page_title: Atakapa
hierarchical_section_title: Atakapa
caption_attribution_description: An Atakapa Indian in his winter clothing.
context_page_description: The Atakapa are an indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands, who spoke the Atakapa language and historically lived along the Gulf of Mexico. The competing Choctaw people used this term for this people, and European settlers adopted the term from them. The Atakapan people were made up of several bands. They called themselves the Ishak in their own language, pronounced "ee-SHAK", which translates as "The People." Within the tribe there were two moieties, and the Ishak identified as "The Sunrise People" or "The Sunset People". Although the people were decimated by infectious disease after European contact and declined as a tribe, survivors joined other tribes. Their descendants still live in the traditional territory of southern Louisiana and Texas. People identifying as Atakapa-Ishak had a gathering in 2006.
  Their name was also spelled Attakapa, Attakapas, or Attacapa. The Choctaw used this term, meaning "man eater", for their practice of ritual cannibalism. Europeans encountered the Choctaw first during their exploration, and adopted their name for this people to the west.
context_section_description: The Atakapa /əˈtɑːkəpə/ are an indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands, who spoke the Atakapa language and historically lived along the Gulf of Mexico. The competing Choctaw people used this term for this people, and European settlers adopted the term from them. The Atakapan people were made up of several bands. They called themselves the Ishak in their own language, pronounced "ee-SHAK", which translates as "The People."  Within the tribe there were two moieties, and the Ishak identified as "The Sunrise People" or "The Sunset People".  Although the people were decimated by infectious disease after European contact and declined as a tribe, survivors joined other tribes. Their descendants still live in the traditional territory of southern Louisiana and Texas. People identifying as Atakapa-Ishak had a gathering in 2006.
  Their name was also spelled Attakapa, Attakapas, or Attacapa. The Choctaw used this term, meaning "man eater", for their practice of ritual cannibalism. Europeans encountered the Choctaw first during their exploration, and adopted their name for this people to the west. The peoples lived in river valleys, along lake shores, and coasts from present-day Vermilion Bay, Louisiana to Galveston Bay, Texas.
  After 1762, when Louisiana was transferred to Spain following French defeat in the Seven Years' War, little was written about the Atakapa as a tribe. Due to a high rate of deaths from infectious disease epidemics of the late 18th century, they ceased to function as a tribe. Survivors generally joined the Caddo, Koasati, and other surrounding tribes, although they kept some traditions. Some culturally distinct Atakapan descendants survived into the 20th century.
caption: An Attakapas, by Alexandre De Batz, 1735
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