SWANTON] INDIANS OF THE SOUTHEASTERN UNITED STATES 355 



long rows of the latter, the women pound it in a large wooden mortar, which 

 is wide at the mouth, and gradually narrows to the bottom: then they knead 

 both together, wrap them up in green corn-blades of various sizes, about an 

 inch-thick, and boil them well, as they do every kind of seethed food. (Adair, 

 1775, p. 406.) 



The Choctaw called this hdnaha^ and it is thus described by the 

 Choctaw Peter Hudson, as recorded by Foreman : 



To make it the Choctaw Indians soak the shelled corn in water over night ; 

 then beat it in a mortar to separate the hulls from the grain ; the latter is 

 then put in a riddle or flat basket and by manipulation the husks are ex- 

 pelled over the side of the riddle ; the grain is then again placed in the 

 mortar and pounded into meal, which is made into dough. The dough is rolled 

 out into cylindrical segments of something less than a pound in weight. Each 

 of these is encased in corn shucks and around the middle tied with shucks 

 drawn tight so that the ends bulge somewhat larger than the middle. They 

 are boiled until done. When ready to serve the shucks are removed. Bread 

 so made was carried in the shuck container by hunters on their long expedi- 

 tions as it would keep for weeks. After a time it became dry and hard, but 

 the hunter placed it by his camp fire to warm and soften it. (Foreman, 1933, 

 pp. 308-309, footnote.) 



References to treatment of corn by the Caddo Indians are given 

 in Swanton (1942, pp. 127, 131). 



Percy, Smith, and Strachey give us the earliest accounts of bread 

 making in this section. Percy says : 



The manner of baking of bread is thus. After they pound their wheat into 

 flowre, with bote water they make it into paste, and worke it into round balls 

 and cakes, then they put it into a pot of seething water: when it is sod 

 thoroughly, they lay it on a smooth stone, there they harden it as well as in 

 an Oven. (Percy, in Smith, 1907 ed., p. 18.) 



The descriptions of Smith and Strachey are, as usual, parallel. 

 Smith tells us that 



they first steep [their matured and dried corn] a night in hot water, and in 

 the morning pounding it in a mortar, they use a small basket for their Temmes 

 [hulls, "tamis"], then pound againe the great, and so separating by dashing 

 their hand in the basket, receave the flower in a platter made of wood scraped 

 to that forme with burning and shels. Tempering this flower with water, 

 they make it either in cakes, covering them with ashes till they bee baked, 

 and then washing them in faire water, they drie presently with their owne 

 heat : or else boyle them in water eating the broth with the bread which they 

 call Ponap [ponak]. (Smith, Tyler ed., 1907, pp. 95-96.) 



Strachey puts this in a somewhat more intelligible form : 



Their old wheat (corn) they firste steepe a night in hot water, and in the 

 morning pounding yt in a morter, they use a small baskett for the boulter or 

 searser, and when they have syfted fourth the finest, they pound againe the 

 great, and so separating yt by dashing their hand in the baskett, receave the 

 flower in a platter of wood, which, blending with water, they make into flatt, 

 broad cakes, . . . and these they call appones, which covering with ashes 

 till they be baked . . . , and washing them in faire water, they let dry with 



