262 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHXOLOGT [Bull. 137 



The names of the Tunica months have not been preserved, though 

 we are told that the Indians lived during one of these on persimmons 

 (Shea, 1861, p. 134). 



For some reason difficult to explain, we have fewer references to 

 the economic cycle among the great inland tribes, the Creeks, Chick- 

 asaw, and Choctaw, than for those on the margins. Swan gives us 

 a very reliable statement regarding the Creek calendar, and we have 

 strong evidence that the Choctaw system was practically identical 

 in former times, though during the nineteenth century the month 

 names, not having been corrected with reference to the natural events 

 to which they properly applied, had gotten dislodged from their true 

 positions. Swan distinguishes a series of winter months and a series 

 of summer months, but the former began, not with cold weather, but 

 apparently with the busk, or green corn ceremony, and the summer 

 months began with February. Their year was from equinox to 

 equinox rather than solstice to solstice. The winter months were: 

 Much Heat, or Big Ripening (August) , Little Chestnut (September) , 

 Big Chestnut (October), Iholi, probably signifying "Frost," or 

 "Change in Weather" (November), Big Winter (December), and 

 Little Winter (January). The summer months were: Wind Month 

 (February), Little Spring (March), Big Spring (April), Mulberry 

 (May), Blackberry (June), and Little Warmth, or Little Ripening 

 (July) (Swan, 1855, p. 276). The only names which the Creeks 

 shared with the Natchez were the names of the month of Mulberries 

 and the month (or months) of Chestnuts, but their positions in the 

 series differ. The Creek month names also show a striking contrast 

 to those used by the Natchez in that relatively few of them refer to 

 articles of food. The only ones are the Little Chestnut month. Big 

 Chestnut month, Mulberry month, and Blackberry month, and these 

 do not indicate foods of cardinal importance. The Chickasaw months 

 would probably be found to agree with the Creek and Choctaw. 



Speaking of all the Southeastern Indians of his acquaintance, Adair 

 says: 



They divided the year into spring — summer — autumn, or the fall of the leaf — 

 and winter. . . . They number their years by any of those four periods, for 

 they have no name for a year; and they subdivide these, and count the year 

 by lunar months . . . They count the day also by the three sensible differences 

 of the sun. . . . They subdivide the day, by any of the aforesaid three stand- 

 ards — as half way between the sun's coming out of the water; and in like 

 manner by midnight, or cock-crowing, &c. . . . They begin the year, at the 

 first appearance of the first new moon of the vernal equinox, according to the 

 ecclesiastical year of Moses. . . . They pay a great regard to the first appear- 

 ance of every new moon, and, on the occasion, always repeat some joyful sounds, 

 and stretch out their hands towards her — but at such times they offer no public 

 sacrifice. . . . When they lack a full moon, or when they travel, they count by 

 sleeps. (Adair, 1775, pp. 74-77.) 



