46 THE PROBLEM OF THE OHIO MOUNDS. 



is tlie statement by Haywood, already referred to, that the Cherokees 

 had a tradition that in former times they dwelt on the Ohio and built 

 monuds. 



These data, though slender, when combined with the apparent simi- 

 larity between the name Tallegwi and Cherokee or Ohellakee, and the 

 character of the works and traditions of the latter, furnish some ground 

 for assuming that the two were one and the same people. But this as- 

 sumption necessitates the further inference that tlie pressure which 

 drove them southward is to be attributed to some other people than the 

 Iroquois as known to history, as this movement must have taken place 

 previous to the time the latter attained their ascendancy. It is proba- 

 ble that Mr. Hale is correct in deciding that the "^amaesi Sipu" of 

 the tradition was not the Mississippi.' His suggestion tliat it was that 

 portion of the great river of the North (the St. Lawrence) which con- 

 nects Lake Huron with Lake Erie, seems also to be more in conformity 

 with the tradition and other data than any other which has been offered. 

 If this supposition is accepted it would lead to the inference that the 

 Talamatan, the people who joined the Delawares in their war on the 

 Tallegwi, were Hurons or Huron-Iroquois previous to separation. That 

 the reader may have the benefit of Mr. Hale's views on this (juestion, 

 the following quotation from the article mentioned is given : 



The country from which the Leuape migrated was Shhuili, the '■ land of fir trees," 

 not iu the West but iu the far North, evidently the woody region north of Lake Su- 

 perior. The people who joined them in the war against the AUighewi (or Tallegwi, 

 as they are called in this record), w^ere the Talamatan, a name meaning "not of them- 

 selves," whom Mr. S<inier identifies with the Hurons, and no doubt correctly, if we 

 understand by this name the Huron-Iroquois people, as they existed Ijcfore their sep- 

 aration. The river which they crossed was the Messnsipu, the Great River, beyond 

 which the Tallegwi were found " possessing the East." That this river was not our 

 Mississippi is evident from the fact that the works of the mound-builders extended 

 tar to the westward of the latter river, and wovild have been encountered by the 

 invading nations, if they had approached it from the west, long before they ar- 

 rived at its banks. The '' Great River" was apparently the upper St. Lawrence, and 

 most probably that i)ortion of it which flows from Lake Huron to Lake Erie, and 

 which is commonly known as the Detroit River. Near this river, according to Hecke- 

 welder, at a point west of Lake St. Clair, and also at another place just south of Lake 

 Eric, some desperate conflicts took place. Hundreds of the slain Tallegwi, as be 

 was told, were buried under mounds in that vicinity. This precisely accords with 

 Cusick's statement that the people of the great southern empire had " almost pene- 

 tr.ated to Lake Erie" at the time when the war began. Of course in coming to the 

 Detroit River from the region north of Lake Su^xsrior, the Algouquins would be ad- 

 vancing from the west to the east. It is quite conceiv.able that, after many geneia- 

 tions and many wanderings, they may themselves have forgotten whicli was the true 

 Messnsipu, or Great River, of their traditionary tales. 



The passage already quoted from Cusick's narrative informs us tliat (he contest 

 Justed "perhaps one hundred years." In close agreement with this statement tin' 

 Delaware record makes it eudun^ during tlie terms of four head-chiefs, who in suc- 

 cession piesided in the I>ena[)t^ councils. Erom what we know historically of Indian 

 customs the average Itnins of such chiefs may be computed at about twenty-five 



' Am. Antiquarian, vol. .''), ISS.*?, p. 117. 



