Yuchi

This article covers the Yuchi Indian people in the USA. For the Korean community Yuchi (鱼池 朝鲜族 乡) in the city of Shangzhi in the Chinese province of Heilongjiang, see Yuchi (Shangzhi) , for the Taiwanese community of the same name see Yuchi (Nantou) .

Yuchi tribal area in the 17th century.

The Yuchi (also spelled Euchee or Uchee ) are a North American Indian people who originally lived in the east of the river valley formed by the Tennessee River in what is now Tennessee , northern Georgia and Alabama . Today most of the tribesmen settle in northeastern Oklahoma . They call themselves Tsoyaha , which translated means "children of the sun". The tribal members were clearly decimated in the 18th century by diseases and wars with the Cherokee . In 2005 there were around 3,000 Yuchi.

Yuchi language

The Yuchi language is an isolated language and is not related to any other known language. The Yuchi and their language are the subject of a chapter in Mark Abley's book on endangered languages, Spoken Here: Travels Among Threatened Languages . Currently only five older tribe members speak the Yuchi language, which is on the verge of extinction.

history

The first information about the Yuchi can be found in the records of the European colonists from the 17th century. Scientists debate whether the Yuchi and Westo belonged to a people, but this theory is controversial. There is clear historical and archaeological evidence of the existence of several Yuchi villages in the 18th century; one of the earlier settlements, Chestowee in southwest Tennessee, is mentioned in colonial scriptures. In 1714 Chestowee was attacked and destroyed by Cherokee who were incited by two traders. The Cherokee intended to destroy more Yuchi settlements on the Savannah River . The South Carolina government made it clear that it would not condone this venture. The Cherokee then withdrew. The destruction of the Yuchi village of Chestowee highlighted the dominance of the Cherokee in the region.

Another early Yuchi village was on the banks of the Savannah River at Mount Pleasant, in what is now Effingham County , which existed from about 1722 to 1750. A large settlement from the middle to the end of the 18th century was "Uche Town" on the Chattahoochee River , not far from the Uche Creek and only about 15 kilometers downstream from the Creek settlement "Coweta Old Town". Uche Town was visited in the 1770s by William Bartram , who was enthusiastic about the development of the population. Another Yuchi village existed on Silver Bluff in Aiken County , South Carolina from 1746 to 1751 . In the late 1700s there was a village called "Patsiliga" on the banks of the Flint River . Other places possibly inhabited by the Yuchi were on the Oconee River not far from Uchee Creek in Wilkinson County and on Brier Creek in Burke or Screven County .

In the early 19th century, the Yuchi were forced to move with the Creek to Oklahoma. Historically, the Yuchi were always a separate people, but they were often grouped into other tribes or considered part of the Creek.

Todays situation

Most of the Yuchi are of multiple tribal descent and many of them are registered members of the Creek people, the Muskogee , although a number of them also belong to other tribes such as the Shawnee , Sauk or Fox . Over the past few decades, the Yuchi have repeatedly tried to obtain national recognition as a people by the American authorities, but so far without success. Several organizations have tried to establish a tribal government, but so far none of these groups has been able to achieve tribal support.

See also

• List of North American Indian tribes

literature

• Mark Abley: Spoken Here: Travels Among Threatened Languages. Houghton Mifflin, 2003.
• Robbie Ethridge: Creek Country: The Creek Indians and their World. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill 2003.
• Jason Jackson: Yuchi Ceremonial Life: Performance, Meaning, and Tradition in a Contemporary American Indian Community. University of Nebraska Press, 2003.
• Jason Jackson: Yuchis in Alabama . In: Encyclopedia of Alabama . 2013.
• Frank Speck: Ethnology of the Yuchi Indians (reprint) . University of Nebraska Press, 2004.
• Yuchi. In: William C. Sturtevant, Raymond Fogelson (Eds.): Handbook of North American Indians. Vol. 14: Southeast. Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC 2004.

Web links

• Yuchi.org: Who Were the Mysterious Yuchi of Tennessee and the Southeast?
• Library of Congress : Memoirs of Jeremiah Curtin in the Indian Territory pages 327 and 333-335.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Scientists: Many World Languages ​​Are Dying ( Memento of the original from October 5, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Associated Press , Fox News , Sept. 18, 2007 
2. ^ Alan Gallay: The Indian Slave Trade: The Rise of the English Empire in the American South 1670-1717 . Yale University Press, 2002, ISBN 0-300-10193-7 .
3. ^ Lamar Institute Reports: Mount Pleasant. To Eighteenth-Century Yuchi Indian Town, British Trader Outpost, and Military Garrison in Georgia ( Memento of the original from June 29, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.