swanton] EARL'S HISTORY OF THE CREEK INDIANS 151 
in- to the description here given. The later depopulation can he 
accounted for by the wars of which Iberville speaks and by the 
pestilences, which seem to have moved just a little in advance of 
the front rank of white invasion. 
Narvaez encountered some of the Indians of Mobile Bay, 1 but 
it is open to question whether they were the ones in possession in 
Iberville's time. The Province of Achuse or Ochus, discovered by 
Maldonado, may also have been here, and again it may have been 
about Pensacola. 2 
Our next historical encounter with the Mobile tribes was that 
famous and sanguinary meeting between De Soto and the Mobile, 
which has served to immortalize the Indians participating almost as 
much as does the city which bears their name. 
According to Ranjel they first heard of the people of Mobile at 
"Talisi," probably the Creek town now known as Talsi, where mes- 
sengers reached them from Tascaluca, the Mobile chief. His name is 
in the Choctaw language or one almost identical with Choctaw, just 
a^ we should expect, and means "Black warrior." Ranjel calls him 
" a powerful lord and one much feared in that land." " And soon, " he 
adds, ''one of his sons appeared and the governor ordered his men to 
mount and the horsemen to charge and the trumpets to be blown 
(more to inspire fear than to make merry at their reception). And 
when those Indians returned the commander sent two Christians 
with them instructed as to what they were to observe and to spy out, 
so that they might take counsel and be forewarned." 
On Tuesday. October 5, 1540, the army left Talisi and, after pass- 
ing through several villages, encamped the following Saturday, 
October 9, within a league of Tascaluca's village. "And the governor 
dispatched a messenger, and he returned with the reply that he 
would be welcome whenever he wished to come." RanjePs narrative 
goes on as follows: 
Sunday, October 10, the governor entered the village of Tascaluca, which is called 
Athahachi, a recent village. And the chief was on a kind of balcony on a mound at 
one side of the square, his head covered by a kind of coif like the almaizal, so that his 
licaddress was like a Moor's, which gave him an aspect of authority; he also wore a 
p< lott or mantle of feathers down to his feet, very imposing; he was seated on some high 
cushions, and many of the principal men among his Indians were with him. He was 
as tall as that Tony of the Emperor, our lord's guard, and well proportioned, a fine and 
comely 1 Lgure of a man. He had a son, a young man as tall as himself, but more slender. 
Before this chief there stood always an Indian of graceful mien holding a parasol on 
a handle something like a round and very large fly fan, with a cross similar to that of 
the Knights of the Order of St. John of Rhodes, in the middle of a black field, and the 
cross was white. And although the governor entered the plaza and alighted from his 
horse and went up to him, he did not rise, but remained passive in perfect composure, 
and as if he had been a king. 
i See pp. 144-14H. » See pp. 147-148. 
