Concepts of Big man or Chief systems; simple, complex, or super-complex Notions of Chiefs, Chiefdoms, Chieftaincies, Chiefly Confederacies, and Chiefdom confederacies 

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

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Totemism, Tribalism, Clan, and Power: (band, tribe, chiefdom, and state)

Women of POWER: Matrilineal Chiefdoms and Matrilineal clans as well as Women as Chief/King or Warrior Women

My thoughts: Chiefdoms are powers that are often believed to mobilize due to surplus labor, food, and prestige items. However, I see it as a cultural package that started with hunter-gather/fisher-foragers in western Siberia with the switch from a Matrilineal society to a patrilineal society from 8,000 to 7,000 years ago, and from there spread this new war and powerful male thinking, but some Matrilineal societies changed to the war and power model as well but kept being female-centered. I often talk as if they were completely wiped out by male clans, but not all were, and some became as horrible as male clans. One such major transfer of such ideas, which I think relates to the Tlingit (Matrilineal Na-Dene language connected to patrilineal Yeniseian languages such as the Ket People of  Siberia with mostly to Y-DNA haplogroup Q-M242 linking Tlingit and South America) of the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America (But other groups throughout the entire Pacific Northwest Coast eventually shared similar ideas and these ides then spread doun through other groups and language families across amost all the americas.), was a Slaveholding, matrilineal clan chiefdom. And like 90% of South America, they share their DNA and, to me, likely also somewhat influenced all Mesoamerican cultures and Moundbuilding cultures that had “Big Men/Big Women” pre/proto-chiefdoms, chiefdoms, and then clan monarchs: Kings/Empresses.

Making and unmaking egalitarianism in small-scale human societies

“Humans have likely spent the vast majority of our history as a species in relatively egalitarian, small-scale societies. This does not mean humans are by nature egalitarian. Rather, the ecological and demographic conditions common to small-scale societies favored the suppression of steep, dominance-based hierarchy and incentivized relatively shallow, prestige-based hierarchy. The role of prestige in human hierarchy is a contributing factor to egalitarianism. Shifts in ecological and demographic conditions, particularly with the spread of agriculture, weakened constraints on coercion. Historical shifts to greater inequality include coercive and non-coercive forces.” ref

Early Humans’ Egalitarian Politics

“A model of human uniqueness based on an unusual distinction between two contrasted kinds of political competition and political status: (1) antagonistic competition, in quest of dominance (antagonistic status), a zero-sum, self-limiting game whose stake—who takes what, when, how—summarizes a classical definition of politics (Lasswell 1936), and (2) synergistic competition, in quest of merit (synergistic status), a positive-sum, self-reinforcing game whose stake becomes “who brings what to a team’s common good.” In this view, Rawls’s (1971) famous virtual “veil of ignorance” mainly conceals politics’ antagonistic stakes so as to devise the principles of a just, egalitarian society, yet without providing any means to enforce these ideals. Instead, this paper proposes that human uniqueness flourished under a real “adapted veil of ignorance” concealing the steady inflation of synergistic politics which resulted from early humans’ sturdy egalitarianism. This proposition divides into four parts: (1) early humans first stumbled on a purely cultural means to enforce a unique kind of within-team antagonistic equality—dyadic balanced deterrence thanks to handheld weapons; (2) this cultural innovation is thus closely tied to humans’ darkest side, but it also launched the cumulative evolution of humans’ brightest qualities—egalitarian team synergy and solidarity, together with the associated synergistic intelligence, culture, and communications; (3) runaway synergistic competition for differential merit among antagonistically equal obligate teammates is the single politically selective mechanism behind the cumulative evolution of all these brighter qualities, but numerous factors to be clarified here conceal this mighty evolutionary driver; (4) this veil of ignorance persists today, which explains why humans’ unique prosocial capacities are still not clearly understood by science.” ref

“An “egalitarian hypothesis of human uniqueness” which clarifies and reconciles a wealth of extant cross-disciplinary evidence, from primatology and human paleontology to hunter-gatherers’ behavioral ecology, anthropology, and archaeology, including general principles of animal behavior, evolutionary psychology, and political philosophy. The model also emphasizes many political aspects of the human condition—notably, the quest for maximum merit (“like” scores) and minimum demerit (“dislike” scores) among peers and teammates—which, while extremely familiar, remain neglected in behavioral ecology and very confused in political economics. For example, citizens of modern meritocracies are familiar with the idea that individual differences in merit—as roughly measured by “who brings what to the common good,” a synergistic stake therefore—are often rewarded by large disparities in “who gets what share of the common output”, an antagonistic stake according to the simple definition proposed here. This conventional wisdom holds that such contrasted antagonistic rewards are powerful individual incentives without which the common good of economic and cultural progress would remain sluggish.” ref

“By contrast, this paper proposes that, starting from chimpanzeelike societies which were far from egalitarian, the evolutionary and cultural progress which gave rise to human uniqueness derived from the steady inflation of a purely synergistic form of competition—a race to maximize merit (“like” scores) and minimize demerit (“dislike” scores)—wherein everyone got an equal share of team synergy’s common benefits, and this, among other reasons, because any unequal share was associated with strong “dislike” scores (obvious signs of demerit) liable to all sorts of collective punishment. This kind of coalitionary punishment is often invoked to explain human egalitarianism, as recently emphasized in Boehm’s (2012) landmark Moral Origins. However, within an already hierarchical order, any coalition will necessarily end up hierarchical too, eventually changing the political order, but only to another hierarchical one. Therefore, the capacity to collectively weed out and punish individual demerit is certainly an important aspect of human egalitarianism, but it cannot be its primary cause, nor the primary driver of human uniqueness’s brighter aspects.” ref

“The triggering of early humans’ unique political egalitarianism, and its maintenance up until its Neolithic breakdown, is here more precisely ascribed to a simple, fast-spreading cultural innovation: the antagonistic balance of deterrence afforded by handheld weapons—clubs, sticks, and stones, or “technological weapons” as proposed by Chapais (2008)—leading to a purely dyadic form of antagonistic equality, which nonetheless ensures that no one can impose his will but through a process of quorum formation, 1 the ensuing synergistic quorums necessarily remaining egalitarian for the same reason. In this view, collective punishment becomes a challenge of quorum formation among antagonistic equals, but so do all other, more positive collective endeavors. Hence the notion of egalitarian team synergy, with the ensuing selective yet quorum-dependent political competition among obligate teammates with different political aptitudes, attitudes, and behaviors, both antagonistic and synergistic. Now, even if the number of possible teammates is limited within a small egalitarian team, all their appreciated, merit-worthy attitudes become open-access behaviors, 2 which can be freely emulated and followed, and whose possible combinations (the different “what, where, when, how, and with whom” of collective action) multiply accordingly, hence the inflationary potential of synergistic competition among antagonistic equals.” ref

“Why compete for maximum merit (“like” scores) and minimum demerit (“dislike” scores) in such uniquely egalitarian settings? This question will be examined repeatedly throughout this paper, but the shortest and most proximate answer boils down to the fact that, among antagonistic equals, differential merit (synergistic political fitness) becomes the best means to recruit and be recruited—that is, the best means to build up or join the most effective synergistic quorums according to one’s own best interests, merit also remaining the best means to avoid quorum punishment.” ref

“If correct, this suggests that the root of humans’ brightest qualities, the open-access, quorum-dependent quest for merit among antagonistically equal obligate teammates, is somewhat neglected by current evolutionary approaches of animal and human behavior. The contrast with the attention granted to limited-access dominance is striking. According to one of this paper’s main propositions, this disregard for open-access merit is a predictable effect of the adapted veil of ignorance which has concealed synergistic competition’s mighty dynamics since the onset of human egalitarianism. The ensuing paradoxical mix of procedural familiarity and foggy declarative awareness persists today, thus demanding that the veil in question be lifted at least somewhat before discussing human uniqueness’s other aspects, especially the darker ones. Indeed, without a proper lens to see the light first, it is extremely difficult to imagine how the darkness of balanced deterrence could have triggered and sustained the inflation of open-access quorum synergy and the evolution of all the brighter aspects of human uniqueness all along the Paleolithic.” ref

“Three branching pairs of core distinctions can briefly delineate the field of synergistic politics:

1. A first already evoked distinction between two opposite forms of political competition:
• Antagonistic competition, about who gets what share of the available material resources, whether individually gathered or collectively produced.
• Synergistic competition, about who brings what contribution to the common good, that of a team or any other dyadic or polyadic partnership among familiar individuals.
2. A second distinction between two branching forms of individualized within-group synergy, beyond the anonymous forms of herd synergy (Hamilton 1971):
• Micro synergy: mutualism, reciprocity, and cooperation among a limited number of familiar, well-identified group mates, usually no more than two or three.
• Whole-group team synergy in between-team competition.
3. A third distinction between two branching kinds of whole-group team synergy:
• Hierarchical team synergy: whole-group teamwork under a stable antagonistic order.
• Egalitarian team synergy: whole-group teamwork among antagonistically equal teammates—a human singularity, as proposed here.” ref

“According to this framework, human uniqueness developed because early humans were the first social animals to cross the threshold of “egalitarian team synergy” from a previous state of chimpanzeelike “hierarchical team synergy.” In this view, demanding forms of whole-group cooperation and collective action such as teamwork and team solidarity in between-team competition cannot normally develop except within an already stable and reliable antagonistic rank order, thus usually giving rise to strictly hierarchical forms of whole-group team synergy. In such circumstances typical of most cooperative breeding animals (a wolf pack, for example), whole-group team synergy remains a strictly limited-access game where (a) positive-sum synergistic displays of prestige can sometimes replace mere zero-sum antagonistic displays of dominance, but where (b) leadership and most of team synergy’s positive-sum benefits are monopolized by alpha dominants because of the underlying hierarchical order. Early humans escaped this political straitjacket thanks to the antagonistic balance of deterrence afforded by handheld weapons.” ref

“Which suggests that, for animals already specialized in the mutual dependence and the tightly constrained forms of synergistic competition typical of hierarchical teams, such a fast neutralization of within-team antagonistic competition could have led to an inflationary escalation of synergistic competition: an open-access runaway quest for “like” scores and merit-worthy displays through an escalatory “who brings what, when, how” to a team’s common good. Among antagonistic equals, this runaway expansion of synergistic competition would thus become an unbridled evolutionary driver responsible for the emergence and diversification of all the brighter aspects of human uniqueness, notably the inflationary expansion of synergistic intelligence, culture, and communications (language).” ref

AI Overview: Modern evolutionary anthropologists emphasize that this early egalitarianism was an actively maintained system designed to suppress dominance and inequality.

Prestige Avoidance in Egalitarian Societies?

“In egalitarian societies, prestige avoidance is the practice of actively downplaying personal success, skill, or status to maintain strict social equality. The resulting social contract is egalitarian along the three dimensions of power, esteem, and standing. With respect to power, each individual retains their autonomy at the band level. No one is entitled to claim leadership of the band and boss others around. This social contract is not simply prudential. The rules it institutes are moral, because compliance is motivated by moral sentiments. Victims resent being bullied. People respond to braggarts with contempt, and join with victims in punishing bullies, even at potential cost to themselves. Resentment and contempt express concerns not simply for one’s material interests, but for others to recognize one’s standing as someone whose interests must count in others’ deliberations, and who is entitled to make moral claims on others. Morality is thus fundamentally about how one is valued in the eyes of others.” ref

Dominance, prestige, and the role of leveling in human social hierarchy and equality

New Study Debunks the Myth of Truly “Egalitarian” Societies in Human History

Prestige and dominance in egalitarian and hierarchical societies

Marquis Amon – “Damien Marie AtHope, I have read a lot of your articles over the years, and one was about homo erectus behavior. You have also written about the egalitarian nature of humans, and that the first major wealth inequality began when we moved from hunter-gatherers to sedentary agricultural societies that created the first city-states. Catal Huyuk was a famous egalitarian city-state, whereas Gobekli Tepe had some hierarchy, if I am not mistaken?”

My response: Catal Huyuk started egalitarian, got leaders for a time towards the end, then they seemed to be either rejected, or the people left towards Europe to get away from them. Gobekli Tepe had a little of both egalitarianism and some early hierarchy; no mace heads, but they did have portable zoomorphic (animal-form) scepters at Gobekli Tepe. The origins of that early hierarchy may relate back to Körtik Tepe, with mace heads and scepters, which is the oldest known Neolithic archaeological site in Turkey. Non-mace head “scepters” (seeming religious leadership) refer to elongated, stylized stone artifacts often categorized as Nemrik-type scepters. These portable scepters are not unique to Göbekli Tepe. They have been found across a wide region of Upper Mesopotamia, including contemporary sites like Nevalı Çori, Hallan Çemi, and Jerf el Ahmar. Their shared design points to a tight-knit social (power/status) and cultural network in the early Neolithic. Slavery also seems to have started in the Neolithic.

“Slavery predates written records and has existed in many cultures. Slavery is rare (or less common) among hunter-gatherer populations because it requires economic surpluses and a substantial population density. Thus, although it has existed among unusually resource-rich hunter-gatherers, such as the American Indian peoples of the salmon-rich rivers of the Pacific Northwest coast, slavery became widespread only with the invention of agriculture during the Neolithic Revolution about 11,000 years ago. Slavery was practiced in almost every ancient civilization.” ref

“Many Native-American tribes practiced some form of slavery before the European introduction of African slavery into North America. Tribal territories and the slave trade ranged over present-day borders. Some Native American tribes held war captives as slaves prior to and during European colonization. The Haida and Tlingit peoples who lived along the southeastern Alaskan coast were traditionally known as fierce warriors and slave-traders, raiding as far as California. Slavery was hereditary after slaves were taken as prisoners of war. Among some Pacific Northwest tribes, about a quarter of the population were slaves. Other slave-owning tribes of North America were, for example, Comanche of Texas, Creek of Georgia, the fishing societies, such as the Yurok, that lived along the coast from what is now Alaska to California; the Pawnee, and Klamath.” ref

“Native American groups often enslaved war captives, whom they primarily used for small-scale labor. Others, however, would stake themselves in gambling situations when they had nothing else, which would put them into servitude for a short time, or in some cases for life; captives were also sometimes tortured as part of religious rites, which sometimes involved ritual cannibalism. During times of famine, some Native Americans would also temporarily sell their children to obtain food. The ways in which captives were treated differed widely among Native American groups. Captives could be enslaved for life, killed, or adopted. In some cases, captives were only adopted after a period of slavery. For example, the Iroquoian peoples (not just the Iroquois tribes) often adopted captives, but for religious reasons there was a process, procedures, and many seasons when such adoptions were delayed until the proper spiritual times.” ref

“In many cases, new tribes adopted captives to replace warriors killed during a raid. Warrior captives were sometimes made to undergo ritual mutilation or torture that could end in death, as part of a spiritual grief ritual for relatives slain in battle. Adoptees were expected to fill the economic, military, and familial roles of the departed loved ones, to fit into the societal shoes of the dead relative, and maintain the spirit power of the tribe. Captured individuals were sometimes allowed to assimilate into the tribe, and would later produce a family within the tribe. The Creek, who engaged in this practice and had a matrilineal system, treated children born of slaves and Creek women as full members of their mothers’ clans and of the tribe, as property and hereditary leadership passed through the maternal line.” ref

“In the cultural practices of the Iroquoian peoples, also rooted in a matrilineal system with men and women having equal value, any child would have the status determined by the woman’s clan. More typically, tribes took women and children captives for adoption, as they tended to adapt more easily into new ways. Several tribes held captives as hostages for payment. Various tribes also practiced debt slavery or imposed slavery on tribal members who had committed crimes; full tribal status would be restored as the enslaved worked off their obligations to the tribal society. Male warriors in some Native American groups also had a strong interest in obtaining prisoners, as this was seen as proof of one’s courage. Other slave-owning tribes of North America included the Comanche of Texas; the Creek of Georgia; the fishing societies, such as the Yurok, who lived in Northern California; the Pawnee; and the Klamath.” ref 

“When St. Augustine, Florida, was founded in 1565, the site already had enslaved Native Americans, whose ancestors had migrated from Cuba. The Haida and Tlingit, who lived along Alaska’s southeast coast, were traditionally known as fierce warriors and slave-traders, raiding as far as California. In their society, slavery was hereditary after slaves were taken as prisoners of war—children of slaves were fated to be slaves themselves. Among a few Pacific Northwest tribes, as many as one-fourth of the population were slaves. They were typically captured by raids on enemy tribes, or purchased on inter-tribal slave markets. Slaves would be bought, sold, or given away at potlatches like any other property. Some were killed ceremonially because of a death or important event; at a potlatch they might be killed to demonstrate their owner’s wealth. Slaves were also sometimes freed to show favor to them or to honor a relative.” ref

“There were differences between slavery as practiced in the pre-colonial era among Native Americans and slavery as practiced by Europeans after colonization. Whereas many Europeans eventually came to look upon slaves of African descent as being racially inferior, Native Americans took slaves from other Native American groups, and therefore viewed them as ethnically inferior. European contact greatly influenced slavery as it existed among pre-contact Native Americans, particularly in scale. As they raided other tribes to capture slaves for sale to Europeans, they fell into destructive wars among themselves, and against Europeans. When Europeans arrived as colonists in North America, Native Americans changed their practice of slavery dramatically. Native Americans began selling war captives to Europeans rather than integrating them into their own societies as some had done before.” ref

“Some Native Americans were captured and sold by others into slavery to Europeans, while others were captured and sold by Europeans themselves. In the late 18th and 19th centuries, a small number of tribes, such as the five so-called “civilized tribes” (Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee, and Seminole) began increasing their holding of African-American slaves. Some tribes held people as captive slaves late in the 19th century. For instance, “Ute Woman”, was a Ute captured by the Arapaho and later sold to a Cheyenne. She was kept by the Cheyenne to be used as a prostitute to serve American soldiers at Cantonment in the Indian Territory. She lived in slavery until about 1880. She died of a hemorrhage resulting from “excessive sexual intercourse”. Native American women were at risk for rape whether they were enslaved or not; during the early colonial years, settlers were disproportionately male. They turned to Native women for sexual relationships. Both Native American and African enslaved women suffered rape and sexual harassment by male slaveholders and other white men.” ref

“In some cases, Native American slaves were allowed to live on the fringes of Native American society until they were slowly integrated into the tribe. The word “slave” may not accurately apply to such captive people. When the Europeans made contact with the Native Americans, they began to participate in the slave trade. Native Americans, in their initial encounters with the Europeans, attempted to use their captives from enemy tribes as a “method of playing one tribe against another” in an unsuccessful game of divide and conquer. The slave trade of Native Americans lasted until around 1730. It gave rise to a series of devastating wars among the tribes, including the Yamasee War. The Indian Wars of the early 18th century, combined with the increasing importation of African slaves, effectively ended the Native American slave trade by 1750. The exact number of Native Americans who were enslaved is unknown because vital statistics and census reports were at best infrequent. Andrés Reséndez estimates that between 147,000 and 340,000 Native Americans were enslaved in North America, excluding Mexico. Linford Fisher’s estimates 2.5 million to 5.5 million Natives enslaved in the entire Americas.” ref

Big Man (big woman/people of power)?

Lugal “big man” – 3rd-millennium Sumer: “Lugal (Sumerian: 𒈗) is the Sumerian term for “king, ruler”. Literally, the term means “big man”. In Sumerian, lú “𒇽” is “man” and gal “𒃲” is “great”, or “big”. It was one of several Sumerian titles that a ruler of a city-state could bear (alongside en and ensi, the exact difference being a subject of debate). The sign eventually became the predominant logograph for “King” in general. In the Sumerian language, lugal is used to mean an owner (e.g. of a boat or a field) or a head or chief (of a unit, such as a family). The cuneiform sign LUGAL 𒈗 serves as a determinative in cuneiform texts (Sumerian, Akkadian, and Hittite), indicating that the following word is the name of a king.” ref

Big man (form of hierarchical leadership): “A big man is a highly influential individual in a tribe, especially in Melanesia and Polynesia. Such a person may not have formal tribal or other authority (through, for instance, material possessions or inheritance of rights), but can maintain recognition through skilled persuasion and wisdom. The big man has a large following from both his clan and other clans. He provides his followers with protection and economic assistance, in return receiving support which he uses to increase his status. The constructed ideal types of hierarchical relations are used to compare a large-scale Polynesian-type hierarchical society of chiefs and sub-chiefs with a Melanesian-type big-man system. Traditionally, among people of non-Austronesian-speaking communities, authority was obtained by a man (the so-called “big man”) recognized as “performing most capably in social, political, economic, and ceremonial activities”. His function was not to command, but to influence his society through his example.” ref

AI Overview: “Headsman and Big Man leaders are similar in that both are types of informal, non-coercive leadership found in tribal or band societies where authority is achieved rather than inherited. However, they differ significantly in their scope of influence and the sometimes more aggressive, competitive, and expansive nature of the Big Man’s leadership style.” [1, 2, 3]

The Big Man Mechanism: how prestige fosters cooperation and creates prosocial leaders

“Anthropological evidence from diverse societies suggests that prestige-based leadership may provide a foundation for cooperation in many contexts. Here, inspired by such ethnographic observations and building on a foundation of existing research on the evolution of prestige, we develop a set of formal models to explore when an evolved prestige psychology might drive the cultural evolution of n-person cooperation, and how such a cultural evolutionary process might create novel selection pressures for genes that make prestigious individuals more prosocial. Our results reveal (i) how prestige can foster the cultural emergence of cooperation by generating correlated behavioral phenotypes, both between leaders and followers, and among followers; (ii) why, in the wake of cultural evolution, natural selection favors genes that make prestigious leaders more prosocial, but only when groups are relatively small; and (iii), why the effectiveness of status differences in generating cooperation in large groups depends on cultural transmission (and not primarily on deference or coercion). Ethnography suggests that particularly prestigious individuals generate cooperation, influence group decisions, and provide informal leadership in a wide range of societies.” ref

“These individuals often derive their prestige from superior skill, knowledge, or success in locally valued domains, including domains related to social norms and rituals. In small-scale societies, the domains associated with prestige include hunting, oratory, shamanic knowledge, and combat. Prestigious individuals, particularly those who emerge as local leaders, often behave prosocially and exhibit unusual levels of generosity. They also receive deference from others in many forms, including public praise, small gifts, ready aid in projects, a variety of favors, and mating opportunities. Though these patterns can be observed across a wide range of human societies, they are particularly important in egalitarian or acephalous tribal societies, including mobile hunter–gatherers, which have relatively few institutions for selecting leaders, granting authority or delivering sanctions. Such prestige-based status hierarchies and patterns of informal leadership are common in egalitarian societies.” ref

“For example, summarizing work on hunting, status and cooperation among foraging peoples in Northern Canada, Paine writes, ‘Acknowledged expertise attracts, though perhaps only temporarily, what we may term a following of dependent persons. These persons will be welcomed as a principal source of prestige—as a capital benefit of the hunter’s expertise. It is particularly noteworthy that prestige status shapes social life and provides a foundation for informal leadership in groups possessing a variety of social norms and practices that otherwise actively suppress status differences. In sedentary societies that lack institutions for transmitting power across generations, prestigious ‘Big Men’ emerge and often become the center of political life. As in more mobile populations, prestige is often derived from skill, expertise and success in locally valued domains, but now these domains include economic production or wealth accumulation. Such societies can be found all over the world, including among foragers in California and the Northwest Coast of North America.” ref

Hunter-Gatherer Groups with Chiefs or Chiefly Confederacies?

