Part 32

"Closely enveloped in the dense forests of Chiapas, Gautemala, Yucatan, and Honduras, the ruins of several ancient cities have been discovered, which are far superior in extent and magnificence to any seen in Aztec territory, and of which a detailed description may be found in the fourth volume of this work. Most of these cities were abandoned and more or less unknown at the time of the [Spanish] Conquest. They bear hieroglyphic inscriptions apparently identical in character; in other respects they resemble each other more than they resemble the Aztec ruins—or even other and apparently later works in Guatemala and Honduras. All these remains bear evident marks of great antiquity. … I deem the grounds sufficient … for accepting this Central American civilization of the past as a fact, referring it not to an extinct ancient race, but to the direct ancestors of the peoples still occupying the country with the Spaniards, and applying to it the name Maya as that of the language which has claims as strong as any to be considered the mother tongue of the linguistic family mentioned. … There are no data by which to fix the period of the original Maya empire, or its downfall or breaking up into rival factions by civil and foreign wars. The cities of Yucatan, as is clearly shown by Mr. Stephens, were, many of them, occupied by the descendants of the builders down to the conquest, and contain some remnants of wood-work still in good preservation, although some of the structures appear to be built on the ruins of others of a somewhat different type. Palenque and Copan, on the contrary, have no traces of wood or other perishable material, and were uninhabited and probably unknown in the 16th century. The loss of the key to what must have been an advanced system of hieroglyphics, while the spoken language survived, is also an indication of great antiquity, confirmed by the fact that the Quiché structures of Guatemala differed materially from those of the more ancient epoch. It is not likely that the Maya empire in its integrity continued later than the 3d or 4th century, although its cities may have been inhabited much later, and I should fix the epoch of its highest power at a date preceding rather than following the Christian era."

_H. H. Bancroft, Native Races of the Pacific States, volume 2, chapter 2; volume 4, chapters 3-6; volume 5, chapters 11-13._

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ALSO IN _Marquis de Nadaillac, Prehistoric America, chapters 6-7._

_J. L. Stephens, Incidents of Travel in Yucatan; and Travel in Central America, &c._

_B. M. Norman, Rambles in Yucatan_.

_D. Charnay, Ancient Cities of the New World_.

See, also, MEXICO: ANCIENT, and AZTEC AND AND MAYA PICTURE-WRITING.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mayoruna, or Barbudo.

See above: ANDESIANS.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Menominees.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY, and SACS, &c.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Metöacs.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Miamis, or Twightwees.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY, ILLINOIS, and SACS, &c.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Micmacs.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mingoes.

"The name of Mingo, or Mengwe, by which the Iroquois were known to the Delawares and the other southern Algonkins, is said to be a contraction of the Lenape word 'Mahongwi,' meaning the 'People of the Springs.' The Iroquois possessed the head-waters of the rivers which flowed through the country of the Delawares."

_H. Hale, The Iroquois Book of Rites, appendix, note. A._

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Minneconjou.

See below: SIOUAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Minnetarees.

See above: HIDATSA; and below: SIOUAN FAMILY. See Note, Appendix E. 9.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Minquas.

See below: SUSQUEHANNAS; and above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Minsis, Munsees, or Minisinks.

See above: DELAWARES, and ALGONQUIAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Miranha.

See above: GUCK OR COCO GROUP.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Missouris.

See below: SIOUAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mixes.

See below: ZAPOTECS, ETC.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mixtecs.

See below: ZAPOTECS, ETC.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mocovis.

See below: PAMPAS TRIBES.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Modocs (Klamaths) and their California and Oregon neighbors.

See Note, Appendix E.

"The principal tribes occupying this region [of Northern California from Rogue River on the north to the Eel River, south] are the Klamaths, who live on the head waters of the river and on the shores of the lake of that name; the Modocs, on Lower Klamath Lake and along Lost River; the Shastas, to the south-west of the Lakes; the Pitt River Indians; the Euroes, on the Klamath River between Weitspek and the coast; the Cahrocs, on the Klamath River from a short distance above the junction of the Trinity to the Klamath Mountains; the Hoopahs [or Hupas, a tribe of the Athapascan Family] in Hoopah Valley on the Trinity near its junction with the Klamath; numerous tribes on the coast from Eel River and Humboldt Bay north, such as the Weeyots, Wallies, Tolewahs, etc., and the Rogue River Indians, on and about the river of that name. The Northern Californians are in every way superior to the central and southern tribes."

