DICTIONARY OP INDIANS. 



Illinois. — Continued. 



states that the word illini signifies 

 a "perfect or accomplished man." 

 Although the term was used in 

 the earliest notices as referring to 

 a "nation'/' it applied in reality to 

 a confederacy of several tribes for- 

 merly occupying the southern por- 

 tion of Wisconsin, the northern part 

 of Illinois, and certain sections of 

 Iowa and Missouri. This account 

 therefore relates only to the con- 

 federacy, the component tribes being 

 treated under their respective names 

 (Cahokia, Kaskaskia, Michigamea 

 (Mouingouena) , Peoria, and Tam- 

 aroa, q. v.). 



The Illinois are first mentioned by 

 the French writers (1640-58) as liv- 

 ing in the vicinity of Green bay. But 

 "vicinity" in this connection was a 

 very indefinite term, and applied to 

 tribes fifty or seventy-five leagues 

 distant as well as to those in the im- 

 mediate neighborhood. Whether 

 Nicollet (1634-39) reached any of the 

 tribes is not positively known. Jus- 

 tin Winsor (Cartier to Frontenac), 

 judging by the language of Vimont 

 (Jes. Rel., 1640), is inclined to think 

 he did, and although it is doubtful 

 whether he passed down Wisconsin 

 river, this writer remarks that "it 

 seems far more certain that Nicollet 

 pushed directly south and reached 

 the tribe of the Illinois, where he saw 

 something of the Sioux, who were in 

 that neighborhood on an expedition 

 from the country farther west." The 

 Jesuit Relation for 1660 represents 

 them as living southwest from Green 

 bay in sixty villages, and gives the 

 extravagant estimate of the poptila- 

 tion as 20,000 men or 100,000 souls. 

 AUouez, who met a body of them at 

 La Pointe, on Lake Superior, says, 

 "The Illinois do not live in these 

 parts; their country is more than 

 sixty leagues from here at the south 

 beyond a great river." At the time of 

 his visit some three or four years 

 later, they were reduced to two vil- 

 lages in consequence of continual 

 wars with the Sioux, Iroquois, and 

 other tribes. It is evident, however, 

 that he refers to those with whom 

 he came in contact or of whom he 

 obtained knowledge. There are no re- 

 liable data or native traditions relat- 

 ing to the direction from which they 

 came, nor the point at which they 

 entered the region in which they were 

 first found by the whites. It is prob- 

 able, however, that they came through 

 the lower peninsula of Michigan, for 

 they are not mentioned in the early 



accounts in connection with Macki- 

 naw or Sault Ste Marie; it is known 

 that the Mascoutin (q. v.), with 

 whom they are probably related, 

 came by this route; it is also gener- 

 ally conceded that the Sauk and 

 Fox (q. v.), who, as well as the Mas- 

 coutin, were found in Wisconsin 

 north of the Illinois, came by the 

 same route; their somewhat close re- 

 lationship with the Miami, who, with 

 the Kickapoo and Mascoutin, are in- 

 cluded by some of the old authorities 

 under the term "Illinois," would 

 seem to favor this view, as nothing is 

 found indicating that either of these 

 tribes was ever located at, or in, the 

 vicinity of Mackinaw, or the Sault. 

 The statement in the Jesuit Relations 

 that they came from the border of a 

 great sea in the far west arose, no 

 doubt (as Tailhan suggests), from a 

 misunderstanding of the term "great 

 water" given by the Indians, which 

 in fact referred to the Mississippi. 

 Their exact location when first heard 

 of by the whites cannot be de- 

 termined with certainty, as the 

 tribes and bands were more or less 

 scattered over southern Wisconsin, 

 northern Illinois, and along the west 

 bank of the Mississippi. They first 

 came in actual contact with them 

 (unless it be true that Nicollet visited 

 them) at La Pointe (Chegoimegon) , 

 where AUouez met a party in 1667 

 which was visiting that point for pur- 

 poses of trade. In 1670 the same 

 priest found a number of them at the 

 Mascoutin village on upper Fox 

 river, some nine miles from where 

 Portage City now stands, but this 

 band then contemplated joining their 

 brethren on the Mississippi. The 

 different statements in regard to 

 the number of their villages at this 

 period and the indefiniteness as to 

 localities render it difficult to reach 

 a satisfactory conclusion on these 

 points. It appears that some villages 

 were located on the west side of the 

 Mississippi, in what is now the state 

 of Iowa, yet the larger portion of the 

 tribes belonging to the confederacy 

 resided at points in northern Illinois. 

 When Marquette journeyed down 

 the Mississippi in 1673, he found the 

 Peoria and Moingouena on the west 

 side, about the mouth of the Des 

 Moines river. On his return he 

 found them on Illinois river, near the 

 site of the present city of Peoria. 

 Thence he passed northward to the 

 village of Kaskaskia, on upper Illinois 

 river, within the limits of the present 

 Lasalle county. At this time the 