Hunter/Fisher-Gatherer is a subsistence style, and while many Hunter/Fisher-Gatherer societies are highly mobile as well as egalitarian, non-hierarchical leadership, or not really stratified. However, this is just a common association because there are also some such Hunter/Fisher-Gatherer societies that can be more complex, less than fully egalitarian, with some amount of hierarchical leadership, or somewhat stratified, as well as either semi-sedentary, seasonally sedentary, or mostly sedentary groups. More complex Hunter-Fisher-Gatherer societies are thought to have more abundant resources than those with fewer, and these groups have historically featured “big men/women,” chiefs, or chiefly confederacies. Some limit their thinking about possible chiefs or chiefdoms to agricultural groups, but this is just a norm, not a defined truth of social organization fixed in the reality of cultures the world over. Cultures are diverse; it is our understanding that is limited.

AI Overview: Several Native American tribes had established leadership structures with identified chiefs at the time of European contact, particularly in the Eastern Woodlands and Southeastern regions. Notable examples include the Powhatan Confederacy under Chief Powhatan, the Wampanoag under Massasoit, the Lenape under Netawatwees, and the Cherokee with their system of White and Red chiefs. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

Tribes and Leadership at Time of Contact

• Powhatan Confederacy (Virginia): Chief Powhatan (Wahunsenacawh) led a massive alliance of Algonquian-speaking tribes in the Chesapeake Bay area.
• Wampanoag (New England): Massasoit was the paramount sachem (leader) at the time of the Pilgrim landing.
• Lenape/Delaware (Mid-Atlantic): Netawatwees (King Newcomer) was a prominent sachem (principle chief).
• Narragansett (Rhode Island): Sachems governed eight distinct groups within the tribe.
• Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederacy (NY): While a confederacy, individual tribes like the Mohawk and Cayuga had leadership structures that met with early explorers.
• Cherokee (Southeast): Had a “white-chief” for peace and a “red chief” for war, with leaders like John Ridge known in early records.
• Timucua (Florida): A large, populous tribe with 35 separate chiefdoms.
• Taino (Caribbean): Caciques (chiefs) were identified by Spanish explorers, including leaders like Cuauhtémoc and Tecun Uman. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

Key Regional Leadership Dynamics

• Sachems: A term often used by Algonquian nations of New England for paramount chiefs.
• Weroance: Used in the Chesapeake region for a leader, such as those within the Powhatan Confederacy.
• Cacique: A term used among the Taino, later adopted by the Spanish for Native leaders, including the Tupi people (Morubixaba).
• Confederacy Leaders: Many groups in the Southeast (e.g., Cherokee, Choctaw) were organized under chiefs who later engaged in diplomatic trade with British and French colonists. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

Pre-Columbian Native American societies (those existing before roughly 1492–1600 AD) were often organized into complex chiefdoms with distinct social hierarchies. While many individual leaders from this era are not named in written history, archaeology and early contact records have identified several tribes and their governing leaders. [1, 2, 3, 4]

North America (Pre-Columbian and Early Contact Period)

• Powhatan Confederacy (Tsenacommacah): Led by Chief Powhatan (Wahunsenacawh), who commanded over thirty tribes in the Chesapeake Bay region as a paramount chief.
• Mississippian Culture Chiefdoms: Various tribes (c. 800–1600 AD) thrived in the Southeast/Midwest, known for mound-building and centralized leadership, such as those at Cahokia.
• Cherokee Confederacy (Southeastern US): Society organized as a confederacy of towns, each governed by its own chief.
• Hopi (Southwestern US): An ancient Puebloan people whose villages were, and still are, led by a kikmongwi (town chief/priest).
• Iroquois Confederacy (Haudenosaunee): Associated with foundational leaders like Hiawatha and Deganawida.
• Ancestral Puebloans: Early inhabitants of the Southwest (c. 100 AD) governed by religious leaders or town chiefs known as a cacique.
• Pequot/Wampanoag: Early New England tribes with established council systems. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
• In the pre-Columbian era, leadership structures varied significantly across North America. While many tribes operated by consensus, some regions—particularly the Southeastern Woodlands and the Pacific Northwest—developed formal chiefdoms with hierarchical leadership. In other areas like the Northeast, tribes were led by civil and war chiefs who were often constrained by tribal councils. [1, 2, 3]
• Chinookan peoples, advanced societies with permanent villages where chiefs demonstrated wealth and prestige through potlatches—lavish feasts where valuables were gifted or destroyed.

Mesoamerica (Pre-Columbian Civilization)

• Aztec Empire (Mexica): Controlled by an elected chief or “Huey Tlatoani” (Great Speaker), such as Moctezuma I or Moctezuma II.
• Maya Civilization: City-states with hereditary rulers (Ajaw), such as K’inich Janaab’ Pakal (Pakal the Great) of Palenque.
• Olmec Civilization: Early “mother culture” of Mexico (c. 1500 BC – 400 BC).
• Tarascan State (Purépecha): A major rival to the Aztec Empire. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

South America (Pre-Columbian Civilizations) [1]

• Inca Empire: Led by a supreme ruler or Emperor (Sapa Inca), such as Pachacuti.
• Muisca Confederation: Located in modern-day Colombia, ruled by powerful caciques (leaders) like the Zipa and Zaque.
• Tairona Confederation: Highland inhabitants in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

Prehistoric Pacific Northwest: Shell Mounds, Culture, Religion, Migrations, Languages, Clans, Power/Elites, Inequality, and Slavery

North America Examined 

Area #1 (Pacific Northwest)

Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast

“The Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast are the many First Nations and Alaska Native peoples whose traditional homelands lie along the Pacific coast of northwestern North America. The region is defined as a long, narrow coastal zone from the Alaska Panhandle through to British Columbia, Washington State, Oregon, and Northern California. Each ethnic group has distinct histories, political identities, and languages, but they share cultural and subsistence practices, certain beliefs, ceremonies, traditions, and artistic forms. The environment of the Pacific Northwest supported unusually dense settlement for hunter-gatherer societies, making possible large permanent or semi-permanent villages, extensive trade, and highly complex political and ceremonial life. Some cultures in this region were very similar and shared certain elements, while others differed. Prior to contact, and for a brief time after colonization, some of these groups regularly conducted war against each other through raids and attacks. Through warfare, they gathered captives for slavery. At one point, the region had the highest population density of a region inhabited by Indigenous peoples in Canada.” ref

“Many groups engaged in potlatch, a highly complex event where people gather to commemorate a specific event (such as the raising of a totem pole or the appointment/election of a new chief). These potlatches would usually be held in competition with one another, providing a forum to display wealth within a tribe. In the potlatch ceremony, the chief would give highly elaborate gifts to visiting peoples to establish his power and prestige, and by accepting these gifts the visitors conveyed their approval of the chief. There were also great feasts and displays of conspicuous consumption, such as the burning of articles or throwing things into the sea, purely as a display of the great wealth of the chief. Groups of dancers put on elaborate dances and ceremonies. These dancers were members of secret “dancing societies”. Watching these performances was considered an honor. Potlatches were held for several reasons: the confirmation of a new chief; coming of age; tattooing or piercing ceremonies; initiation into a secret society; marriages; the funeral of a chief; and battle victory.” ref

“Potlatch was/is traditionally the primary governmental institution, legislative body, and economic system. This includes the Heiltsuk, Haida, Nuxalk, Tlingit, Makah, Tsimshian, Nuu-chah-nulth, Kwakwaka’wakw, and Coast Salish cultures. Potlatches are also a common feature of the peoples of the Interior and of the Subarctic adjoining the Northwest Coast, although mostly without the elaborate ritual and gift-giving economy of the coastal peoples (see Athabaskan potlatch). A potlatch was held on the occasion of births, deaths, adoptions, weddings, and other major events. Typically, the potlatch was practiced more in the winter seasons, as historically the warmer months were for procuring wealth for the family, clan, or village, then coming home and sharing that with neighbors and friends. The event was hosted by a numaym, or ‘House‘, in Kwakwaka’wakw culture. A numaym was a complex cognatic kin group usually headed by aristocrats, but including commoners and occasional slaves. The House drew its identity from its ancestral founder, usually a mythical animal who descended to earth and removed his animal mask, thus becoming human.” ref

Eyak – chiefs (matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “Subsisted on fishing and gathering, supplemented by hunting. The family household was the fundamental social unit, organized into moieties likely modeled after those of the Tlingit, and there were three distinct social strata: chiefs and their families, commoners, and slaves (mostly war captives). Settlements were comprised of family dwellings belonging to their respective moieties, each with its own chief whose relative power depended on the number of villagers in their moiety.” ref “The Eyak were exogamous and matrilineal, divided into an Eagle and a Raven Moiety. This arrangement had parallels to the Wolf and Raven division among the Tlingit, which may have influenced its origin. Most of the seven clans recorded within the Raven Moiety, and the six clans of the Eagle Moiety, possessed Tlingit names in the early twentieth century.” ref

Tlingit – chiefs (matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Tlingit language, is a Na-Dene language. A family of Native American languages that includes at least the Athabaskan languages, Eyak, and Tlingit languages. There is a proposed genetic relationship between Na-Dene and the Yeniseian languages of central Siberia, termed Dene–Yeniseian.” ref, ref AI Overview: Na-Dene (Athabaskan and Tlingit) groups that utilize traditional or modern leadership systems with chiefs include the Dene Nation of northern Canada (comprising Denesuline, Tlicho, and Gwich’in communities with modern band chiefs), the Tanana Chiefs Conference representing interior Alaska Athabascan tribes, and the Tlingit of the Pacific Northwest with hereditary clan leaders. [1, 2, 3]

Haida – chiefs (matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer)

Tsimshian – chiefs (matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “Hereditary chiefs. The Tsimshian language has some 27 different terms for ‘chief’ likely because it is a stratified and ranked society.” ref

Gitxsan – chiefs (matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “Hereditary Chiefs” ref (related to Tsimshian)

Haisla – chiefs (matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Haisla consist of two bands: the Kitamaat people, residing in upper Douglas Channel and Devastation Channel, and the Kitlope People, inhabiting upper Princess Royal Channel and Gardner Canal in British Columbia, Canada. The Kitamaat people identify themselves as Haisla, meaning “dwellers downriver”. The term Kitamaat originates from the Tsimshian people.” ref “The Haisla are characterized by a matrilineal social structure comprised of five clans.” ref

Heiltsuk – chiefs (matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Heiltsuk, also known as Bella Bella, are organized into three subtribes and matrilineal clans, each with its own cultural identity and symbols, like the Killer Whale and Raven.” ref

Nuxalk – chiefs (bilateral kinship, matrilineal/patrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “Nuxalk Hereditary Chiefs” ref “While descent is ambilineal, pre-contact Nuxalk culture was characterized by patrilocality and the predominantly matrilineal inheritance of prerogatives, although the latter is thought to have shifted over time from a more patrilineal system of inheritance.” ref

Wuikinuxv – chiefs (matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “Oowekyala, the language of the Wuikinuxv, is closely related to the Heiltsuk language, so much so that it is considered one of two dialects of a language named Heiltsuk–Oowekyala, the other dialect being Heiltsuk. It is also closely related to Haisla and is also related to Kwak’wala, the most widely spoken of the Northern Wakashan languages. It is more distantly related to Nuu-chah-nulth, Ditidaht, and Makah, the Southern Wakashan languages.” ref

Wuikinuxv – chiefs (bilateral kinship matrilineal/patrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “Hereditary Chief” ref “The traditional social structure of the Wuikinuxv (also known as Oweekeno) people was organized around hereditary lineages associated with ranked plank houses, each led by a chief whose authority was inherited through bilateral descent, emphasizing both maternal and paternal lines, as documented in early 20th-century ethnographies of Northwest Coast societies.” ref “The Wuikinuxv, also known as the Owekeeno speak a language related to Heiltsuk, Wuikyala or Oowekyala (they are dialects of a language that has no independent name; linguists refer to it as Heiltsuk-Oweekyala). Together with the Heiltsuk and Haisla, they were once incorrectly known as the Northern Kwakiutl because of their language’s close relationship with Kwakʼwala (Kwakʼwala  is a Wakashan language spoken by about 150 Kwakwakaʼwakw people around Queen Charlotte Strait in Western Canada.” ref).” ref

 Kwakwakaʼwakw – chiefs (bilateral kinship but patrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “Kwakwa̱ka̱ʼwakw kinship is based on a bilinear structure, with loose characteristics of a patrilineal culture. It has large extended families and interconnected community life.  A head chief who, through primogeniture, could trace his origins to that naʼmima’s ancestors delineated the roles throughout the rest of his family. Every clan had several sub-chiefs, who gained their titles and position through their own family’s primogeniture. In some of the nations, there also existed Eagle Chiefs, but this was a separate society within the main society and applied to the potlatching only.” ref “Kwakʼwala is a Northern Wakashan language, a grouping shared with Haisla, Heiltsuk and Oowekyala.” ref

Nuu-chah-nulth – chiefs (matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Nuu-chah-nulth speak a Southern Wakashan language and are closely related to the Makah and Ditidaht.” ref “The Nuu-chah-nulth are related to the Kwakwaka’wakw, the Haisla, and the Ditidaht First Nation.” ref “The Nuu-chah-nulth have a matrilineal social structure, where lineage and inheritance are traced through the mother’s side of the family.” ref

Ditidaht/Nitinaht  – chiefs (bilateral kinship but mainly matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Ditidaht are a Southern Wakashan speaking people related to the Nuu-chah-nulth.” ref “The present Ditidaht Nation is an alliance of at least ten “local groups” each consisting of a group of people occupying a specific geographical area and centered around chiefs and their families. Ditidaht chiefs, known as chaabat’, held rights to the fish, roots, and other food resources within our territory. The chiefs also held the weir trap prerogatives on the major salmon streams. So strict were these property rights that poachers were killed for serious infractions, although theft of plant foods would result only in confiscation of the illegal harvest. Some high-status people held rights to certain salmon-harpooning sites or rocks where particularly good seafood could be harvested.” ref “The Ditidaht participated in a distinct, often described as (bilateral, matrilineal) for certain rights, names or associations.” ref

Makah – chiefs (bilateral kinship society and complex hunter-gatherer) “Linguistically and ethnographically, they are closely related to the Nuu-chah-nulth and Ditidaht peoples. Members of Makah families were ranked in society according to their relationship to the chief of the tribe. There were no stratifications in gender roles, and women participated in the hunting of whales and other livestock. Although men were more fishermen and hunters, women’s activities centered on gathering resources for the family.” ref “Historically, the structure of Makah society is a class system; people in the middle or lower classes could gain better social status by marrying into the upper levels. The community was in mostly a cognatic descent structure.” ref “Cognatic kinship is a mode of descent calculated from an ancestor counted through any combination of male and female links, or a system of bilateral kinship where relations are traced through both a father and mother.” ref

Coast Salish – chiefs (bilateral kinship, matrilineal/patrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Coast Salish cultures differ considerably from those of their northern neighbors. One branch, the Bella Coola, feature a patrilineal, not matrilineal, system. As a whole, the Coast Salish tribes generally have both a matrilineal and patrilineal system.” ref “Most Salish tribes were divided into autonomous, loosely organized bands of related families, each with its own chief and local territory. Salish, linguistic grouping of North American Indian tribes speaking related languages. Interior Salish in the upper basins of the Columbia and Fraser rivers and their tributaries in what are now the province of British Columbia, Can., and the U.S. states of Washington, Idaho, and Montana. And their neighbors, the Coast Salish tribes who resided on the Northwest Pacific Coast. On the fringes of the Plateau culture area, however, conditions were different. The westernmost Salish groups, such as the Lillooet and western Shuswap, traded with the Northwest Coast Indians and adopted some of their customs. The Lillooet, for instance, had a well-organized clan system similar to those used by Coast Salish peoples, and the western Shuswap had both clans and castes of nobles, commoners, and slaves, forms of social organization similar to those found on the coast. The easternmost Salish, such as the Flathead, who were horsemen, bison hunters, and warriors, had a relatively well-developed system of tribal chiefs and councils, much in the manner of the Plains Indians with whom they traded. Like other Northwest Coast Indians before colonial contact, the Coast Salish lived principally on fish, although some groups living along the upper rivers relied more heavily on hunting. They built permanent winter houses of wood and used mat lodges for temporary camps. Traditionally, the tribe’s basic social unit was the local group consisting of close relatives. Each extended family usually lived in one large house, and groups of houses formed a winter village; people dispersed during the summer for fishing, hunting, and berrying.” ref

Chimakum – chiefs (patrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Chimakum people were a Chimakuan-speaking people, like the Quileute.” ref “The Chemakum language was one of two Chimakuan languages and very similar to the Quileute language. The Chimakum language is a tribal language thought to be similar in lexicographic and phonetic aspect with very little diversion to the Quileute language, implying that the Chimakum, Salishan and Wakashan tribes may be proved to be genetically related.” ref “All that was left was the smoking remains of the last Chemakum village. In the end, the raiders killed the Chemakum men, then paddled away with the captured women and children as their slaves. The only survivors of the attack on this village were those, including the Chemakum chief, who had gone upstream in the early morning to spear fish.” ref “Social structure was hierarchical, comprising three classes: nobility or chiefs who held leadership roles and mediated disputes, commoners who formed the bulk of the population engaged in daily subsistence, and slaves acquired through warfare or raids. Patrilineal descent governed inheritance of status, names, and property, with no documented clan or matrilineal systems. Village governance centered on chiefs selected from noble lineages, supported by kinship alliances that reinforced social cohesion and inter-village relations in this isolated, defensively oriented society.” ref

Quileute – chiefs (bilateral kinship but more matrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Quileute people speak a language belonging to the Chimakuan language family. Like many Northwest Coast nations, in precontact times the Quileute relied on fishing from local rivers and the Pacific Ocean for food. They built plank houses (longhouses). They also hunted whales and seals, likely having learned whaling from the neighboring Makah to the north. In the 18th and 19th centuries, Quileute society was divided into three classes: hereditary chiefs and family heads, commoners, and slaves. Each village had two hereditary chiefs of equal power. Slaves were obtained through raids or in trade. Political life revolved around getting and maintaining family prestige and status.” ref “Quileute society descent (bilateral, matrilineal) for certain rights, names or associations: and Kinship was bilateral. When agreement was reached on the goods to be exchanged, the boy and his dowry were delivered to the girls’ kindred.” ref

Willapa-Kwalhioqua–Clatskanie – chiefs (patrilineal society hunter-gatherers) “The Willapa people are a traditionally Athabaskan-speaking people of southwestern Washington. Their territory was between Willapa Bay (named after them) and the prairie lands around the head of the Chehalis and Cowlitz Rivers. A related people, known as the Clatskanie (/ˈklætskɪnaɪ/) or Tlatskani, lived on the south side of the Columbia River in northwestern Oregon.” ref “The Willapa or Willoopah, also known as Kwalhioqua / Kwalhiokwa, were a Northern Athapaskan-speaking people in southwestern Washington, United States. Their territory was the valley of the Willapa River and the prairie between the headwaters of the Chehalis and Cowlitz Rivers. The Kwalhioqua lived north of the lower Columbia River, the Clatskanie (Tlatskanai) to the south, separated by the territory of the Lower Chinook-speaking Shoalwater Bay Chinook (or Willapa Chinook) or Clatsop and the Kathlamet (Cathlamet), who spoke another Chinookan variant.” ref “The term Shoalwater Bay Indians is used to refer to those of Lower Chehalis and Lower Chinook descent and other Indians whose primary home was and is the bay.  The north end of the bay around the present-day reservation was populated predominantly by Lower Chehalis-speaking peoples. The Southern end of the bay, near present-day Bay Center and southward, was inhabited by Willapa Chinook peoples. The original territory of the Shoalwater Bay peoples was a vast network of waterways along the coast. The Shoalwater Bay chiefs in attendance at the Chehalis River Treaty Council of 1855 refused to sign the non-negotiable treaty offered by Governor Stevens.” ref “Chief Toke was a leader of the Shoalwater Bay Tribe, a Native American group inhabiting the Pacific coast of what is now Washington state. The coastal settlement of Tokeland, located at the northern entrance to Willapa Bay, derives its name from him, as the area served as a summer home for Toke and his family prior to European settlement. Chief Toke’s ancestry combined Chinook and Chehalis lineages, aligning with the mixed heritage of the Shoalwater Bay peoples who wintered along the bay’s shores. As a leader among these groups, his descent reflected patterns of inter-tribal marriages prevalent in the lower Columbia River and coastal regions, where kinship ties facilitated resource sharing and alliances amid overlapping territories. Chiefs like Toke typically mediated disputes via fines or blood money payments, allocated communal resources like fishing sites, and maintained order in kin networks, functions rooted in hereditary succession from father to eldest son among high-status families. This structure supported resilient adaptation to coastal environments, countering assumptions of pre-contact fragility by prioritizing empirical reliance on predictable marine yields over hierarchical centralization.” ref “The Pacific Coast bloc is interesting because there is an intermediate group, a probable residue of the Athapaskan migrations in the now-extinct Kwalhioqua-Clatskanie-Owilapsh (KCO) Athapaskans who dwelled around the mouth of the Columbia River in Oregon and Washington State. KCO is a single language of three dialects, grouped with PCA on geographical grounds, but technically distinct from the other PCA languages in southern Oregon and northern California. KCO is linguistically about equidistant from its nearest Northern Athapaskan and PCA neighbors, and thus could be composed of remnant-bands in a chain of migrations connecting the Northern and Pacific Coast blocs.” ref “Pacific Coast Athapaskans involved the Willapas, Swaals, Kwalhioqwa, and Klatskani peoples. Unlike the matri-emphasis of other Athapaskans, Pacific Coast communities were more patrilineal and patrilocal, with settled towns and territories.” ref

