29) Moquelumnan; (30) Muskhogean; (31) Natchesan; (32) Palaihnihan; (33) Piman; (34) Pujunan; (35) Quoratean; (36) Salinan; (37) Salishan; (38) Sastean; (39) Shahaptian; (40) Shoshonean; (41) Siouan; (42) Skittagetan; (43) Takilman; (44) Tañoan; (45) Timuquanan; (46) Tonikan; (47) Tonkawan; (48) Uchean; (49) Waiilatpuan; (50) Wakashan; (51) Washoan; (52) Weitspekan; (53) Wishoskan; (54) Yakonan; (55) Yanan; (56) Yukian; (57) Yuman; (58) Zuñian.
This has been the working-list of students of American Indian languages, but since its appearance the scientific investigations of Boas, Gatschet, Dorsey, Fletcher, Mooney, Hewitt, Hale, Morice, Henshaw, Hodge, Matthews, Kroeber, Dixon, Goddard, Swanton and others have added much to our knowledge, and not a few serious modifications of Powell’s classification have resulted. With Powell’s monograph was published a coloured map showing the distribution of all the linguistic stocks of Indians north of Mexico. Of this a revised edition accompanies the Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, published by the Bureau of American Ethnology in 1907–1910, now the standard book of reference on the subject. The chief modifications made in Powell’s list are as follows: The temporary presence in a portion of south-west Florida of a new stock, the Arawakan, is now proved. The Adaizan language has been shown to belong to the Caddoan family; the Natchez to the Muskogian; the Palaihnian to the Shastan; the Piman to the Shoshonian. The nomenclature of Powell’s classification has never been completely satisfactory to American philologists, and a movement is now well under way (see Amer. Anthrop. vii. n.s., 1905, 579-593) to improve it. In the present article the writer has adopted some of the suggestions made by a committee of the American Anthropological Society in 1907, covering several of the points in question.
In the light of the most recent and authoritative researches and investigations the linguistic stocks of American aborigines north of Mexico, past and present, the areas occupied, earliest homes (or original habitats), number of tribes, subdivisions, &c., and population, may be given as follows:—
| Stock. | Area. | Earliest Home. | Tribes, &c. | Population. |
| 1. Algonkian. | Most of N. and E. North America, between lat. 35° and 55°; centred in the region of the Great Lakes and Hudson's Bay. | N. of the St Lawrence and E. of Lake Ontario (Brinton); N.W. of the Great Lakes (Thomas). | Some 50-60, with many minor groups. | About 90,000, of which some 50,000 in Canada. |
| 2. Arawakan. | Within the territory of the Calusas in S.W. Florida. | Central South America. | Small colony from Cuba. | Extinct about end of 16th century. |
| 3. Atakapan. | In part of S.W. Louisiana and N.E. Texas. | Somewhere in E. or N.E. Texas. | 2. | Practically extinct; in 1885 4 individuals living in Louisiana, and 5 in Texas. |
| 4. Athabaskan. | Interior of Alaska and Canada; W. of Hudson's Bay and N. of the Algonkian; also represented in Oregon, California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and northern Mexico. | Interior of Alaska or N.W. Canada. | Some 50, with numerous minor groups. | About 54,000, of which some 20,000 in Canada. |
| 5. Beothukan. | Newfoundland. | Some part of Newfoundland or Labrador. | Local settlements only. | Extinct; last representative died in 1829. |
| 6. Caddoan. | Country between the Arkansas and Colorado rivers in Louisiana, Texas, &c., particularly on the Red River and its affluents; later also in Kansas, Nebraska, Dakota, and Oklahoma. | On the lower Red River, or, perhaps, somewhere to the S.W. | Some 12-15. | About 2000. |
| 7. Chemakuan. | On the N.W. shore of Puget Sound, Washington; also on Pacific coast, near Cape Flattery. | Some part of N.W. Washington. | 2. | About 200. |
| 8. Chimarikan. | In N. California, on Trinity river, N.W. of the Copehan. | Somewhere in N. California. | 1. | Practically extinct; in 1903 only 9 individuals reported living. |
| 9. Chinookan. | On the lower Columbia river, from the Cascades to the Pacific Ocean; on the coast, N. to Shoalwater Bay and S. to Tillamook Head,in Washington and Oregon. | N. of the Columbia, in W. Washington. | Some 10 or 12 with numerous villages. | About 300. |
| 10. Chitimachan. | Part of S.E. Louisiana. | Region of Grand Lake and river, Louisiana. | 1. | Nearly extinct; in 1881 only 50 individuals surviving. |
| 11. Chumashan. | In S.W. California, S. of the Salinan and Mariposan; in the basins of the Sta Maria, Sta Inez, lower Sta Clara, &c., on the coast, and the northern Sta. Barbara Islands. | Somewhere in S.W. California. | 7 or more dialects, with many small settlements. | Nearly extinct; only 15-20 individuals still living. |
| 12. Copehan (Wintun). | In central N. California, W. of the Pujunan; W. of the Coast range, from San Pablo and Suisun Bays N. to Mount Shasta. | Somewhere in N. California. | 2 chief divisions, with many small settlements. | About 130 at various villages, and as many on Round Valley Reservation. |
| 13. Costanoan. | In the coast region of central California, N. of the Salinan; from about San Francisco S. to Point Sur and Big Panoche Creek, and from the Pacific Ocean to the San Joaquin river. | Somewhere in central California. | No true tribes, but 15-20 settlements. | Nearly extinct; only 25 or 30 individuals still living. |
| 14. Eskimoan. | Greenland and some of the Arctic islands, the whole northern coast N. of the Alonkian and Athabaskan, from the straits of Belle Isle to the end of the Aleutian Islands; also in extreme N.E. Asia W. to the Anadyr river; in E. North America in earlier times possibly considerably farther south. | Interior of Alaska (Rink); in the region W. of Hudson's Bay (Boas); preferably the latter. | 9 well-marked groups, with 60-70 “settlements,” &c. | About 28,000, of which there are in Greenland 11,000 Alaska 13,000, Canada 4500, and Asia 1200. |
| 15. Esselenian. | On the coast of W. California, S. of Monterey, N. of the Salinan. | Somewhere in W. or central California. | Many small settlements. | Extinct; last speaker of language died about 1890. |
| 16. Haidan (Skittagetan). | The Queen Charlotte Islands, off the N.W. coast of British Columbia, and part of the Prince of Wales Archipelago, Alaska. | Interior of Alaska or N.W. Canada. | 2 dialects; about 25 chief “towns,” and many minor settlements. | About 900, of which 300 are in Alaska. |
| 17. Iroquoian. | The region about Lakes Erie and Ontario (Ontario, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, &c.),and on both banks of the St Lawrence, on the N. to beyond the Saguenay, on the S. to Gaspé; also represented in the S.E. United States by the Tuscarora, Cherokee, &c. (now chiefly in Oklahoma). | Somewhere between the lower St Lawrence and Hubson's Bay (Brinton, Hale); in S. Ohio and Kentucky (Boyle, Thomas). | Some 15 chief tribes with many minor subdivisions. | About 40,000, of which 10,000 are in Canada; of those in the United States 28,000 are Cherokee. |
| 18. Kalapuyan. | In N.W. Oregon, in the valley of the Willamette, above the Falls. | Somewhere in N.W. Oregon. | About 15-18, with minor divisions. | Only some 140 individuals still living. |
| 19. Karankawan. | On the Texas coast, from Galveston to Padre Island. | Somewhere in S. Texas. | 5-6, with minor divisions. | Extinct probably in 1858; a few survived later, possibly, in Mexico. |
| 20. Keresan. | In N. central New Mexico, on the Rio Grande and its tributaries the Jemez, San José, &c. | Somewhere in the New Mexico-Arizona region. | 17 “villages” (pueblos); earlier more. | 3990, in 6 pueblos (some 150 at Isleta). |
| 21. Kiowan. | On the upper Arkansas and Canadian rivers, in Colorado Kansas, Oklahoma, &c.; formerly on the head-waters of the Platte, and still earlier on the upper Yellowstone and Missouri, in S.W. Montana. | At the foot of the Rocky Mountains in S. W. Montana. | 1. | 1219 in Oklahoma. |
| 22. Kitunahan. | In S.E. British Columbia, N. Idaho, and part of N.W. Montana. | Somewhere E. of the Rocky Mountains in Montana or Alberta. | 2 chief divisions and 3 others. | About 1100; half in Canada and half in the United States. |
| 23. Koluschan (Tlingit). | On the coast and adjacent islands of S. Alaska, from 55° to 60° N. lat.; also some in Canada. | Somewhere in the interior of Alaska or N. W. Canada. | Some 12-15. | About 2000. |
| 24. Kulanapan (Pomo). | On the coast in N.W. California (Sonoma, Lake and Mendocino counties), W. of the Yukian. | Somewhere in N.W. California. | About 30 local divisions, &c.; no true tribes. | About 1000. |
| 25. Kusan. | On the coast of central Oregon, on Coos Bay and Coos and Coquille rivers, S. of the Yakonan; now mostly on Siletz Reservation. | Somewhere inland from Coos Bay, Oregon. | 4, earlier more. | About 50. ​ |
| 26. Lutuamian (Klamath). | In the region of the Klamath and Tule lakes, Lost and Sprague rivers, &c., in Oregon (chiefly) and N.E. California; now on Klamath Reservation, Oregon, with a few also in Oklahoma. | In S. Oregon, N. of the Klamath lakes. | 2, with local subdivisions. | 1034; of these 755 Klamath, and 279 Modoc (56 in Oklahoma). |
| 27. Mariposan (Yokuts). | In S. central California, in the valley of the San Joaquin, on the Tule, Kaweah, King's rivers,&c.; E. of the Salinan, S. of the Moquelumnan. | Somewhere in central California. | 30-40 groups with special dialects. | About 150, at Tule river reservation, &c. |
| 28. Moquelumnan (Miwok). | In central California, in three sections: the main area on the W. slope of the Sierras, from the Cosumnes river on the N. to the Fresno on the S.; a second on the N. shore of San Francisco Bay, and a third (small) S. of Clear Lake on the head-waters of Putah Creek. | Somewhere in central California. | 7 dialects, no true tribes; about 20 local groups with numerous minor ones. | Several hundred; much scattered. |
| 29. Muskogian (Muskhogean). | In the Gulf States, E. of the Mississippi, most of Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia, part of Tennessee, S. Carolina, Florida and Louisiana; now mostly in Oklahoma. | Somewhere W. of the lower Mississippi. | About 12, with many minor divisions. | About 40,000; of these 38,000 in Oklahoma, 1000 in Mississippi, 350 in Florida, and a few in Louisiana. |
| 30. Pakawan (Coahuiltecan). | On both banks of the Rio Grande in Texas and Mexico, from its mouth to beyond Laredo; at one time possibly E. to Antonio, and W. to the Sierra Madre. | Some part of N.E. Mexico. | 20-25, some very small. | Practically extinct; in 1886 about 30 individuals still living, mostly on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande. |
| 31. Pujunan (Maidu). | In N.E. California, E. of the Sacramento river, between the Shastan and Moquelumnun. | N.E. California. | No true tribes; several larger and very many smaller local divisions, “villages,” &c. | About 250 full-bloods. |
| 32. Quoratean (Karok). | In extreme N.W. California, on the Klamath river, &c.; W. of the Shastan. | Somewhere in N. California. | Many “villages,” &c. | In 1889 some 600; much reduced since; possibly 300. |
| 33. Sahaptian. | In the region of the Columbia and its tributaries, in parts of Washington, Idaho and Oregon; between lat. 44° and 47°, and from the Cascades to the Bitter Root Mountains. | Somewhere in the region of the Columbia, or farther N. | 5-7. | About 4200. |
| 34. Salinan. | On the Pacific coast of S.W. California, from above S. Antonio, to below S. Louis Obispo; W. of the Mariposan. | Somewhere in S. W. California. | 2 or 3 larger divisions; no true tribes. | Practically extinct; in 1884 only 10-12 individuals living. |
| 35. Salishan. | A large part of S. British Columbia and Washington, with parts of Idaho and Montana; also part of Vancouver Island, and outliers in N. British Columbia (Bilqula), and S.W. Oregon. | Central or N. British Columbia. | Some 60-65, of which a number are merely local divisions. | About 15,000 in Canada, and some 6300 in the United States. |
| 36. Shastan. | In N. California and S. Oregon, in the basins of the Pit and Klamath rivers, on Rogue river and to beyond the Siskiyou Mountains; S. of the Lutuamian. | In N. California or Oregon. | 6 or more linguistic divisions. | Less than 40 Shasta full-bloods; some 1200 Achomawi. |
| 37. Shoshonian. | In the W. part of the United States; most of the country between lat. 35° and 45° and long. 105° and 120°, with extensions N., S., and S.E. outside this area; represented also in California, and in Mexico by the Piman, Sonoran and Nahuatlan tribes. | Foot-hills and plains E. of the Rocky Mountains in N.W. United States or Canada, but residence in Plateau region long-continued. | Some 12-15 in the United States; many more in Mexico, ancient and modern. | In the United States, some 24,000. |
| 38. Siouan. | In the basin of the Missouri and the upper Mississippi; from about N. lat. 33° to 53° and, at the broadest, from 89° to 110° W. long.; also represented in Wisconsin (Winnebago), Louisiana, the Carolinas, and Virginia (formerly). | In the Carolina-Virginia region. | Some 20 large and many minor ones. | About 38,000; of which some 1400 in Canada. |
| 39. Takelman. | In S.W. Oregon, in the middle valley of Rogue river, on the upper Rogue, and to about the California line or beyond. | In some part of S. Oregon. | 2. | Practically extinct; perhaps 6 speakers of the language alive. |
| 40. Tanoan. | In New Mexico, on the Rio Grande, &c., from lat. 33° to 36°; also a settlement with the Moqui in N.E. Arizona, and another on the Rio Grande at the boundary line, partly in Mexico. | Some part of New Mexico. | Some 14-15 pueblos. | About 4200 in 12 pueblos. |
| 41. Timuquan. | In Florida, from the N. border and the Ocilla river to Lake Okeechobee, perhaps farther N. and S. | Some part of Florida. | Some 60 or more settlements. | Extinct in 18th century. |
| 42. Tonikan. | In part of E. Louisiana and part of Mississippi; in Avoyelles parish, La., &c. | Somewhere in the Louisiana-Mississippi region. | 3. | Practically extinct; in 1886 some 25 individuals living at Marksville, La. |
| 43. Tonkawan. | In S.E. Texas, N.W. of the Karankawan; remnants now in Oklahoma. | Somewhere in S. or W. Texas. | 1. | Nearly extinct; in 1884 only 78 individuals living; in 1905 but 47, with Ponkas in Oklahoma. |
| 44. Tsimshian (Chimmesyan). | In N.W. British Columbia, on the Nass and Skeena rivers, and the adjacent islands and coast S. to Millbank Sound also (since 1887) on Annette Island Alaska. | On the head-waters of the Skeena river. | 3 main and several minor divisions. | About 3200 in Canada, and 950 in Alaska. |
| 45. Wailatpuan. | A western section (Molala) in the Cascade region between Mounts Hood and Scott, ihn Washington and Oregon; an eastern (Cayuse) on the head-waters of the Wallawalla. Umatilla and Grande Ronde rivers. | In Oregon, S. of the Columbia river. | 2. | Language practically extinct; 405 Cayuse (in 1888 only 6 spoke their mother tongue) are still living; in 1881 about 20 Molalas. ​ |
| 46. Wakashan (Kwakiutl-Nootka). | Most of Vancouver Island (except some 2/3 of the E. coast) and most of the coast of British Columbia from Gardner channel to Cape Mudge; also part of extreme N.W. Washington. | Somewhere in the interior of British Columbia. | 3 main divisions, with more than 50 “tribes.” | 4765, of which 435 are in the United States. |
| 47. Washoan. | In E. central California and the adjoining part of Nevada, in the region of Lake Tahoe and the lower Carson valley. | In N.W. Nevada. | 2. | About 200, in the region of Carson, Reno, &c. |
| 48. Weitspekan (Yurok). | In N.W. California, W. of the Quoratean. | In N. California or S. Oregon. | 6 divisions; no true tribes. | A few hundreds; in 1870 estimated at 2000 or more. |
| 49. Wishoskan (Wiyot). | In N.W. California, in the coast region, S. of the Weitspekan. | In N. California. | 3-5 divisions; no true tribes. | Nearly extinct. |
| 50. Yakonan. | In W. Oregon, in the coast region and on the rivers from the Yaquina to the Umpqua. | W. central Oregon. | 4 chief divisions, with numerous villages. | About 300, on the Siletz Reservation. |
| 51. Yanan. | In central N. California in the region of Round Mountain, &c., S. of the Shastan. | Somewhere farther E. | 1. | Practically extinct; in 1884 but 35 individuals living. |
| 52. Yuchian. | In E. Georgia, on the Savannah river from above Augusta down to the Ogeechee, and also on Chatahoochee river; remnants now in Oklahoma. | Somewhere E. of the Chatahoochee. | 1. | About 500, with Creeks in Oklahoma. |
| 53. Yukian. | In N.W. California, E. of the Copehan, with a N. and a S. section; in the Round Valley region. | N. or central California. | 5 divisions; no true tribes. | About 250. |
| 54. Yuman. | In the extreme S.W. of the United States (lower Colorado and Gila valley), part of California, most of Lower California, and a small part of Mexico. | N.W. Arizona. | 9-10. | In the United States about 4800. |
| 55. Zuñian. | In N.W. New Mexico, on the Zuñi river. | Some part of the New Mexico-Arizona region. | 1. | 1500. |
Of these 55 different linguistic stocks 5 (Arawakan, Beothukan, Esselenian, Karankawan and Timuquan) are completely extinct, the Arawakan, of course, in North America only; 13 (Atakapan, Chimarikan, Chitimachan, Chumashan, Costanoan, Kusan, Pakawan, Salinan, Takelman, Tonikan, Tonkawan, Wishoskan, Yakonan) practically extinct; while the speakers of a few other languages or the survivors of the people once speaking them (e.g. Chemakuan, Chinookan, Copehan, Kalapuyan, Mariposan, Washoan, Yukian), number about 200 or 300, in some cases fewer. Of the Wailatpuans, although some individuals belonging to the stock are still living, the language itself is practically extinct. The distribution of the various stocks reveals some interesting facts. Among these are the stretch of the Eskimoan along the whole Arctic coast and its extension into Asia; the immense areas occupied by the Athabaskan and the Algonkian, and (less notably) the Shoshonian and the Siouan; the existence of few stocks on the Atlantic slope (from Labrador to Florida, east of the Mississippi, only 8 are represented); the great multiplicity of stocks in the Pacific coast region, particularly in Oregon and California; the extension of the Shoshonian, Yuman and Athabaskan southward into Mexico, the Shoshonian in ancient, the Athabaskan in modern times; the existence of an Arawakan colony in south-western Florida, a 16th-century representative in North America of a South American linguistic stock. Some stocks, e.g. Atakapan, Beothukan, Chemakuan, Chimarikan, Chitimachan, Kiowan, Kitunahan, Lutuamian, Takelman, Tonkawan, Wailatpuan, Yanan, Yuchian, Zuñi, &c., were not split up into innumerable dialects, possessing at most but two, three or four, usually fewer. Of the larger stocks, the Athabaskan, Algonkian, Shoshonian, Siouan, Iroquoian, Salishan, &c., possess many dialects often mutually unintelligible. In marked contrast with this is the case of the Eskimoan stock, where, in spite of the great distance over which it has extended, dialect variations are at a minimum, and the people “have retained their language in all its minor features for centuries” (Boas). As to the reason for the abundance of linguistic stocks in the region of the Pacific (from Alaska to Lower California, west of long. 115°, there are 37: Eskimoan, Koluschan, Athabaskan, Haidan, Tsimshian, Wakashan, Salishan, Kitunahan, Chimakuan, Chinookan, Sahaptian, Wailatpuan, Shoshonian, Kalapuyan, Yakonan, Kusan, Takelman, Lutuamian, Quoratean, Weitspekan, Wishoskan, Shastan, Yanan, Chimarikan, Yukian, Copehan, Pujunan, Washoan, Kulanapan, Moquelumnan, Mariposan, Costanoan, Esselenian, Salinan, Chumashan, Yuman) there has been much discussion. Of these no fewer than 18 are confined practically to the limits of the present state of California. Dialects of Athabaskan, Shoshonian and Yuman also occur within the Californian areas, thus making, in all, representatives of 21 linguistic stocks in a portion of the continent measuring less than 156,000 sq. m. In explanation of this great diversity of speech several theories have been put forward. One is to the effect that here, as in the region of the Caucasus in the Old World, the multiplicity of languages is due to the fact that tribe after tribe has been driven into the mountain valleys, &c., by the pressure of stronger and more aggressive peoples, who were setting forth on careers of migration and conquest. Another view, advocated by Horatio Hale in 1886 (Proc. Amer. Assoc. Adv. Sci.; also Proc. Canad. Inst., Toronto, 1888), is that this great diversity of human speech is due to the language-making instinct of children, being the result of “its exercise by young children accidentally isolated from the teachings and influence of grown companions.” A pair of young human beings, separating thus from the parent tribe and starting social life in a new environment by themselves, would, according to Mr Hale, soon produce a new dialect or a new language. This theory was looked upon with favour by Romanes, Brinton, and other psychologists and ethnologists. Dr R. B. Dixon (Congr. intern. des. Amér., Quebec, 1906, pp. 255-263), discussing some aspects of this question, concludes “that the great linguistic and considerable cultural complexity of this whole California-Oregon region is due to progressive differentiation rather than to the crowding into this restricted area of remnants of originally discrete stocks.” How far two dialects of one stock can go in the way of such differentiation without becoming absolutely distinct is illustrated by the Achomawi branches of the Shastan family of speech, which Dr Dixon has very carefully investigated.
The test of vocabulary is not the only means by which the languages of the North American aborigines might be classified. There are peculiarities of phonetics, morphology, grammar, sentence-structure, &c., which suggest groupings of the linguistic stocks independent of their lexical content. Some languages are harsh and consonantal (e.g. the Kootenay and others of the North Pacific region), some melodious and vocalic, as are certain of the tongues of California and the south-eastern United States. Some employ reduplication with great frequency, like certain Shoshonian dialects; others, like Kootenay, but rarely. A few, like the Chinook, are exceedingly onomatopoeic. Some, like the northern languages of California, have no proper plural forms. Of the Californian languages the Pomo alone distinguishes gender in the pronoun, a feature common to other languages no farther off than Oregon. The high development and syntactical use of demonstratives which characterize the Kwakiutl are not found among the Californian tongues. A few languages, like the Chinook and the Tonika, possess real grammatical gender. Some languages are essentially prefix, others essentially suffix tongues; while yet others possess both prefixes and suffixes, or even infixes as well. In some languages vocalic changes, in others consonantal, have grammatical or semantic meaning. In certain languages tense, mood and voice are rather ​weakly developed. In some languages syntactical cases occur (e.g. in certain Californian tongues), while in many others they are quite unknown. Altogether the most recent investigations have revealed a much greater variety in morphological and in grammatical processes than was commonly believed to exist, so that the general statement that the American Indian tongues are all clearly and distinctly of the “incorporating” and “polysynthetic” types needs considerable modification. Using criteria of phonetics, morphology, grammar, &c., some of the best authorities have been able to suggest certain groups of North American Indian languages exhibiting peculiarities justifying the assumption of relationship together. Thus Dr Franz Boas (Mem. Intern. Congr. Anthrop., 1893, pp. 339-346, and Ann. Archaeol. Rep. Ontario, 1905, pp. 88-106) has grouped the linguistic stocks of the North Pacific coast region as follows: (1) Tlingit (Koluschan) and Haida; (2) Tsimshian; (3) Wakashan (Kwakiutl-Nootka), Salish, Chemakum; (4) Chinook. In the same region the present writer has suggested a possible relationship of the Kootenay with Shoshonian. In the Californian area Dr R. B. Dixon and Dr A. L. Kroeber have made out these probable groups among the numerous language stocks of that part of the United States: (1) Chumashan and Salinan; (2) Yurok (Weitspekan), Wishoskan, Athabaskan, Karok (Quoratean), Chimarikan; (3) Maidu (Pujunan), Lutuamian, Wintun (Copehan), Yukian, Pomo (Kulanapan), Costanoan, Esselenian, Yokuts (Mariposan), Shoshonian, Shastan, Moquelumnan and possibly Washoan; (4) Yanan; (5) Yuman. Suggestions of even larger groups than any of these have also been made. It may be that, judged by certain criteria, the Kootenay, Shoshonian, Iroquoian and Siouan may belong together, but this is merely tentative. It is also possible, from the consideration of morphological peculiarities, that some if not all of the languages of the so-called “Palaeo-Asiatic” peoples of Siberia, as Boas has suggested (Science, vol. xxiii., n.s., 1906, p. 644), may be included within the American group of linguistic stocks. Indeed Sternberg (Intern. Amer.-Kongr. xiv., Stuttgart, 1904, pp. 137-140) has undertaken to show the relationship morphologically of one of these languages, the Giliak (of the island of Saghalin and the region about the mouth of the Amur), to the American tongues, and its divergence from the “Ural-Altaic” family of speech. Here, however, more detailed investigations are needed to settle the question.
At one time the opinion was widely prevalent that primitive languages changed very rapidly, sometimes even within a generation, and the American Indian tongues were rather freely used as typical examples of such extreme variation. The error of this view is now admitted General character of Indian languages. everywhere, and for the speech of the New World aborigines Dr Franz Boas states (Hndb. Amer. Ind. pt. i., 1907, p. 759): “There is, however, no historical proof of the change of any Indian language since the time of the discovery comparable with that of the language of England between the 10th and 13th centuries.” Another statement that has obtained currency, appearing even in otherwise reputable quarters sometimes, is to the effect that some of the vocabularies of American Indian languages consist of but a few hundred words, one being indeed so scanty that its speakers could not converse by night, since darkness prevented resort to the use of gesture. This is absolutely contrary to fact, for the vocabularies of the languages of the American Indians are rich, and, according to the best authority on the subject, “it is certain that in every one there are a couple of thousand of stem words and many thousand words, as that term is defined in English dictionaries” (Boas). The number of words in the vocabulary of the individual Indian is also much greater than is generally thought to be the case. It was long customary, even in “scientific” circles, to deny to American Indian tongues the possession of abstract terms, but here again the authority of the best recent investigators is conclusive, for “the power to form abstract ideas is, nevertheless, not lacking, and the development of abstract thought would find in every one of the languages a ready means of expression” (Boas). In this connexion, however, it should be remembered that, in general, the languages of the American aborigines “are not so well adapted to generalized statements as to lively descriptions.” The holophrastic terms characteristic of so many American Indian languages “are not due to a lack of power to classify, but are rather expressions of form of culture, single terms being intended for those ideas of prime importance to the people” (Boas). This consideration of American primitive tongues in their relation to culture-types opens up a comparatively new field of research, and one of much evolutional significance.
As a result of the most recent and authoritative philological investigations, the following may be cited as some of the chief characteristics of many, and in some cases, of most of the languages of the aborigines north of Mexico.
1. Tendency to express ideas with great graphic detail as to place, form, &c.
2. “Polysynthesis,” a device making possible, by the use of modifications of stems and radicals and the employment of prefixes, suffixes, and sometimes infixes, &c., the expression of a large number of special ideas. By such methods of composition (to cite two examples from Boas) the Eskimo can say at one breath, so to speak, “He only orders him to go and see,” and the Tsimshian, “He went with him upward in the dark and came against an obstacle.” The Eskimo Takusariartorumagaluarnerpâ ? (“Do you think he really intends to go to look after it?”) is made up from the following elements: Takusar(pâ), “he looks after it”; iartor (poq), “he goes to”; uma (voq), “he intends to”; (g) aluar (poq), “he does so, but”; nerpoq, “do you think he.” The Cree “word” “kekawewechetushekamikowanowow” (“may it,” i.e. the grace of Jesus Christ, “remain with you”) is resolvable into: Kelawow (here split into ke at the beginning and -owow as terminal), “you” (pl.); ka = sign of futurity (first and second persons); we = an optative particle; weche = “with”; tusheka = verbal radical, “remain”; mik = pronominal particle showing that the subject of the verb is in the third person and the object in the second, “it-you”; owan = verbal possessive particle, indicating that the subject of the verb is something inanimate belonging to the animate third person, “his-it.” The Carrier (Athabaskan) lekœnahweshœndœthœnœzkrok, “I usually recommence to walk to and fro on all fours while singing,” which Morice calls “a simple word,” is built up from the following elements: le = “prefix expressing reciprocity, which, when in connexion with a verb of locomotion, indicates that the movement is executed between two certain points without giving prominence to either”; kœ = particle denoting direction toward these points; na = “iterative particle, suggesting that the action is repeated”; hwe = particle referring to the action as being in its incipient stage; shœn = “song” (when incorporated in a verb it “indicates that singing accompanies the action expressed by the verbal root”); dœ = “a particle called for by shœn, said particle always entering into the composition of verbs denoting reference to vocal sounds”; thœ = “the secondary radical of the uncomposite verb thîzkret inflected from thi for the sake of euphony with nœz”; nœz = “the pronominal element of the whole compound” (the n is demanded by the previous hwe, œ marks the present tense, and z marks the first person singular of the third conjugation); krok = “the main radical, altered here by the usitative from the normal form kret, and is expressive of locomotion habitually executed on four feet or on all fours.”
