Myths of the Cherokee by James Mooney

their popular name from the river upon which, in the earliest colonial period, they had their principal settlements. They call themselves Lena'pe or Leni-lena'pe, a term apparently signifying "real, or original men," or "men of our kind." To the cognate tribes of the Ohio valley and the lakes they were known as Wapanaq'ki, "easterners," the name being extended to include the closely related tribes, the Mahican, Wappinger (i. e. Wapanaq'ki), Nanticoke, and Conoy. By all the widespread tribes of kindred Algonquian stock, as well as by the Winnebago, Wyandot, and Cherokee, they were addressed under the respectful title of "grandfather," the domineering Iroquois alone refusing to them any higher designation than "nephew." Their various bands and subtribes seem originally to have occupied the whole basin of Delaware river, together with all of New Jersey, extending north to the watershed of the Hudson and west and southwest to the ridge separating the waters of the Delaware and Susquehanna. Immediately north of them, along the lower Hudson and extending into Massachusetts and Connecticut, were the closely affiliated Mahican and Wappinger, while to the south were their friends and kindred, the Nanticoke and Conoy, the former in Delaware and on the eastern shore of Maryland, the latter between Chesapeake bay and the lower Potomac. All of these, although speaking different languages of the common Algonquian stock, asserted their traditional origin from the Delawares, with whom, in their declining days, most of them were again merged. The Delawares proper were organized into three divisions, which, according to Brinton, were subtribes and not clans, although each of the three had a totemic animal by whose name it was commonly known. These three subtribes were: (1) The Minsi or Munsee (people of the "stony country"?), otherwise known as the Wolf tribe, occupying the hill country about the head of the Delaware; (2) the Unami (people "downstream"), or Turtle tribe, on the middle Delaware, and (3) the Unalachtgo (people "near the ocean"?), or Turkey tribe, in the southern part of the common territory. Of these the Turtle tribe assumed precedence in the council, while to the Wolf tribe belonged the leadership in war. Each of these three was divided into twelve families, or embryonic clans, bearing female names. In this connection it may be mentioned that the Delawares now residing with the Wichita, in Oklahoma, still use the figure of a turtle as their distinctive cattle brand. Of the history of the Delawares it is only possible to say a very few words here. Their earliest European relations were with the Dutch and Swedes. In 1682 they made the famous treaty with William Penn, which was faithfully observed on both sides for sixty years. Gradually forced backward by the whites, they retired first to the Susquehanna, then to the upper Ohio, where, on the breaking out of the French and Indian war in 1754, they ranged themselves on the side of the French. They fought against the Americans in the Revolution, and in the war of 1812, having by that time been driven as far west as Indiana. In 1818 they ceded all their lands in that State and were assigned to a reservation in Kansas, where they were joined by a considerable body that had emigrated to Missouri, in company with a band of Shawano, some years before, by permission of the Spanish government. About the close of the Revolution another portion of the tribe, including most of those who had been Christianized by Moravian missionaries, had fled from Ohio and taken up a permanent abode on Canadian soil. In 1867 the main body of those in Kansas removed to Indian Territory and became incorporated with the Cherokee Nation. A smaller band settled on the Wichita reservation in Oklahoma. The present number of Delawares is, approximately, 1,600, viz: "Moravians and Munsees of the Thames," Ontario, 475; incorporated in Cherokee Nation, 870 (in 1898); on Wichita reservation, 95; Munsee in Kansas and incorporated with Stockbridges in Wisconsin, perhaps 100; Delawares, etc., with Six Nations, in New York, 50. Of their former allies, the Wappinger and Conoy have long since disappeared through absorption into other tribes; the Mahican are represented by a band of about 530 Stockbridge Indians, including a number of Munsee, in Wisconsin, while about 70 mixed bloods still keep up the Nanticoke name in southern Delaware. Tuscarora--The Tuscarora, a southern tribe of the Iroquoian stock, formerly occupied an extensive territory upon Neuse river and its branches, in eastern North Carolina, and, like their northern cousins, seem to have assumed and exercised a certain degree of authority over all the smaller tribes about them. As early as 1670 Lederer described the Tuscarora "emperor" as the haughtiest Indian he had ever met. About the year 1700 Lawson estimated them at 1,200 warriors (6,000 souls?) in 15 towns. In 1711 they rose against the whites, one of their first acts of hostility being the killing of Lawson himself, who was engaged in surveying lands which they claimed as their own. In a struggle extending over about two years they were so terribly decimated that the greater portion fled from Carolina and took refuge with their kinsmen and friends, the Iroquois of New York, who were henceforth known as the Six Nations. The so-called "friendly" party, under Chief Blount, was settled upon a small reservation north of Roanoke river in what is now Bertie county, North Carolina. Here they gradually decreased by disease and emigration to the north, until the few who were left sold their last remaining lands in 1804. The history of the tribe after the removal to the north is a part of the history of the Iroquois or Six Nations. They number now about 750, of whom about 380 are on the Tuscarora reservation in New York, the others upon the Grand River reservation in Ontario. Xuala, Suwali, Sara or Cheraw--For the identification and earliest notices of the Sara see historical note 8, "De Soto's Route." Their later history is one of almost constant hostility to the whites until their final incorporation with the Catawba, with whom they were probably cognate, about the year 1720. In 1743 they still preserved their distinct language, and appear to be last mentioned in 1768, when they numbered about 50 souls living among the Catawba. See Mooney, Siouan Tribes of the East, bulletin of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1894. Catawba--The origin and meaning of this name, which dates back at least two centuries, are unknown. It may possibly come from the Choctaw through the Mobilian trade jargon. They call themselves Nieye, which means simply "people" or "Indians." The Iroquois call them and other cognate tribes in their vicinity Toderigh-rono, whence Tutelo. In the seventeenth century they were often known as Esaw or Ushery, apparently from iswa', river, in their own language. The Cherokee name Ata'gwa, plural Ani'ta'gwa, is a corruption of the popular form. Their linguistic affinity with the Siouan stock was established by Gatschet in 1881. See Mooney, Siouan Tribes of the East.