THE OHIO VALLEY-GREAT LAKES ETHNOHISTORY ARCHIVES: THE MIAMI COLLECTION
It is noted that the following works from the Miami Archives should
be read and considered within the historical context in which they were
composed and printed. The opinions expressed and the language used do not
reflect the opinions or standards of the Glenn A. Black Laboratory of
Archaeology, but are, rather, indicative of thought in that historical moment
during which the documents were published.
The Indians of the Western Great Lakes: 1615-1760
by W. Vernon Kinietz
(Occasional contributions of the Museum of Anthropology of the University of
Michigan)
(go to Introduction) (go to Location of the Tribe) (go to Population Chart)
The derivation of the word "Miami" is very uncertain. One conjecture is that it comes from the Chippewa word Omaumeg, which means "people who live on the peninsula." This seems plausible since the first reference to the Miami in the literature gave their name as "oumamik." (Gabriel Durillettes, Relation...1657-58, J.R., 44: 247). Other variants appearing soon were Oumamis, Oumami, and Miamiak (Claude-Jean Allouez, Relation...1669-70 J.R., 54: 207; idem Relation 1672-74, J.R., 58: 23). As the tribe became better known the form of the name became standardized, and after 1680 the customary designation used by the French was "Miami."
Most of the names applied to the Miami can be recognized easily. The ethnographic material identified with these names has been used. Many documents of the contact period that are without reference to the Miami doubtless related to them. There is no way of determining the relation of much of this material to this tribe, but many of the early references to the customs of the tribes designated as Illinois may be used for the Miami, since the term "illinois": was applied to various tribes in the first part of the contact period, as the following excerpt from Dablon shows:
As the name Outaouacs has been given to all the Savages of these regions, although of different Nations, because the first to appear among the French were the Outaouacs, so it is with the name of the Illinois, who are very numerous and dwell toward the South, since the first who visited point saint Esprit to trade were the Illinois (Relation...1670-71, J.R., 55: 207).
Numerous gaps in the information relating to the Miami have, in this work, been filled in with accounts designated as referring to the Illinois. This procedure is justified on the basis of the linguistic affinity of the two groups, the similarity of thgeir culture in points where data exist for both, and the looseness of the use of the term "Illinois" in the early accounts. All such borrowings have been indicated.
The Miami included the Wea, Atchatchakangouen, Pepicokia, Mengakonkia, Pinakashaw, and Kilatika. These divisions were often spoken of as separate tribes and also as Miami of a certain place. The first white contact with the Miami was the visit of Radisson and Groseilliers to the Mascouten and Miami village northwest of Green Bay about 1654. This was reported by Druillettes in 1658. At this time the major part of the tribe seems to have been occupying the region lying west of the southern end of Lake Michigan. Later, there was a movement of the tribe south and eastward, induced by the French, by the pressure of other tribes behind them, and, finally, by the desire to be nearer the English and the better trading conditions they offered.
The small group near Green Bay appears to have been merely an extension of the main body residing between the southern part of Lake Michigan and the Mississippi River. Its residence there is not mentioned after 1686. Marameg was a principal village of the main group. Its exact location is not known, but various maps indicated that it was near the headwaters of the Fox River, a tributary of the Illinois River. Druillettes mentioned a large group of Miami located sixty leagues from the Potawatomi village near the entrance to Green Bay. It is possible that he was referring to this group or village, although his population of 24,000 souls is obviously an exaggeration. Occasional references to the residence of the Miami on the banks of the Mississippi River may mean a village site there or perhaps only a temporary location for hunting or some other purpose.
There was a Miami and Mascouten village near the portage between the Kankakee and St. Joseph rivers in 1679, according to Henaepin and La Salle (Louis Hennepin, A New Discovery of a Vast country in America, 1: 143-44; Official Account of the Enterprises of La Salle, Margry, Decouvertes, 1, Pt. 2: 502). The St. Joseph River soon became known as the River of the Miami. Until the end of the contact period this was a favorite residence of the Indians, although after 1718 the Miami were largely replaced by Potawatomi. A strength of six hundred warriors was reported in 1695, but only ten or twenty were mentioned after 1718. The village was not at the same site throughout this period, but moved from place to place within the valley of the St. Joseph. The French designated the settlement simply as the St. Joseph River or the Post of the St. Joseph.
