A tribal town ( Muscogee ''talwa'', Hitchiti ''okla'') was a form of political and social organization of people in what is now the

southeastern United States The Southeastern United States, also referred to as the American Southeast or simply the Southeast, is a geographical region of the United States. It is located broadly on the eastern portion of the southern United States and the southern por ...

from at least the 16th century into the 19th century. It had aspects of both a

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

and a

tribe The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide usage of the term in English language, English is in the discipline of anthropology. This definition is contested, in p ...

, and was the basic unit of the

Muscogee Confederacy The Muscogee, also known as the Mvskoke, Muscogee Creek, and the Muscogee Creek Confederacy ( in the Muscogee language), are a group of related indigenous (Native American) peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands

Organization

A tribal town had characteristics of a town and of a tribe. It consisted of a main settlement, centered on a ceremonial square, associated satellite settlements (Muscogee ''talofa'') which did not have a ceremonial square, and individual farmsteads. The tribal town also included hunting grounds and agricultural fields. Lankford defines a tribal town as "a group of people united in having a single square ground and a single sacred fire kept in the middle of the square". People living in separate locations could be members of one tribal town based on one square ground with one sacred fire and a single governing council. People of the Muscogee Confederacy identified primarily as members of their tribal town, and only rarely as Muscogees.

Whites White is a racialized classification of people and a skin color specifier, generally used for people of European origin, although the definition can vary depending on context, nationality, and point of view. Description of populations as " ...

often saw the tribal towns as tribes, using the terms "town", "tribe", and even "clan" interchangeably. The main settlement of a tribal town had a "square ground" or plaza, which was central to the social life of the tribal town. Four buildings surrounded the sacred fire in the middle of the square ground. Square or rectangular, the plaza was kept clean by sweeping, with the removed material often forming a berm around the plaza. When the men of a town were home, they spent much of the day at the plaza, socializing and playing games such as chunkey and "roll the bullet" (Muscogee ''thlechallitchcau''). The plazas were also used for dancing and drinking. Adjacent to the rectangular buildings on the square-ground, tribal towns also had a rotunda or "hot house" (Muscogee ''tcokofa''), a large round structure with

wattle and daub Wattle and daub is a composite building method used for making walls and buildings, in which a woven lattice of wooden strips called wattle is daubed with a sticky material usually made of some combination of wet soil, clay, sand, animal dung a ...

walls and a central fireplace. The rotunda was used for town council meetings during cold weather, and as a communal sleeping space in the winter. The size of a town's rotunda varied, but could be up to across. Tribal towns had a dedicated field on the outskirts of the town where stickball games were played.

White and red

Many of the people of the southeast viewed parts of their world in terms of a

duality Duality may refer to: Mathematics * Duality (mathematics), a mathematical concept ** Dual (category theory), a formalization of mathematical duality ** Duality (optimization) ** Duality (order theory), a concept regarding binary relations ** Dual ...

. The two sides of the duality are often listed as "white" and "red" in sources, although Swanton noted that the people of the southeast rarely used color terms for the concept. Lankford cautions that the usage of the duality of "red" and "white" in Muscogee culture has changed over time, and that historical sources on "red" and "white" towns and clans must be used very carefully, as European observers often did not fully understand, and possibly thoroughly misunderstood, the uses of the terms. The division into red and white towns had a long history in the southeast. Towns were either red or white, but in a different meaning than the internal division of the council. Stickball games were always between towns of opposite colors. Town color was not immutable. If a town lost three games in a row to another town, the losing town had to change color. The division of responsibilities between red and white towns may have changed over time. For example, among Chickasaw towns, red towns first handled all trade with Europeans, but white towns eventually gained some control of the trade. The Chickasaws symbolically adopted new towns as "peace" (white) towns. The Muscogee Confederacy also admitted new towns as "peace" or white towns. Provinces in the Confederacy, originally including the Lower Towns,

Abihka Abihka was one of the four mother towns of the Muscogee Creek confederacy. ''Abihka'' is also sometimes used to refer to all Upper Creek (or ''Muscogee'') people. History Origins The Abihka were the remnants of the 16th century "Chiefdom of Coosa." ...

, and Tallapoosa, had both white and red towns, and the

Alabama (We dare defend our rights) , anthem = "Alabama (state song), Alabama" , image_map = Alabama in United States.svg , seat = Montgomery, Alabama, Montgomery , LargestCity = Huntsville, Alabama, Huntsville , LargestCounty = Baldwin County, Al ...

were admitted to the Confederacy as a group that included red and white towns. White towns were also sanctuaries. Someone trying to escape retaliation could seek refuge in a white town, because blood was not supposed to be spilled in a white town. The duties associated with red and white towns, including white towns serving as sanctuaries, appear to have been reduced by early in the 19th century.

Governance

Each tribal town was internally self-governing, with a town council handling disputes and punishing offenders. Each town had a civil chief (Muscogee ''micco'') and a war chief (Muscogee ''tvstvnvke''). The council had a white side and a red side. The white side of the council consisted of the chief, his assistant (Muscogee ''heniha''), and the "second men" (Muscogee ''henihalgi''), one of whom was the chief's speaker (Muscogee ''yatika''). Members of the white side were selected by various processes. The red side was subordinate to the white side. It was led by the war chief. Men, and an occasional woman, who had become warriors joined the red side as ''tasikayalgi''. Achievements as a warrior led to promotion to ''imathlas'', and then to "war chiefs" (Muscogee ''tastanagalgi''). Warriors who were no longer physically able to go to war and had distinguished themselves in service to the town crossed over to the white side of the council as "beloved men" (Muscogee ''isti atcacagi''). The civil chief was chosen from a clan of the same color as the town and, in many cases, chosen by the clans of the other color, i.e., the civil chief of a white town would be chosen from a white clan by the red clans, and the civil chief of a red town would be chosen from a red clan by the white clans. No matter the "color" of his clan, the civil chief belonged to the white side after his selection. The civil chief chose a war chief from the red clans. The war chief advised the civil chief on matters relating to war, and was responsible for maintaining public order and organizing stickball games with other towns. The second men were responsible for public works (including construction of new houses), the town's common fields , and the brewing of the

black drink Black drink is a name for several kinds of ritual beverages brewed by Native Americans in the Southeastern United States. Traditional ceremonial people of the Yuchi, Caddo, Chickasaw, Cherokee, Choctaw, Muscogee and some other Indigenous peop ...