Chinook– chiefs (patrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Chinookan peoples were once one of the most powerful and populous groups of tribes on the southern part of the Northwest Coast. Their group of dialects are known as Chinookan. Close allies of the Nuu-chah-nulth, they are also a canoe people, and pre-European contact, Chinook Jargon arose as a trading language incorporating both Chinookan and Wakashan vocabulary.” ref “The Chinookan peoples were relatively settled and occupied traditional tribal geographic areas, where they hunted and fished; salmon was a mainstay of their diet. The women also gathered and processed many nuts, seeds, roots, and other foods. They had a society marked by social stratification, consisting of several distinct social castes of greater or lesser status. Upper castes included shamans, warriors, and successful traders. They composed a minority of the community population compared to common members. Members of the superior castes are said to have practiced social discrimination, limiting contact with commoners and forbidding play between the children of the different social groups. Some Chinookan peoples practiced slavery, a practice borrowed from the northernmost tribes of the Pacific Northwest. They took slaves as captives in warfare and used them to practice thievery on behalf of their masters. The latter refrained from such practices as unworthy of high status. The Chinook were known colloquially by early white explorers in the region as “Flathead Indians”. The elite of some tribes had the practice of head binding, flattening their children’s foreheads and the top of the skull as a mark of social status. This custom was a means of marking social hierarchy; flat-headed community members had a rank above those with round heads. Those with flattened skulls refused to enslave other persons who were similarly marked, thereby reinforcing the association of a round head with servility.” ref “Chief Comcomly was a prominent Chinook leader who interacted with early explorers like Lewis and Clark in 1805.” ref “Chief Comcomly (1765–1830) was a Native American leader of the Lower Chinook, a group of Chinookan peoples indigenous to the Pacific Northwest, who inhabited the area near Ilwaco, Washington. Concomly spoke Lower Chinook and was known for his skill with diplomacy and trade. Concomly was reported to have several wives. In contemporaneous journals, Concomly was referred to as Chief or, at times, as “‘King”, a derogatory term. Malaria was one of several diseases brought by colonizers that killed an estimated 150,000 Native peoples near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia Rivers in Oregon and Washington state between 1829 and 1833. Comcomly died in 1830 after an “intermittent fever” epidemic, also called “cold sick” and presumed to be malaria, struck his tribe. His remains were interred in a canoe, per Chinook custom, in the family burial ground.” ref “Since residence was uniformly patrilocal, shortly after the birth, the mother and child returned to the husband’s home, accompanied by large quantities of food, and subsequent feasting. For the established men in the community, those frequently referred to as “chiefs”, subsequent wives were obtained by payment to the bride’s father or other responsible relative. The number of wives that a man had was an important symbol of rank in the society. Both levirate and sororate marriages were strictly observed by the Chinookans. This family consisted of a man’s wife or wives, sons or blood relations, and their dependents and slaves. The head of this household was the highest man by class and rank, who was still in his prime, and who was also the owner of the house. The children of freemen were all subject to extensive head flattening, a practice forbidden to slaves, because it represented a distinctive mark of status in the society.” ref

Tillamook – chiefs (bilateral kinship, matrilineal/patrilineal society and complex hunter-gatherer) “The Tillamook are a Native American tribe from coastal Oregon of the Salish linguistic group. The name “Tillamook” is a Chinook language term meaning “people of [the village] Nekelim (or Nehalem)”, sometimes it is given as a Coast Salish term, meaning “Land of Many Waters”. Marriages among the Tillamook were arranged, with services being exchanged between the two families according to their status. If men acquired high status, they might have sought more than one wife. During the early-mid 19th century, Chief Kilchis (c. 1806–1866) was the leader of the Tillamook people and one of the last free chiefs of the Tillmook.” ref, ref  “Tillamook descent was bilateral.” ref

Area #2 (California)

Indigenous peoples of California

“The traditional homelands of many tribal nations may not conform exactly to the state of California’s boundaries. Many tribes on the eastern border with Nevada have been classified as Great Basin tribes, while some tribes on the Oregon border are classified as Plateau tribes. Tribes in Baja California who do not cross into California are classified as Indigenous peoples of Mexico. The Kumeyaay nation is split by the Mexico-United States border. Early Native Californians were hunter-gatherers, with seed collection becoming widespread around 9,000 BCE. Two early southern California cultural traditions include the La Jolla complex and the Pauma Complex, both dating from c. 6050–1000 BCE. From 3000 to 2000 BCE, regional diversity developed, with the peoples making fine-tuned adaptations to local environments. Traits recognizable to historic tribes were developed by approximately 500 BCE. The Indigenous people practiced various forms of sophisticated forest gardening in the forests, grasslands, mixed woodlands, and wetlands to ensure availability of food and medicine plants. By burning underbrush and grass, the Native people revitalized patches of land and provided fresh shoots to attract food animals. A form of fire-stick farming was used to clear areas of old growth to encourage new in a repeated cycle; a permaculture. Tribes lived in societies where men and women had different roles. Women were generally responsible for weaving, harvesting, processing, and preparing food, while men were generally responsible for hunting and other forms of labor. It was also noted by Juan Crespi and Pedro Fages of “men who dressed as women” being an integral part of Native society. The Spanish generally detested these people, who they referred to as joyas in mission records. With colonialism “joyas were driven from their communities by tribal members at the instigation of priests and made homeless.” The joyas traditionally were responsible for death, burial, and mourning rituals and performed women’s roles.” ref

Northwestern California

Chilula / Hupa – chiefs (bilateral kinship matrilineal/patrilineal society and hunter-gatherer) “The Chilula (Yurok language term: Chueluelaʼ/ Chueluelaaʼ, Tsulu-la, “People of Tsulu, the Bald Hill”, locally known as the “Bald Hills Indians”) were a Pacific Coast Athabaskan tribe speaking a dialect similar to the Hupa to the east and Whilkut to the south, who inhabited the area on or near Lower Redwood Creek, in Northern California. Chilula descendants have since been incorporated into the Hupa.” ref “The social and political organization seems to have been of the same sort as that prevailing at Hupa. Each village had a leader who held his position because of his personal character and wealth. Some of these village chiefs, because of their personal force of character and bravery, had influence and were recognized in other villages. On the whole, there appears to have been a surprising lack of political coherence between the various villages. It is difficult to determine what constituted the larger units. That the Chilula were politically distinct from the Hupa is far from certain. Those who went to the Hupa at the beginning of trouble with white people were received by the Hupa as if they were compatriots, but this may have been due to existing relationships through intermarriages. The general myths and the medicine formulas show no noticeable differences from those of the Hupa. Not even are there the different localizations one might expect. The Hupa myths and tales deal with Yurok and Chilula territory almost as frequently as with the Trinity region.” ref “Archaeologists and linguists believe that the Hupa and Chilula originally lived north of California, most likely in Oregon. They probably began the move south about 1,300 years ago and completed the move about 300 years later. The Hupa are and always have been the largest of the Athabaskan-speaking tribes living in northwestern California. The most important tribal unit among the northwestern California Indians was the village; there was no single chief who headed the entire Hupa or Chilula nations. Villages were composed of groups of people who shared the same family tree. Each village maintained its own version of law and order and was guided by a chief or powerful leader, usually the wealthiest or most popular man in the village. Occasionally a group of wealthy Hupa men gathered to resolve disputes or decide on a payment for breaking rules.” ref “Hupa and likely Chilula descent was bilateral.” ref “Hupa people migrated from the north into northern California around 1000 CE, and language is a member of the Athabaskan language family. Their red cedar-planked houses, dugout canoes, basket hats, and many elements of their oral literature identify them with their northern origin; however, some of their customs, such as the use of a sweat house for ceremonies and the manufacture of acorn bread, were adopted from surrounding Indigenous peoples of California. Closely associated peoples – both by language and custom – were/are the Tsnungwe (South Fork Hupa), the Chilula (Lower Redwood Creek Hupa) and Whilkut (Redwood Creek Hupa).” ref

Karuk– family wealth-class “leader” system (bilateral kinship, matrilineal/patrilineal society and hunter-gatherer) “Karuk patterns of descent (bilateral, matrilineal/patrilineal) for certain rights, names or associations were patrilineal. Political system: (chiefs, clans etc, wealth or status classes): There is no formal political system in either the villages or from the Karok as a whole. However, the families that were considered to be rich were regarded as community leaders. Wealth classes where money could buy a better wife, which allows a better name that gives many perks. These include fishing spots and hunting rights, which, along with marriage rights (from money), breed an informal wealth class system.” ref “The Karuk are members of the Hupa Group of the Klamath River regions of Northwestern California. Not much is known about the pre-history of the Karuk (also spelled Karok) people. Based on several linguistic clues, archaeologists believe that this group, or their Hokan-speaking ancestors (“The Hokan language family is a hypothetical grouping spoken mainly in California, Arizona, and Baja California. Some versions include languages spoken in Oaxaca and Honduras.” ref), migrated to northwestern California from the Pacific Northwest. They may have been among the first groups to enter northwestern California. Once the Yurok arrived in the Klamath River area, the Karuk adopted their methods of fishing and food preservation, as well as their woodworking skills. Also, because the territory the Karuk occupied had very few redwood trees, they traded for the dugout redwood canoes made by the Yurok. After assimilating many of the Yurok skills, the Karuk shifted from a migratory hunter/gatherer society to a more sedentary river-based culture. Although fish provided a large part of their diet, the Karuk considered deer to be necessary to their culture as well. The Karuk were the first known cultivators of the tobacco plant in northwestern California. Used by shamans to soothe patients as well as for pleasure smoking, the Karuk also used tobacco as a trade item and as an offering during religious and ceremonial events. Karuk baskets were similar to those made by the Hupa and Yurok.” ref

Cahto–Kato– chiefs (bilateral kinship with some amount more matrilineal but also patrilineal society and hunter-gatherer) “Each village had its chief, dog sled, and some villages, a second chief. Generally, the chief’s son succeeded to the office, but if a headman died without sons, the people, by common consent and without formal voting, selected from among themselves the man whom they regarded as best fitted for the place. The duty of a chief was to be the adviser of his people. When anything of great importance was to be decided, the village chief summoned the council, which comprised all the elder men. Each expressed his opinion, and the chief would go along with the consensus. Children were not regarded as belonging any more to the paternal than to the maternal side.” Ref “Kato, Athabaskan or Wailaki languages spoken, and belong to the language family of Athabaskan-Eyak-Tlingit (Eyak-Athabaskan, Na-Dene, Dene-Yeniseian) with patterns of descent (e.g., bilateral, matrilineal) for certain rights, names or associations.” ref

Pomo – chiefs (bilateral kinship, matrilineal/patrilineal society, and hunter-gatherer) “The Pomo Indian cultures are several ethnolinguistic groups that make up a single language family in Northern California. Pomo cultures originally encompassed hundreds of independent communities. The Pomo people were traditionally divided into several large groupings, each speaking its own language. While these had no overarching governance structure and villages were politically independent, they had some cultural differences and were recognizable as units to those who lived in them.” ref “Pomo patterns of descent were bilateral.” ref “At one time there were more than seventy independent Pomo tribes. They were further divided into groups called tribelets, which ranged in size from 125 to more than 500 persons. A tribelet is a type of organization in which one main village was surrounded by a few minor outlying settlements. Villages were made up of one or more family groups, who chose one group to be leaders. Some villages had only one chief in charge, while others had as many as twenty. Women have always held a high position in Pomo society. There have been female chiefs, and among some groups, the right to become a chief passed from a chief to his sister’s son, if the young man showed leadership qualities. Pomo women were rare among Native Americans in enjoying a fairly high status. They could be chiefs. Some became members of the tribe’s secret societies, but they were barred from certain other societies.” ref “The Pomoan or Pomo languages are a small family of seven languages indigenous to northern California spoken by the Pomo people.” ref “According to certain linguistic hypotheses, the Pomo descend from Hokan-speaking peoples; per this theory, a Hokan-speaking people migrated into the upland valley regions near Clear Lake ca. 7000 BCE, where their language evolved into Proto-Pomoan.” ref

Shastan– family wealth-class “headman leader” system (bilateral kinship with a preference for patrilineal descent society and hunter-gatherer) “Shastan political system involved each village integrated into a larger band, each led by a headman. The headman was from the richest family in the district. The headman functioned as peacemaker and advisor. Shasta descent was bilateral with a preference for patrilineal descent.” ref

“A village head, village headman or village chief is the leader of a village, hamlet, or other type of settlement too small to have their own mayor. Unlike the position of mayor, denoting a leader of a city, town, or other large settlements with its own incorporated government, the title of village head may be purely ceremonial or even entirely unofficial, simply denoting an individual who commands sizeable political and social influence in a given area.” ref “Headman: a lesser chief of a “Less complex” community.” ref

Tolowa – chiefs/family wealth-class “headman leader” system (bilateral kinship with a preference for patrilineal descent society and hunter-gatherer) “Chieftainship was hereditary among wealthy families. A chief could have 10 to 12 wives. Class largely based on wealth gained through manipulation, haggling and patrilineal inheritance – “The eventual result of all these manipulations plus direct inheritance was that wealth goods as well as food became concentrated in particular households— those of wealthy men or mitxBsxe—and one such wealthy man usually appeared as paramount within each village. These men were not formal chiefs, and they lacked authority in most matters. But they acted as intermediaries in marriage negotiations and indemnity settlements, and they were in a position to initiate projects like canoe- and house-building and the annual first sea lion hunt. Given the optimizing nature of traditional Tolowa subsistence procurement systems, the presence of a non-authoritarian leader in each village who could take the initiative in the few subsistence activities that required cooperative organization and who could marshal resources to construct the facilities necessary for these activities can be regarded as highly adaptive. The institution of a “wealthy man” in each village provided a higher degree of ecological fitness for Tolowa society than would a purely egalitarian system, since without some form of leadership the opportunities to harvest sea lions and salmon would have been severely limited. Patterns of descent (e.g., bilateral, matrilineal) for certain rights, names or associations. Patrilineal for names, rights, and wealth.” ref “The Tolowa language, one of the Athabaskan languages. Their society was not formally stratified, but considerable emphasis was put on personal wealth. Tolowa villages were organized around a headman and usually consisted of related men, in a patrilineal kinship system, where inheritance and status passed through the male line. The men married women in neighboring tribes. The brides were usually related (sisters), in order for the wealth to remain in the paternal families.” ref

Whilkut – village/family wealth-class “headmen leader” system (patrilineal descent society and hunter-gatherer) “The Whilkut Indians belonged to the Hupa dialectic group of the Athapascan linguistic family.” ref “The Whilkut spoke a dialect of the Hupa language, classified within the Pacific Coast Athabaskan subgroup of the Na-Dené family. Whilkut is classified as a dialect of Hupa, closely related to the adjacent Chilula variety, with the three forming a dialect continuum known as Hupa-Chilula-Whilkut. Whilkut had minimal lexical and phonological divergence from Hupa proper, supporting their treatment as mutually intelligible variants rather than distinct languages. No evidence supports independent status for Whilkut outside this cluster, as historical records show intermarriage and cultural exchange with Hupa speakers facilitated linguistic convergence. Unlike coastal neighbors, the Whilkut did not employ canoes for fishing, reflecting their inland orientation.  Families held proprietary rights to specific sites, including fishing holes, acorn groves, and trapping areas, which were defended against outsiders, as seen in conflicts with neighboring Wiyot over oak territories. The Whilkut social structure mirrored that of their linguistically and culturally affiliated Hupa and Chilula neighbors, emphasizing patrilineal descent and extended family units centered on plank-house villages along Redwood Creek and the Mad River drainage. No evidence exists of exogamous clans, totemic moieties, or formalized hereditary nobility, distinguishing Whilkut society from more stratified Northwest Coast groups. Political authority resided informally with village headmen, selected for personal wealth in dentalium shells, hides, and food stores rather than birthright; these leaders arbitrated disputes through compensation, organized communal hunts or fisheries, and redistributed resources during shortages, securing loyalty via economic patronage rather than coercion or councils. This wealth-based hierarchy extended to inter-village relations, where affluent headmen could negotiate truces or alliances, as seen in ties with Hupa ceremonial cycles, though Whilkut autonomy persisted amid occasional conflicts.” ref “The Whilkut also known as “(Upper) Redwood Creek Indians” or “Mad River Indians” were a Pacific Coast Athabaskan tribe speaking a dialect similar to the Hupa to the northeast and Chilula to the north. Most authors consider class the Chilula as a separate people, sometimes they are also considered another fourth tribelet (subgroup) of the Whilkut and are called the Chilula Whilkut. Little is known of the Whilkut culture beyond its similarity to that of the Hupa and is criticized by the Hupa and Chilula as guarded, traditional, less settled hill people.” ref “The Hupa, with the Chilula and the Whilkut, formed a close linguistic unit, considerably divergent from the other dialect groups of California Athabascans. They differed from their two nearer bodies of kinsmen largely in consequence of their habitat on a greater stream, in some fashion navigable for canoes even in summer, and flowing in a wider, sunnier valley. Their population was therefore more concentrated, at least over the favorable stretches, and their wealth greater. The Whilkut are practically unknown. The general basis of their culture must have been northwestern, but they lacked some of the specific features, and probably replaced them by customs of central Californian type.” ref

Wintu– chiefs (bilateral kinship with a preference for patrilineal descent society and hunter-gatherer) “The Wintu language is part of the Penutian language family. The number of bands within the Northern Wintu is debated among tribal members and anthropologists, but most recognize 8 to 11 bands. The Waymuq form a transitional group in culture, language, and society between Wintu-speaking peoples and Shastan-speakers.” ref “Technically speaking, for the Wintu, the right to being chief was passed from father to son, but this was not strictly observed because chieftanship was only passed on if the son possessed the leadership qualities necessary to perform his duties. If the eldest son who should be accepting the chieftanship position proves himself to be unworthy of the position, the chief would be succeeded by the next eldest son or a male relative who has proven himself worthy and capable of leadership. That being said, the term that denoted “chief” in Wintuan could be used to refer to any individual in society who was respected by all. Headmen and “subchiefs” also lived in the village to assist the chief with any duties he could not take on himself. The primary duty of chiefs were to organize villagers for battle, though he was not necessarily expected to partake in the battle itself. Descent was quite patrilineal in that a man was aware that he has “got to be with his children. He has got to teach them how to do things.” Men were charged with teaching their children how to be upright and productive members of the community. This responsibility extended to adoptive fathers, as well as biological fathers. That being said, the naming system, which is noted previously, indicates that there was also a bilateral pattern of descent, indicating that the Wintu society was relatively complicated.” ref

Wiyot – chiefs/wealth-class “headman leader” system (bilateral kinship with a preference for patrilineal descent society and hunter-gatherer) “The Wiyot are culturally similar to the Yurok people (Hiktok). The Wiyot and Yurok are the westernmost people to speak an Algic language. Their languages, Wiyot and Yurok, are distantly related to the Algonquian languages. Healers and ceremonial leaders were mostly women, who received their powers on mountaintops during the night.” ref “Patterns of descent (e.g., bilateral, matrilineal) for certain rights, names or associations. Political system: the richest man is chief, and his job is to settle disputes. The headman is in charge of hospitality. The second chief investigates disputes. There is no tribal organization, and there are no clans. The four principal mythological characters are identical, except in name, with those of the Hupa. Kudiqtat-kaqihl or Kutathidi-kaqihl (meaning: “above old man”), created earth, vegetation, and people in a time when there was nothing but water. Adak-sora-hlukihl (meaning: “down-toward ocean he-went”) traveled about the country changing the character of the earth and demanding for reward the favors of pretty maidens. Puchuri-ghurru (meaning: “pointed buttock”) is the transformer hero, who destroyed numerous creatures hostile to human life. Witkahl (meaning: coyote) is the familiar buffoon.” ref “There was no formal tribal organization or clans, nor were there any standards of kin avoidances, especially those pertaining to in-laws. Descent was patrilineal, and there was no development of elaborate kinship terminology. There was no formal or rigid Organization at the tribal level. The chief or headman’s main function was apparently to receive the largest share of food and property during ceremonies. There were no war chiefs. Social rank was based on wealth and birth, although “common,” or poor men were related to “nobles.” The Wiyot were divided into three separate subgroups occupying the Humboldt Bay (Wikí), Mad River (Batawat), and Eel River (Wiyot) regions. The groups evidently did not unite for common purposes such as war or conflicts with neighboring groups. Within each group, patrilineally related households and communities could form alliances against others when required. Physical and social self-restraint were encouraged as the qualities by which a man could obtain and retain his wealth and become wealthier. A system of fines for violations of the moral code (for example, adultery or seduction) and the low social status of the poor were the principal controls at work for individuals.” ref

Yuki – chiefs and “headmen leader” system (bilateral kinship matrilineal/patrilineal society and hunter-gatherer) “The Yuki language (extinct) was distantly related to the Wappo language, the two languages making up the entirety of the Yukian language family.” ref “The Yukian languages may be, along with Chumashan and perhaps languages of southern Baja such as Waikuri, one of the oldest language families established in California, before the arrival of speakers of Penutian, Uto-Aztecan, and perhaps even Hokan languages. All three are spoken in areas with long-established populations of a distinct physical type.” ref “Yuki had a bilateral pattern of descent.” ref “Yuki villages, each of which had a local headman, were grouped into tribelets. Each tribelet had a dance house, located in one of the larger villages, and a tribelet chief. The job of the tribelet chief was to encourage the people and to settle disputes, while the local headman decided where the people would go to gather food.  Groups of tribelets made up tribal subdivisions. There were likely more than 500 Yuki village sites, making up the eight or nine tribal subdivisions. Each tribelet occupied the land along a part of the river or a creek that joined it. The name Yuki is a Wintun word meaning stranger or foe. The Yuki did not use this name for themselves. Their neighbors regarded them as fierce and warlike. Tribelets had war chiefs, in addition to the tribelet chief. The Yuki fought with the Nomlaki to the northeast and the Pomo to the south, and sometimes with the Cahto. They also did not get along with the Coast Yuki, though they shared a similar language.” ref

Yurok – wealthy man “leader” system (patrilineal descent society and hunter-gatherer) “The Yurok people (“Yurok language“) is one of two Algic languages spoken in California, the other being Wiyot (therefore they are culturally similar to the Wiyot people). Yurok cosmology has been described as a “polytheistic monism“, with various gods and spirits as a facet of the Great Spirit. “Evil” is said to come from imbalance, rather than there being evil spirits like Satan. Yurok Villages (ʼoʼloolekw – “village”) were composed of individual families that lived in separate, single-family homes. The house was owned by the eldest male, and in each lived several generations of men related on their father’s side of the family as well as their wives, children, daughters’ husbands, unmarried relatives, and adopted kin. Yurok villages also consisted of sweat houses and menstrual huts. Sweat houses were designated for men of an extended patrilineal family as a place to gather. During their menstrual cycles, women stayed in separate underground huts for ten days. Additionally, inheritance of land was predominantly patrilineal. The majority of the estate was passed down to the father’s sons. Daughters and male relatives were also expected to acquire a portion of the estate. Yurok society had no chiefs, but in each village, a wealthy man known as a peyerk acted as leader, who was trained by elders. The peyerk‘s training would include a vision quest in which he would communicate with the natural environment and the spirit world. Peyerk from many villages came together to settle tribal disputes and also hosted tribal ceremonies. At these times, the peyerk would supply food and shelter for the Yurok people and special clothing for the dancers. Peyerk lived in homes at higher elevation, wore finer clothing, and sometimes spoke foreign languages. Yurok medicine people were usually women. Women would become shamans after dreaming of being told to do so. Another shaman would then assist her in a ritual dance. Shamans would use plants, prayer, and rituals to heal people and also performed ceremonies to ensure successful hunting, fishing, and gathering. Some sources refer to it Yurok society as socially stratified because communities were divided between syahhlew (“rich”), waʼsʼoyowokʼ / waʼsoyowokʼ(“poor”), and kaʼaal (“slaves”). The syahhlew were the only group allowed to perform religious duties. Furthermore, they had homes at higher elevations, wore nicer clothing, and spoke in a distinctive manner. The primary reason men became slaves was because they owed money to certain families. Nonetheless, slavery was not considered to be a significant institution. Overall, the higher a man’s social ranking was, the more valuable his life was considered. The amount of money paid by a man determined the social status of the couple. A wealthy man, who could afford to pay a large sum, increased the couple and their children’s rank within the community. Men who were unable to pay the full sum of money could pay half the cost for the bride. In doing so, the couple was considered “half-married.” Half-married couples lived with the bride’s family, and the groom would then become a slave for them. Furthermore, their children would take on the mother’s last name.” ref

