332 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 43 



them 4 scalps and made many of their women prisoners." ** These 

 engagements are perhaps responsible for Charlevoix's otherAvise un- 

 supported statement tliat the Arkansas had fallen upon the Yazoo, 

 Koroa, and Tioux, entirely exterminating the last-mentioned tribe and 

 leaving only 15 men of the two former.'' Such a sweeping destruc- 

 tion is improbable, for not only does Le Petit declare, a little farther 

 on, that " among the Yazous and the Corroys there are not more than 

 40 warriors," " a considerable advance on 15, but Charlevoix himself 

 says that the Yazoo and Koroa at the time of the Black river expe- 

 dition occupied a fort by themselves,'' an unlikely proceeding for a 

 tribe with but 15 men. The only subsequent reference to this tribe 

 is to the effect that they took part in the attack on the Tunica in 

 1731 wdiich proved so fatal to the latter.'' It is probable that they 

 afterward retired with their Natchez allies to the Chickasaw^, but, 

 instead of keeping company with them, it would ai)pear that they 

 linally went over to the Choctaw, for Allen Wright, late head chief 

 of that nation, was of Koroa descent.'^ 



The Yazoo 



Although the name of this tribe from its geographical application 

 is better laK)wn than those of either the Tunica or Koroa, their part 

 in history is nnich less prominent. Tlie w^ord itself has become 

 somewhat distorted by changing an original surd " s " into sonant 

 " z," but its meaning has been lost, along with the language from 

 which it sprang. Could we carry ourselves far enough back in the 

 history of the Gulf region w-e should probably find that the two 

 Yazoo towns among the Choctaw Avere named from some former 

 connection with the tribe under discussion, but the nature of it has 

 been long forgotten. In view of the greater size and importance of 

 the Tunica and Koroa tribes it is at first a matter of surprise that 

 the river on Avhich thej^ dwelt should not have received its name 

 from one of them. It appears to have been so called first by Tonti 

 in his account of the route from the Illinois by the Mississippi river 

 to the Gulf of Mexico, where, he says, " The lonica, Yazou, Coroa, 

 and Choaique are, one with the other, about 10 leagues from the 

 Mississippi, on the river of the Yazou," and perhaps we are to 

 interpret the statement a fcAV lines below that '' the Yazou are 

 masters of the soil " as his reason for having done so.*' That they 

 Avere actually the oldest Yazoo river tribe is entirely credible, for, as 

 Ave have seen, the position of the Koroa there appears to haA^e been 

 by no means constant, Avhile the Tunica may haA^e descended from 

 higher up the Mississippi.'' Moreover, while the Louisiana colony 



" .les. Rel., Lxviii, 217. -^ Sec p. 240. 



"Shea ed. of Charlovoix's Mist, of New /■ Gatschet, Creek Mig. Leg., I, 48. 

 Franco, vi, 102. " French, Hist. CoU. La., 82-83, 1846. 



«.Tes. Rel., Lxviii, 22L ''See pp. 306-307, 326, 329-330. 



<< Hist, of New France, vi^ 115. 