for town council meetings. Power and status in a town was derived from inheritance, age, religious role, oratory, and success in warfare. The town councils ruled by consensus. Political decisions made in town councils applied only to members of the town and were non-binding. The civil chief presided over council meetings, but his power was "more of a council manager than an executive."

Clans

Clans A clan is a group of people united by actual or perceived kinship and descent. Even if lineage details are unknown, clans may claim descent from founding member or apical ancestor. Clans, in indigenous societies, tend to be endogamous, meaning ...

were also involved in local governance, controlling specific agricultural fields and performing specific duties. Some town leadership positions were reserved for members of particular clans. Clans were responsible for handling disputes between clan members, and punishing individuals for infractions within the clan. Disputes between clans were handled by the town council. Inheritance was matriarchal, and children were born into their mothers' clan and town. The Muskogean society was

exogamous Exogamy is the social norm of marrying outside one's social group. The group defines the scope and extent of exogamy, and the rules and enforcement mechanisms that ensure its continuity. One form of exogamy is dual exogamy, in which two groups c ...

and

matrilocal In social anthropology, matrilocal residence or matrilocality (also uxorilocal residence or uxorilocality) is the societal system in which a married couple resides with or near the wife's parents. Thus, the female offspring of a mother remain l ...

, requiring people to marry outside of their birth clan, with the males often living with their wives' clan, and the women living with their own clan.

Satellite settlements

Satellite settlements were often created when some group in conflict with others in the town wished to distance themselves without breaking ties with the town. Satellite settlements could be quite close to the main town, sometimes just across a river, or further away, in the next river valley. Some of the tribal towns on the Chattahoochee River had satellite towns away on the

Flint River The Flint River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed April 15, 2011 river in the U.S. state of Georgia. The river drains of western Georgia, flowing south from the u ...

, about two days travel time. The number of satellite settlements a tribal town had varied over time. At one point late in the 18th century,

Tukabatchee Tukabatchee or Tuckabutche ( Creek: ''Tokepahce'' ) is one of the four mother towns of the Muscogee Creek confederacy.Isham, Theodore and Blue Clark"Creek (Mvskoke)." ''Oklahoma Historical Society's Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture.'' ...

(one of the Muscogee Confederacy's four mother towns) did not have any satellite towns, while

Okfuskee Okfuskee are a Muscogee tribe. Alternative spellings include the traditional Mvskoke spelling "Akfvske", referring to the tribal town in Alabama, and the comparable spelling Oakfuskee. They formed part of the former Creek (Muscogee) Confederacy in ...

had seven or more. Just as some satellite towns might be settled by a group avoiding some conflict in the town, relations might later improve and the people of the satellite town would return to the tribal town. Some satellite towns are reported to have eventually built their own square-grounds and council houses, becoming a new tribal town. Members of a town who could not reconcile themselves with the decisions of a town council could leave and found a new town with help from their former town. During the time of the confederacy, a new tribal town was officially founded when a fire was started in the town with embers from one of the "mother towns".

Muscogee Confederacy

The Muscogee Confederacy grew out of confederations or cooperatives of red and white tribal towns that existed before the arrival of Europeans in the southeast. The passage of Hernando de Soto's expedition through the southeast disrupted the existing political organization of the area. Powerful chiefdoms broke apart. There is evidence of population decrease, dispersal and migration after de Soto's passage. However, Foster notes that there is no evidence this had not also happened at times prior to de Soto's arrival. The Muskogean Confederacy was governed by the Grand Council, an annual meeting of the chiefs of the tribal towns in the confederacy. Towns were divided into white and red groups. White clans and towns were generally associated with peace, while red clans and towns were generally associated with war. Four towns in the confederacy, Coweta and Tukabatchee, red towns, and Kasihta and Abihka, white towns, were the "mother towns", often assuming leadership in the confederacy. Tribal towns were

sovereign ''Sovereign'' is a title which can be applied to the highest leader in various categories. The word is borrowed from Old French , which is ultimately derived from the Latin , meaning 'above'. The roles of a sovereign vary from monarch, ruler or ...

. Each tribal town, while a member of the confederacy, could also act on its own, choose to participate or not participate in collective actions, such as going to war, and form alliances with other towns. The towns had a strong sense of identity, with local variations of the

Green Corn Ceremony The Green Corn Ceremony (Busk) is an annual ceremony practiced among various Native American peoples associated with the beginning of the yearly corn harvest. Busk is a term given to the ceremony by white traders, the word being a corruption of t ...

, legends and myths. Immigrants (often refugees from other towns and tribes) could become members of the Creek Confederacy. Ethridge states that under territorial pressure from Europeans, the Muscogee Confederacy changed, gradually suppressing the provincial identities and red/white town dichotomy and emphasizing the Upper Creek/Lower Creek organization as the Muscogee identity. Tukabatchee and Coweta began to claim status as the capitols of the Upper and Lower Muscogees, respectively.

Notes

References

Sources

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