Northeastern California

Achomawi– chiefs (patrilineal descent society and hunter-gatherer)  “Achomawi (also Achumawi, Ajumawi and Ahjumawi) are the northerly nine (out of eleven) bands. 5 autonomous bands (also called “tribelets”) of the Pit River Indians historically spoke slightly different dialects of one common language, and the other two bands spoke dialects of a related language, called Atsugewi. The Achomawi language and the Atsugewi language are classified together as the Palaihnihan languages, and more broadly in a possible northern group of the proposed Hokan phylum with Yana, the Shastan languages, Chimariko, Karuk, Washo, and the Pomo languages. Each of the nine tribes in the “Achomawi” language group had defined separate territories up and down the banks of the Pit River (which they called “Achoma”). Within their respective territories, each band had several villages, which were apparently composed of extended family members, and were organized by having one central village with smaller satellite villages. In marriage, the bridegroom lived in the bride’s home briefly, hunting and working for the bride’s relatives. Eventually she would move with him to his family, in what is known as a patrilocal pattern. They have a patrilineal society, with inheritance and descent passed through the paternal line. The traditional chiefdom was handed down to the eldest son.” ref

Atsugewi – chiefs and “headman leader” system (bilateral kinship, matrilineal/patrilineal society, and hunter-gatherer) “The Atsugewi maintained a decentralized social structure composed of small, autonomous bands that lacked any centralized political authority across the group. These bands were organized into distinct territorial subgroups, such as those inhabiting the Hat Creek and Burney Valley area and a smaller group in Dixie Valley to the east, with no overarching leadership uniting all Atsugewi communities. Villages were typically small and centered around family units, featuring a headman or chief for each significant settlement who held limited authority, primarily in matters of warfare and local disputes; succession often passed to the chief’s brothers or eldest son, but positions were not elective or easily removable. There were only four or five such important chiefs among the entire Atsugewi population, reflecting the absence of hierarchical control beyond the village level. The Atsugewi social organization was centered on bilateral kinship systems, where descent and inheritance were traced through both maternal and paternal lines, emphasizing extended family units as the core of village life. These families formed the foundational social and economic groups, with nuclear families typically residing patrilocally after marriage, though flexibility allowed for matrilocal arrangements in cases of widowhood or alliance needs. Kinship terminology distinguished relatives primarily by generation, sex, and lineal versus collateral relationships, using a system that extended sibling terms to parallel cousins up to the third degree, treating them as equivalents with mutual obligations such as gift-sharing and child-rearing support. For instance, a man regarded his brother’s children as his own and avoided his brother’s mother-in-law, reflecting a strong emphasis on familial reciprocity and avoidance taboos among affines like parents-in-law, where formal speech and physical distance were enforced to prevent supernatural misfortune. No formal clans or exogamous moieties existed, but villages tended to be endogamous to preserve internal cohesion, while inter-village marriages avoided close blood ties to mitigate risks like illness or infertility attributed to incest.” ref “In the past, each Atsugewi village was led by a chief. Atsugewi chiefs were usually medicine men, not war leaders, and they did not exert as much power as the rulers of many other cultures. Today, each Atsugewi rancheria is governed by a tribal council elected by its residents. In the past, there was no central government among the Atsugewi bands, but today the Pit River Tribe has a main governing council made up of representatives sent by all eleven of its member bands.” ref

Northern-central California

Konkow/Maidu – chiefs, wealthy “leader,” and/or male religious “leader” system (bilateral kinship, though it may be more matrilineal than patrilineal society, and hunter-gatherer). “The Maidu spoke a language that some linguists believe was related to the Penutian family. Maidu lived in small villages or bands with no centralized political organization. Leaders were typically selected from the pool of men who headed the local Kuksu cult. They did not exercise day-to-day authority, but were primarily responsible for settling internal disputes and negotiating over matters arising between villages. The primary religious tradition was known as the Kuksu cult. This central California religious system was based on a male secret society. It was characterized by the Kuksu or “big head” dances. Maidu elder Marie Mason Potts says that the Maidu are traditionally a monotheistic people: “they greeted the sunrise with a prayer of thankfulness; at noon they stopped for meditation, and at sunset, they communed with Kadyapam and gave thanks for blessings throughout the day.” The Kuksu cult system was also followed by the Pomo and the Patwin among the Wintun. Stories of K’odojapem/World-maker and Wepam/Trickster Coyote are particularly prominent in Maidu traditional narratives.” ref “Among all the Maidu, kinship alone is said to have been a bar to marriage. The man was free to wed in his own village or another village. Since his home settlement, however, consisted largely of kinsmen, he more commonly went elsewhere for his wife. In normal cases the permanent home of a couple was in the man’s village, but a first residence with the bride’s parents was the rule everywhere. This was clearly to render services as whole or partial purchase payment, and not a reminiscence of any principle of exogamy.” ref “Californian groups without clans or moieties and having this type of kinship system are Hupa, Whilkut, Yuki, Huchnom, Coast Yuki, Lutuami, Achomawi, Atsugewi, Washo, Southern Maidu, Northern Paiute, Eastern Mono (Owens Valley Paiute), Paleuyami Yokuts, Yaudanchi Yokuts, Yauelmani Yokuts, and Karok” ref “The pre-contact Maidu peoples lived in a hunting and gathering society in parts of central California. They spoke closely related languages, including Konkow and Nisenan languages, along with the Chico language and other extinct variations. The Maiduan language family is considered by some linguists to belong to the Penutian language group, along with such families as Miwok, Wintun, Yokuts, and Ohlone. However, this language family is disputed, with others claiming that it is invalid. Maidu nouns are divided into two classes. The first class consists of kinship terms, but these do not include the terms for child and son. Terms, such as /ne/ ‘mother’ occur in conjunction with a pronoun or a demonstrative, as in: nikne – my mother, minne – your mother, and myne – (that) mother. The stem /kyle/ ‘woman’ is notable in that is usually occurs as /kyle/, but may alternate to /kylok/ when attached with suffixes to form ‘old woman’ and ‘women’ or noun construction (‘that woman’ for ‘her’), singularly (‘that one’) and repeated (‘that person’).” ref “Traditional Maidu social organization was built around autonomous, yet allied, settlements; each claimed a communal territory and acted as a single political unit. Among southern groups the chiefs were hereditary, but among northern groups they could be deposed and probably achieved their position through wealth and popularity. Like many other central California tribes, the Maidu practiced the Kuksu religion, involving male secret societies, rites, masks and disguises, and special earth-roofed ceremonial chambers. Some of the purposes of the rituals were naturalistic—to ensure good crops or plentiful game or to ward off floods and other natural disasters such as disease.” ref

ref

The Kuksu Religion

“Kuksu was a religion in Northern California practiced by members within several Indigenous peoples of California before and during contact with the arriving European settlers. The religious belief system was held by several tribes in Central California and Northern California, from the Sacramento Valley west to the Pacific Ocean. The practice of Kuksu religion included elaborate narrative ceremonial dances and specific regalia. The men of the tribe practiced rituals to ensure good health, bountiful harvests, hunts, fertility, and good weather. Ceremonies included an annual mourning ceremony, rites of passage, and intervention with the spirit world. A male secret society met in underground dance rooms and danced in disguises at the public dances. Among the Patwin and Maidu, Hesi developed as a subdivision of Kuksu distinguished by its female participation. Kuksu was personified as a spirit being by the Pomo people. Northern Kuksu religion followers: Patwin culture, Maidu culture, and Pomo culture. Southern Kuksu religion existed, but had less “specialized cosmogony,” in the “southern Kuksu-dancing groups” of the Ohlone/Costanoan, Salinan, Miwok and Esselen and northernmost Yokuts, in comparison to the groups in the Northern California and northern Sacramento Valley.” ref

“Kuksu was personified as a spirit being by the Pomo people. Their mythology and dance ceremonies were witnessed, including the spirit of Kuksu or Guksu, between 1892 and 1904. The Pomo used the name Kuksu or Guksu, depending on the dialect, as the name for a red-beaked supernatural being, that lived in a sweathouse at the southern end of the world. Healing was his province and specialty. The person who played the Kuksu/Guksu in Pomo dance ceremonies was often considered the medicine man, and dressed as him when attending the sick. A ceremony dance was named after him. He also appeared in costume at most ceremonies briefly in order to take away the villager’s illnesses. All males were expected to join a ceremonial society; some of their dances were private or secret from women and children. Scholars differ in their opinions of the societies’ power in the tribe: “There was no secret society of importance as there was among the Maidu and presumedly among the neighboring Wintun, and no organized priesthood vested with control over ceremonies.” In contrast, in 1925 a witness of the Clear Lake Pomo said: “The heart of religious activities lay in a secret society called kuhma, akin to that of the Patwin and Maidu and composed chiefly of men, which managed the ritual of the ancient kuksu religion.” ref

Wappo – chiefs (bilateral kinship, matrilineal/patrilineal society and hunter-gatherer) “With the Wappo regarding kin groups or descent, bilateral is inferred.” ref “Division of meat: chief or other prominent man, not necessarily one who made kill, divided meat (also see above). Chief’s permission not necessary for hunting, but required for other serious undertakings. There was little real division of labor. A man seldom, if ever, gave his full time to a single occupation. The occupations and trades are very similar to those of the Pomo. Women’s activities were less specialized than men’s. In fact, the only women with distinctive positions were the solo singer at dances and the so-called woman chief, who was probably a male chief’s wife and acted as a kind of hostess. Furthermore, although all men grew, their ages varied; some were too young to have acquired special skills, others too old to have retained former positions. For example, those said to have been a chief, but later were not even head of his family or house, retired and may not be mentally capable. Only 2 outstanding activities of women: female chief and paid solo singer before audience in dance house. The so-called chief was little more than a natural leader, one with excellent physical, mental, and moral qualifications. A chief had little authority over the rest of the group and no means of enforcing his commands or wishes other than their own physical prowess and that of relatives and immediate following. Although the chief was the acknowledged leader and was supposed to be concerned with the welfare of everyone, punishment for a wrong as serious as murder was fixed by the relatives of the slain and the slayer, and not by any tribal organization or court of arbitration. The men of the settlement sometimes met to discuss affairs of interest to the entire group, but no votes were cast, and there was no governmental machinery for carrying out their decisions. Such a description would fit most tribes of central California and many other peoples of the less complex world. Theoretically, 4 offices or functions connected with the concept of chieftainship: (1) war chief, (2) home chief, (3) dance or ceremonial chief, (4) “news man” or town crier. War chief was the war leader and organized attacks as well as led fighting. Home chief supervised domestic affairs; decided when tribe should hunt and fish, set dates for “big times,” and carried on all peaceful negotiations with other rancherias. Dance chief directed ceremonials and took leading part in them. Town crier announced all important events to village, and carried such messages as feast invitations to other rancherias. Each chief named by informants is said to have held all 4 offices. Theoretically, the chief chose his own successor and taught him how to make speeches, etc. Among chiefs named above, however, the next most prominent chief succeeded the head chief, whether related to him or not. Informants said each chief had personal following. The fact that several unrelated men were called chiefs at the same time and succeeded one another as head chief suggests that the head chief was simply the man who had the largest or most influential following. Head chief responsible for whereabouts and well-being of subjects. Chiefs had little authority over subjects. Punishment for murder determined by families of killer and victim. If money accepted in compensation for a life, affair closed. Feud followed if payment refused. Chief killed own game as other men did. When a member of a hunting party, he divided the kill. Similarly, chief’s wife gathered acorns and did same work as other women. Chief ordered everyone to bring food to feast, did not supply it himself.” ref

Yana – chiefs, ranked, or class system maybe? (bilateral kinship, matrilineal/patrilineal society, and hunter-gatherer) “With the Yana regarding kin groups or decent bilateral is inferred.” ref “Small egalitarian bands without centralized political authority, were reclusive and fiercely defended their territory of mountain canyons.” ref “Little is known of their social organization, except that it probably comprised small bands and contained classes or rankings.” ref “Social hierarchies are unknown, but the Yana were believed to have class or rank system. Politically believed to have a chief and a ranked or class system or some kind or another. Main village where chief or headman lived, satellite villages nearby. Very little is known about Yana religion. It is believed that they may have practiced the Kuksu. Shamans were generally male and engaged in healing and medicinal practices through dance and song. Most Yana dead are cremated. House and belongings also burnt.” ref “Yana is often classified in the Hokan superstock. Sapir suggested a grouping of Yana within a Northern Hokan sub-family with Karuk, Chimariko, Shastan, Palaihnihan, and Pomoan. Contemporary linguists generally consider Yana to be a language isolate. Unlike other languages of the region, Yana has different word forms used by male and female speakers.” ref

Southern California

“The eight islands are split among the jurisdictions of three California counties: Santa Barbara County (4), Ventura County (2), and Los Angeles County (2). The islands are divided into the Northern Channel Islands and the Southern Channel Islands. There is evidence that humans have lived on the Northern Channel Islands for thousands of years. Analysis of radiocarbon dating data indicates a continuous human presence starting between 8,000 and 11,000 years ago. The islands were inhabited primarily by two different Native American groups, the Chumash and the Tongva (Gabrieleño).” ref

Cahuilla, southern California (Uto-Aztecan family) (Hunter-gatherer, Clans, Hereditary Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref, ref)

Chumash, coastal southern California (Chumashan languages, one of the oldest language families established in California, before the arrival of speakers of Penutian, Uto-Aztecan, and perhaps even Hokan languages) (Hunter-gatherer, Clans, Chiefs as well as elite, and matrilineal  society ref, ref, ref)

Ipai, southwestern California (Hunter-gatherer, Clans, Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref) “Iipai-Tiipai (also known as Kumeyaay) Kumeyaay language belongs to the Yuman–Cochimí language family spoken in Baja California, northern Sonora, southern California, and western Arizona.” ref, ref

Mohave, southeastern California (Agriculturalist, Clans, Totems, Hereditary Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref, ref, ref) “The Mohave creator is Matavilya, who gave Mojave people their clans. They have traditionally used the indigenous plant Datura as a deliriant hallucinogen in a religious sacrament. Their Mojave language belongs to the Yuman–Cochimí language family.” ref

AI Overview: Takic chiefdoms were complex, politically autonomous hunter-gatherer societies formed by Indigenous groups speaking Takic languages (Uto-Aztecan family) in Southern California. The most notable were the Gabrielino (Tongva: Takic language) of the Los Angeles Basin and the Chumash (who neighbored them).

“The Takic languages are a putative group of Uto-Aztecan languages historically spoken by a number of Indigenous peoples of Southern California. Takic is grouped with the Tubatulabal, Hopi, and Numic languages in the northern branch of the Uto-Aztecan family. Takic languages were spoken along coastal California between modern Malibu and Carlsbad and on the Southern Channel Islands. The Takic languages also were spoken in the Southern California interior, in portions of the Coachella Valley, Mojave Desert and Tehachapi Mountains.” ref

• “Acjachemem, (“Juaneño“), Takic, southwestern California (Clans, elite class, clan chief and patrilineal society ref, ref)
• Iívil̃uqaletem, Iviatim, (“Cahuilla“), Takic southern California (Clans, Moieties, Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref, ref)
• Kitanemuk, (“Tejon“) Takic, south-central California (Clans, Hereditary Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref, ref)
• Kuupangaxwichem, (“Cupeño“), southern California (Clans, Moieties, Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref, ref) 
• Payómkawichum, (“Luiseño“), Takic, southwestern California (Clans, Hereditary Chiefs, assistant chiefs, as well as Village councils, and patrilineal society ref, ref)
• Tataviam, Allilik Takic (“Fernandeño“), southern California (Clans, Hereditary captains “chiefs?”, and patrilineal society ref, ref, ref)
• Tongva, (“Gabrieleño“), (“Fernandeño“), (“Nicoleño“), “San Clemente tribe” Takic, coastal southern California (Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref, ref, ref)
• Yuhaviatam Morongo, Vanyume Mohineyam (“Serrano“), southern California. (Clans, Voted Seven-person tribal council, and patrilineal society ref, ref, ref)” ref

Area #3 (Great Plains or Indigenous People of the Plains) 

The First People of the Plains: Pre-Clovis Culture (~23,000 to 13,500 years ago)

The Second People of the Plains: Clovis Culture (13,500 to 10,800 years ago)

The Third People of the Plains: Folsom Culture (10,800 to 10,200 years ago)

The Fourth People of the Plains: Plano Culture (10,900 to 6,900 years ago)

The Fifth People of the Plains: Plains Archaic Culture (7,500 – 1600 years ago)

The Sixth People of the Plains: Plains Woodland Culture (2,500 – 1800 years ago)

“The Plains Woodland period, roughly from 2500–200 years BP, was a 2300 year period of archaeological cultures on the Great Plains, influenced by the Eastern Woodland cultures, marked by limited gardening, ceramic cookware, and mound building, preceding the Plains Village period. After 1200 CE, there was a distinct division in Plains cultures. Some maintained a nomadic Plains Archaic lifestyle; they hunted, followed the great herds of bison and lived in tipis that were ideal for their mobile lifestyle. The population on the plains remained sparse. But with the coming of domestic crops, those living in river valleys took to farming (or joined the traditionalists on the plains).” ref

The Seventh People of the Plains: The Agrarian Plains Village People

“The Plains Village people built and lived near the rivers. They were mostly semi-sedentary; they typically farmed in villages and hunted bison from temporary camps. They used dogs to help transport their temporary lodges and game from the hunts. Depending upon the region, their more permanent architecture included grass houses; stone-lined, semi-subterranean pit-houses; and earth lodges. Bison scapula hoes were used as important tools in farming crops such as maize, beans, and squash. The women made varied ceramic pots for cooking and storage. A bison stomach could be used to line a basket, filled with food/water, and hot rocks added to boil the stew. The Plains Village culture appears to have evolved directly from earlier Woodland cultures, but with low-intensity agriculture added. Sedentary villages can come to support larger than band-sized groups, which selects for hierarchy leading to chiefdoms and complex chiefdoms having a hierarchy of chiefs with one chief being de facto King of all He surveys. This period lasted 500 years and was transformed by the coming of the horse, which selected for an expansionist horseboys (no cows yet) culture, not unlike when the coming of the car created a car culture, and motorcycles enabled motorcycle gangs to form (but not prosper greatly due to laws and enforcement).” ref

“Plains Indians or Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains are the Native American tribes and First Nations peoples who have historically lived on the Interior Plains (the Great Plains) of North America. The earliest people of the Great Plains mixed hunting and gathering wild plants. The cultures developed horticulture, then agriculture, as they settled in sedentary villages and towns. Maize, originally from Mesoamerica and spread north from the Southwest, became widespread in the south of the Great Plains around 700 CE. Numerous Plains peoples hunted the American bison (or buffalo) to make items used in everyday life, such as food, cups, decorations, crafting tools, knives, and clothing. The tribes followed the seasonal grazing and migration of the bison. The Plains Indians lived in tipis because they were easily disassembled and allowed the nomadic life of following game.” ref

The Main Plains Indian languages mainly involve the Algonquian language family in the north, Siouan language mainly in the center, and Caddoan language mainly in the south.