Upon the erection of Fort St. Louis at Starved Rock Illinois, by La Salle in 1682, some of the Miami settled nearby. According to Deliette they were still there in 1689, but moved north shortly afterward into the southern part of the present state of Wisconsin (Louis Deliette, Memoir, IHC, 23: 392). In 1691 part of this group was on the St. Joseph River, and the other part made an establishment at Chicago that was maintained for about twenty years (Ibid.). The Wabash Valley was the seat of some Miami Indians at least as early as 1694, and they remained there to the end of the contact period. The principal villages were located at or near the sites of Vincennes and Lafayette, Indiana. The village at the latter site was commonly known as Ouiatenon.
The establishment of Fort Pontchartrain at Detroit by Cadillac in 1701 likewise drew a few families of Miami from St. Joseph about a year later. This gathering grew until trouble with the Ottawa in 1706 and again in 1712 made the location undesirable to them. Leanings toward the English prompted a settlement on a site near the present Fort Wayne, Indiana. The French followed and built a fort among them. Desultory dealings with the English and the Iroquois continued until 1748, when, notwithstanding the efforts of the French, over four hundred families settled on Loramie Creek, one of the branches of the Big Miami River, where they could enjoy uninterrupted commerce with the English. Further movement eastward was halted when the French raided and razed this village in 1752. From that time until the close of the French regime they maintained at least nominal allegiance to the French and occupied villages in the Wabash Valley and the vicinity of Fort Wayne, with small settlements in the St. Joseph River Valley (Table II).
References to the number of Miami are meager. Usually, only estimates of the number of warriors are given, and these do not cover all the villages. Extension of the number of warriors to total population is open to error, but in this instance there is no other way of arriving at estimates of the population. In 1695 two villages had 1100 to 1200 warriors, (AC., CI: A, 13), in 1718 six villages had between 1400 and 1600 warriors (Jacques Sabrevois, Memoir, WHC., 16: 375-76), in 1736 three villages had 560 (Pierre J. Celeron, "Census of Indian Tribes: 1736," WHC., 17: 349-50), and in 1757 there were over 525 in three villages (Louis-Antoine de Bougainville, Memoir, WHC, 18: 175-76, 185). If three other persons are allowed to each warrior, it seems conservative to say that an original population of four to five thousand had shrunk to about two thousand at the close of the contact period.
Population, Number of Warriors and Villages
|
DATE |
|
NUMBER OF WARRIORS |
|
NUMBER OF VILLAGES |
|
POPULATION |
|
|
1695 |
|
1100-1200 |
|
2 |
|
4400-4800 |
|
CHARACTERISTICS
The Miami were of medium height, shapely, somewhat stockier than the members of the cognate Illinois tribe, but
TABLE II*
REPORTED LOCATIONS OF MIAMI
UPPER FOX OR LITTLE WOLF RIVER, WIS.: Druillettes (1658), Silvy (1667), Allouez (1673), Denonville (1686)
MARAMBO: Druillettes (1658), Narratives of Occurrence (1693), AC, C''A, 13 (1695), La Potherie (1702), Raudot (1710)
BANKS OF MISSISSIPPI RIVER: Allouez (1673), La Potherie (1690), Raudot (1710)
ST. JOSEPH RIVER VALLEY: Hennepin and La Salle (1679), Deliette (1691), AC, C''A, 18 (1695), Cadillac (1699), La Potherie (1702), Raudot (1710), Charlevoix (1721), Celeron (1736), Bougainville (1757), De Silegue (1760)
ILLINOIS RIVER NEAR OTTAWA, ILL.: La Salle (1682), Deliette (1689)
STRAITS OF DETROIT: Durantaye (1687), Cadillac, Cornbury, and Marest (1702), Dubuisson (1712)
CHICAGO: Deliette (1691), Cadillac (1699), La Potherie (1702), Raudot (1710), Sabrevois (1718)
WABASH RIVER: Deliette (1694), Raudot (1710), Charlevoix (1721), Celeron (1736), Bougainville (1757), De Silegue (1760)
MAUMEE RIVER (FORT WAYNE): Dubuisson (1712), Sabrevois (1718), Charlevoix (1721), Beauharnois (1733), Celeron (1736), Celeron (1749), Bougainville (1757), De Silegue (1760),
WHITE RIVER, IND.: Beauharnois (1733), Celeron (1749)
BIG MIAMI RIVER NEAR, PIQUA, O.: Gist (1751)
*represented here in list form.
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