3. Incorporation of noun and adjectives in verb, or of pronouns in verb. From the Kootenay language of south-eastern British Columbia the following examples may be given: Natltlamkine = “He carries (the) head in (his) hand”; Howankotlamkine = “I shake (the) head in (my) hand”; Witlwumine = “(His) belly is large”; Tlitkatine = “He has no tail”; Matlnaktletline = “He opens his eyes.” In these expressions are incorporated, with certain abbreviations of form, the words aqktlam, “head”; aqkowum, “belly”; aqkat, “tail”; aqkaktletl, “eyes.” In some languages the form for the noun incorporated in the verb is entirely different from that in independent use. Of pronominal incorporation these examples are from the Kootenay: Nupqanapine = “He sees me”; Honupqanisine = “I see you”; Tshatlipitlisine = “He will kill you”; Tshatlitqanawasine = “He will bite us”; Tshatltsukwatisine = “He is going to seize you”; Hintshatltlpatlnapine = “You will honour me.” For incorporation of adjectives these examples will serve: Honitenustik = “I paint (my face),” literally, “I make it red” (kanohos, “red”; the radical is nōs or nūs for nōhōs); Howitlkeine = “I shout,” literally, “I talk big”; Howitlkaine = “I am tall (big).” In some languages the pronouns denoting subject, direct object and indirect object are all incorporated in the verb.
4. The formation of nouns of very composite character by the use of stems or radicals and prefixes, suffixes, &c., of various sorts, the intricacy of such formations exceeding often anything known in the Indo-European and Semitic languages. Often the component parts are “clipped,” or changed by decapitation, decaudation, syncopation, &c., before being used in the compound. The following examples from various Indian languages will illustrate the process:—Kootenay: Aqkinkanuktlamnam = “crown of head,” from aq (prefix of uncertain meaning), kinkan = “top,” tlam = “head,” -nam (suffix = “somebody’s”). Tlingit: Kanyiqkuwate = “aurora,” literally, “fire (kan)-like (yiq)-out-of-doors (ku)-colour (wate).”
5. The development of a great variety of forms for personal and demonstrative pronouns. In the latter, sometimes, the language distinguishes “visibility and invisibility, present and past, location to the right, left, front and back of, and above and below the speaker” (Boas). According to Morice (Trans. Canad. Inst., 1889–1890, p. 187), the Carrier language of the Athabaskan stock has no fewer than seventeen possessive pronouns of the third person.
6. Indistinctness of demarcation between noun and verb; in some languages the transitive and in others the intransitive only is really verbal in form.
​7. The use of the intransitive verb as a means of expressing ideas which in European tongues, e.g., would be carried by adjectives. In the Carrier language almost all adjectives are “genuine verbs” (Morice).
8. The expression of abstract nouns in a verbalized form. Thus Cree (Algonkian) generally says, in preference to using the abstract noun pimatisewin, “life,” the periphrastic verb āpimatisenanewuk, literally “that they (indefinite as to person) live.” So far is this carried sometimes that Horden (Cree Grammar, London, 1881, p. 5) says: “I have known an Indian speak a long sentence, on the duties of married persons to each other, without using a single noun.”
As an interesting example of a long word in American-Indian languages may be mentioned the Iroquois taontasakonatiatawitserakninonseronniontonhatieseke. This “word,” which, as Forbes (Congr. intern. d. Amer., Quebec, 1906, p. 103) suggests, would serve well on the signboard of a dealer in novelties, is translated by him, “Que plusieurs personnes viennent acheter des habits pour d’autres personnes avec de quoi payer.” Not so formidable is deyeknonhsedehrihadasterasterahetakwa, a term for “stove polish,” in use on the Mohawk Reservation near Brantford, Ontario.
The literature in the native languages of North America due to missionary efforts has now reached large proportions. Naturally Bible translations have been most important. According to Wilberforce Eames (Handbook of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. pp. 143–145), “the Bible has been printed in part or in whole in 32 Indian languages north of Mexico. In 18 one or more portions have been printed; in 9 others the New Testament or more has appeared; and in 5 languages, namely, the Massachuset, Cree, Labrador Eskimo, Santee Dakota and Tukkuthkutchin, the whole Bible is in print.” Of the 32 languages possessing Bible translations of some sort 3 are Eskimoan dialects, 4 Athabaskan, 13 Algonkian, 3 Iroquoian, 2 Muskogian, 2 Siouan, 1 Caddoan, 1 Sahaptian, 1 Wakashan, 1 Tsimshian, 1 Haidan. Translations of the Lord’s Prayer, hymns, articles of faith and brief devotional compositions exist now in many more languages and dialects. A goodly number of other books have also been made accessible in Indian versions, e.g. Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress (Dakota, 1857), Baxter’s Call to the Unconverted (Massachuset, 1655), Goodrich’s Child’s Book of the Creation (Choctaw, 1839), Thomas à Kempis’s Imitation of Christ (Greenland Eskimo, 1787), Newton’s The King’s Highway (Dakota, 1879), &c. The “Five Civilized Tribes,” who are now full-fledged citizens of the state of Oklahoma, possess a mass of literature (legal, religious, political, educational, &c.) published in the alphabet adapted from the “Cherokee Alphabet” invented by Sequoyah about 1821, “which at once raised them to the rank of a literary people.”
Of periodicals in Indian languages there have been many published from time to time among the “Five Civilized Tribes.” Of the Cherokee Advocate, Mooney said in 1897–1898, “It is still continued under the auspices of the Nation, printed in both languages (i.e. Cherokee and English), and distributed free at the expense of the Nation to those unable to read English—an example without parallel in any other government.” More or less ephemeral periodicals (weekly, monthly, &c.) are on record in various Algonkian, Iroquoian, Siouan and other languages, and the Greenland Eskimo have one, published irregularly since 1861. Wilberforce Eames (Handbook of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 389) chronicles 122 dictionaries (of which more than half are still in MSS.) of 63 North American-Indian languages, belonging to 19 different stocks.
The following linguistic stocks are represented by printed dictionaries (in one or more dialects): Algonkian, Athabaskan, Chinookan, Eskimoan, Iroquoian, Lutuamian, Muskogian, Salishan, Shoshonian, Siouan. There exists a considerable number of texts (myths, legends, historical data, songs, grammatical material, &c.) in quite a number of Indian languages that have been published by scientific investigators. The Algonkian (e.g. Jones’s Fox Texts, 1908), Athabaskan (e.g. Goddard’s Hupa Texts, 1904, Matthews’s Navaho Legends, 1897, &c.), Caddoan (e.g. Miss A. C. Fletcher’s Hako Ceremony, 1900), Chinookan (Boas’s Chinook Texts, 1904, and Kathlamet Texts, 1901), Eskimoan (texts in Boas’s Eskimo of Baffin Land, &c., 1901, 1908: and Thalbitzer’s Eskimo Language, 1904, Barnum’s Innuit Grammar, 1901), Haidan (Swanton’s Haida Texts, 1905, &c.), Iroquoian (texts in Hale’s Iroquois Book of Rites, 1883, and Hewitt’s Iroquoian Cosmology, 1899), Lutuamian (texts in Gatschet’s Klamath Indians, 1890), Muskogian (texts in Gatschet’s Migration Legend of the Creeks, 1884–1888), Salishan (texts in various publications of Boas and Hill-Tout), Siouan (Riggs and Dorsey in various publications), Tsimshian (Boas’s Tsimshian Texts, 1902), Wakashan (Boas’s Kwakiutl Texts, 1902–1905), &c.
The question of the direction of migration of the principal aboriginal stocks north of Mexico has been reopened of late years. Not long ago there seemed to be practical agreement as to the following views. The Eskimo stock had reached its present habitats from a primitive Migrations of Indian stocks. home somewhere in the interior of north-western Canada or Alaska; the general trend of the Athabaskan migrations, and those of the Shoshonian tribes had been south and south-east, the first from somewhere in the interior of north-western Canada, the second from about the latitude of southern British Columbia; the Algonkian tribes had moved south, east and west from a point somewhere between the Great Lakes and Hudson Bay; the Iroquoian stock had passed southward and westward from some spot to the north-east of the Great Lakes; the Siouan tribes, from their primitive home in the Carolinas, had migrated westward beyond the Mississippi; some stocks, like the Kitunahan, now found west of the Rocky Mountains, had dwelt formerly in the plains region to the east. Professor Cyrus Thomas, however, of the Bureau of American Ethnology, discussing primary Indian migrations in North America (Congr. intern. d. Amér., Quebec, 1906, i. 189-204), rejects the theory that the Siouan stock originated in the Carolinas, and adopts for them an origin in the region north of Lake Superior, whence he also derives the Iroquoian stock, whose primitive home Dr David Boyle (Ann. Archaeol. Rep. Ontario, 1905, p. 154), the Canadian ethnologist, would place in Kentucky and southern Ohio. Another interesting contribution to this subject is made by Mr P. E. Goddard (Congr. intern. des. Amér., Quebec, 1906, i. 337-358). Contemplating the distribution of the tribes belonging to the Athabaskan stock in three divisions, viz. a northern (continuous and very extensive), a Pacific coast division (scattered through Washington, Oregon, California), and a southern division which occupies a large area in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Kansas, Texas and Mexico, Mr Goddard suggests that the intrusion of non-Athabaskan peoples into a region once completely in the possession of the Athabaskan stock is the best explanation for the facts as now existing not explicable from assimilation to environment, which has here played a great rôle. It is possible also that a like explanation may hold for the conditions apparent in some other linguistic stocks. Many Indian tribes have been forcibly removed from their own habitats to reservations, or induced to move by missionary efforts, &c. Thus, in the state of Oklahoma are to be found representatives of the following tribes: Apache, Arapaho, Caddo, Cherokee, Cheyenne, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Comanche, Creek, Iowa, Kansa, Kickapoo, Kiowa, Miami, Missouri, Modoc, Osage, Oto, Ottawa, Pawnee, Peoria, Ponca, Potawatomi, Quapaw, Sac and Fox, Seminole, Seneca, Shawnee, Tonkawa, Wichita, Wyandot, &c.; these belong to 10 different linguistic stocks, whose original habitats were widely distant from one another in many cases.
Some of the American-Indian linguistic stocks (those of California especially) hardly know real tribal divisions, but local groups or settlements only; others have many large and important tribes.
The tabular alphabetical list given in the following pages contains the names of the more important and more interesting tribes of American aborigines north of Mexico, and of the stocks to which they belong, their situation and population in 1909, the degree of intermixture with whites or negroes, their social, moral and religious condition, state of progress, &c., and also references to the best or the most recent literature concerning them.
Up to the date of their publication references to the literature concerning the tribes of the stocks treated will be found in Pilling’s bibliographies: Algonquian (1891), Athabascan (1892), Chinookan (1893), Eskimoan (1887), Iroquoian (1888), Muskhogean (1889), Salishan (1893), Siouan (1887) and Wakashan (1894). See also the Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico (Washington, 1907–1910); and the sumptuous monograph of E. S. Curtis, The North American Indian (N. Y., vols. i.-xx., 1908), with its remarkable reproduction of Indian types.
| Tribe. | Stock. | Situation, Population, &c. | Degree of Intermixture. | Condition, Progress, &c. | Authorities. |
| Abnaki. | Algonkian. | At Becancour, Quebec, 27; at St François du Lac and Pierreville, 330. Decreasing. | Probably no pure blood left. | As civilized as the neighbouring whites. All Catholics. | Maurault, Hist. des Abenaquis (Quebec, 1866); Jack, Trans. Canad. Inst., 1892–1893. |
| Acnomawi (Pit river Indians). | Shastan. | N.E. California. About 1100 in the Pit river region; also 50 or 60 on the Klamath Reservation, Oregon. | Little. | Progress very slow; influence of schools felt. Klamath Achomawi under Methodist influence. | Powers, Contrib. N. Amer. Ethnol., vol. iii., 1877; various writings of Dr R. B. Dixon, American Anthropologist, 1905–1908, &c. |
| Aleuts. | Eskimoan. | Aleutian Islands and part of Alaska. About 1600. Decreasing. | About 50% are mixed bloods. | “Decaying.” Once converted to Greek Orthodox church. Methodist mission at Unalaska. | Works (in Russian) of Veniaminov, 1840–1848; Golder, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1905–1907; Chamberlain, Dict. Relig. and Ethics (Hastings, vol. i., 1908). |
| Amalecttes (Maliseets). | Algonkian. | 106 at Viger (Cacouna, Quebec); 702 in various parts of W. New Brunswick. Apparently increasing. | Probably few pure bloods. | Fairly good. At Viger industrially unsettled. Catholics. | Writings of S. T. Rand; Chamberlain (M.), Maliseet Vocabuilary (Cambridge, 1899). |
| Apache. | Athabaskan. | In Arizona, 4879; New Mexico, 1244; Oklahoma, 453. Not rapidly decreasing as formerly thought. | Considerable Spanish blood due to captives, &c. | Marked improvement here and there. Catholic and Lutheran missions. | Cremony, Life among the Apaches (1868); Bourke, 9th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1887–1888, and Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1890; Hrdlička, American Anthropologist, 1905. |
| Arapaho. | Algonkian. | 358 at Ft. Belknap Reservation, Montana; 873 at Wind river Reservation, Wyoming; 885 in Oklahoma. Holding their own. | Some Spanish (Mexican) blood in places. | Oklahoma Arapaho American citizens; progress elsewhere. Mennonite missions chiefly; also Dutch Reformed. | Writings of Kroeber and Dorsey, Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1900–1907, and Publ. Field Columb. Mus., 1903; Scott, Amer. Anthrop., 1907. |
| Assiniboin. | Siouan. | In Montana, 1248; Alberta, 971; Saskatchewan, 420. | Some little. | In Canada “steady advance,” elsewhere good. Alberta Assiniboins are Methodists; in Montana Catholic and Presbyterian missions on reservations. | Maclean, Canadian Savage Folk (Toronto, 1890); McGee, 15th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1893–1894. |
| Babines. | Athabaskan. | 530 on Babine Lake, Bulkley river, &c., in central British Columbia. | Little, if any. | Conservative. Little progress. Reached by Catholic mission of Stuart Lake, B.C. | Morice, Anthropos, 1906–1007, and Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905, and other writings. |
| Bannock. | Shoshonian. | About 500 at Ft. Hall, and 78 at Lemhi Agency, Idaho. | Little. | Considerable improvement morally and industrially. | Hoffman, Proc. Amer. Philos. Soc., 1886; Mooney, 14th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893; Lowie, Anthrop. Pap. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1909. |
| Beaver. | Athabaskan. | About 700 on Peace river, a western affluent of Lake Athabaska. | Very little. | Rather stationary. | See Babines. |
| Bilqula (Bellacoola). | Salishan. | 287 on Dean Inlet, Bentinck Arm, Bellacoola river, &c., coast of central British Columbia. Decreasing. | Little. | Not very encouraging. Mission influence not yet strongly felt. | Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1891, and Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1898. |
| Blackfeet (Siksika). | Algonkian. | About 824 in Alberta, Canada. Decreasing. | Little. | Steadily improving morally and financially. Anglicans, 237; Catholics, 260; pagans, 327. | Maclean, Canadian Savage Folk (Toronto, 1890), and other writings; Grinnell, Blackfoot Lodge-Tales (N.Y., 1903), and other writings; Wissler, Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905; Schultz, My Life as an Indian (N.Y., 1907); Wissler, Anthrop. Pap. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1908. |
| Bloods. | Algonkian. | 1168 near Ft. Macleod, Alberta. Probably decreasing somewhat. | Little. | All able-bodied Indians will soon be self-supporting. Presbyterians, 150; Catholics, 150; the rest pagan. | See Blackfeet. |
| Caddo. | Caddoan. | 550 in Oklahoma. Increasing slightly. | Considerable French blood. | Citizens of United States. Catholic, Methodist and Presbyterian missions. | Mooney, 14th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893; writings of Fletcher, Dorsey, &c. |
| Cariboo-Eaters. | Athabaskan. | 1700 in the region E. of Lake Athabaska, N.W. Canada. | Little, if any. | Little progress. | See Babines. |
| Carriers. | Athabaskan. | 970 between Tatla Lake and Ft. Alexandria, central British Columbia. | Little. | Semi-sedentary and naturally progressive as Indians; improvements beginning to be marked. Under influence of Catholic mission at Stuart Lake, B.C. | Morice, Proc. Canad. Inst., 1889, Trans. Canad. Inst., 1894, Hist. of Northern Inter. of British Columbia (Toronto, 1904), and other writings. See Babines. |
| Catawba. | Siouan. | About 100 on the Catawba river, York county, South Carolina. Decreasing. | Much mixed with white blood. | Slowly adopting white man's ways. Chiefly farmers. | Mooney, Siouan Tribes of the East (Washington, 1894); Gatschet, American Anthropologist, 1900; Harrington, ibid., 1908. |
| Cayuga. | Iroquoian. | 179 on the Iroquois Reservations in New York State; 1044 with the Six Nations in Ontario; also some with the Seneca in Oklahoma and with Oneida in Wisconsin. | Some English admixture. | Canadian Cayuga steadily improving; they are “pagan.” | See Six Nations. |
| Cayuse. | Wailatpuan. | 405 on Umatilla Reservation, Oregon | About 1/4 are of mixed blood, chiefly French. | Conditions improving. Good work of Catholic and Presbyterian missions. | Mowry, Marcus Whitman (1901); Lewis, Mem. Amer. Anthrop. Assoc., 1906. |
| Chehalis. | Salishan. | 182 on Puyallup Reservation, Washington. Perhaps increasing slightly. | No data. | Gradually improving and generally prosperous. Congregational mission. | Gibbs, Contrib. N. Amer. Ethnol., vol. iii., 1877; Eells, Hist. of Ind. Missions on the Pacific Coast (N.Y., 1882), and other writings. |
| Chemehuevi. | Shoshonian. | About 300 on the Colorado Reservation; a few elsewhere in Arizona and California. | No data. | Some improvement. Missions of the Presbyterians and of the Church of the Nazarene. | See Ute. |
| Cherokee. | Iroquoian. | About 28,000, of which 1489 are in North Carolina and the rest in Oklahoma. | Not more than 1/4 are of approximately pure blood. | Oklahoma Cherokee citizens of the United States, and making excellent progress. Various religious faiths. | Royce, 5th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1883–1884; Mooney, 7th Rep., 1885–1886, and especially 19th Rep., 1897–1898. ​ |
| Cheyenne. | Algonkian. | 1440 northern Cheyenne in Montana, 1894 southern Cheyenne in Oklahoma. Former increasing, latter decreasing. | Some white blood from captives, &c. | Southern Cheyenne citizens of United States; Mennonite mission doing good work. Northern Cheyenne making progress as labourers, &c.; Mennonite and Catholic missions. | Mooney, 14th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893; Dorsey, Publ. Field Columb. Mus., 1905 ; Grinnell, Intern. Congr. Americanists, 1902–1906; Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1907–1908; Amer. Anthrop., 1902–1906; Mooney and Petter, Mem. Amer. Anthrop. Assoc., 1907. |
| Chickahominy. | Algonkian. | Some 220 on Chickahominy river, Virginia. | No pure bloods left. Considerable negro admixture. | Fishers and Farmers. | Tooker, Algonquian Series (N.Y., 1900); Mooney, Amer. Anthrop., 1907. |
| Chickasaw. | Muskogian. | 5558 in Oklahoma. | Large admixture of white blood. | American citizens and progressing well. Various religious faiths. | Speck, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1907, and Amer. Anthrop., 1907. |
| Chilcotin. | Athabaskan. | About 450 on Chilcotin river, in S. central British Columbia. | Little. | Fairly laborious, but clinging to native customs, though making progress. Catholic mission influence. | Writings of Morice (see Carriers); Farrand, Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1900. |
| Chilkat. | Koluschan. | About 700 at head of Lynn Canal, Alaska. Decreasing. | No data. | Little progress. | Emmons and Boas, Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1908. |
| Chinook. | Chinookan. | About 300 in Oregon. Decreasing. | Some little. | Stationary or “worse.” | Boas, Chinook Texts (Washington, 1894), and other writings; Sapir, Amer. Anthrop., 1907. |
| Chipewyan. | Athabaskan. | About 3000 in the region S. of Lake Athabaska, N.W. Canada. | Some Canadian-French admixture. | Coming to be more influenced by the whites. Reached by Catholic missions. | Writings of Petitot, Legoff, Morice (see Babines), &c.; Morice, Anthropos, 1906–1907, and Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905. |
| Chippewa (Ojibwa) | Algonkian. | About 18,000 in Ontario, Manitoba, &c.; nearly the same number in the United States (Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, N. Dakota). | Much French and English admixture in various regions. | Good progress. Many Indians quite equal to average whites of neighbourhood. Among the Canadian Chippewa the Methodists, Catholics and Anglicans are well represented; among those in the United States the Catholics and Episcopalians chiefly, also Methodists, Lutherans, &c. A number of native ministers. | Warren, Minn. Hist. Soc. Coll., 1885; Blackbird, Ottawa and Chippewa Indians (1887); W. Jones, Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905; Hugolin, Congr. int. d. Amér. (Quebec, 1906); P. Jones, Hist. Ojebway Inds. (1861). |
| Choctaw. | Muskogian. | 17,529 in Oklahoma; 1356 in Mississippi and Louisiana. | Large element of wnite and some negro blood. | Citizens of United States, making good progress. Various religious faiths. | Gatschet, Migration Legend of Creeks (1884–1888); Speck, Amer. Anthrop., 1907. |
| Clayoquot. | Wakashan. | 224 in the region of Clayoquot Sound, Vancouver Island. Decreasing. | No data. | Rather stationary, but beginning to improve. Influence or Catholic mission and industrial school. | See Nootka. |
| Clallam. | Salishan. | 354 on Puyallup Reservation, Washington. | Little. | Improving, but suffering from white contact. Congregationalist mission. | Eells in Ann. Rep. Smiths. Inst., 1887, and other writings. |
| Colville. | Salishan. | 316 at Colville Agency, Washington. Decreasing slightly. | Some Canadian-French, &c. | Improving. | See Chehalis. |
| Comanche. | Shoshonian. | 1408 in Oklahoma. Now holding their own. | Some due to Spanish (Mexican) captives, &c. | Good progress, in spite of white impositions. | Mooney, 14th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893. |
| Cowichan. | Salishan. | About 1000 on E. coast of Vancouver Island, and on islands in Gulf of Georgia. | Little. | Industrious; steady progress. Catholic and Methodist missions, chiefly former. | Hill-Tout, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1902, and Trans. R. Anthrop. Inst., 1907; Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1889. |
| Cree. | Algonkian. | About 12,000 in Manitoba, and some 5000 in Saskatchewan, Alberta, Keewatin, &c. | Large element of French, Scottish and English blood. | Slow but steady progress (except with a few bands). Catholics, Methodists and Anglirans strongly represented by missions and church members; many Presbyterians also. | Writings of Petitot, Lacombe, Horden, Bell, Watkins, Evans, Young, &c.; Lacombe, Dict. de la langue des Cris (1876); Russell, Explor. in the Far North (1898); Stewart, Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905; Maclean, Canad. Sav. Folk ( 1890). |
| Creek. | Muskogian. | 11,000 in Oklahoma. | Large element of white blood; some negro. | American citizens, making good progress. Various religious faiths. | Gatschet, Migration Legend of the Creeks (1884–1888); Speck, Mem. Amer. Anthrop. Assoc., 1907. |
| Crows (Absaroka). | Siouan. | 1804 at Crow Agency, Montana. | Little. | Improving industrially and financially. Morals still bad. | Simms, Publ. Field Columb. Mus., 1903; Schultz, My Life as an Indian (N.Y., 1907). |
| Dakota (Santee, Yankton, Teton — Sioux). | Siouan. | About 18,000 in South and 4400 in North Dakota; 3200 in Montana; 900 in Minnesota. Seemingly decreasing. | Considerable white blood, varying with different sections. | Capable of and making good progress. Episcopal, Catholic, Congregational missions with good results. | Writings of Dorsey, Riggs, Eastman, &c. Riggs, Contrib. N. Amer. Ethnol., vol. vii., 1890, and vol. ix., 1893; Wissler, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1907; Eastman, Indian Boyhood (1902). |
| Delaware. | Algonkian. | In Oklahoma, 800 with Cherokee and 90 with Wichita; 164 with Six Nations in Ontario. | Considerable. | Oklahoma, Delaware, U.S. citizens, and progressing; Canadians making also good progress. | Brinton, Lenápé and their Legends (Phila., 1885), and Essays of an Americanist (1890); Nelson, Indians of New Jersey (1894). |
| Dog-Ribs. | Athabaskan. | About 1000 in the region E. of the Hares, to Back river, N.W. Canada. | Little. | “Wild and indolent,” not yet much under white influence. | See Chipewyans, Carriers. |
| Eskimo (Greenland). | Eskimoan. | West coast, 10,500; East coast, 500. Slowly increasing. | Large element of white blood, estimated already in 1855 at 30%. | More or less “civilized” and “Christian” as result of Moravian missions. | Writings of Rink, Holm, Nansen, Peary. Rink, Tales and Trad. of the Eskimo (Lond., 1875) and Eskimo Tribes (1887); Nansen, Eskimo Life (1893); Thalbitzer, Eskimo Language (1904). |
| Eskimo (Labrador). | Eskimoan. | About 1300. | Considerable on S.E. coast. | Much improvement due to Moravian and (later) other Protestant missions. | Packard, Amer. Naturalist, 1885; Turner, 11th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1889–1890. ​ |
| Eskimo (central regions). | Eskimoan. | About 2500. | Little. | Not much improvement except here and there. Some reached by Episcopalian mission. | Boas, 6th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1884–1885, and Bull. Amer. Nat. Hist., 1901 and 1908. |
| Eskimo (Mackenzie, &c.). | Eskimoan. | About 1500. | Little. | Not much improvement. Reached by Catholic missions. | Petitot, Les Grands Esquimaux (1887), Monographie des Esquimaux Tchiglit (Paris, 1876) and other writings; Stefánsson, Harper's Magazine, 1908–1909. |
| Eskimo (Alaska). | Eskimoan. | About 12,000, exclusive of Aleuts. | Considerable on certain parts of coast. | Much improvement in parts since introduction of reindeer in 1892. Presbyterian, Methodist, Catholic, Moravian, Baptist, Swedish Evangelical, Quaker, Congregational, Lutheran missions now at work. | Dall, Contrib. N. Amer. Ethnol., vol. i., 1877; Murdoch, 9th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1887–1888; and Nelson, 18th Rep., 1896–1897; Barnum, Innuit Gramm. and Dict. (1901). |
| Eskimo (N.E. Asia). | Eskimoan. | About 1200. | Little. | Little improvement. | Hooper, Tents of the Tuski (1851); Dall, Amer. Naturalist (1881). See Eskimo (Alaska). |
| Flatheads. | Salishan. | 615 at Flathead Agency, Montana. | Considerable. | Continued Improvement. Catholic missions. | McDermott, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1901; Ronan, Flathead Indians (1890). |
| Gosiute. | Shoshonian. | About 200 in Utah. | Little. | Some improvement in last few years. | Chamberlin, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1908. See Paiute, Ute. |
| Grosventres (Atsina). | Algonkian. | 558 at Ft. Belknap Agency, Montana. | Little. | Law-abiding, industrious and fast becoming more moral. Catholic, chief mission influence, also Presbyterian. | Kroeber, Anthrop. Pap. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1907–1908. |
| Haida. | Haidan. | About 600 on Queen Charlotte Is., and 300 in Alaska. Decreasing. | Some little. | Now “gradually advancing along the lines of civilization.” Mission influences Methodists and Anglican, with much success, especially former. | Swanton, Contrib. to Ethnol. of the Haida (1905) and other writings; Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1889; Newcombe, Congr. intern, des Amér (Quebec, 1906). |
| Hankut'qin. | Athabaskan. | About 400 on the Yukon, above the Kotlo, in Alaska. | Little, if any. | Not yet much under white or missionary influence. | See Babines. |
| Hares. | Athabaskan. | About 600 W. of Gt. Bear Lake to Eskimo country, in N.W. Canada. | Little. | “Wild and indolent,” with little improvement. Reached by Catholic missions. | See Babines, Carriers, Chipewyan. |
| Havasupai. | Yuman. | 166 N. of Prescott in N.W. Arizona. Decreasing. | Little. | “Good workers”; not yet distinctly under mission influence. | James, Indians of the Painted Desert Region (Boston, 1903); Dorsey, Indians of the South-west (1903). |
| Hidatsa. | Siouan. | 467 near Ft. Berthold, N. Dakota. | Little. | Making good progress. Congregational and Catholic missions. | Matthews, Ethnogr. and Philol. of the Hidatsa (1877); McGee, 15th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1893–1894; Pepper and Wilson, Mem. Amer. Anthrop. Assoc., 1908. |
| Hupa. | Athabaskan. | 420 in Hoopa Valley, N.E. California. | Little. | Self-supporting by agriculture and stock-raising. Presbyterian and Episcopal missions with good results. | Goddard, Life and Culture of the Hupa (1903), Hupa Texts (1904), and other writings. |
| Hurons of Lorette. | Iroquoian. | 466 at Lorette, near the city of Quebec. Increasing, but losing somewhat by emigration. | No pure-bloods left. | Practically civilized. All Catholics, except one Anglican and six Presbyterians. | Gérin, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1900. |
| Iowa. | Siouan. | 246 in Kansas; 88 in Oklahoma. Holding their own. | Considerable. | In 1906 “accomplished more on their allotments than at any time heretofore.” One regular missionary. | Dorsey, Trans. Anthrop. Soc. Wash., 1883, and 15th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1893–1894; also 11th Rep. |
| Iroquois (of Caughnawaga). | Iroquoian. | 2075 at Caughnawaga, in S.W. Quebec (largely Mohawk). Increasing. | Few, if any, pure-bloods left. | Practically civilized and making fair progress. Chiefly Catholics, but there is a Methodist school. | Ann. Rep. Dept. Ind. Aff. Canada, 1907. |
| Iroquois (of Lake of Two Mountains). | Iroquoian. | 395 at Lake of Two Mountains, Quebec. | Few, if any, pure-bloods left. | Practically civilized and making fair progress. Catholics and Methodists represented. | Cuoq, Lexique de la langue iroquoise (1882), and other writings. |
| Iroquois (of St Régis). | Iroquoian. | 1449 at St Régis, Quebec; 1208 at St Regis, New York. | Few pure-bloods left. | Practically all civilized and making fair progress. | Ann. Rep. Dept. Ind. Aff. Canada, 1907. |
| Iroquois (of Watha). | Iroquoian. | About 65 at Watha (formerly Gibson), near the southern end of Lake Muskoka, Ontario. | Considerable. | Industrious and progressive. Influence of Methodist mission. | Ann. Rep. Dept. Ind. Aff. Canada, 1907. |
| Iroquois (of St Albert). | Iroquoian. | 94 near St Albert, Alberta (“Michel's band”). | “Indians only in name,” no pure-bloods left. | Practically civilized; outlook promising. Catholics. | Chamberlain, Amer. Anthrop., 1904. |
| Jicarilla (Apache). | Athabaskan. | 784 in New Mexico. Decreasing. | Little. | Improvement during past few years. | Mooney, Amer. Anthrop., 1898. See Apache. |
| Kaibab. | Shoshonian. | About 100 in S.W. Utah. Decreasing. | Little. | “Destitute,” but gaining somewhat. | See Paiute, Ute. |
| Kaigani. | Haidan. | About 300 in S. Alaska. | See Haida. | See Haida. | See Haida. |
| ’Kaiyuhkho’tenne | Athabaskan. | About 1500 on the Yukon (between the Anvik and Koyukuk) in W. Alaska. | Little. | Up to the present influenced more by the Eskimo than by the whites. | See Babines, Carriers. Also Chapman, Congr. inter. d. Amér. (Quebec, 1906). |
