Wichita people
Kitikiti'sh | |
---|---|
Kichai | |
Religion | |
Native American Church, Christianity, Indigenous religion | |
Related ethnic groups | |
Caddo, Pawnee, Arikara, Kichai, Caddoan Mississippian culture |
The Wichita people, or Kitikiti'sh, are a confederation of
.Today, Wichita tribes, which include the
Government
The Wichita and Affiliated Tribes are headquartered in
The current tribal administration is as follows.
- President: Terri Parton
- Vice-President: Jarrod Prince
- Secretary: Myles Stephenson Jr.
- Treasurer: Claudia Spybuck[3]
Economic development
The tribe owns the Sugar Creek Casino, several restaurants, the Sugar Creek Event Center, and Hinton Travel Inn in Hinton.[4] It owns a smoke shop, travel plaza, and historical center in Anadarko.[2] Their annual economic impact in 2010 was $4.5 million.
Culture
The Wichita language is one of the Caddoan languages. They are related by language and culture to the Pawnee, with whom they have close relations.
The Wichita lived in settled villages with domed-shaped, grass lodges, sometimes up to 30 feet (9.1 m) in diameter. The Wichita were successful hunters, farmers, traders, and negotiators. Their historical homelands stretched from
The Wichita made much of their own art, including ceramic pottery that greatly fascinated French and Spanish traders.[5] To the untrained eye Wichita pottery was "virtually indistinguishable from the Osage and Pawnee", two other neighboring Indigenous groups.[6]
Historically, for much of the year, the Wichita lived in huts made of forked
Wichita people wore clothing from
Wichita people had a history of intermarriage and alliance with other groups. Notably, the women of the Wichita worked with the Pueblo to harvest crops and engage in trade. Pueblo women were recorded to have intermarried with Wichita people and lived together in Wichita villages.
The social structure was organized by ranking of each tribe. Tribes were also led by two chiefs.
Names
The Wichita tribes call themselves Kitikiti'sh or Kirikirish ("
Bands
Wichita people have been a loose confederation of related peoples on the Southern Plains, including such bands or sub-tribes as
Language
The Wichita people had a unified language system with minor dialectical differences based on the geography of unique tribes. Derived from the Caddoan language, much of the Wichita language was indistinguishable between tribes they shared close alliances with.
Cultural institutions
In 2018, the Wichita Tribes opened the Wichita Tribal History Center in Anadarko, which shares Wichita history, archaeology, visual arts, and culture with the public.[7]
The Wichita Annual Dance, a powwow, is held at the Wichita Tribal Park on US-281, north of Anadarko, every August.[8]
Historical sites
Several sites spanning across different time periods are spread around the United States. These sites are terraced around the Red River in Oklahoma and Texas, and they contain artifacts such as pottery, arrows, knives, clay figurines, and European trade goods. Extensive excavation of these sites revealed large ritualistic and burial structures common in the territory and culture of the Wichita people.[5]
History
Precontact history
After the man and woman were made they dreamed that things were made for them, and when they woke they had the things of which they had dreamed... The woman was given an ear of corn... It was to be the food of the people that should exist in the future, to be used generation after generation. —Tawakoni Jim in The Mythology of the Wichita, 1904
The Ancestral Wichita people lived in the eastern
Archaeologists describe the Washita River Phase from 1250 to 1450, when local populations grew and villages of up to 20 houses were spaced every two or so miles along the rivers.
Great Bend settlements and council circles
Numerous archaeological sites in central Kansas near the Great Bend of the
Great Bend aspect peoples'
Several village sites contain the remains of unusual structures called "council circles," located at the center of settlements.
One of these sites was the city Etzanoa, located in present-day Arkansas City, Kansas, near the Arkansas River, that flourished between 1450 and 1700.[17]
Post-contact history
In 1541 Spanish explorer
It was also noted: "They eat meat raw/
The Quivirans apparently called their land Tancoa (which bears a resemblance to the later sub-tribe called Tawakoni) and a neighboring province on the Smoky Hill River was called Tabas (which bears a resemblance to the sub-tribe of Taovayas).[22] Settlements existed here until the Wichita were driven away in the 18th century.
Sixty years after Coronado's expedition the founder of New Mexico
What the Coronado and Oñate expeditions showed was that the Wichita people of the 16th century were numerous and widespread. They were not, however, a single tribe at this time but rather a group of several related tribes speaking a common language. The dispersed nature of their villages probably indicated that they were not seriously threatened by attack by enemies, although that would change as they would soon be squeezed between the Apache on the West and the powerful Osage on the East. European diseases would also probably be responsible for a large decline in the Wichita population in the 17th century.
In 1719, French explorers visited two groups of Wichita.