*Algonquian language family

“Proto-Algonquian was spoken around 2,500 to 3,000 years ago and descended from Proto-Algic, estimated to have been spoken about 7,000 years ago somewhere in the American Northwest, possibly around the Columbia Plateau, across parts of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. Speakers of Algonquian languages stretch from the east coast of North America to the Rocky Mountains. Around 30 languages are divided into three groups according to geography: Plains, Central, and Eastern Algonquian.” ref, ref, ref

*Siouan language family

“Proto-Siouan, sometimes known as Proto-Siouan–Catawban, is the reconstructed ancestor of the Siouan languages. Although the attested daughter languages are largely native to the Great Plains region of the United States and Canada, Proto-Siouan is believed to have been originally spoken in and around the Ohio River Valley between 3000 BCE and 2000 BCE. Siouan language speakers (located primarily in the Great Plains, Ohio and Mississippi valleys, and southeastern North America, with a few other languages in the east) may have originated in the lower Mississippi River region. They were agriculturalists and may have been part of the Mound Builder civilization during the 9th–12th centuries. Wars with the Ojibwe and Cree peoples pushed the Lakota (Teton Sioux) west onto the Great Plains in the mid- to late 17th century. The Shoshone originated in the western Great Basin and spread north and east into present-day Idaho and Wyoming. By 1500, some Eastern Shoshone had crossed the Rocky Mountains into the Great Plains. After 1750, warfare and pressure from the Blackfoot, Crow, Lakota, Cheyenne, and Arapaho pushed Eastern Shoshone south and westward. Some of them migrated as far south as Texas, emerging as the Comanche by 1700.” ref, ref, ref

*Caddoan language family

“Proto-Caddoan about 3,500 years ago, sometime about then the ancestors of the Northern Caddoan groups split from the Caddo and the two languages began to diversify. In the case of Proto-Caddoan, it appeared to have divided into two branches, Northern and Southern, more than 3000 years ago. (The division of the language also implies a geographic and/or political separation). Northern Caddoan evolved into several different languages. The language that became Wichita, with several different dialects, branched off about 2000 years ago. Kitsai separated from the Northern Caddoan stem about 1200 years ago, and Pawnee and Arikara separated 300 to 500 years ago. The Caddoan languages are a family of languages native to the Great Plains spoken from present-day North Dakota south to Oklahoma. Some linguists believe that the Caddoan, Iroquoian, and Siouan-Catawban languages may be connected in a Macro-Siouan language family, but their work is suggestive, and the theory remains hypothetical. Similar attempts to find a connection with the Algonquian languages have been inconclusive. There is insufficient evidence for linguists to propose a hypothetical Macro-Algonquian/Iroquoian language family.” ref, ref

“The Plains tribes are usually divided into two broad classifications which overlap to some degree. The first group became a fully nomadic horse culture during the 18th and 19th centuries, following the vast herds of American bison, although some tribes occasionally engaged in agriculture. These include the Arapaho (Chiefs and Algonquian language), Assiniboine (Chiefs and Siouan language), Blackfoot (Chiefs and Algonquian language), Cheyenne (Chiefs and Algonquian language), Comanche (Chiefs and Uto-Aztecan language), Crow (Chiefs and Siouan language), Gros Ventre (Chiefs and Algonquian language), Kiowa (Chiefs and Kiowa–Tanoan language), Lakota (Chiefs and Siouan language), Lipan (Chiefs and Na-Dene/Athabaskan language), Plains Apache (Chiefs and Na-Dene/Athabaskan language), Plains Cree (Chiefs and Algonquian language), Plains Ojibwe (Chiefs and Algonquian language), Sarsi (Chiefs and Na-Dene/Athabaskan language), Nakoda (Stoney) (Chiefs and Siouan language), and Tonkawa (Chiefs and Language isolate). The second group were sedentary and semi-sedentary, and, in addition to hunting bison, they lived in villages, raised crops, and actively traded with other tribes. These include the Arikara (Chiefs and Caddoan language), Hidatsa (Chiefs and Siouan language), Iowa (Chiefs and Siouan language), Kaw (or Kansa) (Chiefs and Siouan language), Kitsai (Chiefs and Caddoan language), Mandan (Chiefs and Siouan language), Missouria (Chiefs and Siouan language), Omaha (Chiefs and Siouan language), Osage (Chiefs and Siouan language), Otoe (Chiefs and Siouan language), Pawnee (Chiefs and Caddoan language), Ponca (Chiefs and Siouan language), Quapaw (Chiefs and Siouan language), Wichita (Chiefs and Caddoan language), Santee Dakota (Chiefs and Siouan language), Yanktonai Dakota (Chiefs and Siouan language), and Yankton Dakota (Chiefs and Siouan language).” ref

Main groups in Texas

Apache: semi-nomadic with mixed lifestyle of seasonal hunting, gathering, and limited farming

Jumano: some sedentary, some semi-nomadic, or some nomadic with mixed lifestyle of farming and hunting-gatherering

Coahuiltecan: (bands and family clans such as the Payaya, Xarame, and Ervipiame): semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers

Karankawa: semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers-fishers

Apache Chiefs

“Apache bands include the Chiricahua, Jicarilla, Lipan, Mescalero, Mimbreño, Salinero, Plains, and Western Apache (Aravaipa, Pinaleño, Coyotero, and Tonto). The Apache are several Southern Athabaskan language-speaking peoples of the Southwest, the Southern Plains, and Northern Mexico. They are linguistically related to the Navajo. They migrated from the Athabascan homelands in the north into the Southwest between 1000 and 1500 CE. The term Apache refers to six major Apache-speaking groups: Chiricahua, Jicarilla, Lipan, Mescalero, Plains, and Western Apache. Historically, the term has also been applied to the Comanches, Mojaves, Hualapais, and Yavapais, none of whom speak Apache languages. The six Apache tribes had political independence from each other and even fought against each other.” ref 

“The Apache tribes have two distinctly different kinship term systems: a Chiricahua type and a Jicarilla type. The Chiricahua-type system is used by the Chiricahua, Mescalero, and Western Apache. The Western Apache kinship system differs slightly from the other two but shares similarities with the Navajo system. The Jicarilla type, which is similar to the Dakota–Iroquois kinship systems, is used by the Jicarilla, Navajo, Lipan, and Plains Apache. The Navajo system is more divergent among the four, having similarities with the Chiricahua-type system. The Lipan and Plains Apache systems are very similar. Several extended families worked together as a “local group”, which carried out certain ceremonies, and economic and military activities. Political control was mostly present at the local group level. Local groups were headed by a chief, an influential man with an impressive reputation. The position was not hereditary, and was often filled by members of different extended families. The chief’s influence was as strong as he was evaluated to be—no group member was obliged to follow the chief. Western Apache criteria for a good chief included: industriousness, generosity, impartiality, forbearance, conscientiousness, and eloquence in language.” ref

“Apache bands had no supreme chief or centralized government; instead, they were led by figures called nantans (Variations: “Nantan“, Nantai, Natane, Kantana), often translated as “leader” or “chief.” ref

Jumanos Chief

“In the 1680s, the Jumano chief Juan Sabeata was prominent in forging trade and religious ties with the Spanish. Juan Sabeata (c. 1645–c. 1692) was a Jumano Indian leader in present-day Texas who tried to forge an alliance with the Spanish or French to help his people fend off the encroachments of the Apaches on their territory. Sabeata (also written Xaviata) was born after 1640 at Las Humanas, the Tompiro Pueblo now called Gran Quivira. Sabeata later made his way to the city of Parral in northern Mexico. There, he was baptized a Catholic as an adult and given the Christian name of Juan. When he first came to prominence in 1683, he was a leader of the Jumano Indians and their allies. Sabeata apparently did not speak Spanish well, as he communicated through an interpreter.” ref, ref

“Sabeata said that he lived at La Junta, the junction of the Rio Grande and Conchos rivers near the present day town of Presidio, Texas. He said he had been sent by several Indian nations to request that the Spanish establish Christian missions in their territory. He also requested Spanish aid to the Jumanos and their allies against the depredations of the Apaches. The majority of his tribe, he explained, lived eastward from La Junta and were menaced by the Apache who lived nearby. Sabeata said that the Jumanos had good trade relations with 36 different tribes. Among those he named which can be identified are the Tejas, the Caddoan tribe that would give the state of Texas its name. Moreover, Sabeata mentioned that “other Spaniards”—meaning the French—were trading with the Tejas.” ref 

“It was a masterful performance by Sabeata to excite Spanish interest in a potential harvest of souls among the Jumanos and their allies and to create Spanish concern about French encroachments on what they believed was Spanish territory. Sabeata went on to cement the interest of the Spanish by telling of a battle won by the Jumanos because of a cross that descended from heaven to protect them. Sabeata’s activities included trading. With contacts both in the Indian and Spanish world, he and the Jumanos were intermediaries, bringing Spanish goods to Indians in eastern Texas, and exchanging them for Indian products, mostly buffalo hides. There were well-organized trade fairs all over Texas which no doubt pre-dated the Spanish.” ref

“Sabeata is one of the few Indians who emerges from the myopic Spanish records as an individual. His appeals to the Spanish (and the French) to protect the Jumanos from their enemies failed. He lived at a time when the Spanish were weak and in retreat on their northern frontier and had few resources to extend their control beyond a few towns. Much of what we know about the Texas Indians during this time comes from Sabeata filtered through the lens of the Spanish. He is known to have crisscrossed Texas on at least eight occasions and to have made numerous visits to El Paso, Parral, and other Spanish settlements in Texas and Mexico. He was accepted not only as a leader of the Jumanos, but also as a spokesman for the numerous Tonkawa, Caddoan, and Coahuiltecan bands and tribes that inhabited southern and central Texas. With the disappearance of Sabeata from the historical record in 1692, the Jumanos also soon disappeared. In 1716, the Jumanos again appear in the Spanish records, but as allies of the former enemies, the Apaches, and in 1771 comes the last mention of them as an independent people.” ref

Coahuiltecan Chief

“(ca.1660–1735) Juan Rodríguez, or El Cuilón, was an Ervipiame chief who was instrumental in the founding of the missions at Bexar. The first recorded encounter between him and Spanish officials took place in April 1718, when Rodríguez appeared before Martín de Alarcón at the San Antonio de Valero Mission and introduced himself as the chief of the Ranchería Grande tribes, a loose assemblage of Tonkawa and Coahuiltecan Indian bands that dominated Central Texas from their villages on the Colorado River. Rodríguez assured Alarcón that these tribes wanted to befriend the Spaniards, and the chief agreed to accept missionaries if the White men would provide his people with firearms to use against the hostile Apaches. Alarcón refused him guns but provided Rodríguez with a baton and named him “lieutenant Captain-General of the Province of Texas.” In the next few years, Rodríguez worked closely with Spanish authorities in Texas to recruit his people for the mission at Bexar. He guided Spanish explorers into east and north central Texas, acted as an interpreter in Spanish dealings with the Caddoes in east Texas, and served as a scout in Spanish campaigns against hostile Indians.” ref

“Despite Rodríguez’s urging, however, the Indians of Ranchería Grande refused to settle at San Antonio de Valero in large numbers. Other chiefs replaced him among the Indians, and so Rodríguez, supported by only fifty families, abandoned his own village in 1722 to move to San Antonio. Nevertheless, Spanish officials continued to regard him as an important chief and, at his urging, built two additional missions near San Antonio. These missions, San José y San Miguel de Aguayo and San Francisco de Nájera, were constructed on Rodríguez’s assurance that new missions would attract more Indians. He argued that by providing each tribe with its own mission, the White men would avoid intertribal friction. Rodríguez and his followers continued to live at San Antonio de Valero throughout the eighteenth century. The Ervipiames became the core of a large number of Indians who settled at the missions on the San Antonio River and helped populate the town of Bexar. Rodríguez died at San Antonio de Valero Mission in 1735.” ref

Karankawa Chief

“The Karankawa were an Indigenous people concentrated in southern Texas along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, largely in the lower Colorado River and Brazos River valleys. They consisted of several independent, seasonal nomadic groups who shared a language and some culture. From the onset of European colonization, the Karankawa had violent encounters with the Spanish. After one attack by the Spanish, who ambushed the Karankawa after the establishment of Presidio La Bahía in 1722, the Karankawa allegedly felt “deeply betrayed [and] viewed Spanish colonial settlement with hostility.” In the 1800s, white American settlers arrived in their land under the leadership of Stephen F. Austin. He commissioned a captain to expel the Karankawa from the Austin land grant, leading to multiple attacks, including the Skull Creek massacre of 19 Karankawa. Tribes within the Karankawa include: the Copano people, the Cujane, and the Coco.” ref 

“The groups of Karankawa were commonly led by two chiefs – a civil government chief with a hereditary succession in the male lines, and a war chief, probably appointed by the civil government chief. No evidence of a confederacy, like that of the Caddo or Creeks, was found. The Karankawa were probably a loose-knit body living under separate chiefs only united by the common language and shared war expeditions. The ritual to become a chief has been studied by 18th-century Spaniards. They have stated that a selection starts from many candidates, and each is injured by a comb created from the spines of a sea fish, long wounds being dug into their skin from the top of their heads to the soles of their feet and then tied to a pole for several days to either emerge thin or emaciated and close to death. While this description can indeed be a ritual to choose a chief, a diary of Fray Gaspar Jose De Solis states that he suspects these rituals could simply be a puberty rite or an initiation ritual to a brotherhood.” ref

Area #4 (Great Lakes region and Northeast)

Marginalization of Aboriginal women in Canada

“Aboriginal women have been described as facing a “double-burden” – that for being discriminated against as a woman, and further for being Aboriginal. Historians and scholars have emphasized the various capacities in which Aboriginal women were able to hold positions of power and leadership in their communities. The role of the Clan Mother is frequently cited as an example of a powerful political role, central to the Haudenosaunee Six Nations confederacy. While many Nations had male chiefs, in some societies such as the Haudeonsaunee, women selected the Chief and were also able to take his power away. Historians and other experts also emphasize that women across many First Nations were responsible for land holdings and allocation of resources—they controlled access to certain areas as well as distribution of its products. Ultimately, however, as women’s roles varied greatly between First Nations, they shared similar characteristics. As non-Aboriginal settlers first arrived in what is now Canada, they brought with them their patriarchal social codes and beliefs, and tried to make sense of Aboriginal society through a patriarchal lens. Settlers developed and held onto the mythical archetype of the virtuous Indian Princess willing to reject her own people for Christian civilization. Thus developed the Indian Princess/Squaw dichotomy, or, what Rayna Green terms “the Pocahontas perplex,” placing Aboriginal women into a restrictive binary based on European patriarchal values. The Juvenile Delinquents Act and Training School Act of the 1950s, for example, were established to train young women away from perceived “promiscuity” and into domesticity, forcing European patriarchal roles onto Native women. If Native women did not recognize or obey European patriarchal roles, they could be severely punished. The European belief that the patriarchal, nuclear family was a natural means of organization influenced settler-Aboriginal relationships. Many First Nations historically have operated on a matrilineal system where descent is traced through the mother, meaning that a child would become a member of his or her mother’s clan. Many societies were also matrilocal, in which a man married into a woman’s family and would live with her community, resulting in settlement patterns based on the female line. In contrast, European settlers had taken for granted that a family was structured with men as the head of the family and the women as subservient, and tried to understand Aboriginal families by imposing a patriarchal European family model onto matriarchal Aboriginal kinship systems. This belief was perpetuated throughout government policies that attempted to restructure the Aboriginal family to fit this mould. Aboriginal kinship systems were forcibly restructured over time through a number of policies, including the Indian Act, Indian status, and the residential school system.” ref

Unlike most areas, the Great Lakes region is more likely to have Chiefly confederacies (more similar to egalitarian societies and less socially stratified than regular chiefdoms) rather than just chiefdoms or paramount chiefs seen elsewhere. In their very constitution, chiefdom confederacies (confederacies interact somewhat similarly to democracies) would seem to have embodied a mixture of coercion and voluntarism. I wonder if that started sometime in the Old Copper Complex? I think so, as that would explain why it always stayed with that structure. Iroquoian society also seems to have been minimally socially stratified. In contrast to the situation observed in the more complex chiefdom societies of Early Medieval Ireland and pre-contact Polynesia, where warfare was most often directed by aristocrats.

*Council of Three Fires, Great Lakes region (Ojibwe (or Chippewa), Odawa (or Ottawa), and Potawatomi nations) (796 – 1740s)
*Haudenosaunee Confederacy/Iroquoian confederacy, Great Lakes region (1142– Current?)
*Illinois Confederation (1350? – 1854?) – 12 or 13 tribes from Lake Michigan to Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, and Arkansas.
*Neutral Confederacy (Iroquoian peoples) along the Grand River and the eastern end of Lake Ontario, and extended west along the shores of Erie to Huron (between 1400 and 1500–1651)
*Northwestern Confederacy, Great Lakes region (1740s– 1795)
*Tecumseh’s Confederacy, Great Lakes region (1805–1824)

This region is largely part of either the Algonquian languages (a branch of the Algic language family) or the Iroquoian languages (Proto-Iroquoian with an estimated age of 3,500 to 3,800 years ago, split into North and South Iroquoian)

*Algic-Algonquian language family 

“The Algic languages, also Algonquian–Wiyot–Yurok are an indigenous language family of North America. Most Algic languages belong to the Algonquian subfamily, dispersed over a broad area from the Rocky Mountains to Atlantic Canada. The other Algic languages are the Yurok and Wiyot of northwestern California, which, despite their geographic proximity, are not closely related to each other. All these languages descend from Proto-Algic, a second-order proto-language estimated to have been spoken about 5,000 years ago and reconstructed using the reconstructed Proto-Algonquian language and the Wiyot and Yurok languages.” ref

Wiyot, northwestern California (Hunter-gatherer, Clans, chief? or Headman, and patrilineal society ref, ref, ref)

Yurok, northwestern California (Hunter-gatherer, “no chiefs” but each village had a wealthy man known as a peyerk “lived in higher elevation homes as well as wore finer clothing and sometimes spoke foreign languages” who acted as leaders trained by elders, Wealth was an important goal, Independent houses owned by individual families, Value of a man’s life depended on his social status and patrilineal society, “socially stratified society divided between syahhlew “rich”, waʼsʼoyowokʼ / waʼsoyowokʼ “poor”, and kaʼaal “slaves” ref, ref)

• Algonquian

“Algonquian descent systems: As the notions of matrilineal kinship and matriarchy are becoming popular again, in both the public at large and Indigenous societies, it is important to trace the scholarly context in which these notions became meaningful. During the second half of the twentieth century, patrilineal descent used to be considered the most usual state of affairs for all human communities (47% of the world’s societies), ranging from small bands of hunter-gatherers to sedentary tribes to state societies, with bilateral systems (as in Europe) as the second most common type of kinship. Matrilineality, which is much less common (18% of the world’s societies, mostly Indigenous), used to be explained away as a result of special circumstances giving women control of food production, mostly as horticulturalists, while men are engaged in other pursuits away from home. These views have shaped the development of kinship studies in North America, influenced the ways in which North American Indigenous people have been described, and informed governmental policies. But they have since been challenged; and other perspectives are emerging, including a potential connection between language and the development of a strong matricultural cultural context able to sustain matrilineal lineages. Such a connection has been noticed in the case of Indigenous North America; matrilineal and patrilineal systems are each found in different linguistic families, so one can predict the likelihood of a community being matrilineal simply by the linguistic family to which it belongs. However, the Algonquian and the Siouan linguistic families seem not to follow the others in that they are split between matrilineal, patrilineal, and bilateral descent systems. This discrepancy gives us the opportunity to re-examine the ways in which descent has been defined and then used to classify cultures. Retraces anthropological theoretical stances and concepts leading to the present opposition between patrilineal and matrilineal systems, and the establishment of semiofficial labels for Indigenous communities, and the increasingly separate work of the linguists on understanding the genetic connections between the Indigenous languages. Parts II and III, still to come, will examine the case of the Algonquians in more detail, bringing linguistics, archaeology and ethnology together, widening and deepening our ethnographical, ethno-historical and ethnological knowledge of the Algonquian kinship systems and the cultural context supporting their matriculture, including social organization and worldviews.” ref

• Plains
• 1. Blackfoot (Hunter-gatherer, Clans, Chiefs and Confederacy, and patrilineal society but also some consideration was given to bilateral or both maternal and paternal lines of descent ref, ref, ref)

“The Blackfoot Confederacy is a historic collective name for linguistically related groups that make up the Blackfoot or Blackfeet people: the Siksika (“Blackfoot”), the Kainai (“Many Chiefs”) or Blood, and two sections of the Peigan or Piegan or Piikani (“Splotchy Robe”) – the Northern Piikani (Aapátohsipikáni) and the Southern Piikani (Amskapi Piikani or Pikuni). Broader definitions include groups such as the Tsúùtínà (Sarcee) and A’aninin (Gros Ventre) who spoke quite different languages but allied with or joined the Blackfoot Confederacy.” ref

• Arapahoan 
• 2. Arapaho proper (Hunter-gatherer and Agricultural, Military societies, and bilateral society ref, ref)
• 3. Gros Ventre (Hunter-gatherer and Agricultural, Bands sometimes referred to as Clans, Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref, ref, ref)
• 4. Nawathinehena also known as the “Southern Arapaho” (Hunter-gatherer, Headmen and Chiefs, and bilateral society ref, ref, ref)
• 5. Cheyenne (Hunter-gatherer, Military or war societies led by prominent warriors and the Council of Forty-four peace chiefs: formed from four véhoo’o (chiefs or leaders) of the ten principal manaho (bands) and an additional four ″Old Man″ meetings, and bilateral band kinship system or somewhat matrilineal band/clan system ref, ref)
• Central
• 6. Cree–Innu–Naskapi (Hunter-gatherer, “lodge” as the basic units of organization, Clans, Each clan would have a representative as well as a vote in all Consensus Councils, Band Chief or Leader ((chieftainship was earned, although normally inherited from his father)), and descent and leadership could skew patrilineal, but also bilateral in nature ref, ref, ref)
• 7. Menominee (Agriculturalist, Clans, Tribe council included a principal chief, a war chief, and a number of subordinate band or gentile chiefs, and chieftainship was usually hereditary, and patrilineal society ref, ref)
• Ojibwe–Potawatomi
• 8. Ojibwe (Hunter-gatherers to settled agriculturalists, Clans, Hereditary and elected chiefs and clan leaders, and patrilineal society ref, ref, ref)

“The Ojibwe are part of the Council of Three Fires (along with the Odawa and Potawatomi) and of the larger Anishinaabeg, which includes Algonquin, Nipissing, and Oji-Cree people. Historically, through the Saulteaux branch, they were part of the Iron Confederacy, with the Cree, Assiniboine, and Metis.” ref

• 9. Potawatomi (Hunter-gatherers but also maintained substantial gardens, Clans, generally did not have a chief of the entire tribe, but under some circumstances, such as intertribal warfare or overall agreements, village leaders might select a single man from one of the villages to speak for them with a single voice, and patrilineal society ref, ref)

“The Potawatomi are part of a long-term alliance, called the Council of Three Fires, with the Ojibwe and Odawa (Ottawa). In the Council of Three Fires, the Potawatomi are considered the “youngest brother.” ref

• 10. Sauk–Fox–Kickapoo “Sauk, Meskwaki (Fox), and Kickapoo are distinct tribal groups”(Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, clan and war chiefs, ref, ref, ref, and all were patrilineal societies ref, ref, ref)

“In a loose coalition of tribes – including Dakota (Ashâha), Ho-Chunk, Ojibwe, Odawa, Potawatomi, Kickapoo (Kîkâpôwa), Meskwaki (Fox), and Sauk, along with the Shawnee (Shâwanôwa), Cherokee (Shanahkîha), and Choctaw (Châkitâha) from the Southeast – they attacked the tribes of the Illinois Confederation (Mashkotêwa) and tried to invade their tribal areas. The Illinois (Inoca) became their worst common enemies. The coalition warred for years until they destroyed the Illinois Confederation.” ref

• 11. Shawnee (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref, ref)
• 12. Miami–Illinois–Peoria “all tribes of the Illinois Confederation”(Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Chiefs, and patrilineal society ref, ref)

“The Illinois Confederation, also referred to as the Illiniwek or Illini, were a loosely organized group of 12 or 13 tribes who lived in the Mississippi River Valley. Eventually, member tribes occupied an area reaching from Lake Michigan to Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, and Arkansas. The five main tribes were the Cahokia, Kaskaskia, Mitchigamea, Peoria, and Tamaroa. Other related tribes included the Maroa (which may have been the same as the Tamaroa), Tapourao, Coiracoentanon, Espeminka, Moingwena, Chinkoa, and Chepoussa. By 1700, only the Cahokia, Kaskaskia, Michigamea, Peoria, and Tamaroa remained.” ref

“Early Miami people are considered to belong to the Fisher tradition of Mississippian culture. Mississippian societies were characterized by maize-based agriculture, chiefdom-level social organization, extensive regional trade networks, hierarchical settlement patterns, and other factors. The historical Miami engaged in hunting, as did other Mississippian peoples.” ref

• Eastern
• 13. Miꞌkmaq (Hunter-gatherer, Clans, Chiefs, Grand Council, and matrilineal society ref, ref, ref)

“Politically, the Mi’kmaq were a loose confederacy bound together through a common system of matrilineal clans. For the most part, clans (or bands) were independent with their own chiefs and ceremonies.” ref