| Kalapooia. | Kalapuyan. | About 125 at Grande Ronde, Oregon, and a few also on the Siletz Reservation. | Not much. | Continued improvement. | Powell, 7th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1885–1886; Gatschet, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1899; Lewis, Mem. Amer. Anthrop. Assoc., 1906. |
| Kalispel (Pend d'Oreille). | Salishan. | 826 on the Flathead Reservation, Montana; 98 at Colville Agency, Washington. | Considerable. | Continued improvement. Catholic missions. | Giorda, Kalispel Dictionary (1877–1879). See Chehalis. ​ |
| Kansa (Kaw). | Siouan. | 207 in Oklahoma. | About half are mixed blood. | American citizens, making fair progress. | Dorsey, 11th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1889–1890, and 15th Rep., 1893–1894; Hay, Trans. Kans. State Hist. Soc., 1906. |
| Kickapoo. | Algonkian. | 188 in Kansas; 204 in Oklahoma; about 400 in Mexico. | Considerable. | Progress hampered by liquor, &c. | Mooney, 14th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893; Lutz, Trans. Kansas Hist. Soc., 1906. |
| Kawia (Cahuilla). | Shoshonian. | About 150 in southern California. | Little. | Progress good. Nominally Catholics, result of Californian missions. | Barrows, Ethnobotany of the Coahuilla Indians (1900}; Kroeber, Ethnography of the Cahuilla (1908). |
| Kiowa. | Kiowan. | 1219 in Oklahoma. | Some white blood from captives, &c. | Citizens of the U.S., making fair progress. Catholic, Methodist, Presbyterian, &c., mission influences. | Mooney, 14th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893, and 17th Rep., 1895–1896. |
| Kitksan. | Tsimshian. | About 1100 on upper Skeena river in central British Columbia. | Little. | Making good progress. | See Tsimshian. |
| Klamath. | Lutuamian. | 761 at Klamath Agency, Oregon. | Little. | Mostly self-supporting. Methodist mission, but poor work done. | Gatschet, The Klamath Indians (Washington, 1890); Dorsey, Amer. Anthrop., 1901. |
| Klickatat. | Sahaptian. | About 300 merged with Yakima and other tribes on Yakima Reservation, Washington. | Considerable. | Late reports indicate much bad influence of whites. | Lyman, Proc. Amer. Antiq. Soc., 1904; Lewis, Mem. Amer. Anthrop. Soc., 1906. |
| Konkau (Concow). | Pujunan. | 171 at Round Valley, California. | Little. | Gradually improving. | See Maidu. |
| Kootenay. | Kitunahan. | In S.E. British Columbia; 220 at St Mary's; 59 at Tobacco Plains; 82 at Columbia Lakes; 170, lower Kootenay. At Flathead Agency, Montana, 565. Holding their own, or increasing. | A little French and English. | Good, especially upper Kootenay; continued progress. Kootenay in U.S. not so progressive. Catholic missions with good results. | Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1889; Chamberlain, ibid., 1892 (and other writings), Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905; Schultz, My Life as an Indian (N.Y., 1907). |
| Koyukukho'tenne | Athabaskan. | About 500 on the Koyukuk and Yukon above the 'Kaiyuhkho'tenne in Alaska. | Little, if any. | Little progress noted. | See Babines, Carriers, Chipewyan. |
| Kwakiutl. | Wakashan. | About 2000 in Vancouver Island and British Columbia. Decreasing. | Considerable in places. | Improvement recently. Anglican and Methodist missions — former counting 469; latter, 19 members; rest, “pagans.” | Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1889, 1890, 1896, Rep. U.S. Nat. Mus., 1895, and other writings; Boas and Hunt, Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1902. |
| Lillooet (Statliumh). | Salishan. | About 900 in S.W. British Columbia, on Fraser river, Douglas and Lillooet Lakes, &c. | Considerable places. | Getting along well generally. Catholic and Anglican missions. | Boas, Ethnogr. Album (N.Y., 1890); Hill-Tout, Journ. Anthr. Inst., 1905; Teit, Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1906. |
| Lummi. | Salishan. | 418 at Tulalip Agency, Washington. | Considerable. | Suffering from white contact. | See Chehalis. |
| Maidu. | Pujunan. | In N.E. California. About 250 full-bloods. | Not much. | Few and scattered. | Dixon, Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1902–1905; Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1900–1907. |
| Makah. | Wakashan. | 400 on Makah, 25 on Ozette Reservation, Washington. | Considerable. | Progress good. | Swan, The Indians of Cape Flattery (Washington, 1870); Dorsey, Amer. Antiquarian, 1901. |
| Mandan. | Siouan. | 264 at Ft. Berthold, N. Dakota. Beginning to increase again. | Considerable. | Making some progress. Catholic and Protestant mission influences. | Will and Spindle, The Mandans (1906); Dorsey in 11th and 15th Reps. Bur. Ethnol. |
| Maricopa. | Yuman. | 344 at Pima Agency Arizona. Decreasing slightly. | No data. | Progress in 1906 excellent. Catholic mission school. | See Yuma. |
| Maskegon (Swampy Cree). | Algonkian. | About 2500 in Manitoba, Keewatin, Saskatchewan. | Considerable in certain regions. | Generally law-abiding, but improvident; some making good progress. | Simms in Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1906; Stewart in Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905. |
| Masset. | Haidan. | 360 at Masset, Q. Charlotte Is. | See Haida. | See Haida. | See Haida. |
| Menohinee. | Algonkian. | About 1600, of which 1364 under superintendency of Green Bay, Wisconsin. | Considerable. | Making gradual progress, with noticeable improvement in many respects. Catholic church has many members. | Hoffman in 14th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893. |
| Miami. | Algonkian. | 129 in Oklahoma, 240 in Indiana, a few elsewhere; total about 400. | Considerable French blood, about 50%. | American citizens; intelligent, thrifty and progressive. | Pilling, Bibl. of Algon. Lang. (1891). |
| Micmac. | Algonkian. | 2114 in Nova Scotia, 288 in Prince Edward Island; 1000 in New Brunswick, 591 in Quebec. | Large element of French; some Scottish and English blood. | Progress good; not degenerating nor decreasing. All Catholics. | Writings of Dr S. T. Rand, especially Micmac Legends (1894); Pacifique and Prince, Congr. intern. des Amér., Quebec, 1906; Leland Algonquin Legends (1885); Leland and Prince, Kuloskap (1902). |
| Mission Indians. | Yuman; Shoshonian. | About 3000 in S. California. | Considerable in some sections. | Self-supporting; some individuals remarkably able and industrious. Catholics nominally. | Writings of Miss C. G. du Bois, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore and Amer. Anthrop., 1900–1908, &c. See Kawia. |
| Mississagua. | Algonkian. | At Aluwick, 249; at the river Credit, 267; Rice Lake, 90; Mud Lake, 190; Scugog, 35. Increasing slightly. | Considerable. | Fairly good generally; some at the Credit very successful farmers, competing with whites. Methodists chiefly. | Chamberlain, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1888 and Language of the Mississagas of Skugog (Phila., 1892); Burnham, Ont. Hist. Soc. Pap. and Rec., 1905. |
| Modoc. | Lutuamian. | 52 in Oklahoma, 229 on Klamath Reservation. Oregon. Apparently decreasing slowly, or holding their own. | Little. | Generally industrious and moral. Methodist mission. | Miller, My Life Among the Modocs (1873); Gatschet, Amer. Anthrop., 1894. See Klamath. |
| Mohave. | Yuman. | About 1600 in Arizona. | Little. | Good: industrious but restless. Presbyterian and Church of the Nazarene missions. | Bourke, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1889; Kroeber, Amer. Anthrop., 1902. See Yuman. ​ |
| Mohawk. | Iroquoian. | 1762 with Six Nations, Grand river, Ont., 1320, Bay of Quinte, Ont., slight increase. The “Iroquois” at Caughnawaga, &c., are largely Mohawks. | Considerable English and French. | See Six Nations. | Forbes, Congr. intern. d. Amér., Quebec, 1906; Brant-Sero, Man (London, 1901). See Six Nations. |
| Montagnais. | Algonkian. | About 2000 in N.E. Quebec, N. shore of St Lawrence and St John, &c. | Large element of French blood. | At St John, “energetic, hard working and provident”; others suffering from liquor, &c. Catholic missions. | Chambers, The Ouananiche (1896); Chamberlain, Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905; David, Congr. int. d. Amér., Quebec, 1906. |
| Moqui (Hopi). | Shoshonian. | About 2000 in N.E. Arizona. | Little. | Still “pagan,” but “dry-farming” experts. At Oraihi two factions, progressives and conservatives. Mennonite mission. | Bourke, Snake Dance Among the Moquis (1884); Hough, Amer. Anthrop., 1898; Dorsey and Voth, Field Columb. Mus. Publ., 1901–1902. Also the numerous monographs of Dr. J. W. Fewkes in Rep. Bur. Ethnol. Amer. Anthrop., Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1894–1908. |
| “Moravians.” | Algonkian. | 329 on river Thames, Ontario, Canada. | Considerable. | Generally industrious and very law-abiding. All Methodists. | Ann. Rep. Dept. Ind. Aff. Canada, 1907. |
| Munsee. | Algonkian. | 118 on river Thames, Ontario, Canada; also a few with the Stockbridges in Wisconsin and the Chippewa in Kansas. | Considerable. | Fairly industrious; progress slow. | Ann. Rep. Dept. Ind. Aff. Canada, 1907. |
| Nahané. | Athabaskan. | About 1000 in N.W. British Columbia, N. and S. of Stikeen river, and E. to beyond the Rockies. | Not much. | Have suffered much from white contact. Reached by Catholic missions from Stuart Lake. | Writings of Petitot, Morice, &c., especially the latter in Trans. Canad. Inst., 1894, Proc. Canad. Inst., 1889. See Carriers. |
| Nascapee. | Algonkian. | Some 2500 in N.E. Quebec, Labrador, &c. | Not very much. | Improvement not marked. Catholic mission influence. | Burner, 11th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1889–1890; Chamberlain, Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905. |
| Navaho. | Athabaskan. | About 29,000 in Arizona and New Mexico, about 8000 in the latter state. Increasing in number. | Much Spanish (Mexican) blood. | Have made remarkable progress racially and individually. Catholic, Presbyterian, &c., missions. | Writings of Dr. W. Matthews, especially Navaho Legends (Boston, 1897), The Night Chant (N.Y.. 1902). |
| Nespelim. | Salishan. | 191 at Colville Agency, Washington. | Considerable. | Suffering from liquor and white contact. | See Chehalis. |
| Nez Percés. | Sahaptian. | 83 at Colville Agency, Washington, 1534 under Ft. Lapwai superintendency, Idaho. Decreasing. | Amount uncertain. | Of a high intellectual type (seen in children); suffering much from disease and white contact. About 60% Catholics and 15% Presbyterians. | Packard, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1891; McBeth, The Nez Percés since Lewis and Clark (New York, 1908); Spinden, Mem. Amer. Anthrop. Assoc., 1908. |
| Nipissing. | Algonkian. | 239 on Lake Nipissing, Ontario. Increasing. | Little. | Improving. | Ann. Rep. Dept. Ind. Aff. Canada, 1907. |
| Nipissino (Algonquins). | Algonkian. | About 60 at Lake of Two Mountains, Quebec. | Considerable. | Little marked progress; but fairly industrious. Catholics. | Writings of Rev. J. A. Cuoq, especially Lexique algonquin (Montreal, 1886); Lemoine, Congr. inter. d. Amér., Quebec, 1906. |
| Niska (Nasqa). | Tsimshian. | About 800 in Nass river region in W. British Columbia. Decreasing. | Little. | Making good progress. | Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1895, 1896, and Indianische Sagen (Berlin, 1895). See Tsimshian. |
| Nisqualli. | Salishan. | 146 in W. Washington. | Considerable. | Suffering from white contact, liquor, &c. | Gibbs, Contrib. N. Amer. Ethnol., vol. i., 1877, and Niskwalli Dictionary, ibid. |
| Nootka. | Wakashan. | 2133 (including Clayoquot) on Vancouver Island, B.C. Decreasing slowly. | Considerable in places. | Industrious and law-abiding; evil from white contact increasing. Catholic and Presbyterian missions. | Sproat, Scenes and Studies of Savage Life (1868); Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc., 1890, and Indianische Sagen (1895). |
| Okanagan. | Salishan. | 824 in the Kamloops-Okanagan Agency, British Columbia; 527 on Colville Reservation, Washington. | Considerable in places. | Industrious and law-abiding. Catholic, and in Canada Catholic and Anglican churches largely represented. | Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc., 1889; Teit, Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1900. |
| Omaha. | Siouan. | 1128 in Nebraska. | Much white blood. | Good process in many respects; improvidence, &c., still causing trouble. Presbyterian mission. | Dorsey, 3rd Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1881–1882, and 13th Rep., 1891–1892, and other writings. Also writings of Miss A. C. Fletcher. See Ponca. |
| Oneida. | Iroquoian. | 777 on river Thames, Ontario, and 350 with Six Nations in Ontario; 2151 in Wisconsin; 286 in New York. Increasing. | Large element of white blood. | Canadian Oneidas at Delaware full citizens. All progressing excellently and self-supporting. U.S Oneidas citizens. | Bloomfield, The Oneidas (N.Y., 1907). See Six Nations. |
| Onondaga. | Iroquoian. | 350 with the Six Nations, Ontario; 553 in New York. | Large element of white blood. | Not so advanced in U.S. as Tuscarora. | Clark, Onondaga (Syracuse, 1849); writings of Beauchamp, de Cost Smith, M. R. Harrington, &c. See Six Nations. |
| Osage. | Siouan. | 1994 in Oklahoma. | Very much white blood; half are mixed-bloods. | U.S. citizens and making good progress. Baptists and Catholics represented. | Dorsey (J. O.), 6th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1884–1885; Brewster, Trans. Kans. State Hist. Soc., 1906; Dorsey (G. A.), Publ. Field Columb. Mus., 1904; Speck, Trans. Arch. Dept. Univ. of Penn. (Phila., 1907). |
| Oto. | Siouan. | About 390 with the Missouri in Oklahoma. | Considerable. | Making good progress. | See Osage. |
| Ottawa. | Algonkian. | About 750 on Manitoulin and Coburn Islands, Ontario; 2750 in Michigan; 197 in Oklahoma. | Considerable French and English blood. | Canadian Ottawa industrious and law-abiding, and many in the U.S as civilized as average whites about them. Catholic and Protestant missions. | Blackbird, Ottawa and Chippewa Indians (1887). See Pilling's Bibliography of the Algonkian Languages, 1891. |
| Paiute. | Shoshonian. | 6500 to 7000 chiefly in Nevada (about 600 in Utah; 350 in Arizona). | No data. | Peaceable, moral and industrious; “have steadily resisted the vice of civilization.” Catholic and Protestant missions. | Mooney in 14th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893. See Ute. ​ |
| Pamunkey. | Algonkian. | About 140 in King William county, Virginia. | All mixed-bloods; some negro mixture. | Fishermen and small farmers. | Pollard, The Pamunkey Indians of Virginia (Washington, 1894). |
| Panamint. | Shoshonian. | About 100 in the Panammt Valley, S.E. California. | No data. | Stationary. | Coville, Amer. Anthrop., 1892. |
| Papago. | Piman. | 4991 in Arizona; about 1000 in Mexico. | Little. | Making very good progress recently. Catholic mission. | McGee in Coville and Macdougal, Des. bot. lab., 1903; Bandelier, Arch. Inst. Papers, 1890. See Pima. |
| Passamaquoddy. | Algonkian. | About 350 in Maine. | Considerable French and English. | With Penobscots have representative in Maine legislature. | Leland, Algonq. Leg. of New England (Boston, 1885); Brown, Trans. R. Soc. Canada, 1889; Prince, Proc. Amer. Philos. Soc., 1897; Leland and Prince, Kuloskap (Boston, 1902). |
| Pawnee. | Caddoan. | 649 in Oklahoma. Decreasing. | Considerable. | Citizens of U.S. Special progress recently in agriculture. Methodist mission. | Writings of Dunbar, Grinnell, Dorsey, Fletcher, &c.; Grinnell, Pawnee Hero-Stories (1889); Dorsey, Traditions of the Skidi Pawnee (Boston, 1904), and Pawnee Mythology (1906); Fletcher, 22nd Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1900–1901. |
| Penobscot. | Algonkian. | About 410 in Maine. | Considerable. | See Passamaquoddy. | See Passamaquoddy. |
| Peoria. | Algonkian. | 192 with Kaskaskia, Wea and Plankaskaw in Oklahoma. | No pure-bloods left. | American citizens and progressing well. | See Pilling, Bibliography of the Algonquian Languages (1891). |
| Piegan. | Algonkian. | 482 near Macleod, Alberta; 2072 at Blackfoot Agency, Montana. | Considerable. | Improvement slow in Montana; in Alberta, “noticeable advance along all lines.” Methodist and Anglican missions in Alberta. | See Blackfeet. |
| Pima. | Shoshonian. | 3936 in Arizona; more in Mexico. Increasing slightly. | Considerable. | Making good progress recently. Catholic and Protestant missions. | Russel, Amer. Anthrop., 1903, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1901, and 26th Ann. Rep. Bur. Amer. Ethnol., 1904–1905; Dorsey, Indians of the South-west (1903); Hrdlička, Amer. Anthrop., 1904; Kroeber, Univ. Calif. Publ., 1907. |
| Pomo. | Kulanapan. | About 1000 in N.E. California. | Little. | Progress good. | Barrett, Ethnography of the Pomo (1908). |
| Ponca. | Siouan. | 570 in Oklahoma. | Considerable. | U.S. citizens, making good progress. | Dorsey (J. O.), Cegiha Language (1890), Omaha and Ponka Letters (1891), &c.; Dorsey (G. A.), Field Columb. Mus. Publ., 1905; Boas, Congr. int. d. Amér., Quebec, 1906. |
| Potawatomi. | Algonkian. | 179 on Walpole Island, Ontario; 1740 in Oklahoma. | Considerable. | Canadian Potawatomi are law-abiding and industrious. American Potawatomi citizens making progress. | See Pilling, Bibliography of the Algonquian Languages (1891). |
| Pueblos. | Keresan. | 3990 in 6 pueblos in N. central New Mexico. | Larger element of white blood than other Pueblos Indians, but not great. | Majority nominally Catholics. | Writings of Bandelier, Hodge, Lummis, Stevenson, &c. Stevenson, 11th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1889–1890; Dorsey, Indians of the South-west (1903); Bandelier, Archaeol. Inst. Papers, 1881, 1883, 1892. |
| Pueblos. | Shoshonian. | See Moqui. | See Moqui. | See Moqui. | See Moqui. |
| Pueblos. | Tanoan. | About 4200 in 12 pueblos in New Mexico. | Have not favoured intermixture. Amount little. | Nominally Catholics for most part. At San Juan notable evidences of thrift, less elsewhere. | Writings of Bandelier, Lummis, Fewkes. &c. See Pueblos (Keresan) and Moqui. |
| Pueblos. | Zuñian. | 1500 in Western New Mexico. | Have not favoured white intermixture. | Practically all are “pagans.” Substantial progress lately in several ways. | Bandelier, Journ. Amer. Ethnol. and Archaeol., 1892; Fewkes, ibid., 1891; Stevenson, 5th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1883–1884, and 23rd Rep., 1901–1902; Cushing, 2nd Rep., 1880–1881, 4th Rep., 1882–1883, 13th Rep., 1891–1892, and Zuñi Folk-Tales (N.Y., 1901), and other writings. |
| Puyallup. | Salishan. | 486 at the Puyallup Agency, Washington. | Considerable. | Suffering from white contact; future not bright. | See Chehalis. |
| Quapaw. | Siouan. | 292 in Oklahoma. | Considerable. | Majority are intelligent, thrifty and progressive. Catholic missions. | Dorsey (J. O.), 11th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1889–1890, 13th Rep. 1891–1892, and other writings. |
| Quileute. | Chemakuan. | 232 at Neah Bay Agency, N.W. Washington. | Considerable. | Progress good. | See Clallam. |
| Quinaielt. | Salishan. | 142 at Puyallup Agency in N.W. Washington. | Considerable. | See Nisqualli. | Farrand, Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1902; Conard, Open Court, 1905. |
| Sacs and Foxes (Sauk, &c.). | Algonkian. | 343 in Iowa; 630 in Oklahoma; 90 in Kansas. | Considerable. | Continued improvement; conservative opposition less. Catholic missions. | Lasley, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1902; Jones, ibid., 1901, and Fox Texts (1907); Owen, Folk-Lore of the Musquaki (1904). |
| Sanspoil. | Salishan, | 126 at Colville Agency, Washington. | Considerable. | Improving. | See Chehalis. |
| Sarcee. | Athabaskan. | 205 S.W. of Calgary, Alberta. | More than many other tribes of this stock. | Making good material progress lately. Anglican mission. | Maclean, Canad. Savage Folk (1890); Goddard, Congr. int. d. Amér., 1906; Morice, ibid. and Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905; Simms, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1904. |
| Sekané (Sikani). | Athabaskan. | About 450 on Finlay and Parsnip rivers and W. to forks of Tatla Lake in N. central British Columbia. | Little. | Not so progressive as Carriers &c. Reached by Catholic mission from Stuart Lake. | Morice, Anthropos, 1906, 1907, and Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905, and other writings. See Babines, Carriers. ​ |
| Seminole. | Muskogian. | 2132 in Oklahoma; 350 in Florida. | Much white and some negro blood. | Oklahoma Seminoles American citizens. | MacCauley, 5th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1887; Coe, Red Patriots (1898). See Creek. |
| Seneca. | Iroquoian. | 383 in Oklahoma; 2742 in New York; 215 with Six Nations, on Grand river, Ontario. | Considerable. | See Six Nations. | Sanborn, Seneca Indians (1862); Hubbard, An Account of Sa-go-ye-wat-ha, or Red Jacket and his People (Albany, 1886). See Six Nations. |
| Shawnee. | Algonkian. | 574 in Oklahoma. | Considerable. | Progress good. Catholic and Protestant missions. | See Pilling, Bibl. of Algon. Lang. (1891). Also Harvey, Shawnee Indians (1855). |
| Shoshonee. | Shoshonian. | About 1000 in Idaho; 242 in Nevada; 793 in Wyoming. | Amount of admixture not large. | Progress good in the last few years. Catholic and Protestant Episcopal missions. | Culin, Bull. Free Mus. Sci. and Art (Phila., 1901); Dorsey, Indians of the South-west (1903). See Ute. |
| Shuswap (Sequapamuq). | Salishan. | About 1000 in the S. interior of British Columbia; also 52 within the Kootenay area at the Columbia Lakes. | Considerable in places. | Industrious and law-abiding. Catholic and Protestant missions. | Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1890. and Ethnogr. Album (N.Y., 1900); Dawson, Trans. Roy. Soc. Canada, 1891; Boas, Indianische Sagen (1895). |
| Siletz. | Indians of several stocks. | 483 on Siletz Reservation, Oregon. | Considerable. | Progress good. | Dorsey, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1890, and Amer. Anthrop., 1889. |
| Six Nations (Canada). | Iroquoian. | On Grand River Reservation, Ontario; Cayuga, 1044; Mohawk, 1762; Oneida, 350; Onondaga, 350; Seneca, 215; Tuscarora, 397. Total, 4118. | Large admixture of white blood. | Generally capable and industrious, and steadily improving; many, both in U.S. and Canada, equal to whites. The Canadian Cayuga and Onondaga are “pagans.” Many Christian faiths represented. | Boyle, Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1898 and 1905, and Journ. Anthr. Inst., 1900; Hale, Iroquois Book of Rites (Phila., 1883); Wilson, Trans. Roy. Soc. Can., 1885. See also under tribal names. |
| Six Nations (New York). | Iroquoian. | In New York State; Cayuga, 179; Oneida, 286; Onondaga, 553; Seneca, 2742; Tuscarora, 356. Total, 4116. | Large admixture of white blood. | Improvement varying with tribes; Tuscarora said to be best. Various religious faiths. | Beauchamp, Bull. N.Y. State Mus., 1897–1907, The Iroquois Trail (1892), and other writings; Smith, 2nd Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1880–1881; Hewitt, 21st Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1899–1900, and other writings. See also under tribal names. |
| Skiqomic. | Salishan. | About 150 in the Howe Sd. and Burrard Inlet region of British Columbia. | Some Canadian-French admixture. | “Probably the most industrious and orderly band of Indians in the province.” Catholic mission. | Hill-Tout, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1900; Boas, ibid., 1894. |
| Slavé. | Athabaskan. | About 1100 in the region W. of Gt. Bear Lake, from Ft. Simpson to Ft. Norman in N.W. Canada. | No certain data; but some admixture now going on. | No marked progress, but white influence being felt. Catholics and Episcopal missions. | Various writings of Petitot and Morice; the latter in Anthropos, 1906–1907; Bompas, Mackenzie River (London, 1888); Bell, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1901. |
| Snaimuq (Nanaimo). | Salishan. | About 160 on reserve near Nanaimo Harbour, B.C. | No data. | Making good progress recently. Catholic mission. | Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1889, and Amer. Anthrop., 1889. |
| Songish (Lkungen). | Salishan. | About 200 in S.E. Vancouver Island, B.C. | No data. | Industrious and mostly well-off. Catholic mission. | Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc., 1890; Hill-Tout, Journ. Roy. Anthrop. Inst., 1907. |
| Spokan. | Salishan. | 91 in Idaho; 133 in Montana; 434 in Washington. | Considerable. | Improving. | Writings of Rev. M. Eells. See Chehalis. |
| Tahltan. | Athabaskan. | 220 in the N. Interior of British Columbia, at mouth of Tahltan river. | Little. | Making good progress. | Teit, Boas Anniv. Vol. (N.Y., 1906). |
| Ten'a. | Athabaskan. | About 2000 on the Yukon, between Tanara and Koserefsky in Alaska. | Little. | Not yet much influenced by whites. Catholic mission. | Jetté, Congr. int. des Amér. 1906; Man, 1907; Journ. Anthr. Inst., 1907. |
| Thompson Indian (Ntlakapamuk). | Salishan. | About 1770 in the Thompson river region, S. central British Columbia. | Not very much. | Making good progress. Catholic and Protestant missions. | Teit and Boas, Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1900; Teit, Trad. of Thompson Inds. (Boston, 1898); Hill-Tout, Salish and Déné (London, 1907). |
| Tlingit. | Koluschan. | About 2000 in S. Alaska. | Considerable in places. | Not marked generally. Greek Orthodox and other missions. | Krause, Die Tlinkit Indianer (Berlin, 1885); Boas, Indianische Sagen (Berlin, 1905); Bogoras, Amer. Anthrop., 1902; Swanton, 26th Ann. Rep. Bur. Amer. Ethnol., 1904–1905; Emmons, Mem. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 1903. |
| Tonkawa. | Tonkawan. | 47 in Oklahoma. | No data. | “Contented and enjoying life.” | Mooney, Globus, 1902. |
| Tsimshian (Proper). | Tsimshian. | About 2000 in northern British Columbia. | Not large. | Making good progress. Anglican and other missions. | Boas, Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1889, and Indianische Sagen (Berlin, 1895); von der Schulenburg, Die Sprache der Zimshian-Indianer (1894); Wellcome, Metlakatla (1887). |
| Tuscarora. | Iroquoian. | 397 on Six Nation Reservation, Ontario; 356 with Six Nations, New York. | Considerable. | Making good progress in both Canada and New York. | See Six Nations. |
| Tutchonekut'qin. | Athabaskan. | About 1000 on the Yukon from Deer river to Ft. Selkirk, in Alaska. | Little. | Little progress. | See Babines, Carriers, Chipewyan. |
| Uinta Ute. | Shoshonian. | 435 in Utah. | Little. | See Ute. | See Ute. |
| Umatilla. | Sahaptian. | 207 in Oregon. | Some. | Making progress. Catholic and Presbyterian missions. | See Nez Percés. |
| Uncompaghre Ute. | Shoshonian. | 493 in Utah. | Little. | See Ute. | See Ute. |
| Ute. | Shoshonian. | 845 in Colorado; 1245 in Utah. | Not much. | Some progress recently. Catholic and Protestant missions. | Culin, Bull. Free Mus. Sci. and Art (Phila., 1901); Kroeber, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1901, and Amer. Anthrop., 1906. ​ |
| Walapai. | Yuman. | 513 in Arizona. Decreasing. | Little. | Self-supporting, but poor morally. | James, Indians of the Painted Desert Region (Boston, 1903). |
| Wallawalla. | Sahaptian. | 579 in Oregon. | Some. | Not so satisfactory recently, but progressing. | See Nez Perces. |
| Wichita. | Caddoan. | 441 in Oklahoma. | Probably considerable. | Citizens of U.S., making good progress. Catholic and Protestant missions. | Dorsey, Mythology of the Wichita (Washington, 1904) and other writings. |
| Winnebago. | Siouan. | 1070 in Nebraska; 1285 in Wisconsin. | Considerable. | Many good citizens of U.S. and progressing. Suffering from liquor and the mescal bean to some extent. | Thwaites, Coll. State Hist. Soc. Wisconsin, 1892; Fletcher, Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1890; McGee, 15th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1893–1894. |
| Wyandot. | Iroquoian. | 385 in Oklahoma; 1 at Anderdon, Ontario, Canada. | No pure-bloods left, hardly a half-blood. | More white than Indian. | Powell, 1st Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1879–1880; Connelley, Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905, and Wyandot Folk-Lore (Topeka, 1899); Merwin, Trans. Kansas State Hist. Soc., 1906. |
| Yakima. | Sahaptian. | About 1500 in Washington. | Considerable. | Late reports indicate bad influence of whites. | Pandosy, Gramm. and Dict. of Yakima (1862); Lewis, Mem. Amer. Anthrop. Assoc., 1906. |
| Yellowknives. | Athabaskan. | About 500 N.E. of Great Slave Lake in N.W. Canada. | Not much. | No practical advance as yet. | Writings of Petitot, Morice, &c. Petitot, Antour du Grand Lac des Esclaves (1891), and Monographie des Déné-Dindjté (1876). See Carriers, Chipewyan. |
| Yuma. | Yuman. | 807 at Fort Yuma Agency, California, and a few at San Carlos, Arizona. | Some Spanish (Mexican) blood. | Progress good. Catholic and Protestant missions. | Gatschet, Ztschr. f. Ethnologie (1893); Trippell, Overland Monthly, 1889; Dorsey, Indians of the South-west (1903). See Mission Indians. |
| Zuñi. | Zuñian. | See Pueblos. | Zuñian. | See Pueblos. | See Pueblos (Zuñian). |
From the tables it will be seen that the American Indians in some parts of North America are not decreasing, but either holding their own or even increasing; also that thousands of them are now to all intents and purposes the equals in wealth, thrift, industry and intelligence Population, &c. of the average white man and citizens with him in the same society. In certain regions of the continent small tribes have been annihilated in the course of wars with other Indians or with the whites, and others have been decimated by disease, famine, &c.; and over large areas the aboriginal population, according to some authorities, has vastly diminished. Thus Morice estimates that the Athabaskan population at present in Canada (about 20,000) is less than one-seventh of what it was a century or more ago; Hill-Tout thinks the Salishan tribes (c. 15,000) number not one-fifth of their population a hundred years ago, and equally great reductions are claimed for some other peoples of the North Pacific region; Kroeber thinks probable an Indian population in California of 150,000 before the arrival of the whites, as compared with but 15,000 now; by some the arid regions of the south-west are supposed to have sustained a very large population in earlier times; certain of the Plains tribes are known to have lost much in population since contact with the whites. But under better care and more favourable conditions generally some tribes seem to be taking on a new lease of life and are apparently beginning to thrive again. A considerable portion of the “disappearance” of the Indian is through amalgamation with the whites. Undoubtedly, in some parts of the country, exaggerated ideas prevalent in the early colonial period as to the numbers of the native population have interfered with a correct estimate of the aborigines past and present. Mooney thinks that the Cherokee “are probably about as numerous now as at any period in their history” (Hndb. Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 247), and this is perhaps true also of some other tribes east of the Mississippi. Major J. W. Powell was of opinion that the Indian population north of Mexico is as large to-day as it was at the time of the discovery. This, however, is not the view of the majority of authorities. The total number of Indians in Canada (Ann. Rep. Dept. Ind. Aff., 1907) for 1907 is given as 110,345, as compared with 109,394 for the previous year, not including the Micmac in Newfoundland and the Indians and Eskimo in that part of Labrador belonging to Newfoundland. In 1903 the figures were 108,233. The gain may be largely due to more careful enumeration of Indians in the less well-known parts of the country, but there is evidently no marked decrease going on, but rather a slight increase in Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, &c. In the United States (exclusive of Alaska, which counts about 30,000) the Indian population (Ann. Rep. Ind. Aff., 1906) is estimated at 197,289, no including the “Five Civilized Tribes,” of whose numbers (94,292) some 65,000 can be reckoned as Indians—a total of 382,000. The figures of 197,289, according to the report, show an increase in population “due mainly to increase in number of Indians reported from California.”
