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[This sounds like a description of a people called "Twightwee" or "Wittowees", but this is the first I have heard of such a description for "Atquanachuke". For a different description, google the name combined with "Access Genealogy".] From their word meaning "crane," these Indians were a principal division of the Miami. After hostilities with the Illinois Indians, they moved west of the Mississippi River, where they found more conflict when they were attacked by the Sioux . Moving once again, they briefly settled near the Jesuit mission at Green Bay, before making their way into Illinois and Indiana with the rest of the tribe.

Atfaiati[]

Also known as the Tualatin, they were a band of the Kalapuya tribe that formerly inhabited the Tualatin Valley in

Bird mask

northwest Oregon. Though they had a hunter-gather lifestyle, they also had permanent villages they inhabited during the winter months. Little is known of their native customs. White settlers began to invade their territory in the early 19th century, and by 1842, their population had been much decreased by disease to only about 600. By 1848, it had shrunk to only about 60 people. In 1855, the government negotiated a treaty with the larger Kalapuya group that included the Atfalati tribe, which

removed the Atfalati to the Grand Ronde Indian Reservation at the foothills of the Oregon Coast Range where they lived with a variety of other tribes. By the early 1900's they had further dwindled to only about 20 people.

Athapascan Family[]

The most widely distributed of all the Indian linguistic families of North America, they formerly extending over parts of the continent from the Arctic coast far into north Mexico, from the Pacific Ocean to Hudson Bay at the north, and from the Colorado River to the mouth of the Rio Grande at the south. The languages which compose the Athapascan family are plainly related to each other and, because of certain peculiarities, stand out from the other American languages with considerable distinctness. Phonetically they were rendered harsh and difficult for European ears because of series of guttural sounds, use of tone, many continuants, and frequent checks and aspirations. The name Athabaskan was assigned by Albert Gallatin in his 1836 classification of the languages of North America.


The wide differences in physical type and culture and the differences in language point to a long separation of the family, certainly covering many centuries. The Athabaskan family is conventionally divided into three groups based largely on geographic distribution: Northern Athabaskan, Pacific Coast Athabaskan, and Southern Athabaskan. Northern Athabaskan was spoken in the northern part of North America, particularly in Alaska and the Yukon and included 31 languages. The Pacific Coast Athabaskan languages were spoken in southern Oregon and northern California and included seven different languages. The Southern Athabaskan languages were spoken primarily in the Southwest, including including Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, and Sonora, Mexico. These languages were spoken by various groups of Apache and Navajo peoples.

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