518 



CREEKS CREOLE. 



Syntagma Confessionum Fitlei, Geneva, 1612 and 

 1054; Sylloge Confessionum, Oxfoni, 1804; Butler's 

 Account of Confession* offailh.) 



CREEKS, or MU8CO6BBB ; Indians in the west- 

 ern part of Georgia and the eastern part of Alabama, 

 in the country watered by the Chatahoochee, Talla- 

 poosa, and Coosa. The number of warriors is about 

 6000, and of souls about 20,000. They suffered se- 

 verely in 1813 and 1814, in the war with the United 

 States. (See Seminoies.) They are accounted the 

 mo>t warlike tribe found east of the Mississippi. 

 Ni-.nr of their towns contain from 150 to 200 houses. 

 They have made considerable progress in agriculture, 

 ami raise horses, cattle, fowls, ana hogs, and cultivate 

 tobacco, rice, and corn. 



CREES, or KNISTENAUX ; Indians in North 

 America, residing about Ion. 105 12' W. lat. 55 

 N. They are of moderate stature, well proportion- 

 ed, active, have keen black eyes and open counte- 

 MMMfc 



CREFELD; a city in the Prussian province of' 

 Cleves-Berg, with 1543 houses, and 16,000 inhabi- 

 tants, of whom 700 are Mennonites ; above 12,000 

 are manufacturers. The city is built in the Dutch 

 taste. The chief manufactories are of velvet cloth 

 and ribands. The former is made principally in the 

 city, the latter in the environs. Silk goods of vari- 

 ous kinds, flannels, woollen stockings, cotton and linen 

 goods, &c., are also made here. Crefeld likewise 

 contains tanneries, sugar refineries, distilleries, manu- 

 factories of soap. Of late, it has exported much to 

 America. 



CREMNITZ, or KREMNITZ ; a free royal city 

 in Hungary, in Barsch, situated on the side of a hill ; 

 100 miles E. Vienna ; Ion. 19 \3/ E. ; lat. 48 45' 

 N. ; population, 9700 ; houses, 1200. It is situated 

 amidst lofty mountains, and contains one Lutheran, 

 one Calvinist, and one Catholic church, and a Lu- 

 theran gymnasium. It is celebrated for its mines of 

 gold and silver, and is the oldest mining town in 

 Hungary. The situation is elevated, and the air is 

 very cold. The town itself is very small, not con- 

 taining fifty houses, but the faubourgs are of great 

 extent. The ducats which bear the name of Crem- 

 nitz have enjoyed, for a long time, the reputation of 

 very fine gold. They are to be known by the two 

 letters K. B. (Kermecz Banya, Cremnitz mines), be- 

 tween which is the image of the sovereign. Much 

 gold and silver from these mines is coined in 

 Vienna. 



CREMONA ; a city of the Lombardo-Venetian 

 kingdom, capital of the province and district, in a 

 beautiful situation. It is about five miles in circum- 

 ference, and has spacious and regular streets, with se- 

 veral squares, but the houses are in general ill built. 

 Here are forty-four churches and chapels, forty-three 

 convents, and an obscure university. It is the see 

 of a bishop. The cathedral is a massy structure, 

 with a fagade of beautiful white and red marble, 

 ornamented, .in the interior, with various paintings and 

 pictures in fresco. The tower of Cremona, built by 

 Frederic Barbarossa, in the 12th century, is a very 

 curious edifice, consisting of two octagonal obelisks, 

 surmounted by a cross, and, in all, 372 feet in height. 

 The silk manufactures of this place are considera- 

 ble, and it has long been. noted for its superior vio- 

 lins. This city is of great antiquity, having been 

 created a Roman colony B. C. 291. The Venetians 

 possessed it a long time ; and, under Napoleon, it 

 was, until 1814, capital of the department of Alto 

 Po. Population, 23,000 ; 38 miles S. E. Milan ; 

 Ion. 10 2' 12" E. ; lat. 45 7' 43" N. 



