The Osage Village State Historic Site is a publicly owned property in Vernon County,

Missouri Missouri is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee): Iowa to the north, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee to the east, Arkansas t ...

, maintained by the

Missouri Department of Natural Resources The Missouri Department of Natural Resources (MoDNR) of the government of the U.S. state of Missouri Missouri is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied fo ...

. The

historic site A historic site or heritage site is an official location where pieces of political, military, cultural, or social history have been preserved due to their cultural heritage value. Historic sites are usually protected by law, and many have been rec ...

preserves the archaeological site of a major Osage village, that once had some 200 lodges housing 2,000 to 3,000 people. The site, designated by the

Smithsonian trinomial A Smithsonian trinomial (formally the Smithsonian Institution Trinomial System, abbreviated SITS) is a unique identifier assigned to archaeological sites in many states in the United States. They are composed of one or two digits coding for the sta ...

23VE01, was also known for many years as the Carrington Osage Village Site, under which name it was designated a

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...

in 1964.

History

The

Osage Indians The Osage Nation ( ) ( Osage: 𐓁𐒻 𐓂𐒼𐒰𐓇𐒼𐒰͘ ('), "People of the Middle Waters") is a Midwestern Native American tribe of the Great Plains. The tribe developed in the Ohio and Mississippi river valleys around 700 BC alon ...

were first recorded in 1673 by explorers

Louis Joliet Louis Jolliet (September 21, 1645after May 1700) was a French-Canadian explorer known for his discoveries in North America. In 1673, Jolliet and Jacques Marquette, a Jesuit Catholic priest and missionary, were the first non-Natives to explore and ...

and

Jacques Marquette Jacques Marquette S.J. (June 1, 1637 – May 18, 1675), sometimes known as Père Marquette or James Marquette, was a French Jesuit missionary who founded Michigan's first European settlement, Sault Sainte Marie, and later founded Saint Ign ...

. The territory claimed by the Osage at its greatest influence was vast and consisted of what is now southern Missouri,

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the O ...

, eastern

Kansas Kansas () is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its capital is Topeka, and its largest city is Wichita. Kansas is a landlocked state bordered by Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to th ...

, and Oklahoma. Between 1700 and 1775, a large group of the Osage lived in a village situated on a high, open hilltop near the

Osage River The Osage River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed May 31, 2011 tributary of the Missouri River in central Missouri in the United States. The eighth-largest river ...

valley. This area, designated as a

for the importance of the Osage in this region and the size of the village, has been preserved as the Osage Village State Historic Site. At its peak, the village contained about 200 lodges with 2,000 to 3,000 people living in them. Archaeological excavations have demonstrated that the shape of the dwellings was rectangular. Artifacts such as pottery, weapons, and tools excavated from the site have provided information about the daily lives of the villagers. The men hunted game and traded with the Europeans for furs in exchange for guns and goods. The women cultivated and processed the crops, and processed game and hides to make food, clothing and tools. Throughout the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the Osage Indians accounted for more than half the entire European-American fur trade along the Missouri River. After the United States government took control of the

Louisiana Purchase The Louisiana Purchase (french: Vente de la Louisiane, translation=Sale of Louisiana) was the acquisition of the territory of Louisiana by the United States from the French First Republic in 1803. In return for fifteen million dollars, or app ...

territory in 1804, its settlement policies encouraged European Americans to come into the area. It made treaties with the Osage so that they would cede their territory to the US. The Osage Indians were gradually forced to retreat to a reservation in

Indian Territory The Indian Territory and the Indian Territories are terms that generally described an evolving land area set aside by the United States Government for the relocation of Native Americans who held aboriginal title to their land as a sovereign ...

, now Oklahoma.

References

External links

Osage Village State Historic Site
Missouri Department of Natural Resources
Osage Village State Historic Site Map
Missouri Department of Natural Resources {{National Register of Historic Places Missouri State Historic Sites Protected areas of Vernon County, Missouri Protected areas established in 1984 National Historic Landmarks in Missouri Buildings and structures in Vernon County, Missouri Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in Missouri National Register of Historic Places in Vernon County, Missouri

History

See also

References

External links