The Seminole Tribe
The Seminoles are a very well established Native American tribe. They’re located in Florida and Oklahoma. Some people believe that the name Seminole might come from the word Simanoli which is what the Creeks used to call themselves. They have great connections with the land, interesting food, architecture, religion, government and leaders.
The Seminole tribe are descendants of the Creek tribe. The Creeks spoke two languages, Muskogee and Miccosukee. Miccosukee is a related tongue of Muskogee. Two groups in the tribe speak those languages. That must get confusing.
The Seminoles are close with the land. They used to, and sometimes still do, fish and hunt in the Everglades and in marshy areas. To grow food, they farm small gardens on hammocks, which are little islands in the swamp. Since the 1920’s they’ve been wrestling alligators for visiting tourists. They’ve seemed to make do with the swampy conditions extremely well.
Everyone’s got to eat, and for the Seminoles the women did the cooking for everyone. In the center of camp was a cooking and dining house with a fire pit. On the hammocks they grew pumpkins, melons, and beans. Corn was a staple food. It was most important for soups and breads. Sofiki is a popular soup eaten with one spoon, and everyone eats from one large bowl. They also eat a lot of meat, such as alligator, deer, turkey, duck, rabbit, opossum, squirrel, and sometimes bear. They used blowguns to shoot small animals. Plants, nuts, and berries were also important. To make a certain flour, they used the stems of the arrowroot plant. They were well fed.
The Seminoles had to come up with a way to build a house in a swamp. One practical house was called a chichee, a ho...
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...John Jumper. He was born in Florida in 1820. In 1843 he was brought to Indian Territory as a prisoner. After being on the Seminole Tribal Council, he became chief. At one point the tribe divided and half sided with him. He was a Lt. Colonel during the Civil War. He had quite an impact on them.
The Seminole tribe is still very prominent today. Many of them still live in the Everglades in Florida. Alligators are still being wrestled for crowds. The swamps helped them create a livelihood. They figured out ways to work around the sometimes high waters to protect themselves and their belongings. Their beliefs give them answers to things they can’t explain. The Seminole Tribe is a great example of self-sufficiency.
Bibliography:
Bial, Raymond. Lifeways the Seminole. Benchmark Books, 2000.
“Seminole Nation Leaders.” Seminole Nation, I.T. 2001-2007. .
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Captain John Gordon was an extremely interesting individual and ancestor of mine. I found out about him when I told my grandmother about how we were talking about Andrew Jackson in class. John Gordon was a very close friend to Andrew Jackson, helping him with many conflicts during the Creek War of 1813. He was born on July 15th, 1759 near Fredericksburg, Virginia. Captain Gordon was well known as an Indian fighter, as well as being a Postmaster, ferryman, and even a spy. Although John Gordon is not one of those people you read about in history books, his actions are very remarkable and worth recognition.
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The Cherokee lived in the southeast part of the United States. They lived in what is n... ... middle of paper ... ... train as warriors. All boys led a tough life.
Have you ever heard of the Powhatan tribe? If not let me share a little fact about them. Powhatan means “waterfall” in the Virginia Algonquian language. The Powhatans didn't live in tepees. They lived in small roundhouses called wigwams, or in larger Iroquois-style longhouses. Another fact is Powhatan warriors used tomahawks or wooden war clubs. They also carried shields. Powhatan hunters used bows and arrows. If you would like to learn more about the Powhatan tribe please continue reading this paper. You will learn all about the Powhatan and how they lived. Enjoy.
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depended on berries and hunting deer and antelope they had many ways that they could kill and
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advantage of the rich black soil for farming. Corn was their main source of food,
The Cherokee lived in the present day United States of America hundreds of years before its occupation by the Europeans. History proclaims that members of this community migrated from the Great Lakes and settled in the Southern Appalachians. When the Europeans started settling down in America, the Cherokee decided to co-exist peacefully with her foreign neighbors. The Cherokee lands consisted of Alabama, parts of Virginia, Kentucky, North and South Carolina and Georgia.... ... middle of paper ...
Andrew Frank, “Taking the State Out: Seminoles and Creeks in Late Eighteenth-Century Florida,” The Florida Historical Quartley 84. (Summer 2005): 10-27
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Ordinarily, Native American tribes were separated by ethno-linguistic groups. The immense linguistic diversity was due to the isolation and disperses of the tribes all throughout the United States. The surviving languages were not numerous and they had the widest geographic distribution that was all over the country. A few became combined with roots of other tribe languages, which evolved new languages and dialects causing a great deal of miscellany and variety. Unfortunately, a large quantity of these languages became extinct with the European contact the...
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