“Historically the Sante’ Mawio’mi, or Grand Council, which was made up of chiefs of the district councils of Mi’kma’ki, was the traditional senior level of government for the Mi’kmaq people. The 1876 Indian Act disrupted that authority by requiring First Nations to establish representative elected governments and attempting to limit the Council’s role to that of spiritual guidance. In addition to the district councils, the Mi’kmaq have been traditionally governed by a Grand Council or Sante’ Mawio’mi. The Grand Council was composed of Keptinaq (“captains” in English), who were the district chiefs. There were also elders, the putús (wampum belt readers and historians, who also dealt with the treaties with the non-Natives and other Native tribes), the women’s council, and the grand chief. The grand chief was a title given to one of the district chiefs, who was usually from the Mi’kmaq district of Unamáki or Cape Breton Island. This title was hereditary within a clan and usually passed on to the grand chief’s eldest son.” ref

• 14. Maliseet-Passamaquoddy “Wolastoqiyik (matrilineal cultural preferences) (Agriculturalists/horticulturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Elected chiefs, Grand Council, and matrilineal society ref, ref, ref) and Passamaquoddy (very fluid social organization based on patrilineal kinship) (Hunter-gatherers, self-governing tribal communities, patrilineal society ref, ref, ref)

“The Wabanaki Confederacy (Wabenaki, Wobanaki, translated to ‘People of the Dawn’ or ‘Easterner’; also: Wabanakia, ‘Dawnland’) is a North American First Nations and Native American confederation of five principal Eastern Algonquian nations: the Abenaki, Mi’kmaq, Wolastoqiyik, Passamaquoddy (Peskotomuhkati), and Penobscot. There were more tribes, along with many bands, that were once part of the Confederation. Native tribes such as the Nanrantsouak, Alemousiski, Pennacook, Sokoki, and Canibas, through massacres, tribal consolidation, and ethnic label shifting were absorbed into the five larger national identities. The territory boundaries encompass present-day Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, in the United States, and New Brunswick, mainland Nova Scotia, Cape Breton Island, Prince Edward Island and some of Quebec south of the St. Lawrence River, Anticosti, and Newfoundland in Canada.” ref

• Abenaki (Agriculturalists/horticulturalists and hunter-gatherers, Kin-based bands/clans?, Chiefs, General council, and patrilineal society ref, ref, ref)

“The Abenaki are one of several tribes in the Wabanaki Confederacy.” ref

“Abenaki, Algonquian-speaking North American Indigenous people that united with other peoples in the 17th century to furnish mutual protection against the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederacy. The name refers to their location “toward the dawn.” In its earliest known form, the Abenaki Confederacy consisted of tribes or bands living east and northeast of present-day New York state, including the Abenaki, Passamaquoddy and Penobscot in present-day Maine, Malecite and Mi’kmaq (Micmac) in present-day Maritime Provinces, and Cowasuck, Sokoki, and others in present-day Vermont and New Hampshire. Later the confederacy included some groups as far south as present-day Delaware.” ref

“Traditional Abenaki social organization consisted of relatively small kin-based bands led by a civil chief who advised the group and facilitated consensus-based decision making; there was usually a separate war chief. A general council of all adult men and women decided matters relating to war; a smaller council of chiefs and representatives from each family decided other questions of importance to the group. In order to cement relations between bands and with other tribes, the Abenaki engaged in a form of institutionalized comradeship that united two men for life in ritual brotherhood.” ref

• 15. Western Abenaki 
• 16. Eastern Abenaki
• 17.  Massachusett (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, territorial bands led by hereditary leaders, and matrilineal society ref, ref)

“Massachusett Tribal life was matriarchal. Women of the tribe trapped small game, gathered shellfish, wild grains, greens and herbs for food and medicine. The women of the tribe owned and tended the planting fields, and preserved the harvests. The children were employed to keep the birds away from the planted fields. The women also built and owned the wetus (summer huts) and winter long houses that the tribal members lived in. The women were also the potters and basket weavers, wood gatherers and fire keepers. Women took an active role in decision making along with the men and elders within the tribe. Men of the tribe were responsible for mining, whaling, fishing and hunting and for protecting the tribe and its territory against encroachment by other indigenous tribes.” ref

• 18. Narragansett (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Chiefs, Elected tribal council, and matrilineal society ref, ref, ref)

“Women elders participated in the selection of chiefs or sachems, although men held most of the positions of power.” ref

• 19. Mohegan–Pequot (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Chiefs, General council, and matrilineal society ref, ref)

“The Mohegan and the Pequot peoples share a common ancestral origin. Prior to European contact, both groups are believed to have been part of a larger coastal Algonquian-speaking population that migrated southward from the upper Hudson River Valley and other inland regions. By the early 17th century, this population had become culturally and politically distinct, forming separate but related identities as the Pequot and the Mohegan.” ref

• 20. Quiripi-Naugatuck-Unquachog (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Bands unified as a tribe, Chiefs, and matriarchal society ref, ref, ref, ref)

“Seventeenth century colonist and writer on Indian tribes Daniel Gookin asserted the Quinnipiac were part of the Pequot; this association is unlikely, given that the Quinnipiac sought military protection from the Pequot and Mohawk in their first treaty with English settlers. 19th-century historian Edward Manning Ruttenber regarded the Quinnipiac as part of the Wappinger confederacy. The Quinnipiac tribal leader was a sachem. The Totoket people were part of the Quinnipiac sachemdom. The Hammonasset were likely also part of the Quinnipiac sachemdom.” ref

“Sachem or Sagamore is a term for leaders of Algonquian polities along the northeastern coast of North America. The two words are anglicizations of cognate terms (c. 1622) from different Eastern Algonquian languages. Some sources indicate the sagamore was a lesser chief elected by a single band, while the sachem was the head or representative elected by a tribe or group of bands; others suggest the two terms were interchangeable. The sachem is an appointed or elected position and not strictly hereditary. However, the choice of sachem is at least partly based on the prominence of the individual’s family or kinship ties to the previous sachem. According to Captain John Smith, who explored New England in 1614, the Massachusett tribes called their kings “sachems” while the Penobscots (of present-day Maine) used the term “sagamos” (anglicized as “sagamore”). Conversely, Deputy Governor Thomas Dudley of Roxbury wrote in 1631 that the kings in the Massachusetts Bay bay area were called sagamores, but were called sachems southward (in Plymouth). The two terms apparently came from the same root. Although “sagamore” has sometimes been defined by colonists and historians as a subordinate lord (or subordinate chief), modern opinion is that “sachem” and “sagamore” are dialectical variations of the same word.” ref

• Delawaran
• 21.  Mohican (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Chiefs, General council, and matrilineal society ref, ref)

“The Mohican villages were governed by hereditary sachems advised by a council of clan elders. They had a matrilineal kinship system, with property and inheritance (including such hereditary offices) passed through the maternal line. Mohican matrilineal society was divided into three phratries (Turkey, Turtle, and Wolf). These were divided into clans or subclans, including a potentially prominent Bear Clan.” ref

• Lenape (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Chiefs, Councils of elders, and matrilineal society ref)

“At the time of European settlement in North America, a Lenape would have identified primarily with their immediate family and clan, friends, and village unit and, after that, with surrounding and familiar village units followed by more distant neighbors who spoke the same dialect, and finally, with those in the surrounding area who spoke mutually comprehensible languages. The Lenape had three clans at the end of the 17th century, each of which historically had twelve sub-clans. The three primary Lenape clans are: Wolf, Turtle, and Turkey. The Lenape clan system is matrilineal, and historically they were a matrilocal society, that is, husbands moved into their wife’s homes. Children belong to their mother’s clan, from which they gain social status and identity. Within a marriage itself, men and women had relatively separate and equal rights, each controlling their own property and debts, showing further signs of a woman’s power in the hierarchical structure. Lenape villages were organized on a democratic and egalitarian basis. The local sachems held considerable authority but they had to follow their peoples’ expectations, and consulted with councils of elders.” ref

• 22. Munsee (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Elected chiefs, and matrilineal society ref)

“Social structure was decentralized and egalitarian, consisting of autonomous villages led by multiple sachems (chiefs) selected through consensus among elders and matriarchs rather than hereditary monarchy or centralized authority. Governance emphasized diplomacy and collective decision-making, with no evidence of rigid hierarchies or private land ownership; communities coexisted across clan lines in bands that prioritized communal resource use.” ref

• 23. Unami (Lenape) (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Chiefs, and matrilineal society)
• 24. Nanticoke (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Chiefs, and matrilineal society ref, ref, ref)
• 25. Piscataway (Agriculturalists with some hunter-gathering, Clans, Chiefs, and matrilineal society ref, ref, ref)

“Culturally and socially, the Piscataway were traditionally organized around exogamous, matrilineal clan systems. Within the Piscataway Indian Nation and Tayac Territory, the predominant and principal clan is the Beaver Clan.” ref

“The Piscataway Indian Nation and Piscataway Conoy Tribe are within the latter group was included the Piscataway Conoy Confederacy and Sub-Tribes and the Cedarville Band of Piscataway Indians. All these groups descend from the Western Bank of the Chesapeake, spanning across Maryland, Virginia, D.C, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia, and are primarily located in Southern Maryland.” ref

“It would appear that the Piscataway name for their paramount chief was tayac, he being overlord to a loose confederacy of the smaller tribes mentioned above, all of which were outside Powhatan control. One tayac mentioned for the Piscataway was Kittamaquund, elsewhere noted as the weroance of the Doeg. However, the rank of tayac would equate to that of paramount chief (such as the Powhatan chief), whereas a weroance was seen as a lesser figure – a village chief within a region – the equivalent of an emperor and a ‘mere’ king, respectively. Matrilineal inheritance of these positions seems to have been the norm, at least until the death of Kittamaquund in 1641. Other leading positions in Piscataway society were war chiefs, priests, shamans, and great men (as well as weroances), who advised the tayac.” ref

“The onset of a centuries-long “Little Ice Age” around 1300 put pressure on groups to migrate, which in turn caused conflict with local groups. One of these groups was the Montgomery Complex, in the Potomac Piedmont & Ridge and Valley. Starting from 1300, the populations moved themselves into fortified towns, likely from outside conflict with Keyser/Luray Complex peoples migration. The Keyser/Luray Complex had migrated to the region in order to dominate the lucrative Conestoga and Carolina Paths, which intersects in the region. Chiefs, or lords, all the way in Florida would export marine shell north through these trails, to be traded with groups in the Northeast where these marine shells hold ceremonial value. This series of wars would tighten their alliance with the neighboring Piscataway, who shared a similar material culture and likely were both members of an ancestral defensive alliance that stretched as far north as modern day Albany under the Mahican Confederation. This alliance was described to be “were so united, that whatsoever nation attacked the one, it was the same as attacking the whole.” The Montgomery Complex were eventually forced to flee to the coast to their Piscataway allies in the late 14th to early 15th centuries. In order to accommodate the new immigrants, and possibly also to aid the war effort, the Potomac Complex gradually centralized rule under the existing class of hereditary elite, indicated during contact period by their copper fish headdresses. These elite were composed of Werowances, or regional chiefs, Wisos, who were held roles of priestly elders or great men and, most importantly, the Tayac, known to the English as “Emperor of Piscataway.” ref

• 26. Carolina Algonquian “Croatan, Secotan, Pamlico, Machapunga, Roanoke, Weapemoc, Chowanoc” (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Clans, Chiefs, Independent chiefdoms, and matrilineal society ref, ref, ref)

“According to Thomas Harriot, the Native Americans living in coastal North Carolina believed there was “one only chief and great God, which has been from all eternity” and which made petty gods “to be used in the creation and government to follow.” ref

“Carolina Algonkian tribes were ruled by a leader called “ Manamatowick ”. The paramount chief, or Manamatowick, usually controlled between six or eight towns, although some ruled as many as eighteen and could gather seven to eight hundred warriors. At the time of English colonization on Roanoke Island, Wingina, ruled over Dasemonquepuc, Roanoke Island, and possibly the towns of Tramaskecooc, Croatoan, Aquascogoc, Pomeiooc, Cotan, Secotaoc, and Secoton. Each town had its own subchief called “Werowances.” ref

• 27. Powhatan (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Chiefs, Paramount Chief, Confederacy, and matrilineal society ref, ref, ref)

“Powhatan people are Indigenous people of the Northeastern Woodlands. They were a leading member of the Powhatan Confederacy (began in 1607) in Tsenacommacah whose historic territories are in eastern Virginia. In the late 16th and early 17th centuries, the Confederacy’s leader, titled Mamanatowick was Wahunsenacawh. He led a large confederacy consisting of 30 members who joined through inheritance, marriage and war. The Confederacy included much of the Tidewater region of Virginia and they called their country Tsenacommacah (“densely inhabited Land”). English colonists used The Powhatan to refer to Wahunsenacawh. Each member of the confederacy was led by a Weroance (leader, commander), all of whom were led by the Mamanatowick and their advisors.” ref

• 28. Etchemin (Hunter-gatherer, Clans, Chiefs, and matrilineal society ref)

“Etchemins: Eastern Etchemins (Passamaquoddys) allied with the Mi’kmaqs, Western Etchemins allied with the Abenakis, known as the Mawooshen Confederacy, headed by a grand chief named Bashabas. Descendants of the old Mawooshen Confederacy who became known as Penobscots.” ref

AI Overview: The Etchemin people, whose descendants are primarily modern Passamaquoddy and Maliseet (Wolastoqiyik) nations, traditionally used a matrilineal clan structure to determine descent, clan membership, and tribal citizenship. In this system, identity, status, and leadership roles were traced exclusively through the female line.

• 29. Loup “Nipmuc Tribe” (Agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers, Chiefs, and matrilineal society ref, ref, ref) ref

*Iroquoian language family

“As was typical of the Indigenous peoples of the American Northeast before colonization, Iroquoian groups were semisedentary agriculturists who palisaded their villages in times of need. Each village typically comprised several hundred persons. Iroquoian people dwelt in large longhouses made of saplings and sheathed with elm bark, each housing many families. The longhouse family was the basic unit of traditional Iroquoian society, which used a nested form of social organization: households (each representing a lineage) were divisions of clans, several clans constituted each moiety, and the two moieties combined to create a tribe. Groups of men built houses and palisades, fished, hunted, and engaged in military activities. Kinship and locality were the bases for traditional Iroquoian political life. Iroquoian speakers were fond of meetings, spending considerable time in council. Council attendance was determined by locality, sex, age, and the specific question at hand; each council had its own protocol and devices for gaining consensus, which was the primary mode of decision-making. Warfare was important in Iroquoian society, and, for men, self-respect depended upon achieving personal glory in war endeavors. War captives were often enslaved or adopted to replace dead family members. Losses to battle and disease increased the need for captives, who had become a significant population within Iroquoian settlements by the late 17th century.” ref

“Hiawatha is recognized as a significant figure in the history of the Iroquois Confederacy, embodying themes of peace, reconciliation, and leadership. Little is definitively known about his early life, but oral traditions suggest he was a prosperous chief who suffered the tragic loss of his daughters, leading to his exile. During this period of grief, he met the visionary Deganawida, who inspired Hiawatha to embrace a message of peace and unity. Together, they worked to unite the five nations of the Iroquois—Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca—into a confederacy, fostering a spirit of cooperation and healing among previously warring tribes. Hiawatha’s contributions included the ceremonial use of wampum, which became a symbol of peace and a tool for recording agreements. His role in the formation of the Iroquois Confederacy is often emphasized, as he was the first tribal leader to support Deganawida’s vision, representing a significant shift towards a structured political alliance. Hiawatha’s legacy continues to be honored for its emphasis on humility and the power of reconciliation, marking him as an important historical figure in both Iroquois and broader contexts of peace and democracy.” ref

“The Haudenosaunee Confederacy is believed to have been founded by the Great Peacemaker at an unknown date estimated between 1450 and 1660, bringing together five distinct nations in the southern Great Lakes area into “The Great League of Peace”. Other research based on astronomical events dates the founding to 1142. Each nation in the confederacy had a distinct Iroquoian language, territory, and function in the League. The League is embodied in its Grand Council, an assembly of fifty chiefs, each representing a clan of a nation. Fraternal societies, often called “medicine societies”, “medicine lodges”, or “curing societies”, played an important role in Haudenosaunee social organization. Lewis H. Morgan says that each society “was a brotherhood into which new members were admitted by formal initiation.” ref

“Originally, the membership seems to have been on the basis of moiety (the matrilineal division within each clan), but by 1909 all societies seem to have been open to all men regardless of kinship. It is believed that “most of the societies are of ancient origin and that their rituals have been transmitted with little change for many years.” “Each society has a legend by which its origin and peculiar rites are explained.” As part of his religious revolution, Handsome Lake “sought to destroy the societies and orders that conserved the older religious rites.” A council of chiefs proclaimed, some time around 1800, that all animal and mystery societies should immediately dissolve, but through a defect in the form of the order the societies decided it was not legally binding and “went underground” becoming secret societies. Condemned by the Code of Handsome Lake, the societies were also rejected by the Christian Haudenosaunee as holding pagan beliefs. Gradually, however, the societies came more into the open as hostility lessened.” ref 

“A number of societies are known, of which the False Face Society is the most familiar. Others were the Little Water Society, the Pygmy Society, the Society of Otters, the Society of Mystic Animals, the Eagle Society, the Bear Society, the Buffalo Society, the Husk Faces, and the Woman’s Society—which, despite its name, had male membership. The Sisters of the Deo-ha-ko was an organization of women. During healing ceremonies, a carved “False Face Mask” is worn to represent spirits in a tobacco-burning and prayer ritual. False Face Masks are carved in living trees, then cut free to be painted and decorated. False Faces represent grandfathers of the Haudenosaunee, and are thought to reconnect humans and nature and to frighten illness-causing spirits. The Haudenosaunee today have several different medicine societies. The False Face Company conducts rituals to cure sick people by driving away spirits; the Husk Face Society is made up of those who had dreams seen as messages from the spirits, and the Secret Medicine Society likewise conducts rituals to cure the sick. There are 12 different types of masks worn by the societies.” ref

Iroquoian

• Northern Iroquoian
  • (Lake Iroquoian)
    • Iroquois Proper (Five Nations)
      • Seneca 
      • Cayuga 
      • Onondaga 
      • Susquehannock or Conestoga
      • Mohawk–Oneida
        • Oneida 
        • Mohawk 
    • Huronian
      • Wendat/Wyandot (Huron) 
      • Petun (Tobacco) 
  • Tuscarora–Nottoway
    • Tuscarora 
    • Meherrin
    • Nottoway 
  • Unclassified
    • Wenrohronon or Wenro 
    • Neutral 
    • Erie 
    • Laurentian 
    • Scahentoarrhonon 
• Southern Iroquoian/Cherokee
  • South Carolina-Georgia dialect
  • North Carolina dialect
  • Oklahoma dialect ref

ref

“Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (formerly Southern Cult, Southern Death Cult or Buzzard Cult), abbreviated S.E.C.C., is the name given by modern scholars to the regional stylistic similarity of artifacts, iconography, ceremonies, and mythology of the Mississippian culture. It coincided with their adoption of maize agriculture and chiefdom-level complex social organization from 1200 to 1650 CE. Due to the seemingly rapid spread of S.E.C.C. traits, early scholarship described the S.E.C.C. as “a kind of religious revival in the lower Mississippi Valley” and nearby regions. As of 2004, theories suggest that the complex developed from pre-existing beliefs spread over the midwest and southeast by the Hopewell Interaction Sphere from 100 BCE to 500 CE.” ref

“Other research shows the complex operated as an exchange network. This kind of network may be illustrated by a pair of shell gorgets whose representation is so similar as to suggest that they were made by the same artist. One was found in southeast Missouri and the other found hundreds of miles away in Spiro Mounds in Oklahoma, suggesting the items were used as gifts or exchange across a wide region. Numerous other pairs of extremely similar gorgets serve to link sites across the entire Southeast. The social organization of the Mississippian culture was based on warfare, which was represented by an array of motifs and symbols in articles made from costly raw materials, such as conches from Florida, copper from the Great Lakes area and Appalachian Mountains, lead from northern Illinois and Iowa, pottery from Tennessee, and stone tools sourced from Kansas, Texas, and southern Illinois.” ref

“Such objects occur in elite burials, together with war axes, maces, and other weapons. These warrior symbols occur alongside other artifacts, which bear cosmic imagery depicting animals, humans, and legendary creatures. This symbolic imagery bound together warfare, cosmology, and nobility into a coherent whole. Some of these categories of artifacts were used as markers of chiefly office, which varied from one location to another. The term Southeast Ceremonial Complex refers to a complex, highly variable set of religious mechanisms that supported the authority of local chiefs.” ref

“With the redefinition of the complex, some scholars have suggested choosing a new name to exemplify the new understanding of the large body of art symbols classified as the S.E.C.C. Participants of a decade-long series of conferences held at Texas State University have proposed the terms “Mississippian Ideological Interaction Sphere” or “M.I.I.S.” and “Mississippian Art and Ceremonial Complex” or “M.A.C.C.” The major expression of the complex developed at the Cahokia site and is known as the Braden Style; it corresponds with the Southern Cult Period horizon defined by Muller. Other regional styles developed as a result of the fusion of ideas borrowed from the Braden Style and pre-existing local expressions of post-Hopewellian traditions.” ref

Area #5 (Southeastern region) 

“Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands, Southeastern cultures, or Southeast Indians are an ethnographic classification for Native Americans who have traditionally inhabited the area now part of the Southeastern United States and the northeastern border of Mexico, that share common cultural traits. This classification is a part of the Eastern Woodlands. The concept of a southeastern cultural region was developed by anthropologists, beginning with Otis Mason and Franz Boas in 1887. The boundaries of the region are defined more by shared cultural traits than by geographic distinctions. Because the cultures gradually instead of abruptly shift into Plains, Prairie, or Northeastern Woodlands cultures, scholars do not always agree on the exact limits of the Southeastern Woodland culture region. Shawnee, Powhatan, Waco, Tawakoni, Tonkawa, Karankawa, Quapaw, and Mosopelea are usually seen as marginally southeastern, and their traditional lands represent the borders of the cultural region. The area was linguistically diverse, major language groups were Caddoan and Muskogean, besides a number of language isolates.” ref

“In the Late Prehistoric time period in the Southeastern Woodlands, cultures increased agricultural production, developed ranked societies, increased their populations, trade networks, and intertribal warfare. Most Southeastern peoples (excepting some of the coastal peoples) were highly agricultural, growing crops like maize, squash, and beans for food. They supplemented their diet with hunting, fishing, and gathering wild plants and fungi. In the Late Prehistoric time period in the Southeastern Woodlands, cultures increased agricultural production, developed ranked societies, increased their populations, trade networks, and intertribal warfare. Most Southeastern peoples (excepting some of the coastal peoples) were highly agricultural, growing crops like maize, squash, and beans for food. They supplemented their diet with hunting, fishing, and gathering wild plants and fungi.” ref

