most intelligent, and have had most intercourse with the southern
tribes, that the Lipans are allied to them, and that this relationship
is traceable through the Wichitas and the Tonkaways. The evidence
consists of (1) statements by the Wichitas and Tonkaways, (2) an
alleged similarity of language and personal names, and (3) a
similarity in the songs of the tribes. A Pawnee Indian, who has lived
for seven seasons with the Wichitas, gave me the following story which
he had gathered from that people. They say that long ago they did not
know the Tonkaways, but that when the tribes met they found that they
could understand each other's speech. Their languages were not the
same, but they were not more unlike than were the tongues spoken by
the Skidi and the three other Pawnee bands long ago; in other words,
they were dialects of the same language. After that meeting, the
Tonkaways and the Wichitas lived together for a time. But the
Tonkaways had bad ways. They would eat human flesh. When they could
find a Wichita boy out away from the camp, they would capture him, and
strangle and eat him. Sometimes they would kill a man of the
Wichitas, if they could catch him away off on the prairie. Therefore
the Wichitas drove the Tonkaways off south, and soon afterward moved
up across the Arkansas River, and into southern Kansas. Since then the
Wichitas and the Tonkaways have never lived together. A Tonkaway chief
named Charlie told Ralph J. Weeks, an educated Pawnee, "I have heard
that my people are Pawnees, but that we separated long ago." I am
informed that the personal names of the Tonkaways are the same as
those of the Pawnees, and are readily comprehended by the latter.
Ralph Weeks, while in a Tonkaway lodge, heard a man call out to a
girl, addressing her as _Tsi-sah-ru-rah-ka´-ri-ku_, which means "Woman
Chief's House." Ralph inquired about this name, and found that it was
the same in sound as Pawnee, and had the same meaning. The Tonkaways
say that some of the Pawnee words are the same as those used by their
relations to the south, the Lipans and others. The songs of the
Tonkaways are the same as those of the Pawnees, and the latter at once
recognize them. The old songs of the Lipans are the same as those of
the Pawnees, according to both Pawnee and Tonkaway testimony. Finally,
the Tonkaways and Lipans claim close relationship. They speak
different dialects of the same language.
The Pawnees, however, say that they never knew of the existence of the
Tonkaways until they came down into the Indian Territory, and, of
course, never met them until after that time. Neither did they know
the Caddos. As the Pawnees knew nothing of the Caddos and Tonkaways,
so the Wichitas knew nothing of the Arickaras until recently, and were
greatly surprised to learn that far to the north there was another
tribe which spoke their language.
The Wichitas claim that they and the Caddos are one people. Their
languages are said to differ somewhat, but only dialectically.
The southern members of the Pawnee family appear always to have lived
on excellent terms with the other wild tribes which inhabited their
country. They were allies of the Kiowas, Comanches, and Cheyennes,
tribes with which the northern Pawnees were long at war.
II. ORIGIN AND MIGRATIONS.
The Pawnees came from the south. All the information bearing on their
origin, which has as yet been secured, points to the conclusion that
the primitive home of this family was in the south.
Although Mr. Dunbar has carefully traced out the later history of
several of the members of this group, his researches carry us back
scarcely further than the beginning of the present century, and we
have no actual knowledge of the origin and early history of the
Pawnees. Except the Arickaras, none of the tribes belonging to this
family have ever dwelt much north of the Platte River, and in this we
have an indication of their southern origin. The traditions of the
tribe confirm this suggestion, and Mr. Dunbar has given other reasons,
derived from his study of this people, which abundantly justify us in
regarding them as migrants from the south.
There are still current among the Pawnees two traditions as to the
region from which they came, but both of these are vague, and so
lacking in detail as to be of little value except as suggestions which
need confirmation before being accepted as having any solid basis of
fact. The first of these traditions, now half forgotten, is known
only to the very oldest men. It is to the effect that long ago they
came from the far southwest, where they used to live in stone houses.
This might point to an original home for the Pawnees in Old Mexico,
and even suggests a possible connection with the so-called Pueblo
tribes, who still live in houses made of stone, and entered from
above.
Secret Pipe Chief, a very old Chau-i, the High Priest of the tribe,
gave me the history of their wanderings in these words: "Long ago," he
said, "very far back, all of one color were together, but something
mysterious happened so that they came to speak different languages.
