bwahton] EARLY HISTORY OF THK CREEK INDIANS 167 
The two together settled a (own known ;is Hotalgihuyana. 1 Their 
familiarity with Bitchiti may have been merely a natural result of 
long association with Ghiaha and Apalachicola Indians. No remem- 
brance of any language other than Hitchiti and Muskogee is preserved 
among them.' 
THE CHIAHA 
The Chiaha were a more prominent tribe and evidently much 
larger than those last mentioned. While the significance of their 
name is unknown it recalls the Choctaw chaha, "high," "height," 
and this would be in harmony with the situation in which part of the 
tribe was first encountered northward near the mountains of Tennessee. 
There is also a Cherokee place name which superficially resembles 
this, but should not be confounded with it. It is written by Mooney 
Tsiyahi and signifies "Otter place." One settlement so named 
formerly existed on a branch of the Keowee River, near the present 
Cheohee, Oconee County, South Carolina; another in Cades Cove, 
on Cove Creek, in Blount County, Tennessee; and a third, still occu- 
pied, about Robbinsville, in Graham County, North Carolina. 2 
As a matter of fact we know from later history that there were at 
least two Chiahas in very early times — one as above indicated and 
a second among the Yamasee. In discussing the Cusabo I have 
already spoken of the possibility that the Kiawa of Ashley River 
\\ ere a third group of Chiaha, and will merely note the point again in 
passing. 3 That there were Chiaha among the Yamasee is proved by a 
passage in the manuscript volume of proceedings of the board dealing 
with the Indian trade of Carolina. There we find it recorded that in 
1713 an agent of this board among the Lower Creeks proposed that a 
way be prepared that "the Cheehaws who were formerly belonging to 
the Yamassees and now settled among the Creeks might return." 4 
This seems to be confirmed by the presence of a Chehaw River in 
South Carolina between the Edisto and Combahee, though it is 
possible that that received its name from the Kiawa. There is, 
however, another line of evidence. In 1566 and 1567 Juan Pardo 
made two expeditions inland toward the northwest, and reached 
among other places in the second of these the Chiaha whom De Soto 
had formerly encountered. Now Pardo calls them "Chihaque, que 
tiene por otro nombre se llama Lameco," 5 and in another place 
"Lameco, que tiene por otro nombre Chiaha," 6 while in Vandera's 
account we read "Solameco, y por otro nombre Chiaha." 7 Gat- 
schet derives this last from the Creek Suli miko, "Buzzard chief," 
• See pp. 170, 409. • Ruidiaz, La Florida, n, p. 471. 
1 Mooney in 19th Ann. Kept. Bur. Amer. Kthn., p. 53*. 'Ibid., p. 472. 
' See p. 25. ^ Ibid., p. 484. 
« MS. as above, p. titi. 