“Mississippian cultures flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from approximately 800 CE to 1500 CE, varying regionally. After adopting maize agriculture, the Mississippian culture became fully agrarian, as opposed to the preceding Woodland cultures that supplemented hunting and gathering with limited horticulture. Mississippian peoples often built platform mounds. They refined their ceramic techniques and often used ground mussel shell as a tempering agent. Many were involved with the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex, a multi-regional and multi-linguistic religious and trade network that marked the southeastern part of the Mississippian Ideological Interaction Sphere. Information about the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex primarily comes from archaeology and the study of the elaborate artworks left behind by its participants, including elaborate pottery, conch shell gorgets and cups, stone statuary, and Long-nosed god maskettes. The Calusa peoples, of southern Florida, carved and painted wood in exquisite depictions of animals.” ref

“By the time of European contact, the Mississippian societies were already experiencing severe social stress. Some major centers had already been abandoned. With social upsets and diseases unknowingly introduced by Europeans, many of the societies collapsed and ceased to practice a Mississippian lifestyle, with the exception being the Natchez people of Mississippi and Louisiana. Other tribes descended from Mississippian cultures include the Alabama, Biloxi, Caddo, Choctaw, Muscogee Creek, Tunica, and many other southeastern peoples. Social traits included having a matrilineal kinship system, exogamous marriage between clans, and organizing into settled villages and towns. Southeastern Woodlands societies were usually divided into clans; the most common from pre-contact Hopewellian times into the present include Bear, Beaver, Bird other than a raptor, Canine (e.g. Wolf), Elk, Feline (e.g. Panther), Fox, Raccoon, and Raptor.” ref 

“They observe strict incest taboos, including taboos against marriage within a clan. In the past, they frequently allowed polygamy to chiefs and other men who could support multiple wives. They held puberty rites for both boys and girls. Southeastern peoples also traditionally shared similar religious beliefs, based on animism. They used fish poison, and practiced purification ceremonies among their religious rituals, as well as the Green Corn Ceremony. Medicine people are important spiritual healers. Many southeastern peoples engaged in mound building to create sacred or acknowledged ritual sites. Many of the religious beliefs of the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex or the Southern Cult, were also shared by the Northeastern Woodlands tribes, probably spread through the dominance of the Mississippian culture in the 10th century.” ref

“The Miccosukee, along with the Florida Seminole, speak the Hitchiti-Mikasuki, which belongs to the Muskogean language family. The Miccosukee broke from the Muscogee Confederacy in Northern Florida after the First Seminole War of 1817 and 1818. Members of the Miccosukee tribe, a group of Creek origin who had settled in Florida and became identified with the developing Seminole nation.” ref, ref, ref

*Muskogean language family

“The Muskogean family consists of Alabama, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee (or Creek), Koasati, Apalachee, and Hitchiti-Mikasuki. Hitchiti is generally considered a dialect of Mikasuki. Dialects of Choctaw/Muscogee relate to some Seminoles (Seminole people’s Ethnic origin: Choctaw, Muscogee, Yamasee, Yuchi, Gullah). Several sparsely attested languages have been claimed to be Muskogean languages. George Broadwell suggested that the languages of the Yamasee and Guale were Muskogean. However, William Sturtevant argued that the “Yamasee” and “Guale” data were Muscogee and that the language(s) spoken by the Yamasee and Guale people remain unknown. It is possible that the Yamasee were an amalgamation of several different ethnic groups and did not speak a single language. Chester B. DePratter describes the Yamasee as consisting mainly of speakers of Hitchiti and Guale. The historian Steven Oatis also describes the Yamasee as an ethnically mixed group that included people from Muskogean-speaking regions, such as the early colonial-era native towns of Hitchiti, Coweta, and Cussita.” ref, ref

“Proto-Uto-Aztecan is the hypothetical common ancestor of the Uto-Aztecan languages. Authorities on the history of the language group have usually placed the Proto-Uto-Aztecan homeland in the border region between the United States and Mexico, namely the upland regions of Arizona and New Mexico and the adjacent areas of the Mexican states of Sonora and Chihuahua, roughly corresponding to the Sonoran Desert and the western part of the Chihuahuan Desert. It would have been spoken by Mesolithic foragers in Aridoamerica, about 5,000 years ago.” ref

“Reconstructions of the botanical vocabulary offer clues to the ecological niche inhabited by the Proto-Uto-Aztecans. Fowler placed the center of Proto-Uto-Aztecan in Central Arizona with northern dialects extending into Nevada and the Mojave desert and southern dialects extending south through the Tepiman corridor into Mexico. The homeland of the Numic languages has been placed in Southern California near Death Valley, and the homeland of the proposed Southern Uto-Aztecan group has been placed on the coast of Sonora.” ref

“A contrary proposal suggests the homeland of Proto-Uto-Aztecan to have been much farther to the south; it was published in 2001 by Jane H. Hill, based on her reconstruction of maize-related vocabulary in Proto-Uto-Aztecan. By her theory, the assumed speakers of Proto-Uto-Aztecan were maize cultivators in Mesoamerica, who gradually moved north, bringing maize cultivation with them, during the period of roughly 4,500 to 3,000 years ago. The geographic diffusion of speakers corresponded to the breakup of linguistic unity. The hypothesis has been criticized on several grounds, and it is not generally accepted by Uto-Aztecanists. Using computational phylogenetic methods, Wheeler & Whiteley (2014) also suggest a southern homeland for Proto-Uto-Aztecan in or near the area occupied by historical Cora and some Nahua. Nahuatl forms the most basal clade in Wheeler & Whiteley’s (2014) Uto-Aztecan phylogram.” ref

“A survey of agriculture-related vocabulary by Merrill (2012) found that the agricultural vocabulary can be reconstructed for only Southern Uto-Aztecan. That supports a conclusion that the Proto-Uto-Aztecan speech community did not practice agriculture but adopted it only after entering Mesoamerica from the north. A more recent proposal from 2014, by David L. Shaul, presents evidence suggesting contact between Proto-Uto-Aztecan and languages of central California, such as Esselen and the Yokutsan languages. That leads Shaul to suggest that Proto-Uto-Aztecan was spoken in California’s Central Valley area, and it formed part of an ancient Californian linguistic area.” ref

“In pre-Columbian Aztec society, calpulli (from Classical Nahuatl calpōlli, Nahuatl pronunciation: meaning “large houses”, singular calpul) were units of commoner housing that had been split into kin-based or other land-holding groups within Nahua city-states or altepetls. In the Aztec Empire, calpulli represented the lowest and most populous social unit under the level of the city-state. Calpullis also had their own military schools (telpochcalli) where young men were educated. When they were mustered for war, the men from a calpulli went into battle as a unit. Calpullis had their own patron deity and a ceremonial district with administrative buildings and a temple where they worshiped.” ref, ref

“While the calpulli were the lowest class of the organized groups, they were not poor or without influence in the greater Aztec society. Some of the calpulli controlled lands up to a few acres in area; some had access to a few elite goods, while others did not. Calpulli-based military garrisons were dangerous if their loyalty wasn’t rewarded, and military leaders paid them handsomely to avert massive looting of conquered cities. Even though the calpulli was the main Aztec unit of social organization and included the majority of the population, little of its political structure or composition is fully described in the historical records left by the Spanish, and scholars have long debated the precise role or makeup of calpulli.” ref

Olmecs, Mayans, Aztecs, Isthmo-Colombians, and Incas: their differences and similarities, Origins, DNA, Languages, Cultures, Religions, and Gods

Mesoamerica Examined

Preclassic Era or Formative Period Mesoamerica

“The 2,000 years of the Formative period (1800 BCE – CE 200) were a time of rapid and far-reaching cultural change throughout Middle America. Archaeologists usually divide this time span into three subperiods. The Early Formative period (1800-900 BCE) saw the initial settlement of most areas of the region by sedentary peoples. In a few areas, early villages grew in size and complexity to reach the form of social organization known as the chiefdom. During the latter part of this period, a complex polity emerged on the Gulf Coast of Mexico at San Lorenzo, and a shared political and religious iconography spread throughout several regions. The succeeding Middle Formative period (900-400 BCE) is notable for three main historical developments: (1) complex chiefdoms and incipient states emerged in many parts of Middle America; (2) the first pyramid mounds were built, and (3) an adaptation completely dependent on agriculture and based on maize, beans, and squash, spread to most parts of Mesoamerica. In the Late Formative period (400 BCE – CE 200), many Middle Formative polities collapsed, to be replaced by larger and more complex societies, the first fully developed Mesoamerican states.” ref

“During the Preclassic Era, or Formative Period, large-scale ceremonial architecture, writing, cities, and states developed. Many of the distinctive elements of Mesoamerican civilization can be traced to this period, including the dominance of corn, the building of pyramids, human sacrifice, jaguar-worship, the complex calendar, and many of the gods.” ref

“In the formative period, agriculture and cultural traits such as a complex mythological and religious tradition, a vigesimal numeric system, a complex calendric system, a tradition of ball playing, and a distinct architectural style, were diffused through the area. Villages began to become socially stratified and develop into chiefdoms, and large ceremonial centers were built, interconnected by a network of trade routes for the exchange of luxury goods, such as obsidian, jade, cacao, cinnabar, Spondylus shells, hematite, and ceramics.” ref

“Pre-Olmec cultures had flourished since about 2500 BCE, and it has been speculated that the Olmecs derived in part from the neighboring Mokaya or Mixe–Zoque cultures which developed during this time.” ref

“Mokaya were pre-Olmec cultures of the Soconusco region in Mexico and parts of the Pacific coast of western Guatemala, that developed a number of Mesoamerica’s earliest-known sedentary settlements. The Mokaya are thought to have been among the first cultures in Mesoamerica to develop a hierarchical society, which arose in the Early Formative (or Preclassic) period of Mesoamerican chronology, at a time (late 2nd millennium BCE) slightly before similar traits were evident among the early Olmec centers. Based on artifact distributions, architectural analysis and regional survey, they suggest that simple chiefdoms emerged in the Mazatán region during the Locona phase (1650 to 1550 BCE).” ref

“The beginnings of Olmec civilization have traditionally been placed between 1400 and 1200 BCE. In addition to their influence with contemporaneous Mesoamerican cultures, as the first civilization in Mesoamerica, the Olmecs are credited, or speculatively credited, with many “firsts”, including the bloodletting and perhaps human sacrifice, writing and epigraphy, and the invention of popcorn, zero and the Mesoamerican calendar, and the Mesoamerican ballgame, as well as perhaps the compass. Some researchers, including artist and art historian Miguel Covarrubias, even postulate that the Olmecs formulated the forerunners of many of the later Mesoamerican deities.” ref

“Due to the limited knowledge historians are forced to draw assumptions and hypothesize about the intricate aspects of Olmec culture. Olmec society can most closely be classified as a theocratic chiefdom consisting of a small hereditary elite class and a much larger working class made up of craftsmen, artisans, and merchants. One theory suggests the distribution of major Olmec cities and their proximity to important but scarce resources hints at a system of collaborative exchange under the control of chiefs from each of the cities.” ref

“The Preclassic period (c. 2000 BCE to CE 250) saw the establishment of the first complex societies in the Maya region, and the cultivation of the staple crops of the Maya diet, including maize, beans, squashes, and chili peppers. The first Maya cities developed around 750 BCE, and by 500 BCE these cities possessed monumental architecture, including large temples with elaborate stucco façades. Hieroglyphic writing was being used in the Maya region by the 3rd century BCE. In the Late Preclassic, a number of large cities developed in the Petén Basin, and the city of Kaminaljuyu rose to prominence in the Guatemalan Highlands.” ref

“Beginning around CE 250, the Classic period is largely defined as when the Maya were raising sculpted monuments with Long Count dates. This period saw the Maya civilization develop many city-states linked by a complex trade network. In the Maya Lowlands two great rivals, the cities of Tikal and Calakmul, became powerful. The Classic period also saw the intrusive intervention of the central Mexican city of Teotihuacan in Maya dynastic politics. Rule during the Classic period centered on the concept of the “divine king”, who was thought to act as a mediator between mortals and the supernatural realm. Kingship was usually (but not exclusively) patrilineal, and power normally passed to the eldest son. A prospective king was expected to be a successful war leader as well as a ruler. Closed patronage systems were the dominant force in Maya politics, although how patronage affected the political makeup of a kingdom varied from city-state to city-state. By the Late Classic period, the aristocracy had grown in size, reducing the previously exclusive power of the king.” ref

South America Examined

ref

“Muisca chiefdom of Pasca. Gold was used in Central America by the first centuries CE and was spiritually and symbolically important to Pre-Columbian peoples. The countries of the Isthmus—Costa Rica, Panama, and Colombia—emerged as a single goldworking region that shared styles and methodology, such as the use of lost-wax casting instead of hammering. Metalworking in the region began with objects for religious rituals and royalty, rather than as tools, weapons, or currency; this symbolic use from the outset established a precedent for metalworking throughout the region’s history. The Muisca people, also known as the Chibcha, were situated at 9000 ft elevation in the eastern Andes of Colombia near modern day Bogotá, the town of Tunja, and Lake Guatavita. While most Muisca villages had a chief and priests, the Muisca were generally an egalitarian agricultural people. They made pottery and textiles and mined emeralds and salt, but they lacked the gold and beeswax needed to create their signature gold pieces. For those raw materials, they bartered with neighboring peoples. Gold was not reduced to the use of the elite or the Muisca chiefs, and was not the principal object of prestige, as it was mainly used for religious offering purposes. Instead, all Muisca families decorated their doors and windows with gold objects.” ref

“Around 1500 BCE, groups of agrarians with ceramic traditions came to the region from the lowlands. They had permanent housing and stationary camps, and worked the salty water to extract salt. In Zipacón, there is evidence of agriculture and ceramics; the oldest settlement of the highlands dates to 1270 BCE. Muisca migrated in the Formative stage (between 1000 BCE and CE 500). Between 800 BCE and 500 BCE, a second wave of migrants came to the highlands. Their presence is identified by multicolor ceramics, housing, and farms. These groups were still in residence upon the arrival of the Spanish invaders. The Muisca may have integrated with more ancient inhabitants, but the Muisca were the ones who molded the cultural profile and the social and political organization. Their language, a dialect of Chibcha, was very similar to those peoples of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta (Kogi, Ijka, Wiwa, and Kankuamo) and the Sierra Nevada del Cocuy (U’wa).” ref

“The Muysca language is part of the Chibcha linguistic family, which in turn belongs to the macro-Chibchan group. The Chibcha linguistic family includes several indigenous languages of Central America and Northwestern South America. In prehistorical times, in the Andean civilizations called preceramic, the population of northwestern South America migrated through the Darién Gap between the isthmus of Panama and Colombia. Other Chibchan languages are spoken in southern Central America and the Muisca and related indigenous groups took their language with them into the heart of Colombia where they comprised the Muisca Confederation, a cultural grouping.” ref

“The Muisca (also called the Chibcha) were a pre-Columbian culture and colonial communities of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense before the Spanish colonization of the Americas, whose customs lasted up to the beginning of the 19th century and Colombian independence, and are indigenous peoples in Colombia in a process of cultural re-definition and revitalization. The Muisca spoke Muysccubun, a language of the Chibchan language family, also called Muysca and Mosca, which is part of an important revival effort. The first known contact with Europeans in the region was in 1537 during the Spanish conquest of New Granada. Subgroupings were identified chiefly by their allegiances to three great Muisca rulers: the hoa in Hunza, ruling a territory roughly covering modern southern and northeastern Boyacá and southern Santander; the psihipqua in Muyquytá and encompassing most of modern Cundinamarca, the western Llanos; and the iraca, religious ruler of Suamox and modern northeastern Boyacá and southwestern Santander.” ref

“The territory of the Muisca spanned an area of around 25,000 km² (9,700 sq mi) from the north of Boyacá to the Sumapaz Páramo and from the summits to the western portion of the Eastern Ranges. Their territory bordered the lands of the Panche in the west, the Muzo in the northwest, the Guane in the north, the Lache in the northeast, the Achagua in the east, and the Sutagao in the south. At the time of the Spaniard invasion, the area had a large population, although the precise number of inhabitants is not known. Estimates vary from 1 million to over 3 million inhabitants. Their economy was based on agriculture, salt mining, trading, metalworking, and manufacturing. Due to Spanish colonization, the population of the Muisca drastically decreased and assimilated into the general population. The descendants of the Muisca are often found in rural municipalities including Cota, Chía, Tenjo, Suba, Engativá, Tocancipá, Gachancipá, and Ubaté.” ref

“Scholars agree that the group identified as Muisca migrated to the Altiplano Cundiboyacense in the Formative stage (between 1000 BCE and 500 CE), as shown by evidence found at Aguazuque and Soacha. Like the other formative-era cultures of America, the Muiscas were transitioning between being hunter-gatherers and becoming sedentary farmers. Around 1500 BCE, groups of agrarians with ceramic traditions came to the region from the lowlands. They had permanent housing and stationary camps, and worked the salty water to extract salt. In Zipacón, there is evidence of agriculture and ceramics; the oldest settlement of the highlands dates to 1270 BCE. Between 800 BCE and 500 BCE, a second wave of migrants came to the highlands. Their presence is identified by multicolor ceramics, housing, and farms. These groups were still in residence upon the arrival of the Spanish invaders. They left abundant traces of their occupation that have been studied since the 16th century, allowing scientists to reconstruct their way of life. The Muisca may have integrated with more ancient inhabitants, but the Muisca were the ones who molded the cultural profile and the social and political organization. Their language, a dialect of Chibcha, was very similar to those peoples of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta (Kogi, Ijka, Wiwa, and Kankuamo) and the Sierra Nevada del Cocuy (U’wa).” ref

“The Muisca people were organized in multiple confederations that was a loose union of polities that each retained sovereignty. The confederation was not a kingdom, as there was no absolute monarch, nor was it an empire, because it did not dominate other ethnic groups or peoples. It is hard to compare the Muisca Confederation with other American civilizations, such as the Aztec or the Inca empires as it was more similar to a confederation of states, such as the Achaean League. The Muisca Confederation was one of the biggest and best-organized confederations of tribes on the South American continent. Every tribe within the confederation was ruled by a chief or a cacique. Most of the tribes were part of the Muisca ethnic group, sharing the same language and culture and forming relations through trade. They united in the face of a common enemy. The army was the responsibility of the zipa or zaque. Güeches, the traditional ancient warriors of the Muisca, made up the military.” ref

“The Muisca Confederation existed as the union of two lesser confederations. The southern confederation, headed by the zipa, had its capital at Bacatá (now Bogotá). This southern polity included most of the Muisca population and held greater economic power. The northern territory was ruled by the zaque, and had its capital in Hunza, known today as Tunja. Although both areas had common political relations and affinities and belonged to the same tribal nation, rivalries still existed between them. Among the territories there were four chiefdoms: Bacatá, Hunza, Duitama, and Sogamoso. The chiefdom was composed by localities. The tribes were divided into Capitanías (ruled by a capitan). There were two kinds: Great Capitania (sybyn) and Minor Capitania (uta). The status of Capitan was inherited by maternal lineage. Confederation (zipa or zaque), → Priests (Iraca) → Chiefdoms (Cacique) → Capitanía (Capitan) → Sybyn → Uta.” ref

Muisca Confederations (political units)

“Muisca Confederations were loose confederations of different Muisca chiefdoms in the Eastern Andean highlands of what is today Colombia before the Spanish conquest of northern South America. These unions, centred around main chiefdoms recognised by smaller ones, were not a single, even loose, muisca confederation of chiefdoms, but multiple, independent regional entities. The area, presently called Altiplano Cundiboyacense, comprised the current departments of Boyacá, Cundinamarca and minor parts of Santander. Usually, Muisca chiefdoms were composed of various basic matrilineal units (uta, minor, or sibyn, major) called capitanías by the Spaniards. However, power was based on individual alliances of Muisca rulers with households or basic units. Often, sibyn were villages and uta groups of houses. Four confederations of chiefdoms formed in Muisca territory: Bogotá, Tunja, Duitama, and Sogamoso. Additionally, the Chibcha-speaking Guane and Lache were also ruled by the confederation of Guanentá and the confederation of El Cocuy respectively. Different models exist to explain the nature of power among Muisca elites.” ref

Muisca Confederations

“The Muiscas lived in the Andes Orientales in a territory of approximately 22.000 km². At the time of the Spanish Conquest, four confederations existed in their territory (Bogotá, Tunja, Duitama, Sogamoso). According to colonial documents, the confederations of Sogamoso and Duitama were independent of Tunja and had great importance. Political power was not based on economic or political subordination but recognition of certain authorities, sometimes multiple at a time. The size of the Muisca population remains debated. The most powerful chiefdom at the time of the Spanish conquest was Bogotá. Additionally, there were independent chiefdoms in the north-west, not affiliated to any confederation. Muisca settlements were organized around the cacique’s enclosure or cercado. Roads were present to connect the settlements with each other and with the surrounding indigenous groups, of which the Guane and Lache to the north, the Panche and Muzo to the west, and Guayupe, Achagua, and Tegua to the east were the most important.” ref

“The period named “Muisca” is separated by scholars into “early Muisca” (approximately CE 1000–1200) and “late Muisca” (approximately CE 1200–1600). This period is associated with the rise of Muisca chiefdoms. Through the construction of monolithic structures, elites acquired an ideological more than a direct economic control. The reasons for the expansion of chiefdoms are uncertain. According to Gerardo Reichel-Dolmatoff, the north-western, independent chiefdoms are representative of the state of Muisca society prior to the creation of confederations. Possibly, matrimonial alliances, conducted independently of the “territory” assigned to each chiefdom, played an important role. Two traditions of chroniclers reported different versions of Bogotá expansion.” ref

“According to Juan Rodríguez Freyle, Bogotá’s expansion began just one year before the Spanish conquest, after having revolted against the previously dominant chiefdom of Guatavita. On the other hand, Lucas Fernández de Piedrahíta related Bogotá’s expansion in the course of 67 years, as the result of various military campaigns led by different chiefs. According to Martha Herrera Angel, the colonial-era writings, while filled with exaggerations and misunderstandings, contain a core of historical truth. The concept of gue (“house”) was essential for muisca chiefs to secure their legitimacy, which was based on rules of succession and a certain degree of popular consent. Their role was to redistribute an accumulated surplus of goods, not to accumulate them. The existence of religious specialists can be explained by the need to maintain the equilibrium of the world.” ref

