The pristine territory of this family was mainly in one body, the only
exceptions being the habitats of the Biloxi, the Tutelo, the Catawba and
Woccon.
Contrary to the popular opinion of the present day, the general trend of
Siouan migration has been westward. In comparatively late prehistoric
times, probably most of the Siouan tribes dwelt east of the Mississippi
River.
The main Siouan territory extended from about 53° north in the Hudson
Bay Company Territory, to about 33°, including a considerable part of
the watershed of the Missouri River and that of the Upper Mississippi.
It was bounded on the northwest, north, northeast, and for some distance
on the east by Algonquian territory. South of 45° north the line ran
eastward to Lake Michigan, as the Green Bay region belonged to the
Winnebago.[86]
[Footnote 86: See treaty of Prairie du Chien, 1825.]
It extended westward from Lake Michigan through Illinois, crossing the
Mississippi River at Prairie du Chien. At this point began the
Algonquian territory (Sac, etc.) on the west side of the Mississippi,
extending southward to the Missouri, and crossing that river it returned
to the Mississippi at St. Louis. The Siouan tribes claimed all of the
present States of Iowa and Missouri, except the parts occupied by
Algonquian tribes. The dividing line between the two for a short
distance below St. Louis was the Mississippi River. The line then ran
west of Dunklin, New Madrid, and Pemiscot Counties, in Missouri, and
Mississippi County and those parts of Craighead and Poinsett Counties,
Arkansas, lying east of the St. Francis River. Once more the Mississippi
became the eastern boundary, but in this case separating the Siouan from
the Muskhogean territory. The Quapaw or Akansa were the most southerly
tribe in the main Siouan territory. In 1673[87] they were east of the
Mississippi. Joutel (1687) located two of their villages on the Arkansas
and two on the Mississippi one of the latter being on the east bank, in
our present State of Mississippi, and the other being on the opposite
side, in Arkansas. Shea says[88] that the Kaskaskias were found by De
Soto in 1540 in latitude 36°, and that the Quapaw were higher up the
Mississippi. But we know that the southeast corner of Missouri and the
northeast corner of Arkansas, east of the St. Francis River, belonged to
Algonquian tribes. A study of the map of Arkansas shows reason for
believing that there may have been a slight overlapping of habitats, or
a sort of debatable ground. At any rate it seems advisable to
compromise, and assign the Quapaw and Osage (Siouan tribes) all of
Arkansas up to about 36° north.
[Footnote 87: Marquette’s Autograph Map.]
[Footnote 88: Disc. of Miss. Valley, p. 170, note.]
On the southwest of the Siouan family was the Southern Caddoan group,
the boundary extending from the west side of the Mississippi River in
Louisiana, nearly opposite Vicksburg, Mississippi, and running
northwestwardly to the bend of Red River between Arkansas and Louisiana;
thence northwest along the divide between the watersheds of the Arkansas
and Red Rivers. In the northwest corner of Indian Territory the Osages
came in contact with the Comanche (Shoshonean), and near the western
boundary of Kansas the Kiowa, Cheyenne, and Arapaho (the two latter
being recent Algonquian intruders?) barred the westward march of the
Kansa or Kaw.
The Pawnee group of the Caddoan family in western Nebraska and
northwestern Kansas separated the Ponka and Dakota on the north from the
Kansa on the south, and the Omaha and other Siouan tribes on the east
from Kiowa and other tribes on the west. The Omaha and cognate peoples
occupied in Nebraska the lower part of the Platte River, most of the
Elkhorn Valley, and the Ponka claimed the region watered by the Niobrara
in northern Nebraska.
There seems to be sufficient evidence for assigning to the Crows
(Siouan) the northwest corner of Nebraska (i.e., that part north of the
Kiowan and Caddoan habitats) and the southwest part of South Dakota (not
claimed by Cheyenne[89]), as well as the northern part of Wyoming and
the southern part of Montana, where they met the Shoshonean stock.[90]
[Footnote 89: See Cheyenne treaty, in Indian Treaties, 1873, pp.
124, 5481-5489.]
[Footnote 90: Lewis and Clarke, Trav., Lond., 1807, p. 25. Lewis
and Clarke, Expl., 1874, vol. 2, p. 390. A. L. Riggs, MS. letter
to Dorsey, 1876 or 1877. Dorsey, Ponka tradition: “The Black Hills
belong to the Crows.” That the Dakotas were not there till this
century see Corbusier’s Dakota Winter Counts, in 4th Rept. Bur.
Eth., p. 130, where it is also said that the Crow were the
original owners of the Black Hills.]
The Biloxi habitat in 1699 was on the Pascogoula river,[91] in the
southeast corner of the present State of Mississippi. The Biloxi
subsequently removed to Louisiana, where a few survivors were found by
Mr. Gatschet in 1886.
[Footnote 91: Margry, Découvertes, vol. 4, p. 195.]
The Tutelo habitat in 1671 was in Brunswick County, southern Virginia,
and it probably included Lunenburgh and Mecklenburg Counties.[92] The
Earl of Bellomont (1699) says[93] that the Shateras were “supposed to be
the Toteros, on Big Sandy River, Virginia,” and Pownall, in his map of
North America (1776), gives the Totteroy (i.e., Big Sandy) River.
Subsequently to 1671 the Tutelo left Virginia and moved to North
Carolina.[94] They returned to Virginia (with the Sapona), joined the
Nottaway and Meherrin, whom they and the Tuscarora followed into
Pennsylvania in the last century; thence they went to New York, where
they joined the Six Nations, with whom they removed to Grand River
Reservation, Ontario, Canada, after the Revolutionary war. The last
full-blood Tutelo died in 1870. For the important discovery of the
Siouan affinity of the Tutelo language we are indebted to Mr. Hale.
[Footnote 92: Batts in Doc. Col. Hist. N.Y., 1853, vol. 3, p. 194.
Harrison, MS. letter to Dorsey, 1886.]
[Footnote 93: Doc. Col. Hist. N.Y., 1854, vol. 4. p. 488.]
[Footnote 94: Lawson, Hist. Carolina, 1714; reprint of 1860,
p. 384.]
The Catawba lived on the river of the same name on the northern boundary
of South Carolina. Originally they were a powerful tribe, the leading
people of South Carolina, and probably occupied a large part of the
Carolinas. The Woccon were widely separated from kinsmen living in North
Carolina in the fork of the Cotentnea and Neuse Rivers.
The Wateree, living just below the Catawba, were very probably of the
same linguistic connection.