Tomotley (also known as Tamahli) is a prehistoric and historic Native American site along the lower

Little Tennessee River The Little Tennessee River is a tributary of the Tennessee River that flows through the Blue Ridge Mountains from Georgia, into North Carolina, and then into Tennessee, in the southeastern United States. It drains portions of three national ...

Monroe County, Tennessee Monroe County is a county on the eastern border of the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 census, the population was 46,250. Its county seat is Madisonville. History During the early part of the 18th century, the area around what is now ...

, in the southeastern United States. Occupied as early as the Archaic period (8000 to 1000 BCE), the Tomotley ( chr, ᏔᎹᏟ, translit=Tamatli) site was occupied particularly during the Mississippian period, which was likely when its earthwork platform mounds were built. It was also occupied during the eighteenth century as a

Cherokee The Cherokee (; chr, ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯᎢ, translit=Aniyvwiyaʔi or Anigiduwagi, or chr, ᏣᎳᎩ, links=no, translit=Tsalagi) are one of the indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, t ...

town. It revealed an unexpected style: an octagonal townhouse and square or rectangular residences. In the Overhill period, Cherokee townhouses found in the Carolinas in the same period were circular in design, with, In the late 20th century, the Tomotley site was submerged by

Tellico Lake Tellico Dam is a dam built by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) in Loudon County, Tennessee, on the Little Tennessee River as part of the Tellico Project. Planning for a dam structure on the Little Tennessee was reported as early as 1936 b ...

, an impoundment of the lower

and lower

Tellico River The Tellico River is a river in the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee. It rises in the westernmost mountains of North Carolina, and then flows through Monroe County, Tennessee, before joining the Little Tennessee ...

, after construction of a dam managed by the

Tennessee Valley Authority The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is a federally owned electric utility corporation in the United States. TVA's service area covers all of Tennessee, portions of Alabama, Mississippi, and Kentucky, and small areas of Georgia, North Carolin ...

. The site is visible from Toqua Beach and the Toqua Boat Ramp, both of which are managed by the

Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA) is an independent state agency of the state of Tennessee with the mission of managing the state's fish and wildlife and their habitats, as well as responsibility for all wildlife-related law enforcem ...

Geographical setting

The Little Tennessee River traverses northern Monroe County for roughly between its Calderwood Lake impoundment near the Tennessee-North Carolina border and its mouth along the

Tennessee River The Tennessee River is the largest tributary of the Ohio River. It is approximately long and is located in the southeastern United States in the Tennessee Valley. The river was once popularly known as the Cherokee River, among other name ...

near Lenoir City. The impoundment of the river in 1979 by Tellico Dam created Tellico Lake, which covers the river's lower as well as the lower of its tributary, the

. The Tomotley site was located along the south bank of the Little Tennessee just north of the confluence of Toqua Creek with the river, nearly above the river's mouth at the

. The Overhill village of Toqua, and its associated prehistoric site, were located on the south side of Toqua Creek, opposite Tomotley. Toqua Beach and the Toqua Boat Ramp, which overlook the Tomotley site, are located along Tennessee State Route 360 (Citico Road). They are roughly south of the road's junction with U.S. Route 411 in Vonore.

History

Etymology

The root of the name "Tomotley" is unknown, although it is generally believed to have originated before the Cherokee occupation. Ethnologist

James Mooney James Mooney (February 10, 1861 – December 22, 1921) was an American ethnographer who lived for several years among the Cherokee. Known as "The Indian Man", he conducted major studies of Southeastern Indians, as well as of tribes on the G ...

suggested a possible

Muscogee Creek 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 WoodlandsChattahoochee River in Georgia, and Creek occupancy of this area prior to the Cherokee. Others have theorized that Tomotley was formed by Lower and Valley town

refugees fleeing warfare with the Creek in the mid-18th century. The name was also used for Lower and Valley Cherokee towns in South Carolina and North Carolina.Baden, ''Tomotley: An Eighteenth Century Cherokee Village'', 10-29.

