214 



PAWNEE 



[b. a. 



cognate tribes. The people called them- 

 selves Chahiksichahiks, ' men of men. ' 



In the general northeastwardly move- 

 ment of the Caddoan tribes the Pawnee 

 seem to have brought up the rear. 

 Their migration was not in a compact 

 body, but in groups, whose slow prog- 

 ress covered long periods of time. The 

 Pawnee tribes finally established them- 

 selves in the valley of Platte r., Nebr., 

 which territory, their traditions say, 

 was acquired by conquest, but the peo- 

 ple who were driven out are not named. 

 It is not improbable that in making 

 their way n. e. the Pawnee may have 

 encountered one or more waves of the 

 southward movements of Shoshonean 

 and Athapascan tribes. When the Siou- 

 an tribes entered Platte valley they 

 found the Pawnee there. The geographic 

 arrangement always observed by the four 

 leading Pawnee tribes may give a hint 

 of the order of their northeastward move- 

 ment, or of their grouping in their tra- 

 ditionary southwestern home. The Skidi 

 place was to the n. w., and they were 

 spoken of as belonging to the upper 

 villages; the Pitahauerat villages were 

 always downstream; those of the Chaui, 

 in the middle, or between the Pita- 

 hauerat and the Kitkehahki, the villages 

 of the last-named being always upstream. 

 How^ long the Pawnee resided in the Platte 

 valley is unknown, but their stay was long 

 enough to give new terms to ' west ' and 

 'east,' that is, words equivalent to 'up' or 

 'down' that eastwardly flowing stream. 



The earliest historic mention of a Paw- 

 nee is that of theso-called"Turk" (q. v. ), 

 who by his tales concerning the riches of 

 Quivira (q. v.) allured and finally led 

 Coronado, in 1541, from New Mexico 

 over the plains as far as Kansas, where 

 some Pawnee (see Harahey) visited him. 

 The permanent villages of the tribes lay 

 to the N. of Quivira, and it is improbable 

 that Coronado actually entered any of 

 them during his visit to Quivira, a name 

 given to the Wichita territory. It is 

 doubtful if the Apane or the Quipana 

 mentioned in the narrative of De Soto's 

 expedition in 1541 were the Pawnee, as 

 the latter dwelt to the n. w\ of the Span- 

 iards' line of travel. Nor is it likely that 

 the early French explorers visited the 

 Pawnee villages, although they heard of 

 them, and their locality was indicated by 

 Tonti, La Harpe, and others. French 

 traders, however, were established among 

 the tribes before the middle of the 18th 

 century. 



How the term Pani (q. v.), or Paw- 

 nee, as applied to Indian slaves, came 

 into use is not definitely known. It was 

 a practice among the French and English 

 in the 17th and 18th centuries to obtain 

 from friendly tribes their captives taken 



in war and to sell them as slaves to 

 white settlers. By ordinance of Apr. 13, 

 1709, the enslavement of negroes and 

 Pawnee was recognized in Canada (Shea's 

 Charlevoix, v, 224, 1871). The Pawnee 

 do not seem to have suffered especially 

 from this traffic, which, though lucra- 

 tive, had to be abandoned on account 

 of the animosities it engendered. The 

 white settlers of New Mexico became 

 familiar with the Pawnee early in the 17th 

 century through the latter's raids for pro- 

 curing horses, and for more than two 

 centuries the Spanish authorities of that 

 territory sought to bring about peaceful 

 relations with them, with only partial 

 success. 



As the Pawnee villages lay in a coun- 

 try remote from the region contested by 

 the Spaniards and French in the 17th 

 and ISth centuries, these Indians escaped 

 for a time the influences that proved so 

 fatal to their congeners, but ever-increas- 

 ing contact with the white race, in the 

 latter part of the 18th century, intro- 

 duced new diseases and brought great 

 reduction in population together with loss 

 of tribal pow' er. When the Pawnee terri- 

 tory, through the Louisiana Purchase, 

 passed under the control of the U. S., the 

 Indians came in close touch with the 

 trading center at St Louis. At that time 

 their territory lay between the Niobrara r. 

 on the N. and Prairie Dog cr. on the 

 s., and was bounded on the w. by the 

 country of the Cheyenne and Arapaho, 

 and on the e. by that of the Omaha, 

 on the N. of the Platte, and on the s. of 

 the Platte by the lands of the Oto and 

 Kansa tribes. The trail to the S.W., and 

 later that across the continent, ran partly 

 through Pawnee land, and the increas- 

 ing travel and the settlement of the 

 country brought about many changes. 

 Through all the vicissitudes of the 19th 

 century the Pawnee never made war 

 against the LT. S. On the contrary they 

 gave many evide. .ces of forbearance under 

 severe provocation by waiting, under 

 their treaty agreement, for the Govern- 

 ment to right their wrongs, while Pawnee 

 scouts faithfully and courageously served 

 in the IT. S. army during Indian hostil- 

 ities. The history of the Pawnee has 

 been that common to reservation life — 

 the gradual abandonment of ancient cus- 

 toms and the relinquishment of homes 

 before the pressure of white immigration. 



The first treaty between -the Pawnee 

 and the U. S. was that of the several 

 bands made at St Louis, June 18-22, 

 1818, when peace was concluded with all 

 the tribes of the region disturbed by the 

 War of 1812. By treaty of Ft Atkinson 

 (Council Bluffs), Iowa, Sept. 28, 1825, 

 thePawnee acknowledged the supremacy 

 of the U. S. and agreed to submit all 