They were all together, and determined that they would separate into
different parties to go and get sinew. They could not all go in
company, there were too many of them. They were so numerous that when
they traveled, the rocks where their lodge poles dragged were worn
into deep grooves. Then they were far off in the southwest, and came
from beyond two ranges of mountains. When they scattered out, each
party became a tribe. At that time the Pawnees and the Wichitas were
together. We made that journey, and went so far east that at last we
came to the Missouri River, and stopped there for a time. When the
season came round, we made out of the shoulder blade of a buffalo an
implement to cultivate the ground. There we made our fields."
Another very old man, Bear Chief, a Skidi, said, "Long ago we were far
in the southwest, away beyond the Rio Grande. We came north, and
settled near the Wichita Mountains. One summer there we planted our
corn. So we came from the south. After we left the Wichita Mountains,
that summer we came north as far as the Arkansas River, and made our
fields, and raised corn. Afterward we went to the Mississippi River
where the Missouri runs into it. My father was born while we lived on
the Mississippi." As Bear Chief must be nearly or quite eighty years
old, it would seem likely that the Skidi, or some village of that
tribe, may have been established on the Mississippi one hundred years
ago, but this was not a permanent location.
The second of these traditions tells of a migration from the
southeast. It states that the tribe originally came from somewhere in
the southeast, that is from what is now Missouri or Arkansas. They
started north after sinew--to hunt buffalo--and followed up the game,
until they reached the northern country--the region of the Republican
and the Platte rivers. They found this a pleasant country, abounding
in game, and they liked it, and remained there. The Wichitas
accompanied them part way on their journey, but turned aside when they
had reached southern Kansas, and went south again.
All the traditions agree that up to the time of the journey which
brought the Pawnees to their homes on the Solomon, Republican, Platte
and Loup rivers, the Wichitas were considered a part of the Pawnee
tribe. They agree also that after this separation, the two divisions
of the tribe lost sight of each other for a very long time, and that
each was entirely ignorant as to what had become of the other. We know
that for a long time they were at war, and the difference of the
dialects spoken by these two divisions of the family shows that the
period of separation was a long one.
The tradition of the migration of the Pawnees from the southwest is
evidently much older than the one which tells of their coming from the
southeast. Most of the younger men know the latter; but for the
account of the journey over the mountains from the southwest and
across the Rio Grande, it is necessary to go to the very old men. It
is quite possible that both stories are founded on fact; and, if this
is the case, the migration from the southeast may have taken place
only a few generations ago. Such a supposition would in part explain
its general currency at the present time.
In the existing state of our knowledge of this people, we have no
facts to go on, nothing in the nature of evidence as to their early
history, and we can only speculate as to the probabilities in regard
to their wanderings. It may be conjectured that the Pawnees came from
somewhere in Old Mexico, and, either as a number of related tribes, or
as a single tribe made up of different bands, they crossed the
mountains and the Rio Grande in a body, and wandered eastward across
what is now Texas. From this body it seems probable that the ancestors
of the Lipans and the Tonkaways were the first to separate themselves.
The main tribe perhaps gradually drifted further and further to the
east until it had crossed Texas and reached northwestern Louisiana,
and perhaps even the neighborhood of the Mississippi River. During
this long journey, which must have occupied many years--perhaps many
generations--we may imagine that the Huecos and possibly the Keechies
dropped behind, and remained on the plains.
How long the Pawnees sojourned in Louisiana no one can say. They now
found themselves in a country, which in climate, productions, and
topography, differed widely from anything they had before known. Up to
this time, these people had always inhabited the high, dry tablelands
of Mexico, or the almost equally arid plains of Texas, and now they
had come to a country having a heavy rainfall, abounding in swamps,
and overgrown with deciduous timber. The traditions of both Skidi and
Pawnees speak of a time when they lived in a country where grows the
cane which the white men use for fishing poles. We may imagine that
this forest country was a barrier to their further progress eastward,
and that it turned their steps in a new direction.