Town

Tomotley first appears in the European colonial historical record in 1756, when it was led by Cherokee chief

Attakullakulla Attakullakulla (Cherokee”Tsalagi”, (ᎠᏔᎫᎧᎷ) ''Atagukalu''; also spelled Attacullaculla and often called Little Carpenter by the English) (c. 1715 – c. 1777) was an influential Cherokee leader and the tribe's First Beloved ...

. That same year, a small English force under Captain Raymond Demeré arrived in the area to build and garrison Fort Loudoun on the Little Tennessee River near the Tellico. The British were trying to protect the Cherokee, who they wanted as allies in the

French and Indian War The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was a theater of the Seven Years' War, which pitted the North American colonies of the British Empire against those of the French, each side being supported by various Native American tribes. At the ...

. The garrison was greeted at Tomotley by the chief, Conocotocko (Old Hop), who told Demeré, "I am now old and lie upon a bad bearskin. My life is not more than an inch long."

William de Brahm William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of Engl ...

, who designed the fort, resided at Tomotley while the fort was being constructed in late 1756.Carl Kuttruff, Beverly Bastian, Jenna Tedrick Kuttruff, and Stuart Strumpf,
Fort Loudoun in Tennessee: 1756-1760: History, Archaeology, Replication, Exhibits, and Interpretation
" Report of the Tennessee Wars Commission and Tennessee Division of Archaeology, Research Series No. 17 (Waldenhouse Publishers, Inc., 2010), p. 37. Accessed at the Tennessee State Library and Archives website, 3 December 2013. Around this time, a sharp political rift occurred in the Cherokee hierarchy between those who were aligned with pro-French and pro-English factions. Tensions were increasing as the French and British were engaged in the

Seven Years' War The Seven Years' War (1756–1763) was a global conflict that involved most of the European Great Powers, and was fought primarily in Europe, the Americas, and Asia-Pacific. Other concurrent conflicts include the French and Indian War (175 ...

in Europe, known as the

on its North American front. When pro-French sentiments began to prevail in the key Overhill town of

Great Tellico Great Tellico was a Cherokee town at the site of present-day Tellico Plains, Tennessee, where the Tellico River emerges from the Appalachian Mountains. Great Tellico was one of the largest Cherokee towns in the region, and had a sister town nea ...

, its pro-English headman

Ostenaco Otacity Ostenaco (; chr, ᎤᏥᏗᎯ ᎤᏍᏔᎾᏆ, Utsidihi Ustanaqua, or "Bighead"; c. 1710Kate Fullagar, ''The Warrior, the Voyager, and the Artist: Three Lives in an Age of Empire,''Yale University Press 2020 p.13. – 1780) was a Cher ...

was forced to flee to the Little Tennessee Valley. By the time Anglo-American colonist

Henry Timberlake Henry Timberlake (1730 or 1735 – September 30, 1765) was a colonial Anglo-American officer, journalist, and cartographer. He was born in the Colony of Virginia and died in England. He is best known for his work as an emissary from the Briti ...

visited the Little Tennessee Valley in the Overhill Country on his peace mission in 1761, Ostenaco was governor of Tomotley (Attakullakulla was listed as governor of the nearby towns of Tuskegee and Mialoquo). During the

American Revolution The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revoluti ...

and

Cherokee–American wars The Cherokee–American wars, also known as the Chickamauga Wars, were a series of raids, campaigns, ambushes, minor skirmishes, and several full-scale frontier battles in the Old Southwest from 1776 to 1794 between the Cherokee and American se ...

, most of the Overhill towns were destroyed by American forces. Because Tomotley was located at a strategic ford along the Little Tennessee, it was the first of the Overhill towns to be captured in 1776 by William Christian's expedition. When

John Sevier John Sevier (September 23, 1745 September 24, 1815) was an American soldier, frontiersman, and politician, and one of the founding fathers of the State of Tennessee. A member of the Democratic-Republican Party, he played a leading role in Tennes ...

invaded the valley three years later, he reported that Tomotley was still in ruins.

