page_title: Chiaha
section_title: The people of Chiaha
hierarchical_section_title: Chiaha / The people of Chiaha
caption_attribution_description: English: Detail of the Native American village of Chiaha (spelled "Chiacha" on the map) in what is now East Tennessee, in the southeastern United States, on a 1584 map of La Florida. The map was drawn by Spanish royal cartographer Geronimo Chiaves, and was probably based on accounts by members of the Hernando de Soto expedition (1539-1543). The map was originally published in Abraham Ortelius' Theatrum Orbis Terrarum in 1584.
context_page_description: Chiaha was a Native American chiefdom located in the lower French Broad River valley in modern East Tennessee, in the southeastern United States. They lived in raised structures within boundaries of several stable villages. These overlooked the fields of maize, beans, squash, and tobacco, among other plants which they cultivated. Chiaha was the northern extreme of the paramount Coosa chiefdom's sphere of influence in the 16th century when the Spanish expeditions of Hernando de Soto and Juan Pardo passed through the area. The Chiaha chiefdom included parts of modern Jefferson and Sevier counties, and may have extended westward into Knox, Blount and Monroe counties.
  The Spanish explorers' accounts of Chiaha provide a rare first-hand glimpse of life in a Dallas Phase Mississippian-era village. The Dallas culture, named after Dallas Island near Chattanooga where its distinct characteristics were first observed, dominated much of East Tennessee between approximately 1300 and 1600 AD. Both the de Soto and Pardo expeditions spent several days at Chiaha's principal village. The Pardo expedition constructed a short-lived fort nearby called San Pedro.
context_section_description: Chiaha was on the northern fringe of the Coosa chiefdom's sphere of influence, which stretched from Chiaha in the north to Talisi (near modern Childersburg, Alabama) to the south.  While most villages visited by Pardo were headed by a low-level local chief known as an orata, three villages— Chiaha, Joara, and Guatari— were each headed by a major regional chief known as a mico (some Muskogean-speaking tribes still used the word "mico" for "chief" as late as the 19th century).  Micos were apparently subject to a paramount chief.  At the time of De Soto's expedition, paramount chiefs resided at Cofitachequi and Coosa, but by the time of Pardo's expedition, Cofitachequi's power had been greatly reduced.  The only known paramount chief was at Coosa, which Pardo never visited.
  Life at Chiaha was probably characteristic of life in a Dallas-phase Mississippian period village.  The Mississippian period, which began in Tennessee around 900 AD, marked the transformation of Native American tribes into complex agrarian societies.  Mississippian peoples lived in or near relatively large villages whose design was centered on large, constructed plazas. These public plazas were flanked by one or more mounds used for religious and political purposes and related to the people's cosmology.  The larger mounds, known as "platform mounds", were topped by public buildings.  The Dallas cultures also built elaborate burial mounds.
  In 1940, archaeologists surveyed Zimmerman's Island before it was inundated by reservoir waters.  They photographed a 30-foot (9.1 m) Mississippian-style platform mound near the upstream end of the island (see External links). Researchers have noted that the fortifications described by the Spanish chroniclers (i.e., having square towers or bastions at various intervals) at nearby Tanasqui were consistent with the Dallas-phase fortifications excavated at the Toqua site in the 1970s.  They were likely to have been revealed by excavation on Zimmerman's Island as well.
  Like most Dallas-phase peoples, the Chiahans relied heavily on corn for sustenance.  At Chiaha, De Soto and his men were given large portions of sofkee (a gruel similar to hominy grits), honey, and a sweet-tasting sauce made from bear fat.  The people also collected the wild fruits, such as mulberries and grapes, that grew in abundance in the surrounding hills.  The Chiahans stored their crops in raised storehouses, which the Spaniards called barbacoas.
caption: Detail of Chiaha on a 1584 map of La Florida
exif: {}