CREOLE (from the Spanish Creolld) is the name 

 which was originally given to all the descendants of 

 Spaniards born in America and the West Indies. It 



is also used for the descendants of other Europeans, 

 as French, Danes, in which case we say, French 

 Creole, Danish-Creole. Since the native Spaniards 

 have been expelled from the former Spanish American 

 colonies, the term Creole is comparatively little used, 

 in speaking of those parts of America, it being seldom 

 necessary as a term of distinction ; but, in speaking of 

 the French, Danish, and Spanish possessions in the 

 West Indies, the word occurs more frequently. I n the 

 United States, it is often used for the descendant^ of 

 the French and Spaniards in Louisiana (many of the 

 latter having settled there from Spanish America), 

 in contradistinction to Americans, meaning, by the 

 latter term, people born in the other states, or their 

 descendants. 



In 1776, Charles III., king of Spain, declared the 

 Creoles capable of civil, military, and eerie-optical 

 offices, from wluch, till then, they liad been excluded. 

 Native Spaniards, however, still continued to liave 

 the preference, and the Creoles were treated with 

 the arrogance which too often distinguishes the con- 

 duct of the natives of a parent coimtry towards colo- 

 nists ; and the consequence was great exacerbation 

 of feeling on the part of the Creoles. In the West 

 Indies, the Creoles have always enjoyed equal rights 

 with native Europeans. Before the declaration of 

 independence by the colonies of Spanish America, 

 there existed marked lines of distinction between the 

 different classes, founded on difference of birth. The 

 Chapetones were Europeans by birth, and first in 

 rank and power ; the Creoles were the second ; the 

 Mulattoes and Mestizoes (descendants of white and 

 black, or white and Indian parents) formed the third 

 class ; Negroes and Indians, the fourth. At present, 

 they are all entitled to equal privileges by the con- 

 stitutions. Some of Bolivar's generals were dark 

 Mulattoes, and Paez is a Llanero. The Llaneros are 

 converted Indians. The native Spaniards' formerly 

 avoided associating with the Creoles, and formed the 

 first class. In Venezuela, there existed a kind of 

 Creole nobility, unknown in other parts of South 

 America. They were called Mantuanos, and divided 

 themselves into those of Sangre Azul (blue blood), 

 descendants of the first Spanish conquerors, and those 

 of Sangre Mezclada (mixed blood), Creole families of 

 a later origin, who had intermarried with Spaniards 

 or Frenchmen. The Creoles, in general, before the 

 revolution, were very lazy, leaving the meclianical 

 arts and husbandry altogether to the mulattoes, ne- 

 groes, or Indians ; and, even now, the mechanics are 

 mostly coloured or black persons. The ladies are of 

 a sallow complexion, have beautiful teeth, large, 

 dark eyes, and are, like the men, very finely formed. 



Creole dialects are those jargons which have origi- 

 nated from the mixture of different languages in the 

 West Indies. They are spoken by the slaves, who 

 have destroyed the fine grammatical construction of 

 the European languages, and have intermixed with 

 them some original African words. According to the 

 European language which prevails in a Creole dialect, 

 it is called French- Creole, Danish-Creole, &c. In St 

 Thomas, for instance, the latter is spoken ; in Hayti, 

 French-Creole. Among the numerous corruptions of 

 European words and constructions, we find, very ge- 

 nerally, in the Creole dialects, the corruptions of 

 grammar common among children ; for instance, me 

 is used instead of /. Often no distinction is made 

 between the possessive pronoun and the personal ; 

 e. g., me house for my house, or wi massra for our 

 master. The infinitive is used for the finite tenses, 

 as moi donner for j'e donne. It is well known that 

 Homer has several deviations from grammar which 

 are now peculiar to children ; and the Creole dialects 

 have several peculiarities in common with those used 

 by Homer. The mixture of words from different 



