ion MYTHS OF THK ('HKRI)KKE [eth. an.s.19 



tiua whiel] tlie Spaniards met here, but the only deseriptioii of the town itseU" is from 

 Garcilaso, who sa.ys that it was situated in the midst of many small streams which 

 came down from the mountains round about, tliat it consisted of three hundred 

 houses, which is probably an exaggeration, though it goes to sliov\' that tlic; \illage 

 was of considerable size, and that the chief's house, in which the principal officers 

 were lodgeil, was upon a high hill ("un cerro alto"), around which was a roadway 

 ( " paseadero" ) wide enough for six men to walk abreast. By the "chief's house" 

 we are to understand the tijwn-house, while from various similar references in other 

 parts of the narrative there can be nodoubt that the "hill" upon which it stood was 

 an artificial mound. In modern Spanish writing such artificial elevations are more 

 often called lomas, but these early adventurers may be excused for not noting the 

 distinction. Issuing from the mountains round about the town were numerous small 

 streams, which united to form the river which the Spaniards lienceforth followed 

 from here down to Cliiaha, where it was as large as the Guadalipiivir at Scvilla 

 (Garcilaso). 



Deceived by the occurrence, in the Portuguese narrative, of the name C'anasagua, 

 which they assumed could belong in l)ut one plai'e, earlier commentators have 

 identified this river with the Coosa, Pickett putting Guaxule somewliere upon its 

 upper waters, wliile Jones improves upon this by making the site "identical, or very 

 nearly so, with Coosa wattee Old town, in the southeastern corner of Murray county," 

 Georgia. As M-e shall show, however, the name in question was duplicated in several 

 states, and a careful study of the narratives, in the light of present knowledge of the 

 country, makes it evident that the river was not the Coosa, but the Chattahoochee. 



Turning our attention once more to Xuala, the most northern ]joint reached liy 

 lie Soto, we have seen that this was the territory of the Suwala or Sara Indians, in 

 the eastern foothills of the Alleghenies, about the head waters of Broad and Catawl>a 

 rivers, in North Carolina. As the Spaniards turned here to the west they ])rol)alily 

 did not penetrate far beyond the present South Carolina boundary. The "very high 

 mountain ridge" which they crossed immediately after leaving the town was in all 

 probability the main chain of the Blue ridge, while the river which they found after 

 descending to the savanna on the other side, and which they guessed to be a l)ranch 

 of the Mississi])pi, was almost as certainly the upper part of the French Broad, the 

 first stream flowing in an opposite direction from those which they had previously 

 encountered. They may have struck it in the neighborhood of Hendersonville or 

 Brevard, there being two gaps, passable for vehicles, in the main ridge eastward 

 from the first-named town. The uninhabited mountains through which they strug- 

 gled for several days on their way to Chiaha and Coi,-a (the Creek country) in the 

 southwest were the broken ridges in which the Savannah and the Little Tennessee 

 have their sources, and if they followed an Indian trail they may have passed through 

 the Rabun gap, near the present Clayton, Georgia. Guaxule, and not Xuala, as Jones 

 supposes, was in Nacoochee valley, in the present White county, (reorgia, and the 

 small streams which united to form the river down which the Spaniards ])roceeded 

 to Chiaha were the headwaters of the Chattahoochee. The hill upon which the 

 townhouse was built must have been the great Nacoochee mound, the most promi- 

 nent landmark in the valley, on the east bank of Sautee creek, in White county, 

 about twelve miles northwest of Clarkesville. This is the largest mound in upjjer 

 Georgia, with the exception of the noted Etowah mound near Cartersville, and is the 

 only one which can fill the requirements of the case. There are but tw'o consider- 

 able mounds in western North Carolina, that at Franklin and a smaller one on Ocona- 

 luftee river, on the present East Cherokee reser\'ation, and as both of these are on 

 streams flowing away from the Creek country, this fact alone would bar them from 

 consideration. The only large mounds in upper Creorgia are this one at Nacoochee 

 and the group fin the Etowah river, near Cartersville. The largest of tlie Etowah 

 group is some fifty feet in height and is ascended on one side by means of a roadway 



