14 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [boll. 73 
The Tuskegee havo spoken Muskogee for more than a hundred 
years, but from Taitt (1772) and Hawkins (1799) it appears that 
they once had a language of their own. 1 This statement was con- 
firmed to me by some of the old people and they furnished several 
words which they affirmed belonged to it. 2 Perhaps these are 
nothing more than archaic Creek, but in any case the long associa- 
tion of the tribe with the Creeks, Hitchiti, and Alabama points to a 
Muskhogean connection as the most probable. s 
The Muskhogean affinities of Yamasee have long been assumed 
by ethnologists, largely on the authority of Dr. Gatschet, but it can 
not be said that the evidence which he gives is satisfying. 4 One of 
the words cited by him as proving this, Olataraca, is Timucua; 
another, yatiqui, is both Creek and Timucua; and most of the others 
are not certainly from Yamasee. The traditions of the Creeks are 
divided, some holding that the Yamasee language was related to 
theirs, others that it was entirely distinct. This last contention 
need not have much weight with us, however, because to a Creek 
Hitchiti is an "altogether different" language. From the state- 
ments of Spanish writers it is certain that the language spoken 
in their territories and those of the adjoining coast tribes, 
northward of Cumberland Island, was distinct from the Timu- 
cua of Cumberland Island and more southern regions. One prov- 
ince is called the "lengua de Guale, " the other the "lengua de 
Timucua." 5 More specific evidence as to the nature of that former 
language is not wanting. In 1604 Pedro de Ibarra, governor of 
Florida, jounced from St. Augustine northward along the coast as 
far as St. Catherines Island, stopping at the important mission sta- 
tions and posts, and holding councils with the Indians at each place. 6 
Until he left San Pedro (Cumberland) Island he employed as inter- 
preter a single Indian named Juan de Junco, but as soon as he passed 
northward of that point another interpreter named Santiago was 
added. Moreover, the chiefs met previously were all called ' ' cacique, " 
but afterwards the name ^imco" is often appended, the chief of the very 
first town encountered being called the ''cacique and mico mayor don 
Domingo. " It appears in letters written both before and after the one 
quoted above, as in three by Governor de Canco in 1597, 1598, and 
1603, and the report of a pastoral visit to the Florida missions by the 
Bishop of Cuba in 1606. The earliest of all is in the narrative of an ex- 
pedition sent from Havana in search of Ribault's Port Royal Colony. 
1 Mereness, Trav. in Amer. Col., p. 541; Hawkins, Sketch of the Creek Country, Ga. Hist. Soc. Colls., 
m, p. 39. 
2 See p. 208. 
3 See also the Alabama tradition (p. 192) in which Tuskegee, under the name Hatcafaski, seems to be 
enumerated among the Alabama towns. 
* Gatschet, op. cit., pp. 62-63. 
& Serrano y San?, Doc. Hist., pp. 171, 177. 
• Ibid., pp. 169-193. 
