Chiska

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Chiska (in the Muskogee Indian Language) or Chisca in Castilian - The Chiska were a tribe of Native Americans living in eastern Tennessee and possibly, southwestern Virginia in the 1500s. They were encountered both by the Hernando de Soto Expedition in 1542 and by the Captain Juan Pardo Expedition in 1568. A small exploration party sent out by de Soto in the vicinity of the upper Tennessee River was severely thrashed by Chiska soldiers. {Hudson-Knights of Spain, Warriors of the Cross:203} The experience influenced de Soto not to do any more explorations in their territory. Exploration parties sent out by Captain Juan Pardo also had battles with the Chiska {see Joara.} The name is seldom seen in Spanish colonial records after the Sixteenth Century.

Most likely the Chiska were severely affected by the European diseases which ravaged the advanced indigenous societies of th Southeastern United States in the mid-late 1500s and 1600s AD. The remnants probably either moved south and joined the newly formed People of One Fire (Creek Confederacy; joined with their neighbors the Koasati (Coushatta) and immigrated to Louisiana; or later were absorbed by Cherokee bands moving into the region from Virginia and eastern Kentucky.

Although several ethnologists and archaeologists in the mid-and-late 20th Century assumed that the tribal name Chiska was the word used by the Muskogean mound builders for their Yuchi neighbors, evidently none looked up the word in a Muskogean dictionary. {Swanton:116-120} Chiska in contemporary Muskogee means "the base of a tree" and perhaps, also formerly meant "the foundation of a building or culture." {Thornton:73} However, the Yuchi built few, if any, mounds and were not associated with several other traditions of the Muskogeans. Evidently, it was actually an ethnic name used by later Muskogean immigrants into the Tennessee Valley for a proto-Muskogean people, who entered the region much earlier and founded what is now known as the Southeastern Ceremonial Culture. Possibly, they spoke a language similar to the Alabama or Natchez languages, but no Chiska words are recorded by the Spanish scribes, so this is pure speculation.

[edit] References:

Swanton, John R. The Indian Tribes of North America, Washington,DC:Smithsonian Institute Press, 1952.

Hudson, Charles, The Southeastern Indians, Knoxville,TN:University of Tennessee Press, 1976.

Hudson, Charles, Knights of Spain, Warriors of the Sun, Athens, GA:University of Georgia Press, 1997.

Thornton, Richard, Ancient Roots I: The Indigenous People of the Southern Highlands, Morris, NC: Lulu Press, 2007.