The financial condition of the Indians of the Dominion of Canada for the year ending March 31, 1907, is indicated in the following table:—
The total amounts earned during the year were: from agriculture, $1,337,948; wages and miscellaneous industries, $714,125; fishing, $544,487; hunting and trapping, $630,633. Of these hunting and trapping show a decided decrease over 1906. The Indian Trust Fund amounts to $5,157,566.59. The total appropriation in connexion with the Indians of the Dominion for all purposes for the year 1906–1907 was $1,055,010 and the actual expenditure some $114,000 less. The total amount of sales of lands for the benefit of Indian tribes was $422,086.13. The balance to the credit of the Indian savings account for the funding of the annuities and earnings of pupils at industrial schools, together with collections from Indians for purchase of cattle and for ranching expenses, was $51,708.92.
According to the Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs the total amount of trust funds held by the United States government for the Indians, in lieu of investment, amounted to $36,352,950.97, yielding for 1906 interest at 4 and 5% of $1,788,237.23. The total incomes of the various tribes from all sources for the year ending June 30, 1906, was $6,557,554.39, including interest on trust funds, treaty agreement and obligations, gratuities, Indian money, proceeds of labour, &c.
While the general constitution of the American aborigines north of Mexico is such as to justify their designation as one “American race,” whose nearest congener is to be found in ​the “Mongolian race” of eastern Asia, &c., there is a wide range in variation within the American tribes with respect to Physical characteristics. particular physical characteristics. Some authorities, like Dr Hrdlička (Handb. Amer. Inds. N. of Mex., 1907, pt. i. p. 53), separate the Eskimo from the “Indians,” regarding them as “a distinct sub-race of the Mongolo-Malay,” but this is hardly necessary if, with Boas (Ann. Archaeol. Rep. Ontario, 1905, p. 85), we “consider the inhabitants of north-eastern Asia and of America as a unit divided into a great many distinct types but belonging to one and the same of the large divisions of mankind.” Upon the basis of differences in stature and general bodily conformation, colour of skin, texture and form of hair, shape of nose, face and head, &c., some twenty-one different physical “types” north of Mexico have been recognized.
Although the variation in stature, from the short people of Harrison Lake (average 1611 mm.) to the tall Sioux (average 1726 mm.), Eastern Chippewa (average 1723 mm.), Iroquois (average 1727 mm.), Omaha and Winnebago (average 1733 mm.) and other tribes of the Plains and the regions farther east, is considerable, the North American Indian, on the whole, may be termed a tall race. The stature of women averages among the tall tribes about 92%, and among the short tribes about 94% of that of the men.
The proportion of statures (adult males) above 1730 mm. in certain Indian tribes (Boas) is as follows: Apache and Navaho, 25.3; Arapaho, 45.9; Arikara, 15.2; British Columbia (coast), 28.8; British Columbia (interior), 16.4; California (south), 32.7; Cherokee (eastern), 21.0; Cherokee (western), 40.7; Cheyenne, 72.2; Chickasaw, 23.8; Chinook, 36.2; Choctaw, 32.6; Coahuila, 14.2; Comanche, 27.1; Cree, 33.4; Creek, 53.6; Crow, 51.3; Delaware, 41.1; Eskimo (Alaska), 5.9; Eskimo (Labrador), 0.0; Flathead, 18.9; Harrison Lake, B.C., 1.0; Hupa, 18.7; Iroquois, 52.1; Kiowa, 41.3; Klamath, 20.0; Kootenay, 26.0; Micmac and Abnaki, 45.7; Ojibwa (eastern), 42.7; Ojibwa (western), 42.7; Omaha and Winnebago, 54.9; Oregon (south), 5.1; Ottawa and Menominee, 30.6; Paiute, 22.1; Pawnee, 39.0; Puget Sound and Makah, 6.5; Round Valley, Cal., 3.3; Sahaptin, 28.2; Shuswap, 15.9; Sioux, 50.8; Taos, 18.5; Ute, 12.4; Zuñi and Moqui, 1.9.
Very notable is the percentage of tall statures among the Cheyenne, Creek, Crow, Iroquois, &c. The form of the head (skull) varies considerably among the Indian tribes north of Mexico, running from the dolichocephalic eastern Eskimo with a cephalic index of 71.3 on the skull to the brachycephalic Aleuts with 84.8. Several tribes practising deformation of the skull (mound-builders, Klamath, &c.) show much higher brachycephaly.
The percentage of cephalic indices above 84 (on the heads of living individuals) among certain Indian tribes (Boas) is as follows: Apache, 87.6; Arapaho, 5.0; Arikara, 24.6; Blackfeet, 6.2; Caddo, 47.2; Cherokee, 20.0; Cheyenne, 10.4; Chickasaw, 14.4; Comanche, 65.3; Cree, 4.9; Creek, 25.0; Crow, 12.0; Delaware 12.0; Eskimo, (Alaska), 10.6; Harrison Lake, B.C., 88.8; Iroquois, 15.4; Kiowa, 25.0; Kootenay, 19.1; Mandan, 4.5; Micmac and Abnaki, 7.0; Mohave, 86.5; Montagnais, 21.7; Moqui, 54.3; Navaho, 49.4; Ojibwa (eastern), 26.6; Ojibwa (western), 10.2; Omaha, 23.0; Oregon (south), 50.9; Osage, 79.1; Ottawa and Menominee, 24.7; Pawnee, 4.8; Pima, 9.6; Round Valley, Cal., 4.8; Sahaptin, 57.4; Shuswap, 59.9; Sioux, 9.6; Taos, 6.0; Ute, 8.9; Wichita, 96.0; Winnebago, 66.8; Zuñi, 41.4.
The Apache, Mohave, Navaho, Osage, Sahaptin, Wichita and Winnebago practised skull-deformation, which accounts in part for their high figures. The brachycephalic tendency of the Caddo, Moqui, Shuswap and Zuñi is marked; the Comanche, with an average cephalic index of 84.6 and the Harrison Lake people with one of 88.8, are noteworthy in this respect. As in the case of stature, so in the case of head-form, there seems to have been much mingling of types, especially in the Huron-Algonkian region, the Great Plains and the North Pacific coast.
The North American Indian may be described in general as brown-skinned (of various shades, with reddish tinge, sometimes dark and chocolate or almost black in colour) with black hair and eyes varying from hazel brown to dark brown. Under good conditions of food, &c., the Indian tends to be tall and mesocephalic as to head-form, and well-proportioned and symmetrical in body. The ideal Indian type can be met with among the youth of several different tribes (Plains Indians, Algonkians, Iroquoians, Muskogians and some of the tribes of the south-western United States). Beauty among the aborigines of America north of Mexico has been the subject of brief studies by Dr R. W. Shufeldt and Dr A. Hrdlička (Boas Anniv. Vol., New York, 1906, pp. 38-42).
The extent to which the red and white races have mixed their blood in various parts of North America is greater than is generally thought. The Eskimo of Greenland have intermarried with the Danes, and their kinsmen of Labrador with the English settlers and “summerers.” Race mixture. The eastern Algonkian Indians in New England and Acadia have now considerable French, English and Scottish blood. Many of the Canadian Iroquois are more than half French, many of the Iroquois of New York half English. The Cherokee, an Iroquoian people of the Carolinas, have some admixture of Scottish and German blood, to which Mooney would attribute some, at least, of their remarkable progress. In the state of Oklahoma, which has absorbed the old “Indian Territory,” the results of race-amalgamation are apparent in the large number of mixed bloods of all shades. In spite of the romance of Pocahontas, the intermarriages of the two races in the Virginian region seem not to have been very common or very important. Nor does there appear to have been much intermarriage between Spaniards and Indians in the south Atlantic region, though in Texas, &c., there was a good deal. In New France, in spite of the efforts of some recent Canadian-French writers to minimize the fact, intermixture between whites and Indians began early and continued to be extensive. In parts of New Brunswick, Quebec, Ontario, some of the northern American states and regions of the Canadian north-west, there are Indian villages and white settlements where hardly a single individual of absolutely pure blood can now be found. In the veins of some of the “Iroquois” of Caughnawaga and New York state to-day flows blood of the best colonial stock (Rice, Hill, Williams, Stacey, &c., captives adopted and married within the tribe). In the great Canadian north-west, and to a large extent also in the tier of American states to the south, the blood of the Indian, through the mingling of French, Scottish and English traders, trappers, employees of the great fur companies, pioneer settlers, &c., has entered largely and significantly into the life of the nation, the half-breed element playing a most important rôle in social, commercial and industrial development.
In 1879, besides those whose mixed blood had not been remembered and those who wished to forget it, there were, according to Dr Havard (Rep. Smiths. Inst., 1879), at least 22,000 métis in the United States and 18,000 in Canada (i.e. in the north-west in each case). When the province of Manitoba entered the Canadian Confederation it numbered within the borders some 10,000 mixed-bloods, one of whom, John Norquay, afterwards became its premier. In the Columbia river region and British Columbia some intermixture has taken place, originating in the conditions due to the establishment of trading-posts, the circumstances of the early settlement of the country, &c.—this has been both French and English and Scottish. Farther north in Alaska the Russian occupation led to not a little intermixture, both with the Aleuts, &c., and the coast Indians. In some parts of the far north intermixture of the whites with the Athabaskans is just beginning. In Canada no prohibition of marriage between whites and Indians exists, but such unions are forbidden by law in the states of Arizona, Oregon, North Carolina and South Carolina.
A considerable number of the chiefs and able men of the various Indian tribes of certain regions in recent times have had more or less white blood—Iroquois, Algonkian, Siouan, &c.—who have sometimes worked with and sometimes against the whites. In the case of some tribes there have been “pure blood” and “mixed blood” factions. Some tribes have frowned upon miscegenation; even the Pueblos (except Laguna, which is Keresan) have never intermarried with the whites. Both in Canada and the United States strains of Indian blood run in the veins of prominent families. Some of the “first families of Virginia” are proud to descend from Pocahontas, the Algonkian “Princess,” who married the Englishman Rolfe. In Maine may still be discovered perhaps those whose line of life goes back to the Baron de St Casteins and his Abnaki bride, while in Ontario and New York are to be met those who trace their ancestry back to the famous Iroquois Joseph Brant and his half-English wife. In the early history of Pennsylvania and Ohio were noted the Montours, descendants of a French nobleman who about ​1665 had a son and two daughters by a Huron woman in Canada. In 1817 Captain John S. Pierce, U.S.A., brother of President Franklin Pierce, married the fair Josette la Framboise, who had at least a quarter Indian (Ottawa) blood. In the latter part of the 18th century a young Irish gentleman married Neengai, daughter of the Michigan Ojibwa chief Waubojeeg, and of the daughters born to them one married a Canadian Frenchman of reputation in the early development of the province of Ontario, another the Rev. Mr McMurray, afterwards Episcopal archdeacon of Niagara, and a third Henry R. Schoolcraft, the ethnologist.
Several Indians, some full-blood, others with more or less white blood in their veins, have rendered signal service to ethnological science. These deserve special mention: Francis la Flesche, an Omaha, a graduate of the National University Law School, D.C., holding a position in the Office of Indian Affairs; Dr William Jones, a Sac and Fox, in the service of the Field Museum, Chicago, a graduate of Harvard and of Columbia (Ph.D.); and J. N. B. Hewitt, a Tuscarora, ethnologist in the Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, D.C. In some regions considerable intermixture between negroes and Indians (Science, New York, vol. xvii., 1891, pp. 85-90) has occurred, e.g. among the Mashpee and Gay Head Indians of Massachusetts, the remnants of the Pequots in Connecticut, the Shinnecocks and the Montauks, &c., of Long Island; the Pamunkeys, Mattaponies and some other small Virginian and Carolinian tribes. In earlier times some admixture of negro blood took place among the Seminoles, although now the remnants of that people still in Florida are much averse to miscegenation. Of the tribes of the Muskogian stock who kept large numbers of negro slaves the Creeks are said to have about one-third of their number of mixed Indian-negro blood. Sporadic intermixture of this sort is reported from the Shawnee, the Minnesota Chippewa, the Canadian Tuscarora, the Caddo, &c., in the case of the last the admixture may be considerable. It is also thought probable that many of the negroes of the whole lower Atlantic coast and Gulf region may have strains of Indian blood. The mythology and folk-lore of the negroes of this region may have borrowed not a little from the Indian, for as Mooney notes (19th Rep. Bur. Amer. Ethnol., 1900, pp. 232-234), “in all the southern colonies Indian slaves were bought and sold and kept in servitude and worked in the fields side by side with negroes up to the time of the Revolution.” When Dr John R. Swanton visited the Haida recently the richest man among the Skidegate tribe was a negro. Some of the Plains tribes and some Indians of the far west, however, have taken a dislike to the negro.
The leader in the “Boston Massacre” of March 5, 1770, was Crispus Attucks, of Framingham, Mass., the son of a negro father and a Natick Indian mother. The physical anthropology of the white-Indian half-blood has been studied by Dr Franz Boas (Pop. Sci. Monthly, New York, 1894).
The culture, arts and industries of the American aborigines exhibit marked correspondence to and dependence upon environment, varying with the natural conditions of land and water, wealth or poverty of the soil, abundance or scarcity of plant and animal life subsidiary to human Culture, arts, industries, &c. existence, &c. Professor O. T. Mason (Handb. of Amer. Inds. N. of Mexico, 1907, pt. i. pp. 427-430; also Rep. Smiths. Inst., 1895, and Pop. Sci. Monthly, 1902) recognizes north of Mexico twelve “ethnic environments,” in each of which there is “an ensemble of qualities that impressed themselves on their inhabitants and differentiated them.”
These twelve “ethnic environments” are:—
(1) Arctic (Eskimo); (2) Yukon-Mackenzie (practically Athabaskan); (3) Great Lakes and St Lawrence (Algonkian-Iroquoian); (4) Atlantic Slope (Algonkian, Iroquoian, Siouan, &c.); (5) Gulf Coast, embracing region from Georgia to Texas (Muskogian and a number of smaller stocks); (6) Mississippi Valley (largely Algonkian and “mound-builders”); (7) Plains, including the country from the neighbourhood of the Rio Grande to beyond the Saskatchewan on the north, and from the Rocky Mountains to the fertile lands west of the Mississippi (Algonkian, Siouan, Shoshonian, Kiowan, Caddoan); (8) North Pacific Coast, from Mount St Elias to the mouth of the Columbia river (Koluschan, Haidan, Tsimshian, Wakashan, Salishan); (9) Columbia-Fraser region (Salishan, Sahaptian, Chinookan, &c.); (10) Interior Basin between Rocky Mountains and Sierras (Shoshonian); (11) California-Oregon (“the Caucasus of North America,” occupied by more than twenty-five linguistic stocks); (12) Pueblos region, basin of Rio Grande, Pecos, San Juan and Colorado (Pueblos-Keresan, Tanoan, Zuñian, &c.; on the outskirts predatory Shoshonian, Athabaskan tribes; to the south-west, Yuman, &c.).
In the Arctic environment the Eskimo have conquered a severe and thankless climate by the invention and perfection of the snow-house, the dog-sled, the oil-lamp (creating and sustaining social life and making extensive migrations possible), the harpoon and the kayak or skin-boat (the acme of adaptation of individual skill to environmental demands). In the region of the Mackenzie especially the older and simpler culture of the Athabaskan stock has been much influenced by the European “civilization” of the Hudson’s Bay Company, &c., and elsewhere also by contact with Indian tribes of other stocks, for the Athabaskans everywhere have shown themselves very receptive and ready to adopt foreign elements of culture. The culture-type of the North Pacific coast, besides being unique in some respects, stands in certain relations to the culture of the Palaeo-Asiatic tribes of north-eastern Asia who belong properly with the American race. The culture of the Great Plains, which has been studied by Drs Wissler (Congr. intern. d. Amér., Quebec, 1906, vol. ii. pp. 39-52) and Kroeber (ibid. pp. 53-63), is marked by the presence of a decided uniformity in spite of the existence within this area of several physical types and a number of distinct linguistic stocks. Here the tipi and the camp-circle figure largely in material culture; innumerable ceremonies and religious practices (e.g. the “sun-dance”) occur and many societies and ceremonial organizations exist. The buffalo and later the horse have profoundly influenced the culture of this area, in which Athabaskan (Sarcee), Kitunahan, Algonkian, Siouan, Shoshonian, Kiowan tribes have shared. In some respects the Plains culture is quite recent and the result of “giving and taking” among the various peoples concerned. Some of them merely abandoned an earlier more sedentary life to hunt the buffalo on the great prairies.
The culture of the Mississippi valley region (including the Ohio, &c.) is noteworthy in pre-Columbian and immediately post-Columbian times for the development of “mound-building,” with apparently sedentary life to a large extent. In this Algonkian, Iroquoian and Siouan tribes have participated. In the region of the Great Lakes and on the Atlantic slope occurred the greatest development of the Algonkian and Iroquoian stocks, particularly in social and political activities, expressed both generally, as in the leagues and alliances (especially the famous “Iroquois League”), and individually in the appearance of great men like Hiawatha, Tecumseh, &c. The Gulf region is remarkable for the development in the southern United States of the Muskogian stock (Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, &c.), to which belonged the “civilized tribes” now part of the state of Oklahoma. In this area also, toward the west, are to be met religious ideas and institutions (e.g. among the Natchez) suggestive of an early participation in or connexion with the beginnings of a culture common to the Pueblos tribes and perhaps also to the ancestors of the civilized peoples of ancient Mexico. In some other respects the culture of this area is noteworthy. In the east also there are evidences of the influence of Arawakan culture from the West Indies. The Pueblos region has been the scene of the development of sedentary “village” life on the largest scale known in North America north of Mexico, and of arts, industries and religious ideas (rain-cult especially) corresponding, as Professor J. W. Fewkes (Rep. Smiths. Inst., 1895, pp. 683-700) has shown, most remarkably to their environment. The arid interior basin is the characteristic area of the great Shoshonian stock, here seen at its lowest level, but advancing with the Piman and other Sonoran and Nahuatlan tribes till in ancient Mexico it attained the civilization of the Aztecs. The California-Oregon area is remarkable for the multiplicity of its linguistic stocks and also for the development of many local culture-types. Within the limits of California alone Dr Kroeber (Univ. of Calif. Publ. Amer. Arch. and Ethnol. vol. ii., 1904, pp. 81-103) distinguishes at least four types of native culture.
On account of climatic conditions, in part at least, the development of agriculture in North America has not reached with many Indian tribes a high state of development, although its diffusion is much greater than is generally believed. In the south-eastern part of the United States beans, squashes, pumpkins and some other gourds and melons, potatoes, Indian corn, tobacco, a variety of the sunflower, &c., were cultivated, the growing of beans, squashes and pumpkins extending as far north as Massachusetts and the Iroquois country, in which latter also tobacco was cultivated, as the tribal name (“Tobacco Nation”) of the Tionontati indicates. The cultivation of Indian corn extended from Florida to beyond 50° N. and from the Atlantic to far beyond the Mississippi, and, to judge from the varieties found in existence, must have been known to the Indians for a very long period. In the arid region of Arizona and New Mexico a special development of agriculture occurred, made possible by the extensive use of irrigation in pre-Columbian and in more recent times. Here Indian corn, melons, beans, cotton, &c., were cultivated before the arrival of the Spaniards. For religious purposes the Zuñi appear to have selectively produced a great variety of colours in the ears of corn. Where women had much to do with agricultural operations they greatly influenced society and religious and mythological ideas. Hunting and fishing, as might be expected in an extensive and varied environment like the North American continent, exhibit a great range from simple individual hand-capture to combined efforts with traps and nets, such as the communal nets of the Eskimo, the buffalo and deer “drives” of the Plains and other Indians, with which were often associated ​brush-fences, corrals, “pounds,” pitfalls, &c., advantage taken of a natural cul-de-sac, &c. A great variety of traps, snares, &c., was used (see Mason in Amer. Anthrop., 1899) and the dog was also of great service with certain tribes, although no special variety of hunting-dogs (except in a few cases) appears to have been developed. The accessory implements for the chase (spear, bow and arrow, harpoon, club, &c.) underwent great variation and specialization. The throwing-stick appears in the north among the Eskimo and in the south-west among the Pueblos. In the Muskogian area the blow-gun is found, and its use extended also to some of the Iroquoian tribes (Cherokee, &c.). In part of this area vegetable poisons were used to capture fish. In the New England region torch-fishing at night was in vogue. With the tribes of the Great Plains in particular the hunt developed into a great social event, and often into a more or less marked ceremonial or religious institution, with its own appropriate preliminary and subsequential rites, songs, formulae, taboos and fetishes, &c., as seen e.g. among certain tribes of the Caddoan stock in very interesting fashion.
