The Eyeish were a
Native American tribe from present-day eastern Texas.
History
The Eyeish were part of the
Caddo Confederacy
The Caddo people comprise the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma, a federally recognized tribe headquartered in Binger, Oklahoma. They speak the Caddo language.
The Caddo Confederacy was a network of Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands, who ...
,
[Sturtevant, 616] although their relationship to other Caddo tribes was ambiguous, and they were often hostile to the
Hasinai
The Hasinai Confederacy (Caddo: ) was a large confederation of Caddo-speaking Native Americans who occupied territory between the Sabine and Trinity rivers in eastern Texas. Today, their descendants are enrolled in the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma an ...
. They historically lived on the
Eyeish Creek, located between the
Neches and
Sabine Rivers.
[Eyeish Indian History.]
''Access Genealogy''. (retrieved 6 Sept 2009)
Spanish explorers encountered the tribe in 1542 and reported large herds of buffalo in the area. The tribe was not on the best terms with tribes located west of the
Trinity River or those to the north near the
Red River.
[
Francisco monks who traveled on Domingo Ramón's 1716–17 expedition through Texas founded Mission Nuestra Señora de los Dolores de los Ais; however, the Eyeish were not generally accepting of Spanish missionary efforts. After 50 years, the mission only recorded eleven baptisms, seven burials, and three marriages.][
In the 18th century, the tribe contracted European diseases such as smallpox and measles from the French and Spanish explorers in the region. The populations decreased but rebounded, from a low of 20 tribal members recorded by John Sibley in 1805, to 160 families recorded in 1828. By then, they lived between the Brazos and ]Colorado River
The Colorado River ( es, Río Colorado) is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and northern Mexico. The river drains an expansive, arid drainage basin, watershed that encompasses parts of ...
s.[
Ultimately, they joined the Wichita][ and ]Caddo
The Caddo people comprise the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma, a federally recognized tribe headquartered in Binger, Oklahoma. They speak the Caddo language.
The Caddo Confederacy was a network of Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands, wh ...
tribes in Indian Territory
The Indian Territory and the Indian Territories are terms that generally described an evolving land area set aside by the Federal government of the United States, United States Government for the relocation of Native Americans in the United St ...
.
Synonymy
The tribe is also known as the ''A'-ish, Aiaichi, Aliche, Aliches, Aiche, Ayays, Hais,''[ ''Ays,'' or ''Ahijitos.''][ The group known as ''Hauydix'' may also have been the Eyeish.
They are not, however, considered to be the same tribe as the ''Aijados'' encountered by the Mendoza Expedition of 1683–84, nor are they the same as the '']Ais AIS may refer to:
Medicine
* Abbreviated Injury Scale, an anatomical-based coding system to classify and describe the severity of injuries
* Acute ischemic stroke, the thromboembolic type of stroke
* Androgen insensitivity syndrome, an intersex ...
'' tribe from Florida.
Language
Although the Eyeish people were clearly connected to the Caddo people politically, it is not clear what language they spoke nor how that language relates genealogically to other known languages. Explorer John Sibley wrote that the Eyeish language was one of three unique languages spoken by the Eyeish, the Adai and the Yatasi The Yatasi (Caddo: Yáttasih) are Native American peoples from northwestern Louisiana that are part of the Natchitoches Confederacy of the Caddo Nation. Today they are enrolled in the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma.
History
Prior to European contact, the ...
and Natchitoches people and that Eyeish was spoken by no other group: ‘ tdiffers from all other, and is so difficult to speak or understand, that no nation can speak ten words of it.’ He collected a wordlist in 1807 for Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 18 ...
, but this was lost when a thief stole Jefferson's linguistic papers as they were being moved from Washington DC to Monticello in Jefferson's second term. Sibley also reported that the Eyeish and Adai were bilingual in Caddo, which was used as a contact language
Language contact occurs when speakers of two or more languages or varieties interact and influence each other. The study of language contact is called contact linguistics. When speakers of different languages interact closely, it is typical for the ...
. However, according to informant Caddo Jake's report to John R. Swanton
John Reed Swanton (February 19, 1873 – May 2, 1958) was an American anthropologist, folklorist, and linguist who worked with Native American peoples throughout the United States. Swanton achieved recognition in the fields of ethnology and et ...
, Eyeish was mutually intelligible with the Adai language. There is not sufficient evidence to conclusively relate Adai to Caddoan languages
The Caddoan languages are a family of languages native to the Great Plains spoken by tribal groups of the central United States, from present-day North Dakota south to Oklahoma. All Caddoan languages are critically endangered, as the number of sp ...
, the only documentation being a list of 275 words compiled by Sibley. Allan Taylor and Alexander Lesser and Gene Weltfish have speculated that Adai belonged to the Caddoan language family and was possibly a dialect of Caddo.[Sturtevant, 616–7]
Notes
References
* Bolton, Herbet E
''The Hasinais: Southern Caddoans As Seen by the Earliest Europeans.''
Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2002. .
* Sturtevant, William C., general editor and Raymond D. Fogelson, volume editor. ''Handbook of North American Indians: Southeast''. Volume 14. Washington DC: Smithsonian Institution, 2004. .
External links
from Access Genealogy
{{authority control
Caddoan peoples
Native American history of Texas
Native American tribes in Texas
Unclassified languages of North America