Kaskaskia: Difference between revisions
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==Etymology== |
==Etymology== |
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The name 'Kaskaskia' derives from the old [[Miami-Illinois]] word for the [[katydid]], phonetically ''kaaskaaskia''. This name later appeared in the modern Peoria dialect as ''kaahkaahkia''. <ref>Costa, David J. 2000. Miami-Illinois Tribe Names. In John Nichols, ed., Papers of the Thirty-first Algonquian Conference 30-53. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba.</ref> |
The name 'Kaskaskia' derives from the old [[Miami-Illinois]] word for the [[katydid]], phonetically ''kaaskaaskia''. This name later appeared in the modern Peoria dialect as ''kaahkaahkia''. <ref>Costa, David J. 2000. Miami-Illinois Tribe Names. In John Nichols, ed., Papers of the Thirty-first Algonquian Conference 30-53. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba.</ref> This is already seen in Gravier's early-18th century Illinois dictionary, where for the word <caskaskia>, he gives "‘cigale. item nation Ilinoise, les Kaskaskias". |
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==In popular culture== |
==In popular culture== |
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Revision as of 20:29, 16 May 2010
 | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (August 2008) |
The Kaskaskia were one of about a dozen cognate tribes that made up the Illiniwek Confederation or Illinois Confederation. Their first contact with Europeans reportedly occurred near present-day Green Bay, Wisconsin in 1667 at a Jesuit mission station. The Illinois are reported to have asked the French to send a missionary to them in their home country.
History
In 1673, Jesuit Father Jacques Marquette and French-Canadian explorer Louis Jolliet became the first Europeans known to have descended the Mississipi River. The record of their trip is our earliest, best record of contact between Europeans and the Illinois Indians. Marquette and Jolliet, with five other men, left the mission of St. Ignace at Michilimackinac in two bark canoes on May 17. They travelled to the Mississippi River across Lake Michigan into Green Bay, up the Fox River and down the Wisconsin River. Descending the Mississippi, in June, they met the Peoria and Moingwena bands of Illinois at the Haas/Hagerman Site near the mouth of the Des Moines River in Clark County, northeastern Missouri. They met another Illinois band, the Michigamea, when they reached present-day Arkansas. They began their return trip from this Michigamea village about July 17, following the Illinois River eastward to Lake Michigan rather than taking the more northern route along the Wisconsin River. Near modern Utica in LaSalle County, Illinois, across from Starved Rock, they met the Kaskaskia at the Grand Village of the Illinois (now a State Historic Site, also known as the Zimmerman Site). The land controlled by the allied Illinois groups extended north from modern Arkansas, through Eastern Missouri and most of Illinois, and west into Iowa, where [[Des Moines, Iowa]Des Moines]] was named after the Moingwena[1]
In 1703, the French followed up the Marquette/Joliet expedition with the establishment of a permanent mission and settlement at Kaskaskia.[2] French settlers moved in to farm and to exploit the lead mines on the Missouri side of the river. Kaskaskia became the capital of Upper Louisiana and Fort de Chartes was built in 1718. In the same year Black slaves were brought in from Santo Domingo to work in the lead mines.[3] From its beginning, Kaskaskia was a French/Indian settlement, consisting of a few French men and a large number of Kaskaskia and other Illinois Indians. In 1707, the population of the community was estimated at 2,200, the majority of them Illinois Indians who lived somewhat apart. A visitor, writing of Kaskaskia about 1715, said that the village consisted of 400 Illinois men, "very good people," two Jesuit missionaries, and "about twenty French voyageurs who have settled there and married Indian woman."[4] Of twenty-one children whose birth and baptism was recorded in Kaskaskia before 1714 eighteen mothers were Indian and twenty fathers were French. The offspring of these mixed marriages could become either French or Indian. One devout Catholic full-blooded Indian woman disowned her half-breed son for living "among the savage nations."[5]
From the French, the Indians, and the mixed bloods at Kaskaskia came the voyageurs and coureur des bois who would explore and exploit the Missouri River country. The French had the goal of trading with all the prairie tribes and beyond with the Spanish colony in New Mexico -- a prospect which horrified the Spanish. French goals stimulated the expedition of Claude Charles Du Tisne to establish trade relations with the Plains Indians in 1719. The fate of the Kaskaskia, and the rest of the Illiniwek/Illinois, was irrevocably tied up with that of France. Until their dissolution in France, French Jesuits built missions and ministered to the Kaskaskia. When the Seven Years' War (called the French and Indian War in North America) ended, the Kaskaskia and other Illinois tribes were greatly in decline. The original population estimate reported by early French explorers varied from 6,000 to more than 20,000. By the conclusion of the French and Indian War, the number was a fraction of the original. Contemporary historians believe the greatest fatalities were due to infectious diseases to which the Native Americans had no immunity.