The art of transportation and navigation among the American aborigines north of Mexico has received special treatment from Mason (Rep. U.S. Nat. Mus., 1894) and Friederici, in his recent monograph Die Schiffahrt der Indianer (Stuttgart, 1907). On land some of the Indian tribes made use of the dog-sled and the toboggan in winter, while the dog-travois was early met with in the region of the Great Plains. The Eskimo made special use of the dog-sled, but never developed snow-shoes to the same extent as did the Athabaskan and Algonkian tribes; with the last and with the Iroquoian tribes came the perfection of the skin-shoe or moccasin. In the south and south-west appear sandals. In North America the cradle, as pointed out by Professor Mason (Rep. U.S. Nat. Mus., 1894), has undergone great variation in response to environmental suggestion. No wheeled vehicle and no use of an animal other than the dog for means of transportation is known among the aborigines north of Mexico, men, women and children, women especially, having been the chief burden-bearers. Among the types of boats in use are the seal-skin kayak and umiak (woman’s boat) of the Eskimo; the bull-boat or coracle (raw-hide over willow frame) of the Missouri and the buffalo-region; the dug-out of various forms and degrees of ornamentation in divers regions from Florida to the North Pacific coast; bark-canoes (birch, elm, pine, &c.) in the Algonkian, Iroquoian and Athabaskan areas, reaching a high development in the region of the Great Lakes; the peculiar bark-canoe of the Beothuks in the form of two half ellipses; the bark-canoe of the Kootenay (a similar type occurs on the Amur in north-eastern Asia), noteworthy as having both ends pointed under water; the plank-canoes of the Santa Barbara region; the basketry-boats (coritas) of the lower Colorado and in south central California; the balsas of tule rushes, &c., in use on the lakes and streams of California and Nevada. In various parts of the country log-rafts of a more or less crude sort were in use. No regular sail is reported from North America, although from time to time skins, blankets, &c., were used by several tribes for such purposes.
Since the appearance of Morgan’s monograph on the Houses and House-life of the American Aborigines (Washington, 1881) our knowledge of the subject has been materially increased by the studies and researches of Boas, Fewkes, Mindeleff, Dorsey, Matthews, Murdoch, Willoughby and others. The dwellings in use among the aborigines north of Mexico varied from the rude brush huts of the primitive Shoshonian tribes, and the still earlier caves, to the communal dwellings of the Iroquois and the Pueblos stocks of New Mexico and Arizona. The principal types are as follows:
Crude brush shelters and huts of the lowest Shoshonian tribes, the Apache (more elaborate), &c.; the hogan or earth-lodge of the Navaho, and the earth-lodges of certain Caddoan and Siouan tribes farther north, with similar structures even among the Aleuts of Alaska; the grass-lodge of the Caddoan tribes, still in use among the Wichita; the semi-subterranean earth-covered lodges of parts of California, &c.; the roofed pits of various styles in use in the colder north, &c.; the Eskimo snow-house and wooden karmak; the elaborately carved and painted wooden houses of Pacific coast region (Tlingit, Haida, Nootka, &c.), some of which were originally built on platforms and entered by log-ladders; the simple wooden house of northern California; the dome-shaped bark wigwams of the Winnebago and the conical ones of many of the Algonkian tribes; the skin tents or tipis of many of the Plains peoples; the mat tents of the Nez Percé, Kootenay, &c., and the mat houses of the South Atlantic region; the circular wigwam of bark or mats banked up at the base, of the Ohio-Mississippi valley; the palmetto-house of certain Louisiana Indians; the pile-dwellings of the ancient Floridians. Communal houses of divers types were found among the Mohegans, Iroquois, &c., but are especially illustrated by the so-called pueblos of the south-western United States, out of which grew probably the elaborate structures of ancient Mexico. Some tribes appear to have had simple and ruder summer dwellings and more elaborate or better constructed winter houses. The Eskimo have sometimes temporary hunting-lodges; the Comanches brush-shelters for summer and lodges of buffalo-skin for winter; with some tribes temporary dwellings were erected for the use of those cultivating the land. Many tribes had their “village-houses” for social purposes, like the kashim of the Eskimo. Special tipis or houses for shamans, “medicine-men,” &c., were common in many parts of North America. Secret societies had their own lodges and the so-called “men’s-house.” The houses of the North American Indians are the subject of a monograph by E. Sarfert (Arch. f. Anthr., 1908, pp. 119-215).
The art of fire-making was known to all the aborigines north of Mexico, two methods being widespread, that with flint and pyrites and that by reciprocating motion of wood on wood. For the latter several varieties of apparatus were in use, the simple two-stick apparatus was very common; the Eskimo have a four-part fire-drill and the Iroquois a weighted drill with spindle whorl. The skill displayed in fire-making by some Indians is very great, and the individual parts of the apparatus have in certain regions been highly specialized. The subject of fire-making apparatus and the kindred topic of illumination have been specially treated by Dr Walter Hough (Rep. U.S. Nat. Mus., 1890, pp. 531-587; Rep. Smiths. Inst., 1901–1902). The camp-fire, the torch and the Eskimo lamp represent the employment of fire for artificial light among the aborigines. Fire and smoke were used for signalling by the Plains tribes, &c., and fire-ceremonies form an important part (“new-fire,” “fire-dance”) of the ritual observances of not a few peoples, especially in the region from Florida to the Rio Grande. In metal-working there is up to the present no convincing evidence of the use of fire (heat only being employed to facilitate the cold-hammering processes by which the metals, copper, silver, gold and iron were manufactured into weapons, implements and ornaments) in metallurgy north of Mexico. The tools used were few and the processes simple, as Cushing (Amer. Anthrop., vol. vii., 1894) has proved by actual experiment. The only metal actually mined in large quantities was copper in the region of Lake Superior, whence came most of that employed in the east and south. In Alaska was a source of copper for the North Pacific coast. No special process of hardening copper other than by hammering was known to the Indians. The gold objects of most interest come from mounds in Florida and a few also from those in the Ohio valley. Galena was used to make simple ceremonial objects by the Indians of the Mississippi valley and the “mound-builders.”
The art of sculpture in wood, stone, bone and ivory is best represented by the wooden masks, utensils, house-carvings and totem-poles of the Indians of the North Pacific coast, the stone pipes, ornaments and images of various sorts of the “mound-builders” and other Indians of the Mississippi valley, the carvings of the people of the Floridian pile-dwellings, and the remarkable ivory carvings, sometimes minute, of the Eskimo. Noteworthy also are the slate-sculpture of the Haida, and the work in bone, ivory and deer and mountain goat horn of the British Columbian Indians. The Indians of the region south of the Great Lakes were expert in the manufacture of tobacco-pipes of great variety, among the most interesting being the Catlinite pipes of the Sioux of Minnesota, &c. Soapstone served some of the Eskimo to make lamps and some Indian tribes for other purposes. Pottery appears to have been unknown in certain regions, but flourished remarkably in the Mississippi valley and the Pueblos region of the south-west, where specialization in form and decoration occurred, and ceramic objects of all sorts were manufactured in abundance. The pottery of the Iroquoian and Algonkian tribes of the north-east was, as a rule, rather crude and undeveloped. In many places the relation of ceramic art to basketry is in evidence. Basketry, of which Professor O. T. Mason has recently made a detailed study in his Aboriginal American Basketry (Washington and New York, 1902, 1904), and related arts were carried on (especially by women) with great variety of form, decoration, material, &c., over a large portion of the continent. In North America basketry is “the primitive art,” and here “the Indian women have left the best witness of what they could do in handiwork and expression.” The most exquisite and artistic basketry in the world comes from an utterly uncivilized tribe in California. The relation of basketry to symbolism and religion is best observable among the Hopi or Moqui of Arizona. The appreciation of white men for the products of Indian skill and genius in basketry finds full expression in G. W. James’s Indian Basketry (1900). Weaving is exemplified in the goat’s hair blanket of the Chilkat Indians (Koluschan) of Alaska, and similar products; also in the manufactures of buffalo-hair, &c., of the Indians of the Great Plains and Mississippi valley and the textile art of a higher type known to the Pueblos tribes and by some of them taught to the Navaho. Famous are the “Navaho blankets,” less so the “Chilkat.”
Feather-work and the utilization of bird-skins and feathers for dresses, hats, ornaments, &c., are known from many parts of the continent. In the Arctic regions bird-skins with the feathers on were used to make dresses; the Algonkian tribes of Virginia, &c., had their bird-skin “blankets” and “turkey robes”; the tribes of the North Pacific coast used feathers for decorative purposes of many kinds, as did Indians in other regions also; feather head-dresses and ornaments were much in use among the Plains tribes, &c.; with the Pueblos Indians eagle and turkey feathers were important in ritual and ceremony; some of the tribes of the south-east made fans of turkey feathers. Beads made from various sorts of shell, rolled copper (“mound-builders,” &c.), seeds, ivory (Eskimo) and the teeth of various animals are pre-Columbian, like the turquoise-beads of the Pueblos, and they were put to a great variety ​of uses. Wampum was manufactured by many Algonkian and Iroquoian tribes, who also later produced fine specimens of work with the glass beads introduced by the whites. These glass beads made their way over most of the continent, soon driving out in many sections the older art in shell, &c. European-made wampum-beads affected native art in the 17th century. In the regions where the porcupine abounded its quills were used for purposes of ornamentation on articles of dress, objects of bark, &c., some of the Algonkian and Iroquoian tribes producing beautiful work of this sort.
Besides face and body painting, employed for various purposes and widespread over the continent, particularly in ceremonial observances, during war-time, in courting, mourning, &c., painting found expression among the North American aborigines most fully in the products of the wood art of the Indians of the North Pacific coast (masks, utensils, houses, totem-poles, furniture, &c.), in the more or less ceremonial and symbolic paintings on skins, tipi-covers and the like of some of the Plains tribes (e.g. Kiowa, Sioux) and in ceramic art, notably in the remarkable polychrome pottery of the Pueblos tribes. Among several Pueblos tribes of Arizona and New Mexico (also the Navaho and Apache and of a ruder sort among some of the Plains tribes, e.g. Cheyenne, Arapaho, Blackfeet) “dry-painting,” most highly developed in the sacred ceremonies of the Navaho, is practised and is evidently of great antiquity. The pictures of deities, natural phenomena, animals and plants are made of powdered sandstone of various colours, &c.
Pictography among the aborigines north of Mexico varied from the rude petroglyphs of some of the Shoshonian tribes to the incised work on ivory, &c., of the Eskimo and the paintings on buffalo and other animal skins by some of the Plains tribes, the work of the Pueblos Indians, &c., the nearest approach to hieroglyphics in North America outside of Mexico. Some Indian tribes (e.g. the Kootenay) seem not at all given to pictography, while many others have practised it to an almost limitless extent. The pictography and picture-writing of the North American Indians have been the subject of two detailed monographs by Mallery (4th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1882–1883, pp. 3-256; 10th Rep., 1888–1889, pp. 1-1290), and the graphic art of the Eskimo has received special treatment by Hoffman (Rep. U.S. Nat. Mus., 1895). Some have argued that this ivory pictography of the Eskimo is of recent origin and due practically to the introduction of iron by the whites, but Boas thinks such a theory refuted by the resemblance of the Eskimo graphic art in question to the birch-bark art of the neighbouring Indian tribes. No real “hieroglyphs,” much less any system of writing of an alphabetic nature, have been discovered north of Mexico; the alleged specimens of such, turning up from time to time, are frauds of one sort or another.
The music and song of the American Indians north of Mexico have been studied since the time of Baker (Über die Musik der Nordamerikanischen Wilden, Leipzig, 1882) by Boas, Fillmore, Curtis, Fletcher, Stumpf, Cringan (Ann. Arch. Rep. Ont., 1902, 1905), &c. According to Miss Fletcher (Indian Story and Song, 1900; also Publ. Peab. Mus., 1893), “among the Indians music envelops like an atmosphere every religious tribal and social ceremony, as well as every personal experience,” and “there is not a phase of life that does not find expression in song”; music, too, is “the medium through which man holds communion with his soul and with the unseen powers which control his destiny.” Music, in fact, “is coextensive with tribal life,” and “every public ceremony as well as each important act in the career of an individual has its accompaniment of song.” Moreover, “The music of each ceremony has its peculiar rhythm, so also have the classes of songs which pertain to individual acts: fasting and prayer, setting of traps, hunting, courtship, playing of games, facing and defying death.” In structure the Indian song “follows the outline of the form which obtains in our own music,” and “the compass of songs varies from 1 to 3 octaves.” Among some of the tribes with highly developed ceremonial observances “men and women, having clear resonant voices and good musical intonation, compose the choirs which lead the singing in ceremonies and are paid for the services.” A peculiar development of music among the Eskimo is seen in the “nith-songs,” by which controversies are settled, the parties to the dispute “singing at” each other till the public laughter, &c., proclaim one the victor. Among the American Indians songs belonging to individuals, societies, clans, &c., are met with, which have to be purchased by others from the owners, and even slight mistakes in the rendition of singing, dancing, &c., are heavily penalized. Musical contests were also known (e.g. among the Indians of the Pacific coast). The development of the “tribal song” among the Iroquoian peoples is seen in Hale’s Iroquois Book of Rites (1881). Songs having no words, but merely changeless vocables, are common. As Dr Boas has pointed out, the genius of the American Indian has been devoted more to the production of songs than to the invention of musical instruments. The musical instruments known to the aborigines north of Mexico, before contact with the whites, according to Miss Fletcher (Handb. of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 960), were drums of great variety in size and form, from the plank or box of some of the tribes of the North Pacific coast to the shaman’s drums of the Algonkian and Iroquoian peoples; whistles of bone, wood, pottery, &c. (often employed in ceremonies to imitate the voices of birds, animals and spirits); flageolet or flute (widely distributed and used by young men in courtship among the Siouan tribes); the musical bow (found among the Maidu of California and important in religion and sorcery). Rattles of gourd, skin, shell, wood, &c., are universal, and among some of the tribes of the south-west “notched sticks are rasped together or on gourds, bones or baskets to accentuate rhythm.” From the rattle in the Pueblos region developed a sort of ball of clay or metal.
So far as is known, the primitive culture of the aborigines of North America is fundamentally indigenous, being the reactions of the Indian to his environment, added to whatever rude equipment of body and of mind was possessed by the human beings who at some remote Culture of Indians essentially indigenous. epoch reached the new world from the old, if, indeed, America was not, as Ameghino, on the basis of the discoveries of fossil anthropoids and fossil man in southern South America, maintains, the scene of origin of man himself.
Professor A. H. Keane (Internat. Monthly, vol. v., 1902, pp. 338-357), Stewart Culin (Proc. Amer. Assoc. Adv. Sci. vol. lii., 1903, pp. 495-500) and Dr Richard Andree (Stzgsb. d. anthrop. Ges. in Wien, 1906, pp. 87-98) all agree as to the general autochthony of aboriginal American culture. The day of the argument for borrowing on the ground of mere resemblances in beliefs, institutions, implements, inventions, &c., is past. An admirable instance of the results of exact scientific research in this respect is to be found in Dr Franz Boas’s discussion (Proc. U.S. Nat. Mus., 1908, pp. 321-344) of the needle-cases of the Alaskan Eskimo, which were at first supposed to be of foreign (Polynesian) origin. Other examples occur in Mr Culin’s study of American Indian games, where, for the first time, the relation of certain of them in their origin and development, and sometimes also in their degeneration and decay, is made clear. The independent origin in America of many things which other races have again and again invented and re-invented in other parts of the world must now be conceded.
The extreme north-western region of North America has recently been shown to be of great importance to the ethnologists. The investigations in this part of America and among the more or less primitive peoples of north-eastern Asia, carried on by the Jesup North Pacific expedition in 1897–1902, have resulted in showing that within what may be called the “Bering Sea culture-area” transmissions of culture have taken place from north-eastern Siberia to north-western America and vice versa. The only known example, however, of the migration of any people one way or the other is the case of the Asiatic Eskimo, who are undoubtedly of American origin, and it seems probable, in the language of Dr Boas, the organizer of the Jesup expedition and the editor of its publications, that “the Chukchee, Koryak, Kamchadal and Yukaghir must be classed with the American race rather than with the Asiatic race,” and possibly also some of the other isolated Siberian tribes; also that, “in a broad classification of languages, the languages of north-eastern Siberia should be classed with the languages of America” (Proc. Intern. Congr. Amer., New York, 1902, pp. 91-102). It appears, further, that the arrival of the Eskimo on the Pacific coast (this, although not recent, is comparatively late) from their home in the interior, near or east of the Mackenzie, “interrupted at an early period the communication between the Siberian and Indian tribes, which left its trace in many cultural traits common to the peoples on both sides of the Bering Sea.”
This establishment of the essential unity of the culture-type (language, mythology, certain arts, customs, beliefs, &c.) of the “Palaeo-Asiatic” peoples of north-eastern Siberia and that of the American Indians of the North Pacific coast, as demonstrated especially by the investigations of Jochelson, Bogoras, &c., is one of the most notable results of recent organized ethnological research. No such clear proof has been afforded of the theory of Polynesian influence farther south on the Pacific coast of America, believed in, more or less, by certain ethnologists (Ratzel, Mason, &c.). This theory rests largely upon resemblances in arts (clubs, masks and the like in particular), tattooing, mythic motifs, &c. But several things here involved, if not really American in origin, are so recent that they may perhaps be accounted for by such Hawaiian and other Polynesian contact as resulted from the establishment of the whale and seal-fisheries in the 18th century.
Between the Indians of North America and those of South America few instances of contact and intercommunication, or even of transference of material products and ideas, have been substantiated. It is by way of the Antilles and the Bahamas that such contact as actually occurred took place. In 1894 (Amer. Anthrop. vol. vii. p. 71-79) Professor W. H. Holmes pointed out traces of Caribbean influences in the ceramic art of the Florida-Georgia region belonging to the period just before the Columbian discovery. ​The decorative designs in question, paddle-stamp patterns, &c., akin to the motives on the wooden and stone stools from the Caribbean areas in the West Indies, have been found as far north as 36° in North Carolina and as far west as 84° in Tennessee and 89° in south-eastern Alabama. But the evidence does not prove the existence of Carib colonies at any time in any part of this region, but simply the migration from the West Indies to the North American coast of certain art features adopted by the Indians of the Timuquan and Muskogian Indians and (later) in part by the Cherokee. More recently (1907) Dr F. G. Speck, in a discussion of the aboriginal culture of the south-eastern states (Amer. Anthrop. vol. ix., n.s., pp. 287-295), cites as proof of Antillean or Caribbean influence in addition to that indicated by Holmes, the following: employment of the blow-gun in hunting, use of hammock as baby-cradle, peculiar storage-scaffold in one corner of house, plastering houses with clay, poisoning fish with vegetable juices. It is possible also that the North American coast may have been visited from time to time by small bodies of natives from the West Indies in search of the mythic fountain of youth (Bimini), the position of which had shifted from the Bahamas to Florida in its movement westward. Indeed, just about the time of the advent of the Europeans in this part of the world a number of Indians from Cuba, on such a quest, landed on the south-western shore of Florida, where they were captured by the Calusas, among whom they seem to have maintained a separate existence down to 1570 or later. This Arawakan colony, indicated on the map of linguistic stocks of American Indians north of Mexico, published by the Bureau of American Ethnology in 1907, is the only one demonstrated to have existed, but there may have been others of a more temporary character. In the languages of this region there are to be detected perhaps a few loan-words from Arawakan or Cariban dialects. The exaggerated ideas entertained by some authorities concerning the “mound-builders” of the valley of the Ohio and Mississippi and their alleged “civilization” have led them to assume, without adequate proof, long-continued relations of the tribes inhabiting this part of the country in the past with the ancient peoples of Yucatan and Mexico, or even an origin of their culture from beyond the Gulf. But since these mounds were in all probability wholly the work of the modern Indians of this area or their immediate ancestors, and the greater part, if not all, of the art and industry represented therein lies easily within the capacity of the aborigines of North America, the “Mexican” theory in this form appears unnecessary to explain the facts. In its support stress has been laid upon the nature of some of the copper implements and ornaments, particularly the types of elaborate repoussé work from Etowah, Georgia, &c. That the repoussé work was not beyond the skill of the Indian was shown by Cushing in his study of “Primitive Copper Working” (Amer. Anthrop. vol. vii. pp. 93-117), who did not consider the resemblance of these mound-specimens to the art of Mexico proof of extra-North American origin. Holmes (Handb. of Inds. N. of Mex., 1907, pt. i. p. 343) points out that the great mass of the copper of mounds came from the region of Lake Superior, and that had extensive intercourse between Mexico or Central America and the mound-country existed, or colonies from those southern parts been present in the area in question, artifacts of undoubtedly Mexican origin would have been found in the mounds in considerable abundance, and methods of manipulation peculiar to the south would have been much in evidence. The facts indicate at most some exotic influence from Mexico, &c., but nothing far-reaching in its effects.
In the lower Mississippi valley the culture of certain peoples has been thought to contain elements (e.g. the temples and other religious institutions of the Natchez) suggestive of Mexican or Central American origin, either by inheritance from a common ancient source or by later borrowings. When one reaches the Pueblos region, with its present and its extinct “village culture,” there is considerable evidence of contact and inter-influence, if not perhaps of common origin, of culture-factors. Dr J. Walter Fewkes, a chief authority on the ethnic history of Arizona, New Mexico and the outlying areas of “Pueblos culture,” especially in its ceremonial aspects, has expressed the opinion (Amer. Anthrop. vol. vii. p. 51) that “it is not improbable that both Mexican and Pueblos cultures originated in a region in northern Mexico, developing as environment permitted in its northern and southern homes.” Unfavourable milieu in the north prevented the culture of the Pueblos Indians and the Cliff-dwellers, their ancestors, reaching the height attained in Mexico and Central America, represented by temple-architecture, ornamentation of buildings, hieroglyphs, &c. Strong evidence of Pueblos-Mexican relationship Dr Fewkes sees (Proc. Wash. Acad. Sci., 1900) in the great serpent cult of Tusayan, the “New Fire” and other Pueblos ceremonials of importance; also in the mosaic objects (gorgets, ear-pendants, breast-ornaments, &c.) from Pueblos ruins in Arizona, some of the workmanship of which equals that of similar character in old Mexico. The arid region of the south-western United States and part of northern Mexico may well have been a centre for the dispersion of such primitive institutions and ideas as reached their acme in the country of the Aztecs. But of the Pueblos languages, the Moqui or Hopi of north-eastern Arizona is the only one showing undoubted, though not intimate, relationship with the Nahuatl of ancient Mexico. The Shoshonian family, represented in the United States by the Shoshonees, Utes, Comanches and other tribes, besides the Moqui, includes also the numerous Sonoran tribes of north-western Mexico, as well as the Nahuatl-speaking peoples farther south, some of the outliers having wandered even to Costa Rica (and perhaps to Panama). This linguistic unity of the civilized Aztecs with the rude Utes and Shoshones of the north is one of the most interesting ethnological facts in primitive America. Change of environment may have had much to do with this higher development in the south. Besides the Shoshonian, the Coahuiltecan and the Athabaskan are or have been represented in northern Mexico, the last by the Apaches and Tobosos. From the period of the Spanish colonization of New Mexico down to about the last quarter of the 19th century (and sporadically later, e.g. the attack in 1900 on the Mormon settlement in Chihuahua), these Indians have hovered around the Mexican border, &c., their predatory expeditions extending at one time as far south as Jalisco. In the far west the Yuman family of languages belongs on both sides of the border.
In the popular mind the religion of the North American Indian consists practically of belief in the “Great Spirit” and the “Happy Hunting Grounds.” But while some tribes, e.g. of the Iroquoian and Caddoan stocks appear to have come reasonably near a pantheistic Religion, Mythology, &c. conception tending toward monism and monotheism, not a little of present Indian beliefs as to the “Great Spirit,” “God” and “Devil,” “Good Spirit” and “Evil Spirit,” &c., as well as concerning moral distinctions in the hereafter, can reasonably be considered the result of missionary and other influences coming directly or indirectly from the whites. The central idea in the religion and mythology of the aborigines north of Mexico is what Hewitt (Amer. Anthrop., 1902) has proposed to term orenda, from “the Iroquois name of the fictive force, principle or magic power which was assumed by the inchoate reasoning of primitive man to be inherent in every body and being of nature and in every personified attribute, property or activity belonging to each of these and conceived to be the active cause or force or dynamic energy involved in every operation or phenomenon of nature, in any manner affecting or controlling the welfare of man.” The orendas of the innumerable beings and objects, real and imagined, in the universe differed immensely in action, function, power, &c., and in like manner varied were the efforts of man by prayers, offerings and sacrifices, ceremonies and rites of a propitiatory or sympathetic nature to influence for his own welfare the possessor of this or that orenda, from the “high gods” to the least of all beings. Corresponding to the Iroquoian orenda is the wakanda of the Siouan tribes, some aspects of which have been admirably treated by Miss Fletcher in her “Notes on Certain Beliefs concerning Will Power among the Siouan Tribes” (Science, vol. v., n.s., 1897). Other parallels of orenda are Algonkian manito, Shoshonian pokunt, Athabaskan cæn. As Hewitt points out, these Indian terms are not to be simply translated into English by such expressions as “mystery,” “magic,” “immortal,” “sorcery,” “wonderful,” &c. Man, indeed, “may sometimes possess weapons whose orenda is superior to that possessed by some of the primal beings of his cosmology.”
The main topics of the mythology of the American Indians north of Mexico have been treated by Powell in his “Sketch of the Mythology of the North American Indians” (First Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1879–1880), and Brinton in his American Hero Myths (1876), Myths of the New World (1896) and Religions of Primitive Peoples (1900). Widespread is the idea of a culture-hero or demi-god (sometimes one of twins or even quadruplets) who is born of a human virgin, often by divine secret fecundation, and, growing up, frees the earth from monsters and evil beings, or re-fashions it in various ways, improves the breed and perfects the institutions of mankind, then retires to watch over the world from some remote resting-place, or, angered at the wickedness of men and women, leaves them, promising to return at some future time. He often figures in the great deluge legend as the friend, helper and regenerator of the human race. A typical example of these culture-heroes is the Algonkian character who appears as Nanabozho among the Ojibwa, Wisaketchak among the Cree, Napiw among the Blackfeet, Wisaka among the Sacs and Foxes, Glooscap (Kuloskap) among the Micmac, ​&c. (see Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1891, and Handbook of Amer. Inds., 1907), whose brother is sometimes represented as being after death the ruler of the spirit world. The Iroquoian correspondent of Nanabozho is Tehoronhiawakhon; the Siouan, in many respects, Ictinike. Among many tribes of the North Pacific coast region the culture-hero appears as the “transformer,” demi-god, human or animal in form (coyote, blue-jay, raven, &c.), the last often being tricksters and dupers of mankind and the rest of creation as well. This trickster and buffoon (also liar) element appears also in the Iroquoian and Algonkian culture-heroes and has received special treatment by Brinton (Essays of an Americanist, 1890). On the whole, the Algonkian and Iroquoian culture-hero is mainly actuated by altruistic motives, while the “transformer” of the Indians of the North Pacific coast region is often credited with producing or shaping the world, mankind and their activities as they now exist for purely egotistic purposes. Other noteworthy heroes, “reformers,” &c., among the North American Indians are the subject of legends, like the Iroquoian “Good Mind and Bad Mind,” the Algonkian (Musquaki) “Hot Hand and Cold Hand,” the Zuñian “Right Hand and Left Hand”; and numerous others, including such conceptions as the antagonism and opposition of land and water (dry and wet), summer and winter, day and night, food and famine, giants and pigmies, &c. In the matter of the personification of natural phenomena, &c., there is considerable variation, even among tribes of approximately the same state of culture. Thus, e.g. as Hewitt notes (Handbook of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 970), while with the Iroquoian and eastern Algonkian tribes “the Thunder people, human in form and mind and usually four in number, are most important and staunch friends of man”; in the region of the Great Lakes and westward “this conception is replaced by that of the Thunder bird.”
The Pawnee Indians of the Caddoan stock seem both individually and tribally to possess a deep religious sense expressing itself alike in moods of the person and in ceremonies of a general popular character. This is evident, alike from Miss Fletcher’s description (Amer. Anthrop., 1899, pp. 83-85) of a venerable priest of that tribe, Tahiroossawichi, and from her detailed account of “The Hako: A Pawnee Ceremony” (Twenty-second Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1900–1901, pp. 5-372). This Hako ceremony, the original stimulus for which was probably desire for offspring, and then to ensure friendship and peace between groups of persons belonging to different clans, gentes or tribes, had no fixed or stated time and “was not connected with planting or harvesting, hunting or war or any tribal festival,” although the Indians take up the Hako, with its long series of observances and its hundred songs, “in the spring when the birds are mating, or in the summer when the birds are nesting and caring for their young, or in the fall when the birds are flocking, but not in the winter when all things are asleep; with the Hako we are praying for the gift of life, of strength, of plenty and of peace, so we must pray when life is stirring everywhere,”—these are the words of the Indian hieragogue.