_H. Bancroft, The Native Races of the Pacific States, volume 1, chapter 4._

"On the Klamath there live three distinct tribes, called the Yú-rok, Ká-rok, and Mó-dok, which names are said to mean, respectively, 'down the river,' 'up the river,' and 'head of the river.' … The Karok are probably the finest tribe in California. … Hoopa Valley, on the Lower Trinity, is the home of [the Hú-pá]. Next after the Ká-rok they are the finest race in all that region, and they even excel them in their statecraft, and in the singular influence, or perhaps brute force, which they exercise over the vicinal tribes. They are the Romans of Northern California in their valor and their wide-reaching dominions; they are the French in the extended diffusion of their language." The Modoks, "on the whole … are rather a cloddish, indolent, ordinarily good-natured race, but treacherous at bottom, sullen when angered, notorious for keeping Punic faith. But their bravery nobody can impeach or deny; their heroic and long defense of their stronghold against the appliances of modern civilized warfare, including that arm so awful to savages—the artillery—was almost the only feature that lent respectability to their wretched tragedy of the Lava Beds [1873]."

_S. Powers, Tribes of California (Contributions to North American Ethnology, volume 3), chapter 1, 7, and 27._

"The home of the Klamath tribe of southwestern Oregon lies upon the eastern slope of the southern extremity of the Cascade Range, and very nearly coincides with what we may call the head waters of the Klamath River, the main course of which lies in Northern California. … The main seat of the Modoc people was the valley of Lost River, the shores of Tule and of Little Klamath Lake. … The two main bodies forming the Klamath people are (1) the Klamath Lake Indians; (2) the Modoc Indians. The Klamath Lake Indians number more than twice as many as the Modoc Indians. They speak the northern dialect and form the northern chieftaincy. … The Klamath people possess no historic traditions going further back in time than a century, for the simple reason that there was a strict law prohibiting the mention of the person or acts of a deceased individual by using his name. … Our present knowledge does not allow us to connect the Klamath language genealogically with any of the other languages compared, but … it stands as a linguistic family for itself."

_A. S. Gatschet, The Klamath Indians (Contributions to North American Ethnology, volume 2, part 1)._

In Major Powell's linguistic classification, the Klamath and Modoc dialects are embraced in a family called the Lutuamian Family, derived from a Pit River word signifying "lake;" the Yuroks in a family called the Weitspekan; and the Pit River Indian dialects are provisionally set apart in a distinct family named the Palaihnihan Family.

_J. W. Powell, Seventh Annual Report, Bureau of Ethnology, pages 89 and 97._

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mohaves (Mojaves).

See above: APACHE GROUP.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mohawks.

See above: IROQUOIS CONFEDERACY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mohegans, or Mahicans.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY; and below: STOCKBRIDGE INDIANS; also, NEW ENGLAND: A. D. 1637.

Montagnais.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY; and ATHAPASCAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Montauks.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Moquelumnan Family.

"Derivation: From the river and hill of the same name in Calaveras County, California. … It was not until 1856 that the distinctness of the linguistic family was fully set forth by Latham. Under the head of Moquelumne, this author gathers several vocabularies representing different languages and dialects of the same stock. These are the Talatui of Hale, the Tuolumne from Schoolcraft, the Sonoma dialects as represented by the Tshokoyem vocabulary, the Chocuyem and Youkiousme paternosters, and the Olamentke of Kostromitonov in Bäer's Beiträge. … The Moquelumnan family occupies the territory bounded on the north by the Cosumne River, on the south by the Fresno River, on the east by the Sierra Nevada, and on the west by the San Joaquin River, with the exception of a strip on the east bank occupied by the Cholovone. A part of this family occupies also a territory bounded on the south by San Francisco Bay."

_J. W. Powell, Seventh Annual Report, Bureau of Ethnology, pages 92-93._

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AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Moquis.

See below: PUEBLOS.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Morona.

See above: ANDESIANS.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Moxos, or Mojos.

See above: ANDESIANS; also, BOLIVIA: ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mundrucu.

See below: TUPI.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Munsees.

See above: DELAWARES, and ALGONQUIAN FAMILY; also MANHATTAN ISLAND.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Mura.

See above: GUCK OR Coco GROUP.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Muskhogean, or Maskoki Family.