When the Pawnees left Louisiana, the Caddos certainly, and perhaps the
Keechies and the Tawaconies, were left behind, and for a very long
time lived in and near what is now Caddo Parish, Louisiana, where they
were at the time of the Louisiana Purchase. Geographical names in this
region indicate that their residence there was a long one, and Caddo
Lake, Caddo Fork, Caddo Gap and a town named Keatchie, still bear
testimony of the former occupants of the soil. From there the Caddos
moved up to the Brazos River in Texas. They have always kept up a
close intimacy with the Wichitas.
Perhaps it was during the sojourn of the Pawnees on the western
borders of Louisiana and Arkansas, though it may have been much
earlier, that the Skidi and the Arickaras, either as a single tribe,
or as already divided into two separate bands, left the Pawnees and
moved north and northwest. There appears to be reason for supposing
that for a while this section of the tribe lived on the Red River, the
Canadian and the Arkansas, and it is quite certain that sometimes they
went as far east as the banks of the Mississippi near where St. Louis
now is; but their permanent home, since they have been known to the
whites, was on the Platte and the Loup rivers in Nebraska.
The Pawnees with the Wichitas moved northwest into what is now the
Indian Territory and southern Kansas, where they separated, the latter
turning off to the south, and living at various times on the Canadian
and Red rivers and near the Wichita Mountains, while the Pawnees
proper slowly continued their march northward and westward, residing
for a time on the Arkansas and Solomon, the Republican and Platte
rivers. Here they again met the Skidi.
It is impossible to conjecture when this settlement in the northern
country took place, but it was certainly long ago. Mr. Dunbar has
pointed out that "_O-küt-ut_ and _oku´-kat´_ signify strictly above and
below (of a stream) respectively. Now their villages have usually been
situated upon the banks of the Platte, the general course of which is
from west to east. Hence each of these words has acquired a new
meaning, _i. e._, west and east." In the same way _Pük-tïs´-tu_--toward
the Omahas, has come to mean north; and _Ki´ri-ku´ruks-tu_--toward the
Wichitas, to mean south. The coining of such words points to a long
sojourn by the Pawnees in the region of the Platte. It is interesting
to note that the Omahas have never in historic times lived north of the
Pawnees, but always east of them, though we know that long ago they did
live to the north.
These remarks on the movements of the Pawnees are, to be sure, very
largely speculative, but speculation guided by the hints gathered from
conversations with the older men. It is a surmise as to what may have
been the wanderings of these people. If it were possible to talk with
all the different tribes of the family, something more definite might
be reached, but at this late day this seems hopeless. A study of the
Lipans, and an investigation of their relationships with other
southwestern tribes, might furnish us clues of the utmost importance
in tracing the origin of the Pawnee family.
III. THE SKIDI.
Ranking high among the Pawnee bands, for their intelligence, energy
and courage, stand the Skidi. Their past history is obscure, and we
know little about it beyond the fact that it was different from that
of the other bands. Although the relationship between them is
perfectly well established, still both Pawnee and Skidi traditions
agree that the two tribes were originally distinct, and that their
first meeting took place long ago, but after the migration of the
Pawnees to the northern country. We know, too, that the Arickaras were
close neighbors and near relatives of the Skidi, and it is probable
that they constituted a band, village, or division of that tribe.
It is believed by those who should be well informed, that the
northward migration of the Rees took place not more than a century
ago. One tradition of the separation runs in this way: The Skidi
started out on a hunt, a part going ahead and the others following
later. The first party were killing buffalo, when they were attacked
by a large war party of Sioux. These got between the two parties of
the Skidi, driving one of them back to the village, while the other
retreated northward. This retreat continued until they had been driven
some distance up the Missouri River, where their enemies left them.
They remained there through the winter, and planted their corn in the
spring, nor did they apparently for some time make any attempt to
rejoin their tribe. After some years, however, the two bands came
together on the Loup, and for a time lived together. The Rees even
went further south, to the neighborhood of the Wichita Mountains,
where the Pawnees at that time were living, but soon afterward they
went north again, and rejoined the Skidi on the Loup, and lived near
them there, and on the Platte near Scott's Bluffs. It was not long,
however, before a disagreement arose between the Rees and the Skidi,
and the Rees again moved off north. It is probable that this quarrel
may have originated in the fact that the Rees wished to make war on
the whites, but there is some reason to believe that there was also
jealousy about the head chieftainship of the two bands.
