BOLL. 30J 



SASTAEETSI SATAPO 



469 



pal Pequot settlement. Soon after as- 

 suming the chiefship, in Oct. 1634 Sas- 

 sacus sent an emissary to the governor of 

 the Massachusetts Bay colony to ask for 

 a treaty of friendship, offering as an in- 

 ducement to surrender all the rights of the 

 Pequot to the lands they had conquered, 

 provided the colonists would settle a 

 plantation among his people, an offer 

 which he must have known he could not 

 carry out, and perhaps had no intention 

 of trying to fulfill, as he nourished bitter 

 enmity toward the whites. This pro- 

 posal had the effect of turning against 

 him Uncas, the Mohegan chief, who was 

 related to him by both blood and mar- 

 riage. The domain of the Pequot during 

 Sassacus's chiefship extended from Nar- 

 ragansett bay to Hudson r., including 

 the larger part of Long id., and it is said 

 that at the height of his prosperity no 

 fewer than 26 sachems were subordinate 

 to him. Because of his depredations, 

 especially on the neighboring tribes, the 

 colonists decided in 1636 to make war on 

 the Pequot. The name of Sassacus had 

 inspired such terror among the surround- 

 ing tribes that the Indian allies of the 

 whites could not believe the latter would 

 dare to make a direct attack on the 

 stronghold of this wily chief. The war 

 was soon ended, and Sassacus, having 

 suffered defeat and the loss of a large por- 

 tion of his people, fled with 20 or 30 of his 

 warriors to the INIohawk country. Even 

 here he found no safety, for before the 

 close of 1637 his scalp and those of his 

 brother and five other Pequot chiefs were 

 sent to the governor of Massachusetts by 

 the Mohawk. As Sassacus had carried 

 with him in his flight a large quantity of 

 wampum, a desire on the part of the 

 Mohawk to possess this treasure may 

 have led to the death of himself and his 

 followers. Sassacus was spoken of by 

 the commissioners in 1647 as "the ma- 

 lignant, furious Piquot," while, on the 

 other hand, De Forest styles him "a 

 renowned warrior and a noble and 

 high-spirited man." Consult De Forest, 

 Inds. Conn., 1852; Stone, Uncas and 

 Miantonomoh, 1842; Coll. Mass. Hist. 

 Soc, 1st s., IX, 1804; Drake, Inds. 

 N. A., 1880. (c. T.) 



Sastaretsi. See Adario. 



Sastean. A linguistic family established 

 by Powell (7th Rep. B. A. E., 105, 1891) 

 to include a single tribe, known as Shasta, 

 formerly occupying a part of the drain- 

 age area of Klamath and Sacramento rs., 

 N. California. The name is based on the 

 form Saste, given the tribe by Hale (U.S. 

 Expl. Exped., VI, 218, 1846). See Shasta, 

 Shastan Family. 



Sasthut ('black-bear bathing place'). 

 A Tatshiautin village on Connolly lake, 

 Brit. Col. 



Sas-thut.— Morice, Notes on W. D6n6s, 27, 1893, 

 Sest'sethut. — Morice in Trans. Roy. Soc. Can., X. 

 109, 1S93. 



Sasuagel. A Chumashan village for- 

 merly on Santa Cruz id., Cal. 

 Sasaguel, — Bancroft, Nat. Kaces, I, 459, 1874. 

 Sasuagel.— Taylor in Cal. Farmer, Apr. 24, 1863. 

 Swa-hol. — Heushaw, Buenaventura MS. vocab., 

 B. A., E., 1884. 



Satank. See Setangya. 



Satanta (properly Set-t'ain^-te, 'White 

 Bear'). A noted Kiowa chief, born 

 about 1830; died by suicide in prison, 

 Oct. 11, 1878. For about 15 years before 

 his death he was recognized as second 

 chief in his tribe, the first rank being ac- 

 corded to his senior, Setiingyii, or Satank, 

 and later to Lone Wolf, although probably 

 neither of these equaled him in force and 

 ability. His eloquence in council gained 

 for him thetitleof "Oratorof the Plains," 

 while his manly boldness and directness 

 and his keen humor made him a favorite 

 with army officers and commissioners in 

 spite of his known hostility to the white 

 man's laws and civilization. He was one 

 of the signers of the Medicine Lodge treaty 

 of 1867, by which his tribe agreed to go 

 on a reservation, his being the second 

 Kiowa name attached to the document. 

 The tribe, however, delayed coming in 

 until compelled by Custer, who seized 

 Satanta and Lone Wolf as hostages for 

 the fulfilment of the conditions. For 

 boastfully avowing his part in a murder- 

 ous raid into Texas in 1871, he, with 

 Setangya and Big Tree, was arrested and 

 held for trial in Texas. Setangya was 

 killed while resisting the guard. The 

 other two were tried and sentenced to 

 life imprisonment in the Texas State 

 penitentiary. Two years later they were 

 released, conditional upon the good be- 

 havior of their people, but in the fall of 

 1874, the Kiowa having again gone on 

 the warpath, Satanta was rearrested and 

 taken back to the penitentiary where he 

 finally committed suicide by throwing 

 himself from an upper story of the hos- 

 pital. 



In ai^pearance Satanta was a typical 

 Plains warrior, of fine physique, erect 

 bearing, and piercing glance. One who 

 saw him in prison in 1873 describes him 

 as "a tall, finely formed man, princely 

 in carriage, on whom even the prison 

 garb seemed elegant," and meeting his 

 visitor "with as much dignity and grace 

 as though he were a monarch receiving a 

 foreign ambassador." His memory is 

 cherished by the Kiowa as that of one of 

 their greatest men. See jNIooney, Calen- 

 dar History of the Kiowa Inds., 17th 

 Rep. B. A. E., 1898. (j. m.) 



Satapo (probably Creek: sdta 'persim- 

 mon,' api 'tree'). A town, possibly of 

 the Upper Creeks, mentioned by .fuan 

 de la Vandera in 1567 (Smith, Colec. 



