120 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 137 



in 1699 when the first permanent French establishment on the Gulf 

 coast was instituted. Early references associate with their name that 

 of a tribe called Yakna-Chitto, "Big Country," a term which may 

 have been applied to part of the same people or to the Atakapa. 

 In 1702 St. Denis is said to have undertaken an expedition against 

 these Indians in order to procure slaves and, according to Penicaut, 

 who is our sole authority as to the identity of the tribe attacked, he 

 brought away 20 women and children. As soon as Bienville learned 

 of this, he ordered the captives to be restored to their people but 

 "these orders were badly executed." 



In August 1706, the Taensa invited the Chitimacha and Yakna- 

 Chitto to come to eat the corn of the Bayogoula after they had de- 

 stroyed the latter, but those who accepted the invitation were treach- 

 erously attacked and enslaved. Late the same year, a Chitimacha 

 war party, disappointed in an attempted revenge for this outrage, 

 discovered the missionary St. Cosme and 3 other Frenchmen en- 

 camped by the Mississippi and killed them, and on receiving word 

 of this Bienville induced all the nations along the Mississippi to 

 declare war on this tribe. In 1707 one of their villages was surprised 

 and destroyed by an allied force of French and Indians. Although 

 we hear of no other expeditions aimed directly against the Chiti- 

 macha, who retired into the remoter parts of their country behind a 

 network of bayous, many were captured and sold among the colonists 

 as slaves. On their side, the Chitimacha occasioned great annoyance 

 to the settlers on the Mississippi and this induced Bienville to make 

 peace with them. It was effected in the latter part of the year 1718 

 and Du Pratz supplies us with a long account of the ceremonies. 

 In 1719 part of them removed to the banks of the Mississippi, where 

 they continued to reside for a long period about the upper end of 

 Bayou Lafourche and as far north as the present Plaquemine. 

 Penicaut speaks as if all moved there, but it is probable that only 

 part of the nation was involved — the Mississippi band that is men- 

 tioned by a number of later writers. In 1784 Hutchins tells us that 

 there was a village of about 27 warriors on the Lafourche and 2 

 others on the Teche, 1 under Fire Chief (often known as Mingo 

 Luak), 10 leagues from the sea; the other under Red Shoes, a league 

 and a half higher up. The last of the Mississippi band appear to 

 have settled finally near Plaquemine, where a few years ago there 

 was a single survivor. There seem to have been more villages among 

 the western Chitimacha than the 2 mentioned, but all steadily de- 

 clined in numbers and were as steadily encroached upon by the whites 

 until their land was entirely occupied. The few survivors live at 

 Charenton on Bayou Teche. In 1882 Dr. A. S. Gatschet collected a 

 considerable vocabulary of the language at this place, and I obtained 