The causes of decline are many and varied (See the work of Emily Blasingham, M.A. Indiana University, published in Ethnohistory journal). The Illinois made war with their French allies against the most formidable native nations: to the east, the Iroquois; to the northwest, the Sioux and the Fox; to the south, the Chickasaw and Cherokee; to the west, the Osage Nation. Add to combat losses the great losses to epidemics of European diseases. In 1769, a Peoria warrior killed Pontiac, which brought down upon the Kaskaskia and other Illinois tribes, the wrath of the Great Lakes tribes. (This legendary retaliation may not have happened in fact; see the article on Pontiac.) The Ottawa, Sauk, Fox, Miami, Kickapoo and Potawatomi devastated the Illiniwek and occupied their old tribal range along the Illinois River.
The descendants of the Kaskaskia live in Oklahoma under the banner of the Confederated Peoria Tribe of Oklahoma.
The British arrived in 1766 and build Fort Gage.
On July 4, 1778 George Rogers Clark captured the town and Fort Gage[6].
Etymology
The name 'Kaskaskia' derives from the old Miami-Illinois word for the katydid, phonetically kaaskaaskia. This name later appeared in the modern Peoria dialect as kaahkaahkia. [7] This is already seen in Gravier's early-18th century Illinois dictionary, where for the word <caskaskia>, he gives "‘cigale. item nation Ilinoise, les Kaskaskias".
In popular culture
The term "Kaskaskia" lives on in Illinois. The Kaskaskia River, whose headwaters are near Champaign in central Illinois, and whose mouth is near Ellis Grove, Illinois, still carries the name of this native nation who once settled throughout its estuarial plain. Kaskaskia College is located near Centralia, Illinois, in rural Clinton County. The city of DuQuoin, Illinois, carries the name of Jean Baptiste DuQuoin (sometimes DuQuoigne), a notable Kaskaskia chieftain of their later history. Kaskaskia, Illinois was the first capital of Illinois. Also the Kaskaskia Baptist Association located in Patoka, Illinois carries this name. The USS Kaskaskia (AO-27) also carries the name.
References
- ^ Stelle, Lenville J. "2005 Inoca Ethnohistory Project: Eye Witness Descriptions of the Contact Generation, 1673 -1700." Center For Social Research, Parkland College. http://virtual.parkland.edu/lstelle1/len/center_for_social_research/inoca_ethnohistory_project/inoca_ethnohistory.htm, accessed Apr 14, 2010
- ^ http://www.nps.gov/archTheBicentennial/Symposium2001/Papers/Faherty_FrWilliam.htm, accessed, Apr 14, 2010
- ^ http://www.kansasgenealogy.com/history/du_tisne.htm, accessed Apr 14, 2010
- ^ Norall, Frank. Bourgmont, Explorer of the Missouri, 1698-1725. Lincoln: U of Neb Press, 1988, 107
- ^ Ekberg, Carl J. French Roots in the Illinois Country: The Mississippi Frontier in Colonial Times. Chicage: U of Ill Press, 2000, 153-154
- ^ Fort Kaskaskia State Historic Site
- ^ Costa, David J. 2000. Miami-Illinois Tribe Names. In John Nichols, ed., Papers of the Thirty-first Algonquian Conference 30-53. Winnipeg: University of Manitoba.