18 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 137 



of local autonomy. This was true even on the north Pacific coast 

 where food was so abundant that great numbers could maintain them- 

 selves in close contact with one another for long periods. It is still 

 more apparent among the purely hunting, fishing, and food-gathering 

 tribes of Texas and northeastern Mexico. Tribal solidarity and a 

 certain measure of governmental unification begin to make their ap- 

 pearance, however, when we reach the coast tribes which also raised 

 corn, but an examination of such tribes often discloses certain dis- 

 turbing factors. Thus the Chitimacha were rather a lacustrine and 

 inland people than a purely coastal tribe, and the same may be said of 

 most of the tribes of northern Florida. Spanish records indicate that 

 the Indians of the Georgia coast, in the province known as Guale, 

 recognized a head chief. It is, however, doubtful how long they had 

 been in this section and to what extent this headship was of purely 

 native origin. The Indians of the adjoining "province" of Orista, 

 in what is now South Carolina, seem to have been closely related in 

 both language and culture, but to have had no supreme chief and no 

 central organization. Exceptions also seem to confront us in the 

 tidewater sections of North Carolina and Virginia, but the larger 

 tribal aggregates appear to have been superficial and unstable. The 

 most conspicuous governmental unit here was the so-called Powhatan 

 Confederation, or "Empire of Powhatan." In 1607, when the English 

 came to Jamestown, more than 30 tribes belonged to it, but we are 

 informed that all but 6 of these had been brought under one govern- 

 ment by the chief, Powhatan himself, and the others represented con- 

 quests by his father. It is likely that a state built up in such a sum- 

 mary manner might dissolve with equal rapidity, and this very thing 

 probably happened in the case of the Weapemeoc, which, when the 

 Raleigh colonists landed at Roanoke, extended over the greater part 

 of the present North Carolina mainland north of Albemarle Sound, 

 but by 1650 had been replaced by 4 or 5 independent bands. These 

 "empires" were merely temporary aggregations of the small local units 

 normally found in fishing and hunting territories. It must also be 

 remembered that most of the coastal tribes which formed larger aggre- 

 gations raised corn and pursued communal methods of agriculture of 

 the kind in vogue among the interior nations and that this was a main 

 factor in the evolution of their several tribal organizations. Else- 

 where I have suggested that the littoral states may have represented 

 in some measure a protective reaction against the pressure of the 

 interior agrarian nations. 



In one place, southwestern Florida, we have what appears to have 

 been a powerful littoral community which grew up without any 

 assistance from agriculture. This was the Calusa tribe, which, if we 

 may trust our Spanish authorities, was under the well-nigh auto- 