The most prominent of the Wichita sub-tribes were the Taovayas. In the 1720s they had moved south from Kansas to the Red River establishing a large village on the north side of the River at Petersburg, Oklahoma and on the south side at Spanish Fort, Texas. They adopted many traits of the nomadic Plains Indians and were noted for raiding, trading. They had a close alliance with the French, and in 1746 a French brokered alliance with the Comanche revived the fortunes of the Wichita. The village at Petersburg was "a lively emporium where Comanches brought Apache slaves, horses and mules to trade for French packs of powder, balls, knives, and textiles and for Taovaya-grown maize, melons, pumpkins, squash, and tobacco."[27]
The Wichita and their Comanche allies were known to the Spanish as the Norteños (Northerners). The Wichita people and the Comanche attacked a Spanish military expedition in 1759. Afterwards, in response to the destruction by the Norteños of the San Saba Mission the Spanish and their Apache allies undertook an expedition to punish the Indians. Their 500-man army attacked the twin villages on Red River, but was defeated by the Wichita and Comanche in the Battle of the Twin Villages. The Spanish army suffered 19 dead and 14 wounded, leaving two cannons on the battlefield, although they claimed to have killed more than 100 Indians. [28]
The alliance between the Wichita, especially the Taovayas, and the Comanche began to break up in the 1770s as the Wichita sought a better relationship with the Spanish. Taovaya power in Texas declined sharply after an epidemic, probably
The principal village of the Wichita in the 1830s was near the Wichita Mountains of Oklahoma although the Tawakoni and Wacos still lived in Texas and were moved onto a reservation on the upper Brazos River. They were forced out of Texas to a reservation in Oklahoma in 1859. During the Civil War, the Wichita allied with the Union side. They moved to Kansas, where they established a village at the site of present-day Wichita, Kansas.[30] In 1867 they were relocated to a reservation in southwest Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma) in the area where most of them continue to reside today.[31] On June 4, 1891, the affiliated tribes signed an agreement with the Cherokee Commission for individual allotments.[32]
Relationships with other indigenous tribes
Wichita relationships were mostly harmonious and cooperative. The Wichita were allies with the Comanche and traded with them. However, they were enemies with groups such as the Pawnee, the Missouri, and the Apache. The Apache were the Wichita's worst enemies, having driven them out of their homes before contact with Europeans.
The Wichita people's relationship with the Osage is ambiguous. It is said to have been "cautiously hostile",[25] but many Osage groups attacked them in the 18th century, eventually driving them out of the Arkansas River Basin.
Trade
Due to geographical isolation, it was difficult for the French and Spanish to trade with the Wichita. The French traded with the Wichita primarily for their horses during the 16th century. The Wichita sensed that trading with the French would be ideal. Their migration in 1714 was partly motivated by their desire to move closer to European traders.
The Wichita first gained their European commodities in the mid 18th century, inspiring them to maintain close ties with the French in the 19th century. French traders were eager to exchange their goods with Wichita settlements as they traveled from Louisiana to Santa Fe.[33]
Population
The Wichita had a large population in the time of Coronado and Oñate. One scholar estimates their numbers at 200,000.
In 2018, 2,953 people were enrolled in the Wichita and Affiliated Tribes.
Notable Wichita
- Big Eyes (c. 1520–after 1542), enslaved person, guide for Coronado expedition
- Doris McLemore (1927–2016), last first-language speaker of Wichita
- Cara Jade Myers, actress[35]
See also
References
- ^ a b c Gately, Paul (8 July 2018). "Native Americans chose Waco for water and abundance, like others". 10 KWTX. Retrieved 8 December 2018.
- ^ a b c 2011 Oklahoma Indian Nations Pocket Pictorial Directory. Archived April 24, 2012, at the Wayback Machine Oklahoma Indian Affairs Commission. 2011: 38. Retrieved 8 Feb 2012.
- ^ "Wichita Executive Committee." Archived 2010-07-01 at the Wayback Machine Wichita and Affiliated Tribes. Retrieved 24 April 2013.
- ^ "Sugar Creek Casino". 500 Nations. Retrieved 24 December 2018.
- ^ a b Long unreported artifact collections from Spanish Fort Bend Wichita Indian Sites in Oklahoma and Texas. Plains Anthropologist, 57 (221), 63-69.
- ^ Stephen M. Perkins & Timothy G. Baugh (2008) Protohistory and the Wichita, Plains Anthropologist, 53:208, 381-394,
- ^ "Wichita Tribal History Center". Wichita and Affiliated Tribes. Retrieved 8 December 2018.
- ^ "Wichita Annual Dance Committee". Wichita and Affiliated Tribes. Retrieved 8 December 2018.
- ^ Schlesier, Karl H., Plains Indians, 500–1500 CE: The Archaeological Past of Historic Groups (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1994), 347-348.