The testimony of men still living indicates that about one hundred
years ago some of the Skidi lived on the Mississippi River, near the
present site of St. Louis, and it is said that it was only the coming
in of the white settlers in considerable numbers that caused them to
move further westward. I am inclined to regard this location as only a
temporary one, and to believe that their real home, prior to this, had
been to the west, on the Platte and Loup rivers.
It is, of course, impossible to fix, even approximately, the time when
the Pawnees and the Skidi came together, but it probably was soon
after the Pawnees had settled on the Republican in their northward
migration. It is said that their first meeting was friendly, and that
they made a treaty, and smoked together. But no peace between two such
warlike tribes could last very long, and there were frequent
collisions and disagreements. There was a sharp rivalry between the
Chau-i and the Skidi, and their disputes finally culminated in an
unprovoked attack by the Skidi upon some Pawnees, while they were
hunting buffalo, in which about one hundred of the latter were killed.
The Pawnees made ready to avenge this injury, and marshaled all their
forces. They made a night march to the vicinity of the Skidi village,
which is said to have been on the north side of the Loup, distant from
their own only about twenty miles, and just at daylight sent out about
one hundred warriors, all mounted on dark colored horses, to decoy the
Skidi from the village. These men, lying down on their horses, and
covering themselves with their robes, represented buffalo, and rode
over the hill in sight of the Skidi village. The ruse was successful.
The Skidi at once started out to kill the buffalo, leaving their
village unprotected. The disguised warriors fled, leading the Skidi
further away, while the Pawnees who were in reserve rushed into the
defenseless village, and captured it, almost without striking a blow.
They took all the inhabitants back with them to their own village. The
Skidi were forced to sue for peace; and for their breach of faith were
heavily fined by the victorious Pawnees. They were incorporated into
the tribe, and since that time have lived as a part of the Pawnee
nation. This event was probably the culminating point of a series of
petty fights and skirmishes, which must have been annoying to the
Pawnees. This fighting went on within the memory of men now living,
though there are but few who are old enough to remember it.
Curly Chief, who is about 65 years old, can remember a man who took part
in these wars, and whose name was "The-Skidi-wounded-him-in-the-leg."
Bear Chief, a very old and decrepit Skidi, and Secret Pipe Chief, an old
Chau-i, have both told me that they can remember one or more fights
between the Skidi and the other bands.
A rather interesting evidence of the feeling once existing between the
Skidi and the other bands, and even now surviving among some of the
oldest men, is the statement by Bear Chief that the three other bands
were known as "Big Shields," the implication being that as they hid
themselves behind these big shields they were not so brave as those
who used smaller ones. The existence of such a feeling at the present
day indicates that the final conquest of the Skidi and their
incorporation into the Pawnee tribe took place not very long ago.
Mr. Dunbar sums up the traditions of the meeting of the tribes, their
wars and subsequent union, in the following language: "The historic
basis of this may be somewhat as follows: In the migration of the
Pawnees from the south, the Skidi preceded the other bands perhaps by
nearly a century. With them were the Arickaras. These two bands
together possessed themselves of the region of the Loup. When the
other bands arrived they were regarded as intruders, and hence arose
open hostilities. The result of the struggle was that the two bands
were forced to admit the new comers, and aid in reducing the
surrounding territory. Subsequently the Arickaras seem to have
wandered, or more probably, to have been driven from the confederacy,
and to have passed up the Missouri. Later the Skidi, in consequence of
some real or fancied provocation, attempted to retrieve their losses,
but were sorely punished, and henceforth obliged to content themselves
with a subordinate position in the tribe."
It is said that in the olden time the Skidi were very powerful. The
tribe was made up of four bands or villages, each of which numbered
5,000 people, or 20,000 for the whole tribe. This estimate, which is
founded merely on the statements of old men now living, is probably
excessive. There is no doubt, however, that they were a large and
powerful tribe, while their warlike habits and fierce natures caused
them to be feared and hated by all their neighbors.
The four divisions of the Skidi tribe exist now only in name, and the
origin of these names is almost forgotten. As the result of much
effort and inquiry, I have secured the following list:
_Names of the Skidi Bands._
1. _Tuhk-pah-huks-taht_--Pumpkin vine village. This name is
said to have come from the fact that once, after planting
time, this band went off on the summer hunt, and while they
were away, the pumpkin vines grew so luxuriantly that they
climbed up over the lodges, covering and hiding them.