In the arid region of the south-western United States there has grown up, especially among the Moqui, as may be read in the numerous monographs of Dr J. Walter Fewkes (and briefly in the Report of the Smithsonian Institution for 1905), a system of religious ceremonials and sympathetic magic, the object of which is to ensure the necessary rainfall and through this the continued life and prosperity of the people. Here everything is conceived as really or symbolically related to sun, water, rain. The Moqui are essentially a religious people, and their mythology, in which the central figures are the “earth mother” and the “sky father,” has been described as “a polytheism largely tinged with ancestor-worship and permeated with fetishism.” Part of their exceedingly intricate, complex and elaborate ritual is the so-called “snake dance,” which has been written of by Bourke (The Snake Dance of the Moquis, 1884), Fewkes and others.
In the Gulf region east of the Mississippi, “sun worship,” with primitive “temples,” appears among some of the tribes with certain curious myths, beliefs, ceremonies, &c. The Natchez, e.g. according to Dr Swanton (Amer. Anthrop., 1907), were noteworthy on account of “their highly developed monarchical government and their possession of a national religion centring about a temple, which reminds one in many ways of the temples of Mexico and Central America.” They seem to have had “an extreme form of sun-worship and a highly developed ritual.” A simpler form of sun-worship is found among the Kootenay of British Columbia (Rep. Brit. Assoc., 1889, 1892). With the Yuchi occur some Algonkian-like myths of the deluge, &c.
The best data as to the religion and mythology of the Iroquoian tribes are to be found in the writings of Hewitt, especially in his monograph on “Iroquoian Cosmology” (Twenty-first Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1899–1900, pp. 127-339). In the creation-myths several instances of European influence are pointed out. Mother-earth and her life are the source, by transformation and evolution, of all things. The first beings of Iroquoian mythology (daylight, earthquake, winter, medicine, wind, life, flower, &c.) “were not beasts, but belonged to a rather vague class of which man was the characteristic type,”—later come beast-gods. According to Hewitt the Iroquoian term rendered in English “god” signifies really “disposer, controller,” for to these Indians “god” and “controller” are synonymous; and so “the reputed controller of the operations of nature received worship and prayers.” Creation-legends in great variety exist among the North American aborigines, from simple fiat actions of single characters to complicated transformations accomplished with the aid of other beings. The specific creation legend often follows that of the deluge.
Perhaps the most remarkable of all North American creation stories is that of the Zuñi as recorded by Cushing (Thirteenth Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1891–1892) in his “Outlines of Zuñi Creation Myths.” Here the principal figure is “Awonawilona, the maker and container of all,” and the growth-substance the “fogs of increase,” which he evolved by his thinking in the pristine night. The long tale of the origin of the sun, the earth and the sky, and the taking form of “the seed of men and all creatures” in the lowest of the four caves or wombs of the world and their long journey to light and real life on the present earth is a wonderful story of evolution as conceived by the primitive mind, an aboriginal epic, in fact.
In the mythology and religion of the Algonkian tribes (particularly the Chippewa, &c.) is expressed “a firm belief in a cosmic mystery present throughout all nature, called manitou.” This manitou “was identified with both animate and inanimate objects, and the impulse was strong to enter into personal relation with the mystic power; it was easy for an Ojibwa to associate the manitou with all forms of transcendent agencies, some of which assumed definite characters and played the rôle of deities” (Jones). There were innumerable manitous of high or low degree. The highest development of this conception was in Kitchi Manitou (Great Manitou), but whether this personification has not been considerably influenced by teachings of the whites is a question. The chief figure in the mythology of the Chippewa and related tribes is Nanabozho, who “while yet a youth became the creator of the world and everything it contained; the author of all the great institutions in Ojibwa society and the founder of the leading ceremonies” (Jones, Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905; Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1902, &c.). It is to this character that some of the most human of all Indian myths are attached, e.g. the Micmac legend of the origin of the crowing of babies and the story of Nanabozho’s attempt to stick his toe into his mouth after the manner of a little child. Nanabozho is also the central figure in the typical deluge legend of the Algonkian peoples of the Great Lakes (Journ. of American Folk-Lore, 1891), which, in some versions, is the most remarkable myth of its kind north of Mexico.
The best and most authoritative discussion of the religions and mythological ideas of the Eskimo is to be found in the article of Dr Franz Boas on “The Folk-Lore of the Eskimo” (Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1904, pp. 1-13). The characteristic feature of Eskimo folk-lore is the hero-tales, treating of visits to fabulous tribes, encounters with monsters, quarrels and “wars,” shamanism, witchcraft, &c., and generally of “the events occurring in human society as it exists now,” the supernatural playing a more or less important rôle, but the mass of folk-lore being “thoroughly human in character.” In Eskimo myths there appears to be “a complete absence of the idea that transformations or creations were made for the benefit of man during a mythological period, and that these events changed the general aspect of the world,” quite in contrast with the conceptions of many Indian tribes, particularly in the region of the North Pacific, where the “transformer” (sometimes trickster also), demi-god, human or animal (coyote, raven, blue-jay, &c.), plays so important a part, as may be seen from the legends recorded in Dr Boas’s Indianische Sagen der nord-pacifischen Küste Amerikas (Berlin, 1895) and other more recent monographs. In Eskimo folk-lore the field of animal tales is quite limited, and Dr Boas is of opinion that the genuine animal myth “was originally foreign to Eskimo folk-lore,” and has been borrowed from the Indians. Perhaps the most prominent character in Eskimo mythology is Sedna, the old woman, who is mistress of the lower world beneath the ocean (Amer. Anthrop., 1900). The highest being conceived of by the Athabaskans of Canada was, according to Morice (Ann. Arch. Rep. Ontario, 1905, p. 204), “a real entity, which they feared rather than loved or worshipped.” The way of communicating with the unseen was through “personal totems,” revealed usually in dreams. The Hupa, an Athabaskan people of California, are reported by Goddard as possessing a deep religious sense. But the most remarkable mythology of any Athabaskan tribe is that of the Navaho, which has been studied in detail under some of its chief aspects by Dr Washington Matthews in his valuable monographs, Navaho Legends (1897) and The Night Chant (1902). According to Dr Matthews, the Navaho “are a highly religious people having many ​well-defined divinities (nature gods, animal gods and local gods), a vast mythic and legendary lore and thousands of significant formulated songs and prayers, which must be learned and repeated in the most exact manner; they have also hundreds of musical compositions; the so-called dances are ceremonies which last for nine nights and parts of ten days, and the medicine-men spend many years of study in learning to conduct a single one properly.” The most prominent and revered of the deities of the Navaho is Estsanatlehi, the “woman who rejuvenates herself,” of whom it is believed that she grows old, and then, at will, becomes young again.
The numerous Indian tribes subjected to the environment of the Great Plains have developed in great detail some special religious observances, ceremonial institutions, secret societies, ritual observances, &c. The mental life of these Indians was profoundly influenced by the buffalo and later not a little by the horse. Various aspects of Plains culture have recently been discussed by Goddard, Kroeber, Wissler, Dorsey, Fletcher, Boas, &c., from whose investigations it would appear that much intertribal borrowing has taken place. Among some of the Algonkian (Arapaho, Blackfeet, Cheyenne, &c.), Siouan (Ponka, e.g.) Caddoan, Shoshonian, Kiowan and perhaps Kitunahan stocks the “sun-dance” in some form or other prevailed at one time or another. According to Wissler (Amer. Anthrop., 1908, p. 205), this ceremony, as now practised by many tribes, “is the result of a gradual accumulation both of ceremonies and ideas,”—the torture feature, e.g., “seems to have been a separate institution among the Missouri river tribes, later incorporated in their sun-dance and eventually passed on to other tribes.” Some other complicated ceremonials have apparently grown up in like manner. As ceremonies that are quite modern, having been introduced during the historical period, Dr Wissler instances “the Ghost dance, Omaha dance, Woman’s dance, Tea dance and Mescal eating,” of which all, except the Ghost dance, “flourish in almost all parts of the area under various names, but with the same essential features and songs.” Other interesting ceremonies of varying degrees of importance and extent of distribution are those of “the medicine-pipe, buffalo-medicine, sweat-lodge, puberty-rites, medicine-tipis, war-charms, &c.” Interesting also are the “medicine bundles,” or “arks” as they were once mistakenly called.
The “Ghost dance,” the ceremonial religious dance of most notoriety to-day, “originated among the Paviotso (its prophet was a young Paiute medicine man, Wovoka or ‘Jack Wilson’) in Nevada about 1888, and spread rapidly among other tribes until it numbered among its adherents nearly all the Indians of the interior basin, from Missouri river to or beyond the Rockies” (Mooney). Wovoka’s doctrine was that a new dispensation was at hand, and that “the Indians would be restored to their inheritance and united with their departed friends, and they must prepare for the event by practising the songs and dance ceremonies which the prophet gave them.” East of the Rocky Mountains this dance soon came to be known as the “Ghost dance” and a common feature was hypnotic trances. The Sioux outbreak of 1890–1891 was in part due to the excitement of the “Ghost dance.” According to Mooney, “in the Crow dance of the Cheyenne and Arapaho, a later development from the Ghost dance proper, the drum is used, and many of the ordinary tribal dances have incorporated Ghost dance features, including even the hypnotic trances.” The doctrine generally “has now faded out and the dance exists only as a social function.” A full account of this “dance,” its chief propagators, the modi operandi of its ceremonies and their transference, and the results of its prevalence among so many Indian tribes, is given in Mooney’s detailed monograph on “The Ghost Dance Religion and the Sioux Outbreak of 1890” (Fourteenth Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893).
In reference to “Messiah doctrines” among the aborigines of North America, Mooney calls attention to the fact that “within the United States every great tribal movement (e.g. the conspiracy of Pontiac, the combination of Tecumseh, &c.) originated in the teaching of some messianic prophet.” In primitive America the dance has figured largely in social, religious and artistic activities of all kinds, and one of its most interesting developments has occurred among the Plains Indians, where “the Mandan and other Siouan tribes dance in an elaborate ceremony, called the Buffalo dance, to bring game when food is scarce, in accordance with a well-defined ritual” (Hewitt). Among other noteworthy dances of the North American aborigines may be mentioned the calumet dance of several tribes, the scalp dance, the “Green-corn dance” of the Iroquois, the busk (or puskitau) of the Creeks (in connexion with “new fire” and regeneration of all things), the “fire dance” of the Mississaguas, &c.
The Californian area, remarkable in respect to language and culture in general presents also some curious religious and mythological phenomena. According to Kroeber, “the mythology of the Californians was characterized by unusually well-developed and consistent creation-myths, and by the complete lack not only of migration but of ancestor traditions.” The ceremonies of the Californian Indians “were numerous and elaborate as compared with the prevailing simplicity of life, but they lacked almost totally the rigid ritualism and extensive symbolism that pervade the ceremonies of most America.” The most authoritative discussions of the religion and mythology of the Californian Indians are those of Dr Dixon and Dr Kroeber, the latter especially in the University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology for 1904–1907.
The shamans, “medicine-men,” &c., of the American Indians are of all degrees from the self-constituted angekok of the Eskimo to those among tribes of higher culture who are chosen from a special family or after undergoing elaborate preliminaries of selection and initiation. The “medicine-men” of several tribes have been described with considerable detail. This has been done for the “Midēwiwin, or Grand Medicine Society of the Ojibwa” by Hoffman (Seventh Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol. pp. 143-300); for the “Medicine-men of the Apache” by Bourke (Ninth Ann. Rep. pp. 443-603) and for those of the Cherokee by Mooney (Seventh Ann. Rep. pp. 301-397), while a number of the chief facts concerning American Indian shamans in general have been gathered in a recent article by Dr R. B. Dixon (Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, 1908, pp. 1-12). In various parts of the continent and among diverse tribes the shaman exercises functions as “healer, sorcerer, seer, priest and educator.” These functions among the tribes of lower culture are generally exercised by one and the same individual, but, with rise in civilization, the healer-sorcerer and shaman-sorcerer disappear or wane in power and influence as the true priest develops. The priestly character of the shaman appears among the Plains tribes in connexion with the custody of the “sacred bundles” and the keeping of the ceremonial myths, &c., but is more marked among the Pueblos, Navaho, &c., of the south-west, while “a considerable development of the priestly function may also be seen among the Muskogi, particularly in the case of the Natchez, with their remarkable cult and so-called temple.” The reverent character of the best “priests” or shamans among the Pawnee and Omaha has been emphasized by Miss A. C. Fletcher and Francis la Flesche. The class-organization of the shamans reaches its acme in the midé societies of the Chippewa and the priest-societies of the Pueblos Indians (Moqui, Zuñi, &c.).
The games of the American aborigines north of Mexico have been made the subject of a detailed monograph by Culin, “Games of the North American Indians” (Twenty-fourth Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1902–1903, pp. 1-846), in which are treated the games of chance, games of dexterity Games. and minor amusements of more than 200 tribes belonging to 34 different linguistic stocks. According to Culin, “games of pure skill and calculation, such as chess, are entirely absent.” There are more variations in the materials employed than in the object or methods of play and in general the variations do not follow differences in language. The type known as “dice game” is reported here from among 130 tribes belonging to 30 stocks; the “hand-game” from 81 tribes belonging to 28 stocks. The centre of distribution of North American Indian games, which, with the exception of a few post-Columbian additions, are all autochthonous, Culin finds in the south-west—“there appears to be a progressive change from what appears to be the oldest forms of existing games from a centre in the south-western United States, along lines north, north-east and east.” Similar changes radiating southward from the same centre are likewise suggested. He is of opinion that, outside of children’s games as such and the kinds of minor amusements common in all civilizations, the games of the North American Indians, as they now exist, “are either instruments of rites or have descended from ceremonial observances of a religious character,” and that “while their common and secular object appears to be purely a manifestation of the desire for amusement or gain, they are performed also as religious ceremonies, as rites pleasing to the gods to secure their favour, or as processes of sympathetic magic, to drive away sickness, avert other evil, or produce rain and the fertilization and reproduction of plants and animals or other beneficial results.” He also believes that these games, “in what appears to be their oldest and most primitive manifestations are almost exclusively divinatory.” This theory of the origin of games in divination, which receives considerable support from certain facts in primitive America, needs, however, further proof. So, too, with Mr Culin’s further conclusion that “behind both ceremonies and games there existed some widespread myth from which both derived their impulse,” that myth being the one which “discloses the primal gamblers as those curious children, the divine Twins, the miraculous offspring of the sun, who are the principal personages in many Indian mythologies.” These eternal contenders “are the original patrons of play, and their games are the games now played by men.”
​It was formerly thought that “totemism” and real “gentile organization” prevailed over all of North America. But it now appears that in several sections of the country such beliefs and institutions were unknown, and that even within the limits of one and the same stock one Social organization, customs, &c. tribe did, while another did not, possess them. Matriarchal ideas and the corresponding tribal institutions were also once regarded as the primal social condition of all Indian tribes, having been afterwards in many cases replaced by patriarchal ideas and institutions. Since the appearance of Morgan’s famous monograph on Ancient Society (New York, 1878) and his Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity in the Human Family (Washington, 1871), the labours of American ethnologists have added much to our knowledge of the sociology of the American Indians. Forms of society among these Indians vary from the absolute democracy of the Athabaskan Ten‘a of Alaska, among whom, according to Jetté (Congr. int. d. Amér., Quebec, 1886), there exist “no chiefs, guides or masters,” and public opinion dominates (“every one commands and all obey, if they see fit”), to the complicated systems of some of the tribes of the North Pacific coast regions, with threefold divisions of chiefs, “nobles,” and “common people” (sometimes also, in addition, slaves), secret and “totemic” organizations, religious societies, sexual institutions (“men’s houses,” &c.), and other like divisions; and beyond this to the development along political and larger social lines of alliances and confederations of tribes (often speaking entirely different languages) which have played an important rôle in the diffusion of primitive culture, such as the Powhatan confederacy of Virginia and the Abnaki confederacy of the North Atlantic region; the confederacy of the Chippewa, Ottawa and Potawatomi of the Great Lakes; the Huron confederacy of Ontario; the Dakota alliance of the north-west; the Blackfoot confederacy of the Canadian north-west; the Caddoan confederacy of the Arkansas region; the Creek confederacy of the South Atlantic country. The acme of federation was reached in the great “League of the Iroquois,” whose further development and expansion were prevented by the coming of the Europeans and their conquest of primitive North America. According to Morgan (League of the Iroquois, New York, 1851) and Hale (Iroquois Book of Rites, 1881), who have written about this remarkable attempt, by federation of all tribes, to put an end to war and usher in the reign of universal peace, its formation under the inspiring genius of Hiawatha took place about 1459. But J. N. B. Hewitt, himself an Iroquois, offers reasons (Amer. Anthrop., 1892) for believing that the correct date of its founding lies between 1559 and 1570.
Tribes like the Kootenay (Rep. Brit. Assoc., 1892) have no totems and secret societies, nor do they seem to have ever possessed them. This may also be said of some of the Salishan tribes, though others of the same stock have complicated systems. The Klamath Indians (Lutuamian stock) “are absolutely ignorant of the gentile or clan system as prevalent among the Haida, Tlingit and Eastern Indians of North America; matriarchate is also unknown among them; every one is free to marry within or without the tribe, and the children inherit from the father” (Gatschet). In all parts of California indeed, according to Kroeber (Handbook of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 191), “both totemism and a true gentile organization were totally lacking.” Nor does it appear that either personal or communal totemism is a necessary attribute of clan and gentile organizations where such do exist. The Heiltsuk of British Columbia have animal totems, while the Kwakiutl do not, although both these tribes belong to the same Wakashan stock. Among the Iroquoian tribes, according to Hewitt (Handbook, p. 303), the primary unit of social and political organization, termed in Mohawk ohwachira, is “the family, comprising all the male and female progeny of a woman and of all her female descendants in the female line and of such other persons as may be adopted into the ohwachira.” The head of the ohwachira is “usually the oldest woman in it,” and it “never bears the name of a tutelary or other deity.” The clan was composed of one or more of such ohwachiras, being “developed apparently through the coalescence of two or more ohwachiras having a common abode.” From the clan or gens developed the government of the tribe, and out of that the Iroquois confederation.
The power of the chief varied greatly among the North American aborigines, as well as the manner of his selection. Among the Eskimo, chiefs properly understood hardly have existed; nearly everywhere the power of all sorts of chiefs (both war and peace) was limited and modified by the restraints of councils and other advisers. Age, wealth, ability, generosity, the favour of the shaman, &c., were qualifications for the chieftainship in various parts of the continent. Women generally seem to have had little or no direct voice in government, except that they could (even among some of the Athabaskan tribes) sometimes become chiefs, and, among the Iroquois, were represented in councils, had certain powers and prerogatives (including a sort of veto on war), &c. Many tribes had permanent peace-chiefs and temporary war-chiefs. According to Hewitt (Handb. of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 264), “In the Creek confederation and that of the Iroquois, the most complex aboriginal government north of Mexico, there was, in fact, no head chief. The first chief of the Onondaga federal roll acted as the chairman of the federal council, and by virtue of his office he called the federal council together. With this all pre-eminence over the other chiefs ended, for the governing power of the confederation was lodged in the federal council. The federal council was composed of the federal chiefs of the several component tribes; the tribal council consisted of the federal chiefs and sub-chiefs of the tribe.” The greatest development of the power of the chief and his tenure of office by heredity seems to have occurred among the Natchez and certain other tribes of the lower Mississippi and Gulf region. Among the Plains tribes, in general, non-inheritance prevailed, and “any ambitious and courageous warrior could apparently, in strict accordance with custom, make himself a chief by the acquisition of suitable property and through his own force of character” (Hewitt).
Among the North American aborigines the position of woman and her privileges and duties varied greatly from the usually narrow limits prescribed by the Athabaskans, according to Morice (Congr. int. d. Amér., Quebec, 1906), to the socially high status reached among some of the Iroquoian tribes in particular. In the North Pacific coast region the possession of slaves is said to have been a cause of a relatively higher position of woman there than obtained among neighbouring tribes. The custom of adoption both of children and captives also resulted advantageously to woman. The rôle and accomplishments of woman in primitive North America are treated with some detail in Mason’s Woman’s Share in Primitive Culture (1894). The form of the family and the nature of marriage varied considerably among the North American aborigines, as also did the ceremonies of courtship and the proceedings in divorce, &c. With some tribes apparently real purchase of brides occurred, but in many cases the seeming purchase turns out to be merely “a ratification of the marriage by means of gifts.” Great differences in these matters are found within the limits of one and the same stock (e.g. Siouan). Female descent, e.g., prevailed among the Algonkian tribes of the south-east but not among those of the north and west; and the case of the Creeks (Muskogian) shows that female descent is not necessarily the concomitant of a high social status of woman. Among the Zuñi, where the man is adopted as a son by the father of his wife, “she is thus mistress of the situation; the children are hers, and she can order the husband from the house should occasion arise” (Lowie and Farrand). With many tribes, however, the husband could divorce his wife at will, but Farrand and Lowie in their discussion of Indian marriage (Handb. of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 809) report on the other hand the curious fact that among the Wintun of California “men seldom expel their wives, but slink away from home, leaving their families behind.” In the case of divorce, the children generally go with the mother. From a survey of the available data Lowie and Farrand conclude that “monogamy is thus found to be the prevalent form of marriage throughout the continent,” varied from to polygamy, where wealth and other circumstances dictated it. In California, e.g., polygamy is rare, while with some of the Plains tribes it was quite common. Here again differences of note occurred within the same stock, e.g. the Iroquois proper could not have more than one wife, but the Huron Indian could. The family itself varied from the group of parents and children to the larger ones dictated by social regulations among the eastern tribes with clan organizations, and the large “families” found by Swanton (Amer. Anthrop., 1905) among certain tribes of the North Pacific coast, where relations and “poor relations,” servants and slaves entered to swell the aggregate. Exogamy was widely prevalent and incest rare. Cousin-marriages were frequently tabooed.
With many of the North American aborigines the giving of the name, its transference from one individual to another, its change by the individual in recognition of great events, achievements, &c., and other aspects of nominology are of significance in connexion with social life and religious ceremonies, rites and superstitions. The high level attained by some tribes in these matters can be seen from Miss Fletcher’s description of “A Pawnee Ritual used when changing a Man’s Name” (Amer. Anthrop., 1899). Names marked epochs in life and changed with new achievements, and they had often “so personal and sacred a meaning,” that they were naturally enough rendered “unfit for the familiar purposes of ordinary address, to a people so reverently inclined as the Indians seem to have been.” The period of puberty in boys and girls was often the occasion of elaborate “initiation” ceremonies and rites of various kinds, some of which were of a very trying and even cruel character. Ceremonial or symbolic “killings,” “new-births,” &c., were also in vogue; likewise ordeals of whipping, isolation and solitary confinement, “medicine”-taking, physical torture, ritual bathings, ​painting of face or body, scarification and the like. The initiations, ordeals, &c., gone through by the youth as a prelude to manhood and womanhood resembled in many respects those imposed upon individuals aspiring to be chiefs, shamans and “medicine-men.” Many facts concerning these rites and ceremonies will be found in G. Stanley Hall’s Adolescence (1904) and in the articles on “Ordeals” and “Puberty Customs” in the Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico (1907–1910). In the method of approach to the supernatural and the superhuman among the North American aborigines there is great diversity, and the powers and capacities of the individual have often received greater recognition than is commonly believed. Thus, as Kroeber (Amer. Anthrop., 1902, p. 285) has pointed out, the Mohave Indians of the Yuman stock have as a distinctive feature of their culture “the high degree to which they have developed their system of dreaming and of individual instead of traditional connexion with the supernatural.” For the Omaha of the Siouan stock Miss A. C. Fletcher (Proc. Amer. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 1895, 1896; Journ. Anthr. Inst., 1898) has shown the appreciation of the individual in the lonely “totem” vigil and the acquisition of the personal genius.
From the Indians of North America the white man has borrowed not only hosts of geographical names and many common terms of speech, but countless ideas and methods as to food, medicines, clothes and other items in the conduct of life. Even to-day, as G. W. Contact of races. James points out in his interesting little volume, What the White Race may learn from the Indian (Chicago, 1908), the end of the instruction of the “lower” race by the “higher” is not yet. The presence of the Indians and the existence of a “frontier” receding ever westward as the tide of immigration increased and the line of settlements advanced, have, as Prof. Turner has shown (Ann. Rep. Amer. Hist. Assoc., 1893), conditioned to a certain extent the development of civilization in North America. Had there been no aborigines here, the white race might have swarmed quickly over the whole continent, and the “typical” American would now be much different from what he is. The fact that the Indians were here in sufficient numbers to resist a too rapid advance on the part of the European settlers made necessary the numerous frontiers (really “successive Americas”), which began with Quebec, Virginia and Massachusetts and ended with California, Oregon, British Columbia, Yukon and Alaska. The Indians again are no exception to the rule that one of the fundamentally important contributions of a primitive people to the culture-factors in the life of the race dispossessing them consists of the trails and camping-places, water-ways and trade-routes which they have known and used from time immemorial. The great importance of these trails and sites of Indian camps and villages for subsequent European development in North America has been emphasized by Prof. F. J. Turner (Proc. Wisconsin State Histor. Soc., 1889 and 1894) and A. B. Hulbert (Historic Highways of America, New York, 1902–1905). It was over these old trails and through these water-ways that missionary, soldier, adventurer, trader, trapper, hunter, explorer and settler followed the Indian, with guides or without. The road followed the trail, and the railway the road.
The fur trade and traffic with the Indians in general were not without influence upon the social and political conditions of the European colonies. In the region beyond the Alleghanies the free hunter and the single trapper flourished; in the great north-west the fur companies. In the Mackenzie region and the Yukon country the “free hunter” is still to be met with, and he is, in some cases, practically the only representative of his race with whom some of the Indian tribes come into contact. J. M. Bell (Journ. Amer. Folk-Lore, xvi., 1903, 74), from personal observation, notes “the advance of the barbarous border civilization,—the civilization of the whaler on Hudson’s Bay, of the free trader on the Athabasca Lake and river, of the ranchers and placer miners on the Peace and other mountain rivers,” and observes further (p. 84) that “the influx of fur-traders into the Mackenzie River region, and even to Great Bear Lake within the last two years, since my return, has, I believe, very much altered the character of the Northern Indians.” In many parts of North America the free trapper and solitary hunter were often factors in the extermination of the Indian, while the great fur companies were not infrequently powerful agents in preserving him, since their aims of exploiting vast areas in a material way were best aided by alliance or even amalgamation. The early French fur companies, the Hudson’s Bay Company, the North-West Company, the American Fur Company, the Missouri Fur Company, the Russian-American Company, the Alaska Commercial Company, &c., long stood with the Indians for the culture of the white man. For two centuries, indeed, the Hudson’s Bay Company was ruler of a large portion of what is now the Dominion of Canada, and its trading-posts still dot the Indian country in the far north-west. The mingling of races in the region beyond the Great Lakes is largely due to the fact that the trading and fur companies brought thither employés and dependants, of French, Scottish and English stock, who intermarried more or less readily with the native population, thus producing the mixed-blood element which has played an important rôle in the development of the American north-west. The fur trade was a valuable source of revenue for the early colonists. During the colonial period furs were sometimes even legal tender, like the wampum or shell-money of the eastern Indians, which, according to Mr Weeden (Econ. Hist. of New England), the necessities of commerce made the European colonists of the 17th century adopt as a substitute for currency of the Old World sort.
In their contact with the Indians the Europeans of the New World had many lessons in diplomacy and statecraft. Alliances entered upon chiefly for commercial reasons led sometimes to important national events. The adhesion of the Algonkian tribes so largely to the French, and of the Iroquoian peoples as extensively to the English, practically settled which was ultimately to win in the struggle for supremacy in North America. If we believe Lewis H. Morgan, “the Iroquois alliance with the English forms the chief fact in American history down to 1763.”
