182 



CADDOAN FAMILY 



[b. a. e. 



nais.— Penicaut (1712) in Margry, Dc'C, v, 499, 

 1S83. Assinay.— La Harpe {ca. 1717) in French, 

 Hist. Coll. La., in, 48, 1851. Assine.— Gatschet, 

 Creek Migr. Leg., 1, 43, 1884. Assinnis.— Boiidinot, 

 Star in the West, 125, 1816. Assoni.— Joutel (l(i87) 

 in Margry, Dec, in, 311, 1878. Assony.— .loutel, 

 ibid., I, 147, 1846. Assynais.— Penicant (171(1) in 

 Margry, Dec.,v, 539, ].s,s3. Ceneseans. — Boiidinot, 

 Star in the West, 126, 1H16. Cenesians. — Hennepin, 

 New Diseov., pt. 2, 25, 1698. Cenis.— .Jontel (1687) 

 in French, Hist. Coll. La., i, 148, 1851. Cenys.— Jou- 

 tel (1687) in Margry, D(5c., Ill, 266, 187S. Ceries 

 Assonys. — French, Hist. Coll. La., ii, 11, note, 

 1875. Cneis.— Drake, Bk. Inds., vii, 1848. Coeni.— 

 Hennepin, New Disco v., map, 1698. Coenis, — 

 De I'Lsle, map, 1700. Couis. — Morse, N. Am., map, 

 1776 (misprint). Hasmai, — ten Kate. lieizen in 

 N. Am., 374, 1885 (own name). Iscanis,— Bull. 

 See. Geog. Mex., ,504, 1869. Nasoni,— For forms of 

 this name, see yasoni. Senis.— Cavelier (1687) 

 quoted by Shea, Early Voy., 31, 1861. Tiddoes.— 

 Keane in Stanford, Compend., Cent, and So. Am., 

 539, 1878 (same?). Yscanes.— Te.x. State Arch., 

 Nov. 15, 1785. Yscanis. — Census of Nacogdoches 

 nrisdiction, ibid., 1790. 



Caddoan Family, A linguistic family, 

 first classified by Gallatin (Trans, and 

 Coll. Am. Antiq. Soc, ii, 116, 1836), who 

 regarded the Caddo and Pawnee lan- 

 guages as distinct, hence both names ap- 

 pear in his treatise as family designations. 

 Although now regarded as belonging to 

 the same linguistic stock, there is a pos- 

 sibility that future investigation may 

 prove their distinctness. The Caddoans 

 may be treated in three geographic groups : 

 The Northern, represented by the Arikara 

 in North Dakota; the Middle, comprising 

 the Pawnee confederacy formerly living 

 on Platte r., Neb., and to the w. and s. w. 

 thereof; and the Southern group, includ- 

 ing among others the Caddo, Kichai, and 

 Wichita (Powell in 7th Rep. B. A. E., 58, 

 1891 ) . The tribes included in the Southern 

 grouj) were scattered throughout the re- 

 gion of the Red r. of Louisiana and its trib- 

 utaries, in Arkansas and s. Oklahoma, 

 where their names survive in the Washita 

 r., the Wichita mountains and river, 

 Waco city, Kichai hills, etc.; they also 

 spread along the Sabine, Neches, Trinity, 

 and Brazos rs. of Texas, and in part con- 

 trolled the territory as far as the Colorado 

 r. of Texas and the Gulf of Mexico. 



From cultural and other evidence the 

 Caddoan tribes seem to have moved 

 eastward from the S. W. The advance 

 guard was probably the Caddo proper, 

 who, when first met by the white race, 

 had dwelt so long in the region of the Red 

 r. of Louisiana as to regard it as their 

 original home or birthplace. Other 

 branches of the Caddoan family followed, 

 settling along the rivers of n. e. Texas. 

 W^hether they drove earlier occupants of 

 the region to the Gulf or at a later day 

 were forced back from the coast by intru- 

 sive tril)es is not clear, but that some dis- 

 placement had occurred seems probable, 

 as early Spanish and French travelers 

 found tribes of different families on the 

 Gulf coast, while the Caddoans held the 

 rivers but were acquainted with the coast 



and visited the bays of Galveston and 

 INIatagorda. The last group to migrate 

 was i^robably the Pawnee, who kept to 

 the N. and n. e. and settled in a part of 

 what is now Kansas and Nebraska. 



The tribes of N. e. Texas being in the 

 territory over which the Spaniards, 

 French, and English contended for su- 

 premacy, were the first to succumb to 

 contact with the white race and the in- 

 roads of wars and new diseases. Those 

 dwelling farther inland escaped for a 

 time, but all suffered great diminution 

 in numbers; the thousands of 2 centuries 

 ago are now represented by only a few 

 hundreds. The survivors to-day live on 

 allotted lands in Oklahoma and North 

 Dakota, as citizens of the United States, 

 and their children are being educated in 

 the language and the industries of the 

 country. 



From the earliest records and from tra- 

 ditions the Caddoan tribes seem to have 

 been cultivators of the soil as well as 

 hunters, and practised the arts of pottery 

 making, weaving, skin dressing, etc. 

 Tattooing the face and body was common 

 among those of the Southern group. 

 Two distinct types of dwellings were 

 used — the conical straw house among 

 the Southern group and the earth lodge 

 among the Pawnee and Arikara. Their 

 elaborate religious ceremonies pertained 

 to the quest of long life, health, and 

 food supply, and embodied a recogni- 

 tion of cosmic forces and the heavenly 

 bodies. By their supernatural and social 

 power these ceremonies bound the people 

 together. The tribes were generally 

 loosely confederated; a few stood alone. 

 The tribe was subdivided, and each one 

 of these subdivisions had its own village, 

 bearing a distinctive name and sometimes 

 occupying a definite relative position to 

 each of the other villages of the tribe. A 

 village could be spoken of in three ways: 

 (1) By its proper name, which was gen- 

 erally mythic in its significance or re- 

 ferred to the share or ])art taken by it in • 

 the religious rites, wherein all the vil- 

 lages of the tribe had a place; (2) by its 

 secular name, which was often descrip- 

 tive of its locality; (3) by the name of 

 its chief. The people sometimes spoke 

 of themselves by one of the names of 

 their village, or by that of their tribe, or 

 by the name of the confederacy to which 

 they belonged. This custom led to the 

 recording, by the earl}' travelers, of a mul- 

 tiplicity of names, several of which might 

 represent one community. This confusion 

 was augmented when not ail the tribes of 

 a confederacy spoke the same language; 

 in such cases a mispronunciation or a 

 translation caused a new name to be record- 

 ed. For instance, the native name of the 

 Caddo confederacy, Hasinai, ' our own 



