842 



MENOMINEE 



[b. a. E. 



former Chippewa village on the e. bank 

 of Saginaw r., in lower Michigan. — Sagi- 

 naw treaty (1820) in U. S. Ind. Treat., 

 142, 1873. 



Menominee {meno, by change from mino, 

 'good', 'beneficent'; m/»,a 'grain', 'seed', 

 the Chippewa name of the wild rice. — 

 Hewitt. Full name Menominkvok inini- 

 icok, the latter term signifying 'they are 

 men'). An Algonquian tribe, the mem- 

 bers of which, according to Dr William 

 Jones, claim to understand Sauk, Fox, 

 and Kickapoo far more easily than they 

 do Chippewa, Ottawa, and Potawatomi, 

 hence it is possible that their linguistic 

 relation is near to the former group of 

 Algonquians. Grignon (Wis. Hist. Soc. 



AMI3KQUEW — MENOMINEE MAN. 



Coll., Ill, 265, 1857) speaks of the 

 Noquet as a part of the Menominee, 

 and states that "the earliest locality 

 of the Menominee, at the first visits of 

 the whites, was at Bay de Noque and Me- 

 nominee r., and those at Bay de Noque 

 were called by the early French Des 

 Noques or Des Noquia." {^^e Noquet.) 

 The Jesuit Relation for 1671 includes the 

 Menominee among the tribes driven from 

 their country — that is, "the lands of the 

 south next to Michilimackinac," which 

 is the locality where the Noquet lived 

 when they first became known to the 

 French. It is generally believed that the 

 Noquet, who disappeared from history at 

 a comparatively early date, were closely 

 related to the Chippewa and were incor- 

 porated into their tribes; nevertheless,. 

 the name Menominee must have been 



adopted after the latter reached their his- 

 toric seat; it is possible they were pre- 

 viously known as Noquet. Charlevoix 

 (Jour. Voy., ii, 61, 1761) says: "I have 

 been assured that they had the same 

 original and nearly the same languages 

 with the Noquet and the Indians at the 

 Falls." 



The people of this tribe, so far as known, 

 were first encountered by the whites when 

 Nicolet visited them, probably in 1634, at 

 the mouth of Menominee r., Wis. -Mich. 

 In 1671, and henceforward until about 

 1852, their home was on or in the vicinity 

 of Menominee r., not far from where they 

 were found l^y Nicolet, their settlements 

 extending at times to Fox r. They have 

 generally been at peace with the whites. 

 A succinct account of them, as well as a 

 full description of their manners, customs, 

 arts, and beliefs, by Dr W. J. Hoffman, 

 appears in the 14th Rep. Bureau of Eth- 

 nology, 1896. In their treaty with the 

 United States, Feb. 8, 1831, they claimed 

 as their possession the land from the 

 mouth of Green bay to the mouth of Mil- 

 waukee r., and on the west side of the 

 bay from the height of land l)etween 

 it and L. Superior to the headwaters of 

 Menominee and Fox rs., which claim was 

 granted. They now reside on a reserva- 

 tion near the head of Wolf r., Wis. 



Major Pike described the men of the 

 tribe as "straight and well made, about 

 the middle size; their complexions gen- 

 erally fair for savages, their teeth good, 

 their eyes large and rather languishing; 

 they have a mild but independent ex- 

 pression of countenance that charms at 

 first sight. ' ' Although comparatively in- 

 dolent, they are described as generally 

 honest, theft being less common than 

 among many other tribes. Drunkenness 

 was their most serious fault, but even this 

 did not prevail to the same extent as 

 among some other Indians. Their beliefs 

 and rituals are substantially the same 

 as those of the Chippewa. They have 

 usually been peaceful in character, sel- 

 dom coming in. contact with the Sioux, 

 but l)itter enemies of the neighboring 

 Algonquian tribes. They formerly dis- 

 posed of their dead by inclosing the 

 bodies in long pieces of birchbark, or 

 in slats of wood, and burying them in 

 shallow graves. In order to protect the 

 body from wild beasts, three logs were 

 placed over the grave, two directly on 

 the grave, and the third on these, all 

 being secured by stakes driven on each 

 side. Tree burial was occasionally prac- 

 tised. 



The Menominee — as their name indi- 

 cates — subsisted in part on wild rice 

 {Zizania aquatica); in fact it is spoken of 

 by early writers as their chief vegetal 

 food. Although making such constant 