The whites in their turn have influenced greatly the culture, institutions and ideas of the American aborigines. The early influence of the Scandinavians in Greenland has had its importance exaggerated by Dr Tylor (Journ. Anthrop. Inst., 1879). French influence in Canada and Acadia began early and was very marked, affecting the languages (several Algonkian dialects have numerous loan-words, as have the Iroquois tongues still spoken in Quebec) and the customs of the Indians. French authorities, missionaries and traders seemed to get into more sympathetic relations with the Indians, and the intermarriage of the races met with practically no opposition. Hence the French influence upon many tribes can be traced from the Atlantic past the Great Lakes and over the Plains to the Rocky Mountains and even beyond, where the trappers, voyageurs, coureurs des bois and missionaries of French extraction have made their contribution to the modern tales and legends of the Canadian north-west and British Columbia. In one of the tales of the North Pacific coast appears Shishé Tlé (i.e. Jesus Christ), and in another from the eastern slope of the Rockies Mani (i.e. Mary). Another area of French influence occurs in Louisiana, &c. The English, as a rule, paid much less attention than did the French to the languages, manners and customs and institutions of the aborigines and were in general less given to intermarriage with them (the classical example of Rolfe and Pocahontas notwithstanding), and less sympathetically minded towards them, although willing enough, as the numerous early educational foundations indicate, to improve them in both mind and body. The supremacy of the English-speaking people in North America made theirs the controlling influence upon the aborigines in all parts of the country, in the Pacific coast region to-day as formerly in the eastern United States, where house-building, clothing and ornament, furniture, weapons and implements have been modified or replaced. Beside the Atlantic, the Micmac of Nova Scotia now has its English loan-words, while among the Salishan tribes of British Columbia English is “very seriously affecting the purity of the native spech” (Hill-Tout), and even the Athabaskan Nahané are adding English words to their vocabulary (Morice).
The English influence on tribal government and land-tenure, culminating in the incorporation of so many of the aborigines ​as citizens of Canada and the United States, began in 1641. The first royal grants both in New England and farther south made no mention of the native population of the country, and the early proprietors and settlers were largely left to their own devices in dealing with them, the policy of extinguishing their titles to land being adopted as needed. Later on, of course, due recognition was had of the fact that certain parts of America were inhabited by “heathen,” “savages,” &c., and the chiefs of many of the tribes were looked upon as rulers with prerogatives of princes and royal personages (e.g. the “Emperor” Powhatan and the “Princess” Pocahontas, “King” Philip, the “Emperor” of the Creeks, &c.). The method of dealing with the Indian “tribes” by the Federal government as autonomous groups through treaties, &c., lasted till 1871, when, by act of Congress, “simple agreements” were favoured in lieu of “solemn treaties.”
Meanwhile no consistent purpose was shown in dealing with the Indian problem. At one time the American policy was to concentrate all the Indians on three great reservations, an expansion of the plan adopted early in the 19th century which set aside the former “Indian country” (afterwards restricted to the Indian Territory). The sentiment in regard to great reservations, however, gradually weakened, till in 1878 it was proposed to concentrate the Indians on smaller reservations; but the entire reservation system became increasingly unpopular, and finally in 1887 Congress enacted the Land Severalty Law, paving the way for abolition of the reservation and agency system; at the same time it emphasized the government policy of gradually (the reservation system was a preliminary step in the way of bringing the Indians more under government control) bringing about the cessation of all “tribes” as independent communities and securing their ultimate entrance upon citizenship with the white population. This certainly was far removed from the declaration of the Virginia Assembly in 1702 that “no Indian could hold office, be a capable witness, or hunt over patented land”; and at this time also, “an Indian child was classed as a mulatto, and Indians, like slaves, were liable to be taken on execution for the payment of debt.” As Miss Fletcher (Handb. of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 501) notes, the ordinance of Congress passed in 1787 respecting the duty of the United States to the Indian tribes, which was confirmed by the act of 1789, was reaffirmed in the organizing acts of Alabama, Colorado, Dakota, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon, Wisconsin and Wyoming.
The Land Severalty Law of 1887 (amended 1890) provided for the survey of reservations and the allotment to each person of a tract ranging from 40 to 160 acres, the remainder being sold to white settlers. The process of dividing the Indian lands into individual allotments and disposing of the remainder for the benefit of the tribe or the nation has been very successful in many cases. This policy has culminated in a recent decision of the United States Supreme Court, by virtue of which all Indians living upon their own allotments were declared to be citizens, on the same terms and subject to the same laws as the whites.
During the period 1609–1664, from the visit of Hudson to the surrender of New Amsterdam to the English, the Dutch exercised not a little influence upon the aborigines of the present state of New York and some of the regions adjoining. Hudson’s harsh treatment of the natives caused the Dutch trouble later on. Through their trading-post of Fort Orange (now Albany) they came into contact with both Iroquoian and Algonkian tribes, carrying on an extensive trade in furs with some of them, including the New England Pequots. They sided with the Iroquois against the northern Algonkian tribes, but also aided the Mohegans against the Mohawks. Farther south they helped the Senecas against the Munsees. Their quarrels with the English involved many of the Indian tribes on one side or the other. They have been generally condemned for their readiness to furnish the Indians with firearms and intoxicating liquors, though some of these actions were doubtless performed by individual traders and settlers only and cannot be charged to a deliberate policy of the government. The modern title of Kora, given by the Canadian Iroquois to the governor-general (also to the king of England), is a corruption of Corlaer, the name of a trusted Dutch manager of Rensselaerwyck (cf. the Iroquois name for the French governor, Onontio = Montmagny).
German influence among the American Indians north of Mexico has made itself felt among the Eskimo (particularly in Labrador), the Delawares and Mohegans, the Iroquois and the Cherokee, where the Moravian missionaries did much good work. They influenced the Indians for peace and good conduct during the great wars. In Labrador the dress, habitations and beliefs of the Eskimo have been considerably modified. It is said by some that Sequoyah, the inventor of the “Cherokee alphabet,” had for father a German settler.
The great influence of the Spaniards upon the American Indians has been treated by Blackmar in his Spanish Institutions in the South-west, and by Lummis, Bourke, Hodge and other authorities. The results of Spanish contact and control are seen in the loan-words in the various languages of the region, the consequences of the introduction of domestic animals (horse, mule, sheep, goat, fowls), the perfection of the arts involved in the utilization of wool, the planting of wheat, the cultivation of peaches and other exotic fruits. The difference between the Navaho and their close kinsmen the Apache may be largely attributed to changes wrought by the coming of the Spaniards. The “Mission Indians” of California represent another great point of contact. In California thousands and thousands of Indians were converted and brought under the control of the able and devoted missionaries of the Catholic Church, only to become more or less utterly helpless when Spanish domination ceased and the missions fell into decay. Traces of Spanish influence may be found as far north as the Saskatchewan, where personal names implying origin from a Mexican captive occur; and there is not a little Spanish blood in some of the tribes of the Great Plains, who often took with them from their border raids, or acquired from other tribes, many white prisoners from Mexico, &c.
In Alaska the influence of Russian sailors, traders and settlers during the period of occupancy was considerable, as was also that of the priests and missionaries of the Greek Church, but much of what was thus imposed upon the aborigines has now been modified or is being submerged by the more recent influences of the English-speaking settlers, miners, &c., and the efforts of the American government to educate and improve them. The influence of the Russians extended even to California, as the name “Russian River” would indicate, and Friederici (Schiffahrt der Indianer, 1907, p. 46) even thinks that to them is due the sporadic occurrence in that region of skin-boats. It was through the Russians that the Alaskan Eskimo received tobacco. Some Russian words have crept into certain of the Indian languages. It has been said that the Russian authorities from time to time transported a few Indians over-sea to Kamchatka, &c.
The general question of the relations of the Europeans in North America with the Indians has been treated by various authors, one of the most recent being Friederici, whose Indianer und Amerikaner (Brunswick, 1900) is perhaps a little too prejudiced.
The contact between the races in North America has had its darker side, seen in the numerous conflicts and “wars” that have marked the conquest of the continent by the whites and the resistance of the weaker people to the inevitable triumph of the stronger. The Indian wars. following sketch of the warlike relations of various Indian stocks with the European colonists and their descendants brings out the principal facts of historic interest.
Eskimoan.—The history of warfare between the European colonists (and their descendants) and the North American aborigines begins with the conflict of Eskimo and Northmen in Greenland, the last phase of which, in the first half of the 15th century, ended in the destruction of the European settlements and the loss of knowledge of the Eskimo to the Old World till they were rediscovered by Frobisher in 1576 and Davis in 1585. Then came a new series of small conflicts in which the whites have been the chief aggressors—whalers, sealers and other adventurers. In the extreme north-west the Aleuts were very harshly treated by the Russians, and one of the most recent deeds of brutality has been the reported extermination, by irresponsible whalers, of the Eskimo of Southampton Island in Hudson’s Bay.
Algonkian and Iroquoian.—Southward, along the Atlantic coast, the period of actual settlement by the whites in large numbers was preceded by numerous conflicts with the Algonkian Indians in which all too often the whites (adventurers, fishermen, &c.) were principally at fault, the natives being sometimes carried off as slaves to Spain and elsewhere in Europe. When Champlain, very shortly after the founding of Quebec, decided to help his Algonkian neighbours against their Iroquoian enemies, an alliance was entered upon which had much to do with the final defeat of France in North America. The battle fought and won by Champlain near Ticonderoga in 1609 made the Iroquois the lasting antagonists of the French, and, since the former held a large portion of what is now the state of New York, the latter were effectually prevented from annihilating or destroying the English colonies to the south. The Iroquois alliance with the English in New York was preceded by ​one with the Dutch. Another result of the feud between the Iroquois and the French was the destruction of the confederacy of the Hurons, themselves a people of Iroquoian stock, established in the region between Lakes Ontario, Erie and Huron, over a large portion of what is now the province of Ontario, although the antagonism between Hurons and Iroquois had existed even before the coming of Cartier and the inevitable conflict had already begun. As an outcome of Champlain’s visit to the country of the Hurons in 1615 the Jesuit missionaries had established themselves among these Indians and for thirty-five years laboured with a devotion and sacrifice almost unparalleled in the history of the continent. The struggle ended in the campaign of 1648–1649, in which the Iroquois destroyed the Huron settlements and practically exterminated the people, the French priests in many cases having suffered martyrdom in the most cruel fashion at the hands of the savage conquerors. Such of the Hurons as succeeded in escaping took refuge in some of the safer French settlements or found shelter among friendly Indian tribes farther west. Some of these refugees have their descendants among the Hurons of Lorette to-day and among the Wyandots of Oklahoma. The Tionontati (Tobacco Nation) Hurons continued the struggle for some time longer, a battle being fought in 1659 on the Ottawa above Montreal, in which the Iroquois were victorious and the Huron chief slain. As late as 1747–1748 some of the Hurons, who had taken refuge in the west, under Orontony, a wily and unscrupulous chief, who was offended at certain actions of the French, entered into a conspiracy with many Algonkian tribes of the region to destroy the French posts at Detroit, &c., which, however, proved unsuccessful, the plot being revealed through the treachery of a Huron woman. A notable event in the French-Iroquois wars was the attack on Montreal in 1689. After the coming of Frontenac as governor of Canada the wars between the French and English involved some of the Indian tribes more and more, on one side or the other, the Mohawks especially, who took part against the French, being famous for their raids from the region of Ohio to far into New Brunswick. During the French war and the American War of Independence the Algonkian and Iroquoian Indians serving on both sides were in part or wholly responsible for numerous massacres and other acts of barbarity, though the whites sometimes showed themselves fully the equals of the savages they condemned.
In New England the most notable conflicts were “the Pequot war” of 1637–1638 and “King Philip’s war” of 1675–1676, the latter resulting in the overthrow of a powerful confederacy, which at one time threatened the very existence of the colony, and the practical extermination of the Indians concerned, after great havoc had been wrought by them in the white settlements. New England also suffered much from Indian “wars” instigated by the French, and at Caughnawaga and other Iroquois settlements in French Canada there is much white blood resulting from the adoption of captives taken away (e.g. at Marlboro and Deerfield, Mass., in 1703–1704) in raids on New England villages. Celebrated in the annals of war are the Algonkian chiefs Tecumseh (Shawnee), who aided the British in the war of 1812, and Pontiac (Ottawa), whose remarkable conspiracy of 1763 has been studied by Parkman; of noted Iroquoian chiefs and warriors may be mentioned Joseph Brant, who fought for the British in the War of Independence, and Logan, ill-famed for his barbarities perpetrated against the border settlements on the Ohio, 1775–1780, &c.
In Virginia the future of the English colony was not absolutely assured much before 1620. From the founding of Jamestown in 1607 until about 1616 the colony was in more or less danger of extinction by starvation or destruction at the hands of the Indians. The most famous and romantic of the Indian wars of Virginia was that in which Captain John Smith was concerned in the days of Powhatan and Opechancanough, when his rescue by Pocahontas is said to have taken place. Under Opechancanough massacres of the English settlers took place in 1622 and 1644 in particular, while intermittent hostilities continued between these dates, many hundreds of whites being slain by the Powhatan Indians and their confederates of Algonkian stock. As a result of wars with the English and also with other Indian tribes, many of the Algonkian peoples of Virginia, like some of the Iroquoian peoples farther south, were by the end of the 17th century greatly reduced in numbers. In the Carolinian region the Iroquoian Cherokee warred against the English colonists from 1759 until the War of Independence, and continued their struggle then against the Americans until 1794. After their forcible removal west of the Mississippi in 1838–1839 no serious hostilities occurred, with the exception of a conflict between the whites and a portion of the Cherokee, who had earlier moved into eastern Texas while that state was under the Mexican régime. The Tuscarora were in frequent conflict with the English, particularly in the “Tuscarora war” of 1713–14.
Of Algonkian tribes farther west the Cheyenne began conflicts with the whites about 1840, made their first incursion into Mexico in 1853, and between 1860 and 1878–1879, according to Mooney, “they were prominent in border warfare . . . and have probably lost more in conflict with the whites than any other tribe of the plains in proportion to their number.” They participated in the “Sitting Bull war” of 1876.
The Chippewa of the north-western United States in the latter half of the 18th century and till the close of the war of 1812 kept up warfare with the border settlements, but have been generally peaceful since 1815, when a treaty was made. The only serious outbreak among the Cree, who have been generally friendly to the whites from the period of first contact, occurred during the Riel “rebellion” of 1885, but was soon settled. In the latter part of the 18th century (up to the treaty of Greenville, 1795) the Delawares took a prominent part in opposing the advance of the whites. The Kickapoos were concerned in the Indian plot to destroy the fort at Detroit in 1712, and a hundred years later they aided the English against the Americans; in 1832 numbers of them helped Black Hawk in his war against the whites. The Micmac were long hostile to the English, being prominent as aids to the French in the New England wars, and it was not until about 1779 or long after the French cession that conflicts between these Indians and the whites came to an end. The Mississaguas fought with the Iroquois against the French about 1750, having soon become friendly with the English and remaining so. The Ottawa were prominent in the wars of the region about Detroit from 1750 till 1815. Pontiac, whose “conspiracy” of 1763 is noted in American history, was an Ottawa chief. The Penobscot, as friends of the French, continued their attacks on the English settlements till about 1750. The Sacs and Foxes appear early in the 18th century as antagonists of the French (a rare thing among Algonkian peoples) and they were the instigators of the nearly successful attack on Detroit in 1712. In the war of 1812 most of these Indians sided with the British. Black Hawk, the chief figure in the “war” of 1831–1832, was a Sac and Fox chief, who endeavoured to engage all the Indian tribes of the region in a general alliance against the whites. The Shawnees were prominent in the border warfare of the Ohio region, and their famous chief Tecumseh fought for the British in the war of 1812.
Athabaskan.—The Athabaskan tribes of the far north, with the exception of occasional disputes with the traders and settlers, have generally been of a peaceful disposition, and “wars” with the whites have not been recorded to any extent. The warlike members of this stock have been the Apache and the Navaho. The Apache from the middle of the 16th century have given evidence of their instinct for raids and depredations on the frontiers of civilization. In recent times the most noteworthy outbreaks were those under Cochise, Victorio, Geronimo, Nana, Nakaidoklini, &c., between 1870 and 1886, in which several hundred whites in Mexico and New Mexico were killed and much property destroyed. As late as 1900 some of the hostile Apaches, who had escaped to the mountains, made a raid on the Mormon settlers in Chihuahua, Mexico. The Navaho, when New Mexico passed into the possession of the United States in 1849, had long been in the habit of committing depredations upon the white settlements and the Pueblos. These “wars” continued till 1863, when “Kit” Carson completely defeated them and the greater part of the tribe were made prisoners. Since their release in 1867 they have thriven in peace, although occasionally serious trouble has threatened, as, e.g., in November 1905.
Caddoan.—The Caddo proper were friendly to the French and helped them against the Spaniards in the wars of the 18th century. After the annexation of Texas the Indians were badly treated and some of them made answer in kind; in 1855 a massacre of the Indians was proposed by the whites. Since their forced march to Oklahoma in 1859 they have been at peace. The Arikara had a brief conflict with the United States authorities in 1823, as a result of the killing of some traders. In the wars of the 18th century the Kichai adhered to the cause of the French. The Pawnee seem never to have warred against the United States, in spite of much provocation at times.
Californian Stocks.—Such “wars” as are recorded, for the most part between the minor Californian stocks and the whites, have been largely directly or indirectly instigated by the latter for various purposes of gain. The Lutuamian stock is remarkable as furnishing both the Klamath, who have always kept peace with the whites, and the Modoc, who are well known through the “Modoc war” of 1872–73 under the leadership of their chief, Kintpuash or “Captain Jack.”
Kiowan.—The Indians of the Kiowan stock joined with the Comanche, Apache, &c., in the border wars in Texas and Mexico, and, according to Mooney, “among all the prairie tribes they were noted as the most predatory and bloodthirsty, and have probably killed more white men in proportion to their numbers than any other.” They have been on their present reservation since 1868, and the only outbreak of importance latterly occurred in 1874–75, when they joined with the Comanche, Cheyenne, &c.
Muskogian.—This stock has furnished some of the most warlike Indians of the continent. The Chickasaw were friendly to the English, or rather hostile to the French, in the 18th century (war of 1736–40), and their action practically settled the question of the extension of French power in this region. The Choctaw aided the French in the wars of the 18th century, and a few Indians of this tribe participated in the “Creek War” of 1813–14. The Creeks or Muskogees are famous on account of the terrible war of 1813–14 in which they sustained overwhelming defeat. Earlier they were hostile to the Spaniards in Florida, and during the 18th century were generally friendly to the English, particularly in the “Apalachee war” of 1703–08, when they served under Governor Moore of ​Carolina. Another Muskogian people, the Seminole, are remembered for the long and bloody “Seminole War” in Florida, 1835–45, in which many atrocities were committed.
Sahaptian.—The Indians of this stock have been generally very friendly to the whites, and the only notable “war” occurred in 1877, when the Nez Percés, under their famous chief, Joseph, resisted being confined to their reservation in Idaho. Joseph displayed wonderful generalship; he defeated the American troops several times, and finally executed a most remarkable retreat, over 1000 m., in an attempt to reach Canadian territory. This was foiled within a short distance of the boundary, and the entire force surrendered to Colonel Miles on October 5, 1877.
Shoshonian.—North of Mexico this great stock has developed several warlike peoples. Trouble with the Bannock occurred in 1877–78, resulting from the encroachment of the whites at the time of the Nez Percés war, the killing of several settlers, scarcity of food, &c. The outbreak was ended by a campaign under General Howard in which many Indians, men, women and children, were killed and some one thousand taken prisoners. The Comanche, through a long period of more than 150 years after the Spanish occupation, kept up a continual series of raids and depredations upon the settlements of the whites in Mexico, &c. Their general friendly attitude towards Americans in later years did not extend to the Texans, with whom for more than thirty years they indulged in savage warfare. They often entered into warlike alliance with the Apache, the Kiowa, &c. After the outbreak of 1874–75 they settled down for good. The leader in this “war” was Quana Parker, a half-blood Comanche, who, after the matter was settled, accepted broadly the new order of things and became “the most prominent and influential figure among the three confederated tribes” (Mooney). The Paiute, Shoshonees (Snakes) and Utes have figured in several more or less temporary outbreaks since 1865.
Siouan.—This great stock has had its celebrated antagonists of the whites as well as its famous combatants of other Indian tribes. The Dakota (or Sioux) were unfriendly to the French for aiding their enemies, the Chippewa, and after the fall of French power in America in 1763, they allied themselves with the English and assisted them in the War of Independence and the war of 1812, with few exceptions. After the treaty of peace in 1815 various minor troubles occurred, but in 1862 the Indians in Minnesota rose under Chief Little Crow and committed terrible barbarities against the settlers, some 800 whites being killed before the revolt was put down. The gold-fever of the whites in Dakota, where the Indians had settled down, precipitated a formidable outbreak in 1876 under the leadership of Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, Spotted Tail and other chiefs. The most notable event of this “war” was the so-called “massacre” (properly cutting-off) of General Custer and his cavalry at the battle of Little Bighorn on June 25, 1876. When the “Ghost Dance” was prevalent among so many Indian tribes of the Plains in 1890–1891 another serious rising of the Sioux took place, which was put down by General Miles. Sitting Bull was killed (December 15, 1890); and resistance to an attempt to disarm a large party of Indians at Wounded Knee Creek, near the Pine Ridge Agency, resulted (December 29) in a deplorable massacre, in which many women and children were killed. The story of these Sioux outbreaks and the guiltiness of the whites with respect to them has been told authoritatively by Mooney (14th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., 1892–1893). At one time these troubles threatened to involve the Canadian Indians of the region adjacent. The Catawba of South Carolina, in the wars of the 18th century, aided the English against the French, the Tuscaroras (war of 1713–14) and the Lake tribes. They sided with the Americans during the War of Independence. The Osage were friendly with the French early in the 18th century and fought with them against the Sacs and Foxes at Detroit in 1714.
Pueblos.—After the Spanish conquest of the Pueblos Indians of Arizona and New Mexico the most remarkable effort of the natives to throw off the foreign yoke was in the general revolt of 1680 under the leadership of Popé of San Juan. At that time among the Moqui (Shoshonian) the missionaries were killed, the churches laid in ruins, &c., and similar events occurred elsewhere in the Pueblos region. For this the Spaniards subsequently took ample vengeance. The Pueblos Indians in general have never taken too kindly to the whites; and to-day at the Moqui pueblo of Oraibi there exist a “Hostile” and a “Friendly” faction, the first bitterly opposed to the Caucasian and all his ways, the latter more liberal-minded, but Indian none the less. An open rupture nearly took place in 1906.
In Canada, since the organization of the Dominion in 1867, Indian wars have been unknown, and Indian outbreaks of any sort rare. In 1890 an outbreak of the Kootenays was threatened, but it amounted to nothing—the present writer traversed all parts of the Kootenay country in 1891 in perfect safety. Occasional “risings” have been reported from the Canadian North-West and British Columbia, but have amounted to little or nothing. In the matter of war it should be noted that some Indian stocks have been essentially peaceful, and have resorted to force only when driven beyond endurance or treated with outrageous injustice. Again, within the same stock one tribe has shown itself peaceable, another quite warlike (e.g. Klamath and Modoc, both Lutuamian; the Hares and the Apache, both Athabaskan). Probably the amount and extent of wars existing north of Mexico in Pre-Columbian times were not as large as is generally stated. The introduction of fire-arms, European-made weapons, the horse, &c., and the development of ideas of property made possible through these, doubtless stimulated intertribal disputes and increased the actual number of warlike enterprises. Over a large portion of the continent “wars” were nearly always initiated and carried out by a portion only of the tribe, which often had its permanent “peace party.”
The missionary labours of the various Christian churches among the North American aborigines have been ably summarized by Mooney in the Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico (pt. i. 1907, pp. 874-909). Besides the famous Relation des Jésuites (ed. Thwaites, 1896–1901) Missions and Education. there are now special mission histories for the Baptists, Congregationalists, Episcopalians, Lutherans, Mennonites, Methodists, Moravians, Mormons, Presbyterians, Quakers, Roman Catholics (also the various orders, &c.), who have all paid much attention to Christianizing and civilizing the Indians. To-day “practically every tribe officially recognized within the United States is under the missionary influence of some religious denomination, workers of several denominations frequently labouring in the same tribe.” Something of the same sort might be said of the Indians of Canada, whose religion (that of 76,319 out of 110,345 altogether reported, is known) is given as follows in the Report of the Department of Indian Affairs for 1907: Roman Catholics 35,682; Anglicans 15,380; Methodists 11,620; Presbyterians 1527; Baptists 1103; Congregationalists 18; and other denominations 597; besides 10,347 pagans. All the Indians of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, are Catholics; in Quebec there are but 678 Protestants (mostly Methodist); in Ontario there are 6173 Catholics to 1030 Baptists, 4626 Methodists, 5306 Anglicans, 18 Congregationalists and 34 Presbyterians. The Indians of British Columbia number 11,529 Catholics, 4304 Anglicans, 3277 Methodists and 431 Presbyterians; those of Manitoba, 1780 Catholics, 1685 Methodists, 382 Presbyterians and 3103 Anglicans; those of Saskatchewan and Alberta 4249 Catholics, 1527 Methodists, 719 Presbyterians, 2549 Anglicans. In some of the tribes and settlements both in Canada and in the United States missionary activities, the influence of individual white men, &c., have led to a great diversity of religious faith, sometimes within comparatively limited areas. Thus in the Mistawasis band of Cree, belonging to the Carlton Agency, province of Saskatchewan, numbering but 129, there are 6 Anglicans, 86 Presbyterians and 37 Catholics; in the Oak River band of Sioux in Manitoba there are 60 Anglicans, 1 Presbyterian, 13 Methodists, 4 Catholics and 195 pagans out of a total of 273. Among the “Six Nations” and the larger Indian peoples of Oklahoma all the leading Christian sects, besides the Salvation Army, the Christian Scientists, the Mormons and the &ldquoldquo;New Thought” movement are represented. There are also the “Navaho New Faith,” the “Shaker Church” of Washington, &c. The history of missionary labours in North America among the aborigines contains stories of disappointment and disaster as well as chronicles of success. Some peoples, like the Timuquans, the Apalachee, the Pakawan tribes, &c., have been converted only to disappear altogether; other great attempts at colonization or “reduction,” like the missions of Huronia and California, succeeded for the time on a grand scale, but have fallen victims sooner or later to the fortunes of war, the changes of politics, or their own mechanism and its inherent weaknesses and defects. But the thousands of good church-members, including many ministers of the Gospel, in Canada and the United States, coming from scores of different tribes and many distinct stocks, no less than the general good conduct of so many Indian nations, are a remarkable tribute to the work done by Catholic and Protestant missionaries alike all over the broad continent from the Mexican border to the snows of Greenland and the islands of the Arctic. The martyrdom of the Jesuits among the fierce Iroquois, the zeal of Duncan at Metlakahtla, the fate of the Spanish friars in the Pueblos rebellion of 1680 under Popé, the destruction of the Huron missions in 1641–1649 and of those of the Apalachee in 1703, the death of Whitman at the hands of the Cayuse in 1847, are but a few of the notable events of mission history. The following ​brief accounts of missionary labours among one or two of the chief Indian stocks and in a few of the chief areas of the continent will serve to indicate their general character.
Californian Indians.—Beginning with the foundation by Father Junipero Serra in 1769 of San Diego de Alcalá, and ending with that of San Francisco Solano in 1823, there were established, from beyond San Francisco Bay to the River Colorado, twenty-three missions of the Catholic faith among the Indians of California, whose direct influence lasted until the “secularization” of the missions and the expulsion of the friars by the Mexican government in 1834. In that year the missions counted 30,650 Indians and produced 122,500 bushels of wheat and corn. They possessed also 424,000 cattle, 62,500 horses and mules, 321,900 sheep, goats, hogs, &c. The mission-buildings of brick and stone contained besides religious houses and chapels, school-rooms and workshops for instruction in arts and industries, and were surrounded by orchards, vineyards and farms. Here Indians of diverse linguistic stocks were “reduced” and “civilized,” and their labour fully utilized by the mission-fathers. But, in the words of Mooney (Handb. of Amer. Inds. pt. i., 1907, p. 895), “Despite regular life, abundance of food and proper clothing according to the season, the Indian withered away under the restrictions of civilization supplemented by epidemic diseases introduced by the military garrisons or the seal-hunters along the coast. The death-rate was so enormous, in spite of apparent material advancement, that it is probable that the former factor alone would have brought about the extinction of the missions within a few generations.” Some of the missions had but a few hundred Indians, some, however, as high as three thousand. Kroeber thinks that their influence was “probably greater temporally than spiritually.” After the “secularization” of the missions decay soon set in, which the American occupation of California later on did nothing to remedy, and the native population rapidly decreased. When the supervision of the missionaries no longer sustained them the Indians fell to pieces and the practical results of seventy years of labour and devotion were lost. In 1908 there remained of the “Mission Indians” less than 3000 individuals (belonging to the Shoshonian and Yuman stocks), whose condition was none too satisfactory, the only human relics of the huge attempt at the “reduction” of the Indian that was planned and carried out in California.
