SwANTON] INDIANS OF THE SOUTHEASTEHN UNITED STATES 297 



in the Southwest in the present States of Mississippi and Louisiana ; 

 and Sagittaria in several places. The Zamia integrifoUa, palm 

 berries, coco berries, and seagrapes belonged to the south Florida 

 province, the one which lacked cultivated plants. 



Raspberries were utilized in the northern highlands, but there 

 are notes of them in Florida and Louisiana which have reference 

 either to the blackcaps or to blackberries. The sugar maple was also 

 exploited in highland portions of the area. 



A mushroom was used by the Natchez and honey locusts by the 

 Creeks and Cherokee. 



Plants and trees introduced at a comparatively early date include 

 the passiflora, watermelon, muskmelon, peach, peanut, canna, sor- 

 ghum, the cultivated sweetpotato, rice, okra, apple, fig, and orange. 



Staple animal foods in every section were provided by the deer 

 and bear, the former being valued mainly for its flesh, the latter for 

 its fat. In the northern and western parts these were supplemented by 

 the bison and elk, and the former was probably a much more impor- 

 tant game animal in prehistoric times than it became later. Most 

 important of the small animals were the rabbit and the squirrel, the 

 former mentioned oftenest in the northeastern section and the latter 

 among the Choctaw. In De Soto's time rabbits were eaten everywhere. 

 Presents of rabbits were made to the Spaniards at Ocute on the east 

 side of Ocmulgee River, and by the Chickasaw, and the explorers 

 learned to trap them in the aboriginal manner west of the Mississippi 

 (Bourne, 1904, vol. 1, pp. 56, 101, 145; vol. 2, p. 22). The beaver and 

 otter were eaten in Virginia and probably in the coast region of 

 North Carolina. The former was also hunted by the Siouan tribes 

 of both Carolinas, but neither appears as a food animal else- 

 where, and Adair (1775, p. 132) says that the beaver was anciently 

 tabooed by the Chickasaw. Lawson states that the Indians of his 

 acquaintance, meaning the Siouan people of the Carolinas and prob- 

 ably the Tuscarora, ate panthers, polecats, wildcats, opossums, and 

 raccoons, while Lederer tells us that the former consumed wildcats 

 although their flesh was rank. (Lawson, 1860, p. 290; Alvord, 1912, 

 p. 147.) "Leopards," presumably panthers, were presented to Lau- 

 donniere, by Florida Indians (1586, p. 130), but it does not appear cer- 

 tain that they regarded them as food, and there are no other references 

 to suggest the eating of them in this section. Adair (1775, pp. 16, 132) 

 says that their flesh and the flesh of the opossum were equally taboo 

 among the Chickasaw. One of the smaller animals, such as the otter 

 or muskrat, may have been intended by the "rats" which were con- 

 sumed by the inhabitants of south Florida (Swanton, 1922, p. 388). 

 They also hunted the manatee, and their successors, the Seminole, who 

 called it the "big beaver" (Bartram, 1792), did the same. According 



