Help needed: Native Americans on the gulf coast.

Are there any "experts" on Native Americans living on the Gulf Coast about 1300? I am aware of the Caddo and others on the Texas coast, but I need to find a link to the great plains. Help is appreciated.
 
Well, it's... complicated. For instance I can give you this map, (this is the western half) but I know it's wrong. for instance, it's unlikely that the Choctaw are where they were shown on the map, as they probably didn't exist as a tribe until the 17th century. In fact, if you've heard of one of the tribes on the map in the Southeast, then they were probably not around in the 1300s, as all of them came to exist from the mixing of tribes. So, you're really just going to have to do individual research on that. I can tell you that in the 1300s you're witnessing the tail end of the Middle Mississipian phase, before the total collapse of places like Cahokia and other moundbuilder sites, which is a complicated time.

On the subject of the plains tribes, it's unclear if tribes like the Osage or Quapaw were present at that time, it depends on when you think they migrated before or after the Beaver Wars.

I really hope DaleCoz shows up, because he can explain this much better then i can. :p
 
Ah... so the Mongols ride north do they?:D

I'm afraid I know nothing but I will do some research for you tonight. Nice to get a teaser of the next installments in the meantime though!
 
Well, it's... complicated. For instance I can give you this map, (this is the western half) but I know it's wrong. for instance, it's unlikely that the Choctaw are where they were shown on the map, as they probably didn't exist as a tribe until the 17th century. In fact, if you've heard of one of the tribes on the map in the Southeast, then they were probably not around in the 1300s, as all of them came to exist from the mixing of tribes. So, you're really just going to have to do individual research on that. I can tell you that in the 1300s you're witnessing the tail end of the Middle Mississipian phase, before the total collapse of places like Cahokia and other moundbuilder sites, which is a complicated time.

On the subject of the plains tribes, it's unclear if tribes like the Osage or Quapaw were present at that time, it depends on when you think they migrated before or after the Beaver Wars.

I really hope DaleCoz shows up, because he can explain this much better then i can. :p

The beaver wars???!
 
A drawn-out series of conflicts in the American northeast between rodent and man. The poor little creatures didn't stand a chance against people who didn't give a dam, alas. :(

And i always thought that was just a Mic Mac myth!

...guess there really is a kernel of truth behind every legend...:rolleyes:
 
The beaver wars???!
You really really need to look them up. They're extremely important to understanding the history of North America. Basically, after the Iriqouis got access to guns (via the Dutch and English after defeating the Mahicans) in the late 17th century, they began competing with the Huron and other French tribes to get beaver pelts to sell to Europeans (in return for more guns). They were... very very successful at this.

So successful they managed to make Ohio and Illinois basically empty for decades, along with Southern Ontario and Michigan, fought the French to eventually negotiating a peace, destroyed the Huron's, Neutral's and Erie's positions as great Tribes forever, and became the most powerful tribe in the entire Northwest Territory. They forced tribes like the Osage to run all the way to Arkansas. In doing so, they created much less resistance for American settlers, and established the English (their gun suppliers) as a powerful force in the Northwest territory.

However, because the war basically took place beyond the European Frontier, and because the later settlement and destruction of native tribes removed many oral records; we know very little about the conflict. All we have are some French reports and some oral traditions from the surviving tribes.
 
Re the Beaver Wars;

I did look them up but will have to leave them for a later time. I'm locked in a pre-columbian time frame right now.

I have found the Chitimacha at the mouth of the Mississippi and believe I can use them as a starting point if I need to, then move upriver towards the Red River and the Caddo.
 
It is fairly difficult to trace a one-to-one relationship between contact-era tribes in the southeast to the precontact period. For one reason, there was probably a tremendous displacement of people and coalescence of depleted groups into "new" tribes caused by the disease epidemtics that wracked the mississippian/caddo area between 1500 and the period of intensive US/anglo contacts in the 18th century, when many "historic" tribes were identified.

Linguistic affiliations would suggest that, although all SE peoples may have share a common history in dim antiquity, they were quite distinct by the time of European contact or protohistory. The Caddoan peoples (Caddo, Wichita, Arikara, and Pawnee) stand apart from the rest and probably adapted early to the western margins of the southeast and who then spread over time throughout much of the southern and central plains. The Cherokee speak an Iroquoian language, suggesting affiliation and origin to the north and east, while the Gulf stock Muscogean languages of some of many other major tribes (Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, etc) may have developed in place from an Algonquan-related proto-language. Smaller groups occupying the gulf coast area proper in Louisiana (Chitimacha, Atacapa) probably share a history with Texas gulf coast tribes (Karankawa and Tonkawa). These latter groups may also have more recent ties to northen Mexico.

Regarding your question regarding a "link" to the Great Plains, look to the Caddoans, who by the 15-16th century had probbaly spread throughout much of the southern and central plains (Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska) only to be put into conflict with Siouians and Osage moving west as European settlement pushed them into the plains.
 
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