Archaeology

The first major archaeological investigation at the Tomotley site was conducted by J.W. Emmert of the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...

in the 1880s. Emmert located two earthwork

mound A mound is a heaped pile of earth, gravel, sand, rocks, or debris. Most commonly, mounds are earthen formations such as hills and mountains, particularly if they appear artificial. A mound may be any rounded area of topographically higher ...

s at the site, one of which was high and had a diameter of . Both contained human burials. In the late 20th century, the Tennessee Valley Authority was proceeding with a project to dam the Little Tennessee River and create Tellico Lake, which would flood many significant historic and prehistoric sites. The

University of Tennessee The University of Tennessee (officially The University of Tennessee, Knoxville; or UT Knoxville; UTK; or UT) is a public land-grant research university in Knoxville, Tennessee. Founded in 1794, two years before Tennessee became the 16th state ...

Department of

Anthropology Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of be ...

(under contract with the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propert ...

) was commissioned to survey the area in 1967. They conducted test excavations at the Tomotley site that same year in an attempt to locate the historical village. As the Tellico Dam project stalled, more extensive excavations were conducted in 1973, 1974, and 1976. The excavations located 19 Cherokee and pre-Cherokee structures, including Tomotley's Cherokee councilhouse (townhouse), 18 human burials, and several thousand ceramic, stone, and bone artifacts. While the site yielded evidence of Archaic (8000 to 1000 BC) and Woodland period occupation, excavation revealed that Tomotley's most substantial periods of habitation occurred during the

South Appalachian Mississippian culture The Mississippian culture was a Native American civilization that flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from approximately 800 CE to 1600 CE, varying regionally. It was known for building large, earth ...

period (1000-1500 AD), when the earthwork mounds were built; and the

Overhill Cherokee Overhill Cherokee was the term for the Cherokee people located in their historic settlements in what is now the U.S. state of Tennessee in the Southeastern United States, on the western side of the Appalachian Mountains. This name was used by 1 ...

period (18th century).Baden, ''Tomotley: An Eighteenth Century Cherokee Village'', iv-vi. Excavations also uncovered a number of Euro-American artifacts, some of which may have originated with the Fort Loudoun garrison.Linda Carnes, ''Tomotley: An Eighteenth Century Cherokee Village'' (Appendix II), 204-205.

Cherokee habitation

Prior to excavation, historians had thought that Tomotley was founded by refugees from the Cherokee Middle, Lower, or Valley towns when they fled warfare with the Creek and later the English, and established Overhill towns. The latter attacked and destroyed their towns in the mid-18th century. The goals of the 1976 excavations were to shed light on this theory by determining the location and structure of Tomotley's councilhouse, analyzing Tomotley's Cherokee dwellings, and establishing the general layout of the village.Baden, ''Tomotley: An Eighteenth Century Cherokee Village'', 30-48. In fact, the dwellings excavated at Tomotley provided some of the strongest evidence of occupation prior to the Overhill Cherokee period. Of the 19 structures uncovered at Tomotley, the councilhouse was octagonal, and the rest were either square or rectangular in shape. The lack of circular structures was inconsistent with historical accounts of Overhill Cherokee dwellings, which typically consisted of a circular ("winter") house and a rectangular ("summer") house. Archaeological investigations at Overhill sites such as Toqua, Chota, and Citico also uncovered substantial evidence of such circular structures. But circular structures were not common among Lower and Valley Cherokee towns in the Carolinas. Other evidence supporting occupation by refugees from these areas includes the ceramic material uncovered during the 1973-1974 excavations. The artifacts bore more similarities to Middle and

Chickamauga Cherokee The Chickamauga Cherokee refers to a group that separated from the greater body of the Cherokee during the American Revolutionary War. The majority of the Cherokee people wished to make peace with the Americans near the end of 1776, following se ...

(Lower Cherokee) ceramics than to Overhill ceramics.Baden, ''Tomotley: An Eighteenth Century Cherokee Village'', 144-180.

References

External links

Frank H. McClung Museum

— TWRA site {{Cherokee South Appalachian Mississippian culture Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in Tennessee Cherokee towns in Tennessee Geography of Monroe County, Tennessee National Register of Historic Places in Monroe County, Tennessee American Revolution on the National Register of Historic Places