"Among the various nationalities of the Gulf territories the Maskoki family of tribes occupied a central and commanding position. Not only the large extent of territory held by them, but also their numbers, their prowess in war, and a certain degree of mental culture and self-esteem made of the Maskoki one of the most important groups in Indian history. From their ethnologic condition of later times, we infer that these tribes have extended for many centuries back in time from the Atlantic to the Mississippi and beyond that river, and from the Apalachian ridge to the Gulf of Mexico. With short intermissions they kept up warfare with all the circumjacent Indian communities, and also among each other. … The irresolute and egotistic policy of these tribes often caused serious difficulties to the government of the English and French colonies, and some of them constantly wavered in their adhesion between the French and the English cause. The American government overcame their opposition easily whenever a conflict presented itself (the Seminole War forms an exception), because, like all the Indians, they never knew how to unite against a common foe. The two main branches of the stock, the Creek and the Cha'hta [or Choctaw] Indians, were constantly at war, and the remembrance of their deadly conflicts has now passed to their descendants in the form of folk lore. … The only characteristic by which a subdivision of the family can be attempted, is that of language. Following their ancient topographic location from east to west, we obtain the following synopsis: First branch, or Maskoki proper: The Creek, Maskokálgi or Maskoki proper, settled on Coosa, Tallapoosa, Upper and Middle Chatahuchi rivers. From these branched off by segmentation the Creek portion of the Seminoles, of the Yámassi and of the little Yamacraw community. Second, or Apalachian branch: This southeastern division, which may be called also 'a parte potiori' the Hitchiti connection, anciently comprised the tribes on the Lower Chatahuchi river, and, east from there, the extinct Apalachi, the Mikasuki, and the Hitchiti portion of the Seminoles, Yámassi and Yamacraws. Third, or Alibamu branch, comprised the Alibamu villages on the river of that name; to them belonged the Koassáti and Witumka on Coosa river, its northern affluent. Fourth, Western or Cha'hta [Choctaw] branch: From the main people, the Cha'hta, settled in the middle portions of the State of Mississippi, the Chicasa, Pascagoula, Biloxi, Huma, and other tribes once became separated through segmentation. The strongest evidence for a community of origin of the Maskoki tribes is furnished by the fact that their dialects belong to one linguistic family. … Maskóki, Maskógi, isti Maskóki, designates a single person of the Creek tribe, and forms, as a collective plural, Maskokálgi, the Creek community, the Creek people, the Creek Indians. English authors write this name Muscogee, Muskhogee, and its plural Muscogulgee. The first syllable, as pronounced by the Creek Indians, contains a clear short a. … The accent is usually laid on the middle syllable: Maskóki, Maskógi. None of the tribes are able to explain the name from their own language. … Why did the English colonists call them Creek Indians? Because, when the English traders entered the Maskoki country from Charleston or Savannah, they had to cross a number of streams or creeks, especially between the Chatahuchi and Savannah rivers. Gallatin thought it probable that the inhabitants of the country adjacent to Savannah river were called Creeks from an early time. … In the southern part of the Cha'hta territory several tribes, represented to be of Cha'hta lineage, appear as distinct from the main body, and are always mentioned separately. The French colonists, in whose annals they figure extensively, call them Mobilians, Tohomes, Pascogoulas, Biloxis, Mougoulachas, Bayogoulas and Humas (Oumas). They have all disappeared in our epoch, with the exception of the Biloxi [Major Powell, in the Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, places the Biloxi in the Siouan Family], [See Note, Appendix E.] of whom scattered remnants live in the forests of Louisiana, south of the Red River."

_A. S. Gatschet, A Migration Legend of the Creek Indians, volume 1, part 1._

"The Uchees and the Natches, who are both incorporated in the [Muskhogee or Creek] confederacy, speak two distinct languages altogether different from the Muskhogee. The Natches, a residue of the well-known nation of that name, came from the banks of the Mississippi, and joined the Creeks less than one hundred years ago. The original seats of the Uchees were east of the Coosa and probably of the Chatahoochee; and they consider themselves as the most ancient inhabitants of the country. They may have been the same nation which is called Apalaches in the accounts of De Soto's expedition. … The four great Southern nations, according to the estimates of the War Department … consist now [1836] of 67,000 souls, viz.: The Cherokees, 15,000; the Choctaws (18,500), the Chicasas (5,500), 24,000; the Muskhogees, Seminoles, and Hitchittees, 26,000; the Uchees, Alibamons, Coosadas, and Natches, 2,000. The territory west of the Mississippi, given or offered to them by the United States in exchange for their lands east of that river, contains 40,000,000 acres, exclusively of what may be allotted to the Chicasas."

_A. Gallatin, Synopsis of the Indian Tribes (Archæologia Americana, volume 2), section 3._

See below: SEMINOLES.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Musquito, or Mosquito Indians.

"That portion of Honduras known as the Musquito Coast derived its name, not from the abundance of those troublesome insects, but from a native tribe who at the discovery occupied the shore near Blewfield Lagoon. They are an intelligent people, short in stature, unusually dark in color, with finely cut features, and small straight noses—not at all negroid, except where there has been an admixture of blood. They number about 6,000, many of whom have been partly civilized by the efforts of missionaries, who have reduced the language to writing and published in it a number of works. The Tunglas are one of the sub-tribes of the Musquitos."

_D. G. Brinton, The American Race, page 162._

See, also, NICARAGUA: A. D., 1850.

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AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Nahuas.

See MEXICO, ANCIENT: THE MAYA AND NAHUA PEOPLES.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Nanticokes.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Napo.

