30 BUREAU OF AMERICAN" ETHNOLOGY [bcll. 43 



allied with the Chickasaw, and we know from Dn Pratz that their 

 language was nnlike that of the Koroa and Yazoo of the lower Yazoo.'* 

 It is a fair inference, therefore, that it was Muskhogean, though the 

 statement can not be made absolute. For the Ibitoupa a short dis- 

 tance lower on Yazoo river we have still less evidence, but the name 

 is readih^ translatable into Choctaw, and its position points to Choc- 

 taw, or rather to Chickasaw, affinities. La Harpe, in 1722, reported a 

 tribe called Choula (" Fox " in Choctaw) living 25 or 30 leagues 

 above the Yazoo and their allies.^ This Avould place them close to 

 the territory formerly occupied by the tribe just considered, which 

 at the time of La ITarpe's visit had moved higher up, above the 

 Chakchiuma, and this fact, combined with their subsequent disappear- 

 ance from history, suggests that the Choula may have been a band 

 of Ibitoupa, who remained a while in the ancient territory of the 

 tribe after the main body had moved away. Or it is possible that 

 they were a branch of the neighboring Chakchiuma, since Fox appears 

 among the names of chiefs in that tribe. At any rate, there is no 

 good evidence that there was ever a permanent, well-recognized tribe 

 called Choula. For the Tangipahoa our information is almost equally 

 scanty, but the name itself is plainly Choctaw, and Iberville was told at 

 the Bayogoula town that " the village of the Tangibaos . . . [formerly] 

 made one of the seven [villages] of the Quinipissas," who at that time 

 did not number more than six.« By " Quinipissas " Iberville means 

 in this place Acolapissa, since at the time he supposed the two to be 

 identical. It is therefore natural to suppose that the language of the 

 Tangipahoa agreed closely with that of the Acolapissa. The Washa, 

 Chawasha, and Okelousa are spoken of as " allied " and " wandering 

 people of the seacoast." ^ Baudry de Lozieres appears to class them 

 temperamentally with the Chitimacha and Atakapa in contradistinc- 

 tion to the more industrious and warlike Houma and Acolapissa, and 

 therefore the writer was at first inclined to regard them as related to 

 one of the first-mentioned tribes, supposing that the Okelousa must 

 be identical with the Opelousa of later writers. Okelousa and Ope- 

 lousa (or A^alusa), hoAvever, have well-recognized but distinct mean- 

 ings in Choctaw, and it hardly appears likely that a mistake has been 

 made, especially since Du Pratz refers to the Okelousa later and gives 

 an explanation of their name,'' while we have independent references 

 to Opelousa from about the same period. Again, almost the first 

 notice we have of the Washa is in company with the Bayogoula, and 

 after the French had established themselves upon the JNIississippi the 

 Chawasha and Washa remained on good terms with them. AVhen the 



" Du Ti-iilz, Hist, de La Louisiane, ii, 22G. 



"l,a Harpo, Jour. Hist., 311, 1831. 



"■ Margi-j', D^couvertes, iv, 168. 



"La Harpe, .Tour. Hist., 18. 



«^ Du Pratz, Hist, de La Louisiano, ii, 241. 