2. _Skidi rah´ru_--Wolves in the pools (of water). The name
originated in this way: Long ago one band of the Skidi were
camped on the Loup River. It was winter, and the buffalo came
to them in great numbers. They killed many and prepared great
quantities of dried meat. The buffalo kept coming, and at
length they had so much meat that they had room for no more.
When they could no longer store dried meat, they stopped
taking the flesh of the buffalo and took only the hides. The
buffalo continued to come and to cross the river just below
the camp, and the men on foot would chase the buffalo on the
ice, where the great animals would slip and sprawl, so that
the Skidi could run up close, and stab them. They would skin
them there and leave the carcasses on the ice. From far and
near great numbers of wolves gathered to feed on the
carcasses, and as it was toward spring, and the weather was
growing milder, the ice began to melt on top, and little pools
of water stood on it. About this time, there came to this
village a Skidi from another band who were half starving, for
they could find no buffalo at all. When the man saw that this
village had so much meat, he wondered at the plenty, and asked
how it was. They took him out from the village down to where
the dead buffalo lay on the ice, and pointed them out to him,
and he saw the wolves standing in the water and feeding on the
carcasses. Then they took him back to the village, gave him
all the dried meat he could carry, and sent him away to his
home, heavily loaded. When he reached his own village he told
the people there how those in the other camp had plenty, and
when they asked him where it was, he told them, and said that
it was _Skidi rah´ru_--where the wolves stand in the pools of
water.
3. _Tuh-wa-hok´-a-sha_--Village on a ridge. _Tuh_--village,
_wa_--the central roach on the head of a man whose hair has
been shaved on both sides, _hok´-a-sha_--curving over. This
village was on a ridge, reaching over on both sides of it.
4. _Tu-hi´ts-pi-yet_--Village on a point or peninsula.
_Tuh_--village, camp, or band; _hits-pi-yu_--a point.
There are yet to be seen on the Loup Fork, in Nebraska, innumerable
remains of Skidi villages, some of which are very ancient.
IV. NAME AND EMBLEM.
It is probable that the name Pawnee, as Mr. Dunbar has remarked, is an
abbreviated form of the word _pa-ri´-ki_, which means a horn, and
referred to the peculiar erect scalp lock which may once have been
worn by this tribe. As Mr. Dunbar says, the name probably once
embraced the Pawnee Picts or Wichitas, among whom this fashion of
wearing the hair seems to have persisted long after it had been
abandoned by the Pawnees. The same writer gives the name Arickara as
from "_ür´-ik-i_, a horn; with a verbal or plural suffix, being thus
simply a later and exact equivalent of _Pa´-ni_ itself."
The name Pawnee Picts, so commonly applied to the Wichitas, appears to
mean Pawnee Picked, or tattooed Pawnees; and refers to the markings
upon the faces and breasts of these people, which are picked in with
a sharp instrument. The northern Indians speak of the Pawnees as
_Pa-na´-na_, while the southern tribes call them _Pi-ta´-da_, and the
Dakotas call the Arickaras _Pa-da´-ni_. All these appear to be merely
attempts to reproduce the name by which the Pawnees call themselves,
_Pa´-ni_.
The English names of the four bands of the Pawnees are, as has been
already stated, for the Skidi, the Wolf; for the Chau-i, the Grand;
for the Kit-ke-hahk´-i, the Republican, and for the Pita-hau-erat, the
Tapaje, Pawnees.
An old French trader, who has known these people for many years,
states that the Skidi are called Wolf Pawnees from the river Loup, on
which they lived; that Grand is an abbreviation for _Grand-pas_,
because the Chau-i were mostly tall men and took long steps; that the
Kit-ke-hahk´-i were called Republican from the river of that name, and
the Pita-hau-erat _Tapaje_ (Fr. noisy), because they are noisy and
restless, and are continually moving about from place to place. This
explanation of these English names is not altogether satisfactory. Mr.
Dunbar informs me that he believes that the Chau-i were called Grand
from the appellation given them by the Spaniards, who called them
_Los Grandes_, referring to their physical stature.