See above: ANDESIANS.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Narragansetts.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY; also RHODE ISLAND: A. D. 1636; and NEW ENGLAND: A. D. 1637; 1674-1675; 1675; and 1676-1678.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Natchesan Family.

When the French first entered the lower Mississippi valley, they found the Natchez [Na'htchi] occupying a region of country that now surrounds the city which bears their name. "By the persevering curiosity of Gallatin, it is established that the Natchez were distinguished from the tribes around them less by their customs and the degree of their civilization than by their language, which, as far as comparisons have been instituted, has no etymological affinity with any other whatever. Here again the imagination too readily invents theories; and the tradition has been widely received that the dominion of the Natchez once extended even to the Wabash. History knows them only as a feeble and inconsiderable nation, who in the 18th century attached themselves to the confederacy of the Creeks."

_G. Bancroft, History of the United States (Author's last revision), volume 2, page 97._

"Chateaubriand, in his charming romances, and some of the early French writers, who often drew upon their fancy for their facts, have thrown an interest around the Natchez, as a semi-civilized and noble race, that has passed into history. We find no traces of civilization in their architecture, or in their social life and customs. Their religion was brutal and bloody, indicating an Aztec origin. They were perfidious and cruel, and if they were at all superior to the neighboring tribes it was probably due to the district they occupied—the most beautiful, healthy and productive in the valley of the Mississippi—and the influence of its attractions in substituting permanent for temporary occupation. The residence of the grand chief was merely a spacious cabin, of one apartment, with a mat of basket work for his bed and a log for his pillow. … Their government was an absolute despotism. The supreme chief was master of their labor, their property, and their lives. … The Natchez consisted exclusively of two classes—the Blood Royal and its connexions, and the common people, the Mich-i-mioki-quipe, or Stinkards. The two classes understood each other, but spoke a different dialect. Their customs of war, their treatment of prisoners, their ceremonies of marriage, their feasts and fasts, their sorceries and witchcraft, differed very little from other savages. Father Charlevoix, who visited Natchez in 1721, saw no evidences of civilization. Their villages consisted of a few cabins, or rather ovens, without windows and roofed with matting. The house of the Sun was larger, plastered with mud, and a narrow bench for a seat and bed. No other furniture in the mansion of this grand dignitary, who has been described by imaginative writers as the peer of Montezuma!"

_J. F. H. Claiborne, Mississippi, volume 1, chapter 4._

In 1729, the Natchez, maddened by insolent oppressions, planned and executed a general massacre of the French within their territory. As a consequence, the tribe was virtually exterminated within the following two years.

_C. Gayarre, Louisiana, its Colonial History and Romance, 2d series, lecture 3 and 5._

"The Na'htchi, according to Gallatin, a residue of the well-known nation of that name, came from the banks of the Mississippi, and joined the Creek less than one hundred years ago. The seashore from Mobile to the Mississippi was then inhabited by several small tribes, of which the Na'htchi was the principal. Before 1730 the tribe lived in the vicinity of Natchez, Miss., along St. Catherine Creek. After their dispersion by the French in 1730 most of the remainder joined the Chicasa and afterwards the Upper Creek. They are now in Creek and Cherokee Nations, Indian Territory. The linguistic relations of the language spoken by the Taensa tribe have long been in doubt, and it is possible they will ever remain so."

_J. W. Powell, Seventh Annual Report, Bureau of Ethnology, page 96._

See LOUISIANA: A. D. 1719-1750. See, also, above: MUSKHOGEAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Natchitoches;

See Note, Appendix E. See TEXAS: THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Nausets.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Navajos.

See above: ATHAPASCAN FAMILY, and APACHE GROUP.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Neutral Nation.

See above: HURONS, &c.; and IROQUOIS CONFEDERACY: THEIR CONQUESTS, &c.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Nez Percés, or Sahaptins.

"The Sahaptins or Nez Percés [the Shahaptian Family in Major Powell's classification], with their affiliated tribes, occupied the middle and upper valley of the Columbia and its affluents, and also the passes of the mountains. They were in contiguity with the Shoshones and the Algonkin Blackfeet, thus holding an important position, intermediate between the eastern and the Pacific tribes. Having the commercial instinct of the latter, they made good use of it."

_D. G. Brinton, The American Race, page 107._

ALSO IN _J. W. Powell, Seventh Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, page 106._

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Niniquiquilas.

See below: PAMPAS TRIBES.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Nipmucs, or Nipnets.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY; also, NEW ENGLAND: A. D. 1674-1675; 1675; and 1676-1678 (KING PHILIP'S WAR).

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Nootkas.

See below: WAKASHAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Nottoways.

See above: IROQUOIS TRIBES OF THE SOUTH.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Nyantics.

See above: ALGONQUIAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Ogalalas.

See below: SIOUAN FAMILY.

AMERICAN ABORIGINES: Ojibwas, or Chippewas.