SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS BELIEFS AND USAGES 
OF THE CHICKASAW INDIANS 
By Joun R. Swanton 
INTRODUCTION 
In the Forty-second Annual Report of the Bureau of American 
Ethnology I treated the social, religious, and medical usages of the 
Indians of the Creek Confederation, and the present paper is an 
attempt to perform an identical service for the Chickasaw. The same 
general system has been followed, but the tribe now under discussion 
constituted a much smaller and much more homogeneous group, 
occupied less territory, and attracted less attention from early writers. 
Moreover, the publication of the Creek material has rendered un- 
necessary an equally elaborate account of a tribe resembling the 
Creeks as closely as did the Chickasaw. 
The outstanding character of the work of the English trader James 
Adair required the constant use of his narrative as a basis in con- 
sidering Creek culture, but the greater part of his information ap- 
plies more immediately to the Chickasaw, and hence, in the present 
volume, it has been necessary to repeat much of the material fur- 
nished by him. A short sketch of the early history of this tribe is 
contained in Bulletin 73. Their later fortunes have been traced by 
James H. Malone in “ The Chickasaw Nation,” and in various articles 
in the Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society. A rela- 
tively recent paper by Prof. Frank G. Speck constitutes an invaluable 
contribution to the subject. From living Indians I have been able 
to add a certain amount of material, particularly on the side of 
Chickasaw social organization, but there are surprisingly few who 
can furnish reliable information. The material culture of all the 
southeastern Indians was so much alike, and so few of the local 
peculiarities, which undoubtedly did exist, have been preserved that 
this subject is best considered for the region taken as a whole. Some- 
thing has been said regarding it in my small paper on “ The Culture 
of the Southeast ” in the Forty-second Annual Report, but an ade- 
quate presentation of the subject is still awaited. 
173 