Iroquoian.—The French missions among the Hurons began in 1615–1616 with Father le Caron of the Recollect order; those of the Jesuits with Father Brebœuf in 1626. These missions flourished, in spite of wars and other adverse circumstances, till the invasion of the Huron country in Ontario by the Iroquois in 1641 and again in 1649 brought about their destruction and the dispersal of the Hurons who were not slain or carried off as prisoners by the victors. Some took refuge among neighbouring friendly tribes; others settled finally at Lorette near Quebec, &c. The Wyandots, now in Oklahoma, are another fragment of the scattered Hurons. The Hurons of Lorette numbered in 1908, 1 Anglican, 6 Presbyterians and 459 Catholics. The Wyandots of Oklahoma are largely Protestants. The mission among the Mohawks of New York was established in 1642 by Father Jogues (afterwards martyred by the Indians), and in 1653 the church at Onondaga was built, while during the next few years missions were organized among the Oneida, Cayuga and Seneca, to cease during the warlike times of 1658–66, after which they were again established among these tribes. The mission of St François Xavier des Pré (La Prairie), out of which came the modern Caughnawaga, was founded in 1669, and here gathered many Christian Iroquois of various tribes—Mohawk especially. About this time the Iroquois settlement on the Bay of Quinté, Ontario, was formed by Christian Mohawks, Cayugas, &c. The Lake of the Two Mountains mission dates from 1720, that of St Regis from 1756. Another mission at Oswegatchie, founded in 1748, was abandoned in 1807. The Episcopal missions among the Iroquois began early in the 18th century, the Mohawks being the first tribe influenced, about 1700. The extension of the work among the other Iroquoian tribes was aided by Sir William Johnson in the last half of the century and by Chief Joseph Brant, especially after the removal of those of the Iroquois who favoured the British to Canada at the close of the War of Independence. In 1776 the Congregationalists established a mission among the New York Oneida, and later continued their labours also among the Oneida of Wisconsin. The Congregational mission among the New York Seneca began in 1831. In 1791–1798, at the request of Chief Cornplanter, the Pennsylvania Quakers established missions among the Oneida, Tuscarora and Seneca. The Moravian missions among the New York Onondaga were established under the Rev. David Zeisberger about 1745. The Methodist missions among the Ontario Iroquois date from 1820. Of the “Six Nations” Indians of the Grand river, Ontario, the Cayuga and Onondaga are still “pagan,” the others being Anglican, Methodist and other denominations, including Seventh Day Adventists, Salvation Army, &c. Among the New York Iroquois great variety of religious faith also exists, the Presbyterians (largest), Methodists, Episcopalians and Baptists being all represented. The Iroquois of Caughnawaga and St Regis are mainly Catholic; at Caughnawaga there is, however, a Methodist school.
Muskogian.—Several tribes of this stock came under the influence of the missions established by the Spanish friars along the Atlantic coast after the founding of St Augustine in 1565. The missionaries in this region were chiefly Franciscans, who succeeded the Jesuits. They were very successful among the Apalachee, but these Indians were constantly subject to attack by the Yamasi, Creek, Catawba and other savage peoples, and in 1703–1704 they were destroyed or taken captive, and the missions came to an end. A few of the survivors were gathered later at Pensacola for a time. In the early part of the 18th century French missions were established among the Choctaw, Natchez, &c., and the Jesuits laboured among the Alibamu from 1725 till their expulsion in 1764. From 1735 to 1739 the Moravians (beginning under Spangenberg) had a mission school among the Yamacraw, a Creek tribe near Savannah. In 1831 a Presbyterian mission was established among the Choctaw on the Yalabusha river in northern Mississippi, to which went in 1834 the Rev. Cyrus Byington, the Eliot mission over which he presided there and in the Indian Territory till 1868 being one of great importance. After the removal of the Indians to the Indian Territory more missions were established among the Choctaw, the Creek and the Seminole, &c. The work was much interfered with by the Civil War of 1861–65, but the mission work was afterwards reorganized. The Baptist missions among the Choctaw began in 1832 and among the Creek in 1839. The “Choctaw Academy,” a high school, at Great Crossings, Kentucky, chiefly for young men of the Choctaw and Creek nations, was founded in 1819 and continued for twenty-four years. In 1835 a Methodist mission was established among the Creek, but soon abandoned, to be reorganized later on. Among the Indians of Oklahoma, the Catholic and Mormon churches and practically all the Protestant denominations, including the Salvation Army and the Christian Scientists, are now represented by churches, schools, missions, &c. The missionaries among the Muskogian tribes during the last half of the 18th century, as may be seen from Pilling’s Bibliography of the Muskhogean Languages (1889), furnished many able students of Indian tongues, whose researches have been of great value in philology. This is true likewise of labourers in the mission-field among the Algonkian, Iroquoian, Athabaskan, Siouan and Salishan tribes and among the Eskimo. The celebrated “Eliot Bible,” the translation (1663) of the scriptures into the language of the Algonkian Indians of Massachusetts, made by the Rev. John Eliot (q.v.), is a monument of missionary endeavour and prescientific study of the aboriginal tongues. In his work Eliot, like many other missionaries, had the assistance of several Indians. The names of such mission-workers as Egede, Kleinschmidt, Fabricius, Erdmann, Kohlmeister, Bruyas, Zeisberger, Dencke, Rasles, Gravier, Mengarini, Giorda, Worcester, Byington, Wright, Riggs, Dorsey, Williamson, Voth, Eells, Pandosy, Veniaminov, Barnum, André, Mathevet, Thavenet, Cuoq, Sagard, O’Meara, Jones, Wilson, Rand, Lacombe, Petitot, Maclean, Hunter, Horden, Kirkby, Watkins, Tims, Evans, Morice, Hall, Harrison, Legoff, Bompas, Peck, &c., are familiar to students of the aboriginal tongues of America.
When in 1900 the withdrawal by the United States of government aid to denominational schools occurred, it compelled some of the weaker churches to give up such work altogether, and interfered much with the activities of some of the stronger ones. According to the statistics given by Mooney (Handb. of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 897) the Catholic Church had in 1904 altogether, under the care of the Jesuits, Franciscans and Benedictines, &c., and the sisters of the orders of St Francis, St Anne, St Benedict, St Joseph, Mercy and Blessed Sacrament, “178 Indian churches and chapels served by 152 priests; 71 boarding and 26 day schools with 109 teaching priests, 384 sisters and 138 other religious or secular teachers and school assistants.” The Catholic mission work is helped by “the Preservation Society, the Marquette League and by the liberality of Mother Katharine Drexel, founder of the order of the Blessed Sacrament for negro and Indian mission work.” The corresponding statistics for the chief Protestant churches were as follows:—
| Denomination. | Missions and Churches. | Missionaries. | Schools. |
| Baptist  Congregationalist   Episcopalian  Friends  Mennonite  Methodist  Moravian  Presbyterian | 14 10 14 10 5   3 101 | 15 12 28 15 6 40 3 69 | 4 5 17 1 0 1 0 32 |
| Total | 157 | 188 | 60 |
This is exclusive of Alaska, where Greek Orthodox (18 ministers in ​1902), Roman Catholics (12 Jesuits and lay brothers and 11 sisters of St Anne in 1903), Moravians (5 mission stations with 13 workers and 21 native assistants among the Eskimo in 1903), Episcopalians (31 workers, white and native, 13 churches, 1 boarding and 7 day schools in 1903), Presbyterians (a dozen stations and several schools), Baptists, Methodists (several stations), Swedish Evangelical (several stations), Friends (several missions), Congregationalists (mission school) and Lutherans (orphanage), all are labouring.
Before the advent of the whites the children of the North American aborigines “had their own systems of education, through which the young were instructed in their coming labours and obligations, embracing not only the whole round of economic pursuits—hunting, fishing, handicraft, agriculture and household work—but speech, fine art, customs, etiquette, social obligations and tribal lore” (Mason). Parents, grandparents, the elders of the tribe, “priests,” &c., were teachers, boys coming early under the instruction of their male relatives and girls under that of their female relatives. Among some tribes special “teachers” of some of the arts existed and with certain of the more developed peoples, such as some of the Iroquoian and Siouan tribes, both childhood and the period of puberty received special attention. Playthings, toys and children’s games were widespread. Imitation of the arts and industries of their elders began early, and with not a few tribes there were “secret societies,” &c., for children and fraternities of various sorts, which they were allowed to join, thus receiving early initiation into social and religious ideas and responsibility in the tribal unit. Corporal punishment was little in vogue, the Iroquois e.g. condemning it as bad for the soul as well as the body. Appeals to the feelings of pride, shame, self-esteem, &c., were commonly made. As the treatment of the youth at puberty by the Omaha e.g. indicates, there was among some tribes distinct recognition of individuality, and the young Indian acquired his so-called “totem” or “guardian spirit” individually and not tribally. In some tribes, however, the tribal consciousness overpowered altogether children and youth. With the Indian, as with all other young human beings, “unconscious absorption” played its important rôle. Parental affection among some of the peoples north of Mexico reached as high a degree as with the whites, and devices for aiding, improving and amusing infants and children were innumerable. Some of the “beauty makers,” however, amounted to rather serious deformations, though often no worse than those due to the corset, the use of uncouth foot-wear, premature factory labour, &c., in civilized countries.
Interesting details of Indian child-life and education are to be found in books like Eastman’s Indian Boyhood (1902), Jenks’ Childhood of Jishib the Ojibwa (1900), Spencer’s Education of the Pueblo Child (1889), La Flesche’s The Middle Five (1901), Stevenson’s Religious Education of the Zuñi Child (1887), and in the writings of Miss A. C. Fletcher, J. O. Dorsey, J. Mooney, W. M. Beauchamp, &c., besides the accounts of missionaries and travellers of the better sort.
Outside of missions proper there were many efforts made by the colonists to educate the Indians. It is an interesting fact, emphasized by James in his English Institutions and the American Indian (1894), that several institutions still existing, and now of large influence in the educational world of the United States and Canada, had their origin in whole or in part in the desire to Christianize and to educate the aborigines, which object was mentioned in charters (e.g. Virginia in 1606 and again in 1621), &c. Sums of money were also left for the purposes of educating Indian children and youth, many of whom were sent over to England for that purpose, by colonists who adopted them (one such was Sampson Occum, minister and author of the hymn, “Awaked by Sinai’s Awful Sound”). In 1618 Henrico College in Virginia was founded, where Indian youth were taught religion, “civility” and a trade. It was succeeded by the College of William and Mary (founded in 1691 with the aid of a benefaction of Robert Boyle), where Indian youth were boarded and received their education for many years. The great university of Harvard has long outgrown “the Indian college at Cambridge,” whose single graduate Cheeshateaumuck, took his degree in 1665, but died afterwards of consumption. But its original charter provided for all things “that may conduce to the education of the English and Indian youth of this country in knowledge and godliness.” Since Cheeshateaumuck’s time, doubtless, there have been graduates of Harvard who could boast of Indian blood in their veins (e.g. recently William Jones, the ethnologist), but they have been few and far between. Dartmouth College, at Hanover, New Hampshire, founded in 1754, really grew out of Wheelock’s Indian school at Lebanon, Connecticut—at this period there were several such schools in New England, &c. In the royal charter, granted to Dartmouth in 1769, is the provision “that there be a College erected in our said Province of New Hampshire, by the name of Dartmouth College, for the education and instruction of Youth of the Indian Tribes in this Land, in reading, writing and all parts of Learning which shall appear necessary and expedient for civilizing and christianizing children of pagans, as well as in all liberal Arts and Sciences, and also of English Youth and any other.” The college of New Jersey long served as one of the institutions for the education of Indian youth. A glimpse of Indians at Princeton is given by Collins (Princeton Univ. Bull., 1902) in his account of the attempt to confer an academic education, at the end of the 18th century, upon Thomas Killbuck and his cousin, George Bright-eyes, son of a Delaware chief, and a descendant of Taimenend, eponym of the political “Tammany.” It would seem that at this period the states and Congress were in the habit of granting moneys for the education of individual Indians at various institutions.
At the present time the most noteworthy institutions for the education of the Indian in the United States are the Chilocco Indian Industrial school, under government auspices, in Kay county, Oklahoma, near Arkansas city, Kansas; the Carlisle school (government) at Carlisle, Pa.; and the Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute (private, but subsidized by the government), at Hampton, Va.
The Chilocco school is, in many respects, a model institution for Indian youth of both sexes, devoted to “agriculture and attendant industries.” It was opened in 1884 with 186 pupils, and in 1906 the attendance was 685 out of an enrolment of 700. There are 35 buildings, and the corps of instruction, &c., consists of “a superintendent, 51 principal employés and 20 minor Indian assistants.” The Carlisle school, “the first non-reservation school established by the government,” whose origin is due to “the efforts of General R. H. Pratt, when a lieutenant in charge of Indian prisoners of war at St Augustine, Florida, from May 11, 1875, to April 14, 1878,” was opened in November 1879 with 147 Indians, including 11 Florida prisoners; it had in 1906 an enrolment of over 1000 pupils of both sexes, under both white and Indian teachers, and an average attendance of 981. In 1906 there were in attendance members of 67 tribes, representing at least 22 distinct linguistic stocks. According to J. H. Dortch (Handb. of Amer. Inds., 1907, pt. i. p. 207), “since the foundation of the school nearly every tribe in the United States has had representatives on its rolls.” The following statistics, cited by Mr Dortch, indicate both the success of the school in general and of the “outing system” (pupils are allowed to work in temporary homes, but keeping in close touch with the school), which “has come to be a distinctive feature not only of the Carlisle school but of the Indian school service generally”:
| Admitted during 25 years | 5,170 |
| Discharged during 25 years | 4,210 |
| On rolls during fiscal year 1904 | 1,087 |
| Outings, fiscal year 1904 (girls 426, boys 498) | 924 |
| Outings during 21 years (girls 3214, boys 5118) | 8,332 |
| Students’ earnings 1904 | $34,970 |
| Students’ earnings during 15 years | $352,951 |
The staff of the school consists of a superintendent, 75 instructors, clerks, &c. It has graduated “a large number of pupils, many of whom are filling responsible positions in the business world, and especially in the Indian service, in which, during the fiscal year 1903, 101 were employed in various capacities from teachers to labourers, drawing a total of $46,300 in salaries.” The Carlisle football team competes with the chief white colleges and universities.
The Hampton Institute was established in 1868 by General S. C. Armstrong and trains both Negroes and Indians, having admitted the latter since 1878. It is partly supported by the government of Virginia and by the United States government, the latter paying $167 a year for 120 Indian pupils, boys and girls (in 1906 there were in attendance 112, of whom 57 were girls and 55 boys), belonging to 33 different tribes, representing 13 distinct linguistic stocks. The following extract from the report of the principal for 1905–1906 is of interest: “Fifteen catechists among the Sioux still hold their own. There are two field-matrons and seven camp-school teachers, all coming into close touch with the more ignorant of the people. Four are physicians getting their living from their white patients ​and doing more or less missionary work among their own people. William Jones has his degrees of A.M. and Ph.D., and is doing valuable ethnological work for the Carnegie Institution, Columbia University and the American Museum of Natural History in New York. James Murie is assisting in similar work for the Field Museum in Chicago. Hampton has but one Indian lawyer. There are about 50 students holding positions pretty steadily in government schools. About 40 boys have employment at government agencies, 20 being employed as clerks and interpreters, either at the agencies or at the schools. Ten boys are working in machine shops at the north and three are in the navy. A fair proportion are working on their farms; some have accumulated quite a little stock, and five are prosperous cattlemen, seven boys have stores of their own and make a good living from them.” The Indian Department has now adopted the policy of giving industrial training and household economy the chief place in education, varying the instruction to suit the environment in which the boy or girl is to grow up and live and not mixing the needs of Alaska with those of California, or those of Dakota with those of Florida.
In Canada the most notable institutions for the education of the Indians are the Mohawk Institute at Brantford, Ontario; the Mount Elgin Institute at Muncey, Ontario; the Brandon Industrial school at Brandon, Manitoba; the Qu’Appelle Industrial school at Lebret, Saskatchewan.
The Mohawk Institute is the oldest, having been founded in 1831 by the “New England Company,” which began its work among the Canadian Iroquois in 1822. It is undenominational, aided by a government grant, and had in 1907 an average attendance of 106 out of an enrolment of 111 of both sexes. The Mount Elgin Industrial Institute was founded by the Methodist Missionary Society in 1847, and had an attendance for 1907 of 104 of both sexes. The Brandon Industrial school, under Methodist auspices, had in 1907 an attendance of 104 of both sexes. The Qu’Appelle Industrial school, under Roman Catholic auspices, had an average attendance of 210 of both sexes. All these schools receive government aid. As in the United States, Indian teachers and assistants are often employed when fitted for such labours.
The first appropriation by the Congress of the United States for the general education of the Indians was made in 1819, when the sum of $10,000 was assigned for that and closely allied purposes, and by 1825 there were 38 schools among the Indians receiving government aid, but government schools proper date from 1873 (contract schools are four years older), the order of their institution being day schools, reservation boarding schools, then non-reservation boarding schools. In 1900 the contract schools were practically abandoned and the Indian appropriation devoted to government schools altogether. Latterly some departure from this policy has occurred, following a decision of the Supreme Court. In less than a century the expenditure for Indian education increased from an annual outlay of $10,000 to one of about $5,000,000, to which must be added the expenditures from private sources, which are considerable.
Exclusive of Alaska, there were in the United States in 1906, according to the report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, 324 Indian schools (government 261, mission 48, contract 15), with an enrolment of 30,929 and an average attendance of 25,492 pupils, costing the government annually $3,115,953. Of the government schools 25 were non-reservation and 90 reservation boarding schools, and 146 day schools; of the mission schools 45 boarding and 3 day; of the contract schools 8 boarding and 6 public. The schools of a denominational character belonged as follows: 29 to the Catholic Church, 5 to the Presbyterian, 4 to the Protestant Episcopal, 2 to the Congregational, 2 to the Lutheran, and 1 each to the Evangelical Lutheran, Reformed Presbyterian, Methodist, Christian Reformed and Baptist. Besides there were in all 446 public schools on or near reservations which Indians could attend.
In Canada, according to the report of the Department of Indian Affairs for 1907, there was a total of 303 Indian schools (day 226, boarding 55, industrial 22), of which 45 were undenominational, 91 Church of England, 106 Roman Catholic, 44 Methodist and 1 Salvation Army. The total enrolment of pupils was 9618, with an average attendance of 6138. In several cases Indians attend white schools, not being counted in these statistics. The total amount appropriated for Indian schools during the year 1906–1907 was $356,277.
The intelligence of the American Indians north of Mexico ranges from a minimum with the lowest of the Athabaskan tribes of extreme north-western Canada and the lowest of the Shoshonian tribes of the south-western United States to a maximum with the highest developed Indian talent and capacity. members of the Muskogian and Iroquoian stocks (both the Cherokee branch and the Iroquois proper). It must be remembered, however, that the possibilities of improvement by change of environment are very great, as is shown by the fact that the Hupa of California and the Navaho of Arizona and New Mexico (also the cruel and cunning Apaches) belong to the Athabaskan family, while the Shoshonian includes many of the “civilized nations” of ancient Mexico and, in particular, the famous Aztecs. One way of judging of the intellectual character of the various stocks of North American aborigines is from the “great men” they have produced during the historical periods of contact with the whites. Many of these stocks have, of course, not had occasion for the development of great men, their small numbers, their isolation, their lack of historical experience, their long residence in an unfavourable environment, their perpetual and unrestricted democracy, &c., are some of the sufficient explanations for this state of affairs, as they would be in any other part of the world. The Eskimoan, Athabaskan, Koluschan, Wakashan (and other tribes of the North Pacific coast), Salishan and Shoshonian (except in Mexico) stocks, together with the numerous small or unimportant stocks of the Oregon-California and Gulf-Atlantic regions, have not produced any great men, although members of many tribes have been individually of not a little service to the intruding race in pioneer times and since then, or have been highly esteemed by them on account of their abilities or character, &c. Here might be mentioned perhaps Sacajawea (see Out West, xxiii. 223), the Indian woman who acted as guide and helper of the Lewis and Clark expedition and saved the journals at the risk of her life (she has now a statue erected to her memory in Seattle); Louise Sighouin, the Sahaptian convert of whom the missionary de Smet thought so much; Catherine Tekatawitha, the “Iroquois saint,” &c.
The following list will serve to indicate some of the “great men” of the Indian race north of Mexico and the stocks to which they have belonged; in it are included also some products of the contact of the two cultures:—
1. Algonkian.—In politics and in oratory, as well as in combat, this stock has produced notable characters, the conflict with the whites and the Iroquois doubtless serving to stimulate native genius. Among Algonkian notables may be mentioned “King Philip” and Powhatan; Pontiac and Tecumseh; Black Hawk; Sampson Occum; George Copway; Francis Assickinack, &c.
2. Athabaskan.—The possibilities of this stock have been recently illustrated by the Apaches, who, on the one hand, have produced Geronimo, the chief who from 1877 to 1886 gave the United States authorities such trouble, and, on the other, Dr Carlos Montezuma, a full-blood Indian, who, after receiving a good education, served the government as physician at several Indian agencies, and in 1908 was practising his profession in Chicago and teaching in the College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Post-Graduate Medical School. From these southern Athabaskans much is to be expected under favouring conditions.
3. Iroquoian.—Here, as among the Algonkian tribes, circumstances favoured the development of men of great ability. Of these may be mentioned: Hiawatha, statesman and reformer (fl. c. 1450), the chief mover in the formation of the great “League of the Iroquois”; Captain Joseph Brant; “Red Jacket”; Oronhyatekha (d. 1906), the head of the Independent Order of Foresters, an important secret charitable society, a physician, and a man of remarkable power as an organizer.
4. Sahaptian.—A remarkable Indian character was Nez Percé Joseph, the leader of his people in the troubles of 1877. In 1905, at the general assembly of the Presbyterian Church, a delegate representing both whites and Indians was Mark Arthur (b. 1873), a full-blood Nez Percé and since 1900 the successful pastor (fully ordained) of the church at Lapwai, Idaho, the oldest Presbyterian church west of the Rocky Mountains.
5. Siouan.—The most famous Indian of Siouan stock is “Sitting Bull” (d. 1890), medicine-man and chief. Miss Angel de Cora, a Winnebago, was in 1908 instructor in art at the Carlisle school.
Another, not always just or fair, method of gauging the intelligence of the North American Indians is by their ability to ​assimilate the culture of the whites and to profit by the contact of the two races. Curiously enough, some of the tribes at one time considered lowest in point of general intellectual equipment have shown not a little of this ability, and there is a marked difference in this respect between tribes belonging to one and the same stock. The Athabaskan stock e.g. shows such variations, or rather perhaps this stock in general exhibits a tendency to adopt the culture of other peoples, thus some of the Athabaskan tribes in Alaska have acquired elements of culture from the Eskimo; the Takulli have been influenced by the Tsimshian, and Nahané by the Tlingit, the Chilcotin by the Salish, the Sarcee by the western Algonkian tribes, and in the extreme south the Navaho by the Pueblos Indians. The Salishan stock has largely this same characteristic. Of these two peoples Mr C. Hill-Tout (The Salish and Déné, London, 1907, p. 50) says: “It would be difficult indeed to find two peoples more susceptible to foreign influences, more receptive of new ideas and more ready and willing to adopt and carry them out.” In the relations established between them and the whites not enough advantage in the proper way has been taken of this “philoneism,” which ought to have been the basis of their acquisition of our culture, or such aspects of it as suited them best. And perhaps there are other stocks of which, if we knew them well, similar things might be said. Of the Indians of the Shoshonian stock the Paiutes of Nevada and Arizona have shown themselves capable of making themselves necessary to the whites (farmers, &c.) of that region, and not falling victims to the “vices of civilization.” Although they still retain their primitive wickiups (or rush huts), they seem actually to have improved in health, wealth and character from association with the “superior” race, a rare thing in many respects among the lower Indian tribes of North America. This improvement of the Paiutes causes us not to be surprised when we find the more cultured Moquis and the “civilized” Aztecs of ancient Mexico to belong to the same Shoshonian stock. Acculturation by borrowing has played an important rôle in the development of North American Indian ideas and institutions. This is well illustrated by the history of the Plains Indians, with their numerous intertribal societies, their temporary and their permanent alliances, federations, &c. If ways and means for the transfer of elements of culture indicate intelligence, some of these tribes must rank rather high in the scale. The Algonkian, Iroquoian and Muskogian stocks, both in the case of individuals and in the case of whole tribes (or their remnants), have exhibited great ability in the directions indicated. Of the Caddoan stock the Pawnees seem gifted with considerable native ability expressing itself particularly in the matter of religion (the Hupas, of the Athabaskan stock, seem also to have “a religious sense”). Some tribes of the Siouan stock have, both in the case of individuals and as peoples, given evidence of marked intelligence, especially in relation to psychic phenomena and the treatment of adolescent youth. In their culture, their ceremonies and ritual proceedings, as well as in their material arts, the Pueblos Indians of the south-western United States show, in many ways, their mental kinship with the creators and sustainers of the civilization of ancient Mexico and Central America. From the table of Indian tribes it will be seen that aborigines of the most diverse stocks have shown themselves capable of assimilating white culture and of adapting themselves to the new set of circumstances. Progress and improvement are not at all confined to any one stock.
A very interesting fact in the history of the education of the aborigines north of Mexico is the success of the attempt to enable them to read and write their own language by means of specially prepared syllabaries, “alphabets,” &c. The first of these, the still existing Syllabaries. “Micmac hieroglyphics,” so-called, was the work of Father le Clercq in 1665, improved by Father Kauder in 1866; one of the most recent, the adaptation of the “Cree syllabary” of Evans by Peck to the language of the Eskimo of Cumberland Sound. The basis of many of the existing syllabaries is “the Cree syllabary,” or “Evans Syllabary,” invented about 1841 by the Rev. James Evans, a Methodist missionary in the Hudson’s Bay region from the study of the shorthand systems current at that time. This syllabary and modifications of it are now in use (with much printed literature) for both writing and printing among many tribes of the Algonkian, Athabaskan (modified by Morice for the Carriers, by Kirkby and others for Chipewyan, Slavé, &c.), Eskimo (modified by Peck), Siouan (Cree syllabary used by Canadian Stonies) stocks. Among the Salishan tribes of the Thompson river region, the Shushwap, Okanagan, &c., a stenographic modification (reproduced by mimeograph) by Father le Jeune of the Duployan system of shorthand has been used with great success. But the most remarkable of all these syllabaries is one more of Indian than missionary origin, in its application at least, the well-known “Cherokee alphabet” of Sequoyah, an uneducated Cherokee half-blood, who got part of his idea from an old spelling-book though his characters did not at all correspond to English sounds—at first 82, later 86 syllables were represented. Invented about 1821 the “Cherokee alphabet” was first used for printing in 1827, and has been in constant use since then for correspondence and for various literary purposes. The effect of this invention is thus described by Mooney (Myths of the Cherokee, 1902):—
“The invention of the alphabet had an immediate and wonderful effect on Cherokee development. An account of the remarkable adaptation of the syllabary to the language, it was only necessary to learn the characters to be able to read at once. No school-houses were built and no teachers hired, but the whole Nation became an academy for the study of the system, until, in the course of a few months, without school or expense of time or money, the Cherokee were able to read and write in their own language. An active correspondence began to be carried on between the Eastern and Western divisions, and plans were made for a national press, with a national library and museum to be established at the capital, New Echota. The missionaries, who had at first opposed the new alphabet on the ground of its Indian origin, now saw the advisability of using it to further their own work.”
In spite of absurdities of form and position in the characters of this syllabary, it serves its purpose so well that, as Pilling informs us (Amer. Anthrop., 1893), “a few hours of instruction are sufficient for a Cherokee to learn to read his own language intelligibly,” and in two and a half months the Cherokee child “acquires the art of reading and writing fluently in these rude characters.” The success of the “Cree syllabary” was also astonishing, and in 1890, according to Maclean (Canad. Sav. Folk, p. 283), “few Cree Indians can be found who are not able to read the literature printed in the syllabic characters.” Here again, “an Indian with average intelligence can memorize the whole in a day, and in less than one week read fluently any book written upon this plan,” and many Indians learn to read fluently “with no other teachers but the Indians around the camp-fires.” Morice reports equal success with his syllabary: “Through it Indians of common intelligence have learnt to read in one week’s leisurely study before they had any primer or printed matter of any kind to help them on. We even know of a young man who performed the feat in the space of two evenings.” Le Jeune’s experience with the Shuswap and Thompson Indians is the same. The creation of a “literary” class among so many Indian tribes within a comparatively brief period is certainly a very interesting result, and one which gives evidence of native intelligence among children and adults alike (Amer. Journ. Psychol., 1905).
For a general list of authorities on the American aborigines, see bibliography under America, section 3, Ethnology. The literature on the subject, already vast, is continually increasing, and it is impossible to enumerate every contribution made by the large number of expert anthropologists working in this field. The chief works of a special nature have already been cited in the text. (A. F. C.)