- ^ a b c Drass, Richard D. "Washita River Phase: A.D. 1250–1450". University of Oklahoma. Archived from the original on 3 March 2016. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
- ^ "Panhandle Pueblo Culture". Texas Beyond History. 26 July 2004. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
- ^ Wood, W. Raymond (1998). Archaeology of the Great Plains University of Kansas Press.
- ^ Hoard, Robert J. and William E. Banks (2006). Kansas Archaeology. University Press of Kansas
- ^ Wedel, Waldo (1967). "The Council Circles of Central Kansas: Were They Solstice Registers?", American Antiquity 32: pp. 54-63.
- ^ Vehik, Susan C. 2002. "Conflict, Trade, and Political Development on the Southern Plains", American Antiquity 67, no. 1: pp. 37–64.
- ^ Hollinger, Eric (2005). Conflict and Culture Change in the Late Prehistoric and Early Historic American Midcontinent, PhD Dissertation. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
- ^ Kelly, David (19 August 2018). "Archaeologists explore a rural field in Kansas, and a lost city emerges". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 8 December 2018.
- ^ Vehik, Susan C. "Wichita Cultural History." Plains Anthropologist, Vol 37, No. 141, 1992, 328
- ^ Winship, George Parker, The Journey of Coronado, 1540–1542, etc. New York: A.S. Barnes, 1904, 124, 215, 219
- ^ a b c Wedel, Mildred M. 1982a The Wichita Indians in the Arkansas River Basin. In Plains Indian Studies: A Collection of Papers in Honor of John C. Ewers and Waldo R. Wedel, edited by D.H. Ubelaker and H.J. Viola, pp. 118-134. Smithsonian
- ^ Brush, Rebecca. "The Wichita Indians", Texas Indians
- ^ Vehik, Susan C. "Oñate's Expedition to the Southern Plains: Routes, Destinations, and Implications for late Prehistoric Cultural Adaptations." Plains Anthropologist, Vol 31, No. 111, 1986, 28
- ^ Bolton, Herbert Eugene, ed., Spanish Exploration in the Southwest, 1542–1706. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1916, 250-267
- ^ Vehik, "Wichita Cultural History," p. 328
- ^ a b Wedel, Mildred Mott (1982) A The Wichita Indians in the Arkansas River Basin. In Plains Indian Studies: A Collection of Papers in Honor of John C. Ewers and Waldo R. Wedel, edited by D.H. Ubelaker and H.J. Viola, pp. 118-134. Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge 30, Washington, D.C.
- ^ John, Elizabeth A. H. Storms Brewed in Other Men's Worlds. Lincoln, NE: U of Neb Press, 1975, 338
- ^ Elam, Earl Henry, "Anglo-American Relations with the Wichita Indians in Texas, 1822–1859." Master's Thesis, Texas Technological College, 1967, 11
- ^ John, 352
- ^ Pekka Hamalainen, The Comanche Empire (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008), p. 96
- ISBN 0-8061-2094-0
- ^ "Wichita Tribes". accessgenealogy.com. Retrieved July 15, 2010.
- ISBN 978-0-8061-3118-4.
- ^ Perkins, S. M. & Drass, R. R. & Vehik, S. C. (2016). Decolonizing the Borderland: Wichita Frontier Strategies. Great Plains Quarterly 36(4), 259-280. University of Nebraska Press. Retrieved May 6, 2019, from Project MUSE database.
- ^ Smith, F. "Wichita Locations and Population, 1719-1901. Plains Anthropologist Vol. 53, No. 28, 2008, pp.407-414
- ^ "Cara Jade Myers". Milken Institute. Retrieved 18 December 2023.
Further reading
- Nye, Wilbur Sturtevant (1937). "Battle of Wichita Village" [OCLC 655582328.
- Schmitt, Karl (1950). "Wichita-Kiowa Relations and the 1874 Outbreak". OCLC 655582328.
- Schmitt, Karl (1952). "Wichita Death Customs" [OCLC 655582328.
- Wedel, Mildred Mott; Blaine, Martha Royce; Moore, Gordon (1981). The Deer Creek Site, Oklahoma: A Wichita Village Sometimes Called Ferdinandina: an Ethnohistorian's View. Issue 5 of Series in Anthropology. Oklahoma City, OK: Oklahoma Historical Society.
- Wedel, Mildred Mott (1988). The Wichita Indians 1541–1750: Ethnohistorical Essays. Volume 38 of Reprints in Anthropology. J & L Reprint Company.
External links
- Wichita and Affiliated Tribes, official website
- Wichita, article in the Oklahoma Historical Society's Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture
- The last word on 'Wichita'. One person left who speaks 'Wichita': Interview with last fluent speakerof Wichitan language". Video by Al Jazeera
- Wichita art and photographs, National Museum of the American Indian