Choctaw

Choctaw, Native Americans of the Muskogean language family and of the Southeast culture area. The tribe originally had villages in southeastern Mississippi and southwestern Alabama, and some groups lived in Louisiana and Georgia. The origin of the name Choctaw is not certain. It may have evolved from the Spanish word chato for “flat,” from the Choctaw practice of flattening their male infants’ foreheads, or perhaps from Haccha, the name in Muskogean for the Pearl River in present-day Mississippi.

The Choctaw were more democratic and less warlike than their traditional enemies, the Chickasaw and the Creek. They lived in wattle-and-daub dwellings, consisting of pole frames covered with mud and bark for the walls and thatch for the roof. An agricultural people, perhaps the most able farmers of the Southeast, they used simple tools to raise corn, beans, sweet potatoes, pumpkins, sunflowers, melons, and tobacco, and usually had a surplus of food to barter. For sustenance they also hunted with blowguns and bows and arrows, fished with spears, hooks and lines, and traps, and gathered edible wild plants. The Choctaw traded extensively with other tribes, and they developed a trade language consisting of simple words and sign language. Dugout canoes were used to transport trade goods, and also for hunting and fishing trips.

Sport was an important part of Choctaw culture. The Choctaw version of lacrosse, also known as Indian stickball and played by many eastern tribes, involved rough contact between players from different villages. It served as a way to socialize, settle disputes, and train for war. Hundreds of players participated in a game and almost any strategy was acceptable, including biting, hitting, and stomping. Players were often injured, and deaths were not unusual. Choctaw priests also were involved, attempting to influence the outcome through rituals and prayers.

After the arrival of the Europeans in the 16th century, the Choctaw began riding horses and using them for pack animals. Along with the Seminole and Chickasaw, the Choctaw developed their own horse breeds. They also raised cattle. During the 18th and 19th centuries the Choctaw were forced to move farther and farther west to avoid conflict with European settlers. They were early allies of the French, then spied on the British for the Americans in the American Revolution (1775-1783). They fought under General Andrew Jackson against the British in the War of 1812 and against the Creek in the related Creek War (1813-1814).

After becoming president, however, Jackson pushed for the relocation of Southeast Indian tribes to lands west of the Mississippi River. The Choctaw were the first tribe relocated to the Indian Territory (in present-day Oklahoma) under the Indian Removal Act of 1830. From 1831 to 1834 they endured a series of forced marches westward; many Choctaw died during these marches from disease, hunger, exposure, or attacks by bandits. By 1842 they had ceded most of their original lands.

In the Indian Territory the Choctaw, along with the Creek, Cherokee, Chickasaw, and Seminole, became known as one of the Five Civilized Tribes, so called because they had organized governments with written constitutions and because they had adopted other habits of the non-Indian settlers, including the establishment of public schools and newspapers. The Choctaw fought on the side of the Confederacy during the American Civil War (1861-1865). With increasing non-Indian settlement, the Choctaw and other Native Americans were hard pressed to retain their lands before and after Oklahoma became a state in 1907. The name Oklahoma was coined by the Choctaw leader Allen Wright to mean “red people” and was originally applied to the western half of the Indian Territory.

In the 2000 U.S. census about 87,000 people identified themselves as Choctaw only; an additional 71,000 people reported being part Choctaw. The Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma holds federal trust lands in the southeastern part of the state, near Durant. The Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians has a reservation near the Pearl River. Other Choctaw groups live in Louisiana. There has been a resurgence of traditional customs and unity among all the groups since the 1950s.