“The people used a decimal counting system, based on the digits of the hand. Their system went from 1 to 10 and for higher numerations they used the prefix quihicha or qhicha, which means “foot” in their Chibcha language Muysccubun. Eleven became thus “foot one”, twelve “foot two”, etc. As in the other pre-Columbian civilizations, the number 20 was special. It was the total number of all body extremities; fingers and toes. The Muisca used two forms to express twenty: “foot ten”; quihícha ubchihica or their exclusive word gueta, derived from gue, which means “house”. Numbers between 20 and 30 were counted gueta asaqui ata (“twenty plus one”; 21), gueta asaqui ubchihica (“twenty plus ten”; 30). Larger numbers were counted as multiples of twenty; gue-bosa (“20 times 2”; 40), gue-hisca (“20 times 5”; 100). The Muisca script consisted of hieroglyphs, only used for numerals. Gold was not the main object of prestige, but had religious significance, as chiefs preferred exotic clothing and sumptuous palisades to show their power. There was no currency among the Muiscas.” ref

Muisca rulers

“Muisca rulers were so-called “aggrandizers“, that is charismatic leaders at the head of various factions, who forged alliances and relations of subordination with various communities and ruled over the Muisca, a pre-hispanic indigenous group of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense in the Eastern Andes. The Muisca communities did not have a unified political entity, but were ruled by several chiefdoms or cacicazgos, some of which formed confederations of chiefdoms. At the time of the Spanish invasion, four confederations were thriving in Muisca territory: Bogotá, Tunja, Duitama and Sogamoso. Additionally, there were independent chiefdoms in the north-west. The Chibcha-speaking Guane and Lache were also ruled by the confederation of Guanentá and the confederation of El Cocuy respectively.” ref

“Power was based simultaneously on prestige and authority, in the form of rules of succession and a degree of popular consent. Economically, chiefs (or caciques) are in permanent competition to show strengthen their legitimacy and power (and finance artisanery) by redistributing an accumulated surplus of goods. Chiefs had a distributing role as organizers of Muisca tamsas (erroneously translated as “tributes”), in receiving goods from their subjects and redistributing the accumulated products in exchange for labor.” ref

Muisca chiefdoms and capitanías

“Muisca chiefdoms were centralized, but not state-like, as communities remained autonomous. There were four or five levels of political hierarchy: At the base, there were the minor matrilineal units named uta, which constituted major units (sybyn or zybin); sybyn formed chiefdoms, some of which were organized into confederations. Additionally, some chiefdoms of border-areas of the Bogotá confederation were uzacazgos (like Pasca or Guasca), and represented an intermediate level of hierarchy between chiefdoms and confederations. Generally, a sybyn was a village, and uta were groups of houses; however, cases have been documented of sybyn and uta existing independently.” ref

“Potentially, there existed groups of one sybyn (major) and one uta (minor) unit, as the Muisca had a dualistic thought. Power was loose however, especially when subordinated territoires were far from the political center. In modern-day Colombia, chiefdoms might correspond to municipios and capitanías to veredas. The Spaniards called basic matrilineal units, whether sybyn or uta, “capitanías“, and the rulers of these entities were called “capitanes” (captains) in Spanish. In muysccubun, a major captain was called sybyntiba or tybarogue, and a minor captain was known as a tybarogue, utatiba, or just uta” ref

Non-patrilineal heritage of rule

“The position of the ruler was inherited, but the line of succession was not patrilineal. Instead, the chief was succeeded by his nephew, the oldest son of his oldest sister. There were exceptions, and the ruler’s subjects, apparently, had some say in the matter, if only to confirm the successor in his post. Other family members inherited furniture of the chief.” ref

Legitimacy

“The legitimacy of chiefs was founded on individual prestige and institutional authority. The center of a chief’s domain is his cercado or enclosure. The power of chiefs is not measured in terms of gold or money, but by the sumptuous decorations of the cercado‘s wooden palisades and by the chief’s exotic clothing. Inside cercados, the chief possesses multiple structures, including his and his wive’s residences and various stockhouses. Powerful chiefs had large cercados, whose vicinity was occupied by markets, feasts, and ceremonies, whose surroundings were settled by multiple subordinated entities.” ref

“However, the traditional interpretation of cercados as places where powerful chiefs, supposedly belonging to an elite composed of lineages, demonstrated their political domination has not been conclusively proven archaeologically, and is most likely to be associated with colonial misunderstandings. The cercado legitimised social and political relations as an axis mundi, and as spatial representation of tradition and continuity. Muisca elites built their legitimacy around the metonymical concept of gue (“house”; by extension “community” as opposed to “gueba“, foreigner or sacrifice of foreigners), considered as a living thing, and it’s needs (feeding). Principles of seniority (guexica, “grandfather”) and rules of succession (guecha, “uncle” or “warrior”), both related to the “gue” concept, were the basis for the chief’s legitimacy.” ref

“Polyginy (a form of polygamy) was, contrary to the sayings of some colonial-era writers, most likely a privilege of chiefs and captains. The chief’s main wife was the only true “partner”, of the same rank and power as the chief himself. She was imposed on him by the members the ruling class. Before assuming their function, chiefs spend multiple years in a closed bohío, before receiving the ear and lip pendants characteristic of their function. Muisca chiefs’ seats are similar to the Caribbean duho, as they are low and have an elongated form. Redistributing the surplus of accumulated goods to the subjects was a fundamental part of achieving legitimacy. Indeed, a certain degree of popular consent was necessary. The chiefs power is individualistic and not institutionalized, and alliances are variously formed with sybyn (major basic units), uta (minor basic units) and individual gue (houses).” ref

Minor capitanías (uta)

“In some cases, the function of captain of a minor unit was hereditary, and in others it was assigned by the chief.” ref

Role

“The main role of chiefs was to “feed” and serve of the deities, the settlement (a living thing), and the subjects. Additionally, the role of the chief was to distribute the accumulated goods during “tamsas“, falsely translated as “tributes“. The chief of Sogamoso, where the Sun Temple was located, cumulated religious and political functions. Reciprocity was practiced between members of the elite. Because of the ambiguity of the Spanish term “capitanía“, the exact role of captains (at the head of basic matrilineal units) remains uncertain. There is disagreement between Carl Henrik Langebaek and Jorge Augusto Gamboa on the exact politico.-economic role of chiefs, as the latter argues for a “moduler or cellular” model similar to Mesoamerica.” ref

“There were four Muisca confederations of chiefdoms, and independent territories in the north-west. According to the Austro-Colombian anthropologist Gerardo Reichel-Dolmatoff, the north-west chiefdoms offered an idea of the state of Muisca organization prior to the expansion of some chiefdoms to form confederations. The chiefdom of Sogamoso or Iraca was related to the northern sun-cult around Sadigue, a parallel figure to Bochica. According to some tales, the chiefs of Iraca were given religious rights by Bochica at his death. The chiefdoms of Sogamoso and Duitama were described as independent of Tunja in colonial documents. The position of the Zipa (chief of the Bogotá confederation) was such that not even the members of the nobility dared to look him in the face, and it is said if the Zipa needed to spit, someone would hold out a piece of rich cloth for him to spit on, because it would be sacrilegious for anything so precious as his saliva to touch the ground.” ref

“Whoever held the cloth (all the while carefully looking the other way) then carried it off to be reverently disposed of. The histories and battles reported by the colonial-era writers called Spanish Chroniclers were likely exaggerated or modified, but contain, according to Martha Herrera Angel, true events. On the other hand, Carl Henrik Langebaek finds them to be moral stories told in the form of mythical narratives and misinterpreted by the Spaniards. The Zipa was also given the responsibility of offering gold to the gods. He would cover himself with gold and float out on a royal barge to the middle of the sacred Lake Guatavita, where he would offer up golden trinkets. This is widely believed to be how the legend of El Dorado started. When Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada arrived in the Muisca territories, the ruling Zipa was Bogotá and the Zaque (chief of Tunja) was Eucaneme.” ref

Muisca warfare

“The Muisca inhabited the Tenza and Ubaque valleys and the Altiplano Cundiboyacense, the high plateau of the Colombian Eastern Ranges of the Andes in the time before the Spanish conquest. Their society was mainly egalitarian with little difference between the elite class (caciques) and the general people. The Muisca economy was based on agriculture and trading raw materials like cotton, coca, feathers, sea snails, and gold with their neighbors. Called “Salt People”, they extracted salt from brines in Zipaquirá, Nemocón and Tausa to use for their cuisine and as trading material.” ref

“Being mostly traders and farmers, the Muisca also had a structure of combatants, called guecha warriors. Between the northern and southern parts of the Muisca Confederation, battles were fought where the zipa, ruling over the Bogotá savanna in the south and the zaque of Hunza in the north contested for control over terrains. The leaders of the communities fought with their warriors. The main enemy of the Muisca were the Panche people who inhabited the area to the west of the Altiplano in the hills leading to the Magdalena River. Fortifications of guecha warriors, a privileged class in their society, were built in the border region with the Panche. The guecha warriors were armed with blowpipes, spears, clubs, and slings; and defended themselves with long shields and thick multi-layered cotton mantles. Battles in the history of the Muisca are described around Chocontá (~1490) and Pasca around 1470.” ref

“When the Spanish conquistadors entered the Muisca Confederation in March 1537 after a long, deadly and sterunous expedition from Santa Marta at the Caribbean coast, they found little resistance of the Muisca, except in later battles against the Tundama ruling over the northernmost area around Duitama. The Spanish who already had conquered the Muisca and founded Bogotá, used the guecha warriors to submit the Panche in the Battle of Tocarema on August 20, 1538. Knowledge about the Muisca warfare has been provided by the conquistadors who made first contact with the Muisca; Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada, his brother Hernán, Juan de San Martín and Antonio de Lebrija. Later scholars were Juan de Castellanos, Pedro Simón and Lucas Fernández de Piedrahita. Modern anthropological research has revised some of the accounts of the early chroniclers on the war-like status of the Muisca, who were even by the conquistadors considered more traders and negotiators than fighters.” ref

“In the ages before the Spanish conquest of the Muisca, the high central plains of the Eastern Ranges of the Colombian Andes was inhabited by the Muisca. They established a rather egalitarian society of small settlements dotted across the valleys and flatlands in the mountains, based mainly on agriculture, trade and the extraction of salt, which gave them the name “The Salt People”. The Altiplano Cundiboyacense and neighbouring Ubaque and Tenza Valleys to the east the inhabited was very much isolated from the coast of later Colombia, but via trade routes and many markets held frequently, they were connected with their neighbouring indigenous groups; to the west and northwest the Panche, Muzo and Yarigui people, to the north the Guane, Lache and U’wa, in the eastern part towards the vast flatlands of the Llanos Orientales the Achagua, Guayupe and Tegua people and to the south in the mountains of Sumapaz the Sutagao.” ref

“The Muisca spoke Chibcha, or in their own language called Muysccubun; “language of the people”, and traded with their neighbors raw products to establish a self-sufficient economy where surpluses were traded for cotton, gold, emeralds, feathers, beeswax (for the fine goldworking of their tunjo offer pieces) and tropical fruits not growing on the high plains. The people were very religious and honored their two main deities, Sué, the Sun, and Chía, his wife; the Moon in their Sun and Moon temples in Sugamuxi and Chía, respectively. Each small settlement of a maximum of 100 bohíos was headed by a cacique, and the major towns of Bacatá and Hunza were ruled by the zipa and zaque. The Sacred City of the Sun Sugamuxi was ruled by a priest, called iraca, and the northernmost area was headed by the Tundama based in the hills around the former lake of Duitama.” ref

“The initiation ritual of the new zipa took place in their sacred Lake Guatavita where he would cover himself in gold dust and jump from a raft in the waters of the circular lake at 3,000 metres (9,800 ft) altitude, a ritual represented in the famous Muisca raft. It was this “Man of Gold” that formed the basis for the myth of El Dorado, known far outside of the Muisca Confederation, as their loose collection of rulers was called. This legend formed the main goal for the Spanish conquest that took the conquistadors more than a year into the Andes, from Santa Marta, where they left in early April 1536. Although early descriptions by Spanish chroniclers narrate about warfare, later revision of earlier beliefs has revealed that the Muisca were more a community of traders than warriors.” ref

“Still, all researchers agree that the Muisca people had special classes in their society reserved for their warriors and that battles were fought mainly defending their terrain against the Panche in the west and southwest and between each other; the battles between the zipa and zaque. The Chibcha word for “war” or “enemy” is saba. For the etymology of the word güecha various hypotheses have been presented. According to Pedro Simón, guecha meant “brave”, while Ezequiel Uricoechea signals its derivation from zuecha, meaning “uncle”; “brother of the mother”. The lineage of heritage in the Muisca society was maternal. Uricoechea described the term as a combination of gue- (“village”) and cha, which means “man” or “male”; “man of the village”. The name guecha has been changed in modern Colombian Spanish as guache, meaning “uncivilised”, “brute.” ref

“The guecha warriors enjoyed special privileges and were considered a higher class of the society. They ranked below the priests, but above the general people. Both Pedro Simón and Lucas Fernández de Piedrahita describe the guecha warriors as strong and brave men, recruited from the people in the various villages of the Muisca Confederation. They went through years of training in combat before being assigned as guecha warrior. Their appearance was different from the other people, of which the men had long hair. To be more efficient and safer in battle, the guecha warriors cut their hair short.” ref

“While jewelry was not common among the general people, and after the installation of the Code of Nemequene, even prohibited, the guecha warriors wore jewels such as golden or tumbaga nose pieces, pectorals, earrings and crowns with coloured feathers. The amount of earrings would indicate the number of enemies beaten. Their bodies were painted using inks from the Genipa americana tree. For their battles, and for hunting, the warriors used clubs, poisoned darts with blowpipes, spears and slings, similar to the atlatl of Mesoamerica. The bows and arrows were not produced by the Muisca themselves, but taken from conquered Panche slaves. To defend themselves from the poisoned arrows the Panche used, the guecha warriors covered themselves with multiple layers of cotton mantles. To protect themselves, they use long shields.” ref

“At the borders of the Muisca territories, the leaders organized fortifications of guecha warriors to defend their territory. Although on the presence of a stone fortress in Cajicá there is serious doubt if it existed in pre-conquest times,^[13] fortifications around the Confederation have been described. While some later scholars have described the Muisca as battling people, the conquistadors who made first contact with them tell a different story. Conquistadors Juan de San Martín, Antonio de Lebrija and leader and writer Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada have said they were: …gente que quiere paz y no guerra, porque aunque son muchos, son de pocas armas y no ofensivas, …people who want peace and not war, because although they are many, their arms are few and not offensive.” ref

“The battles that were fought, were mostly against the Panche to the west, who have been described by the first conquistadors as belligerent and cannibalistic. Pedro Simón interpreted their name, the word panche as meaning “cruel” and “murderer”. Between the two main parts of the Muisca Confederation; the zipa and the zaque two main battles have been described, the first happening around 1470 in Pasca. During battles, the warriors wore the mummies of ancestors on their backs to impress their enemies. Battles were fought according to the Muisca calendar, a complex luni–solar calendar the people used to indicate different types of years and months.” ref

“Two main battles, one between the northern and southern Muisca and one with the southern neighbors, the Sutagao, have been described by the chroniclers, mainly De Piedrahita. The first battle was around the year 1470 in Pasca between the zipa of Bacatá Saguamanchica, leading an army of around 30,000 guecha warriors, and the cacique of the Sutagao, resulting in a victory of the first and the inclusion of the southern region into the Muisca Confederation. The second battle, some twenty years later, took place around Chocontá in the north of the Bogotá savanna between the zipa and the zaque. Here again, Saguamanchica defeated his stronger enemy Michuá of around 60,000 warriors in a three-hour fight. Both leaders died because of the bloody battle.” ref

ref

AI Overview: Tupi-Guarani chiefs, often referred to as caciques or morubixabas, were vital political and spiritual leaders, rather than absolute rulers, who guided their communities through wisdom and oratorical skill rather than coercion. They often functioned as advisors within a communal, egalitarian structure, frequently serving as warriors, shamans, or community coordinators who commanded respect.

“Name of society, language, and language family Guarani (formerly Carijo); Guarani; Tupi-Guarani. Location: Lowland South America; Mostly Brazil and Paraguay. Brief history: They left the Amazon Basin and conquered the Parana Plateau and the mouth of the Amazon. They were bounded by the Paraguay river. They were in conflict with the tribes of the land they were exploring, the Chaco in particular. Political system: (chiefs, clans etc, wealth or status classes): They have a chief. They have large kin ties and a lot of religious knowledge. He is not a leader per se; he gives advice. Indications of social hierarchies? No; everything is decided by kinship, not class. The chief usually has the largest kin group. Specialization (shamans and medicine): The chief is a religious leader. The men use medicine, but the chief knows how to combine medicine with supernatural powers and is a better healer. Specialization (shamans and medicine): The chief is a religious leader. The men use medicine, but the chief knows how to combine medicine with supernatural powers and is a better healer.” ref

“The Guarani are a group of culturally-related Indigenous peoples of South America. They are distinguished from the related Tupi by their use of the Guarani language. The traditional range of the Guarani people is in what is now Paraguay between the Paraná River and lower Paraguay River, the Misiones Province of Argentina, southern Brazil once as far east as Rio de Janeiro, and parts of Uruguay and Bolivia. The history and meaning of the name Guaraní are subject to dispute. Before they encountered Europeans, the Guarani referred to themselves simply as Abá, meaning “men” or “people”. Early Guarani villages often consisted of communal houses (malocas, or ocas), with each house housing several families under the leadership of a chief. Communities were united by common interest and language, and tended to form tribal groups by dialect. It is estimated that the Guarani numbered some 400,000 people when they were first encountered by Europeans. At that time, they were sedentary and agricultural, subsisting largely on manioc, maize, wild game, and honey.” ref

“Polygamy was practiced. Cannibalism was practiced on captives. Equally little is known about early Guarani society and beliefs. They practiced a form of animistic pantheism, much of which has survived in the form of folklore and numerous myths. According to the Jesuit missionary Martin Dobrizhoffer, they practiced cannibalism at one point, perhaps as a funerary ritual, but later disposed of the dead in large jars placed inverted on the ground. Guarani mythology is still widespread in rural Paraguay. In 1542, a Guarani group rebelled against the Spanish. Aracare, chief of a Guarani group from the Jejuy River, refused to serve a Spanish expedition, which prompted the Spanish governor Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca to issue an order to apprehend Aracare. Aracare was subsequently hanged by the Spanish. This prompted an unsuccessful rebellion by Tabare and Guarani against the Spanish.” ref

“The center depot of the slave trade was the town of São Paulo. Originally a rendezvous place for Portuguese and Dutch pirates, it later became a refuge for criminals, who mixed with Native American and African women and actively participated in the capturing and selling of Guaranis as slaves. To oppose these armed and organized robbers, the tribes had only their bows and arrows. Many Guaranis were slain or enslaved by the slave hunters active in Brazil during those years. The Guaraní people in Bolivia, called Chiriguanos, lived in the foothills of the Andes and had a different history than most other Guaraní people. Noted for their warlike character, the Chiriguanos were hostile in turn to the Inca Empire, the Spanish, and the independent state of Bolivia from the late 15th to the late 19th century. The Guarani people and culture persist. Many are descendants of mission exiles. In Paraguay, Guarani lineage predominates in the population and the Guarani language is spoken in most departments to this day.” ref

AI overview: Tupi-Guarani chiefdoms were decentralized,, warlike regional societies, primarily organized as confederations of villages across eastern South America, particularly the Brazilian coast and Paraguay River basin. Dominated by 16th-century groups like the Tupinambá, they relied on slash-and-burn agriculture (cassava, maize) and patrilineal kinship, with major cultural focus on expansionist warfare and ritual, cannibalistic sacrifices.

“Tupi are believed to have originated in southwestern Amazon, from where some of its subfamilies expanded into other parts of the Amazon and, in the case of the Tupi-Guarani, beyond its borders. Recent evidence from archaeology, linguistics, and genetics aligns with José Brochado’s Tupi Expansion model. He proposed that the gradual development of agricultural systems within the Amazon resulted in population growth and, eventually, territorial expansion. This model also supports separate Tupi Expansion branches: Tupinambá (Atlantic coast) and Guarani (south, midwest Brazil). Although being the most populous group on Brazil’s Atlantic coast, which was the most affected by European colonization, the Tupi still account for roughly 20% of the country’s overall indigenous population.” ref

“The Tupi-Guarani were socially organized into regional chiefdoms comprised of confederations of villages. This societal structure enabled them to organize war expeditions that traversed great distances via major waterways. These expeditions had multiple objectives, including attacking enemies, annexing territories, capturing women, and, in some instances, enslaving the defeated. Central to the Tupi-Guarani culture was a strong bellicose ethos and a predatory cosmology. This found expression in practices such as anthropophagic ritual feasting, which carried significant social implications, particularly as a means of acquiring status, a practice that endured until colonial times. Therefore, this expansionist ethos, deeply rooted in their culture and societal structure, likely propelled the Tupi-Guarani to undertake territorial expansion, engage in conflict, and extend their influence across vast territories.” ref

“This illustrates how the social and cultural characteristics of the Tupi likely played a role in driving the vast territorial expansion of the group. It is also important to mention that the lands where the Tupi-Guarani spread into were not previously unoccupied. In fact, the Atlantic coast and some riverside areas had been inhabited by populations of fisher-hunter-gatherers who built shell-mounds (locally known as Sambaquis) since around 8000 years ago. Given the possibility that many shell mounds were built on the continental shelf that is now submerged beneath the Atlantic Ocean, the occupation could be even older. These Sambaqui groups would have occupied the Brazilian coast starting from around 8000 years ago until the arrival of Tupi-Guarani groups and speakers of Macro-Jê languages, as evidenced by the presence of Tupiguarani and Taquara/Itararé pottery (a ceramic tradition associated with Jê-speaking populations from the south of Brazil) in the upper layers of some mounds.” ref

Tupi people (or Tupinambá)

“The Tupi people, a subdivision of the Tupi-Guarani linguistic families, were one of the largest groups of Indigenous peoples in Brazil before its colonization. Scholars believe that while they first settled in the Amazon rainforest, from about 2,900 years ago the Tupi started to migrate southward and, from around 1,000 years ago, gradually occupied the Atlantic coast of Southeast Brazil. Many Tupi people today are merged with the Guaraní people, forming the Tupi–Guarani languages. The Guarani languages are a subdivision of the Tupian languages.” ref

“As Eduardo Navarro explains in his Dicionário de Tupi Antigo (2013), the different Tupi peoples believed they descended from a mythological character called Tupi. Because of this, many Tupi tribes had ethnonyms that began with “tupi”, such as the Tupinambá, the Tupiniquim, the Tupiguaé, and the Tupiminó. However, the main cult among the Tupi who inhabited the coast of Brazil in the 16th century was not that of Tupi, but that of Jurupari. Tupã, the thunder, was not actually a god, but rather a manifestation of the god Nhanderuvuçu. Precisely because Tupã did not have his own rite, the Catholic priests who sought to spread Christianity among the Indians chose Tupã as a symbol for the Christian God, in order to facilitate the understanding of Christianity by the Indians, grafting Christian principles onto the figure of Tupã. At the same time, they associated Jurupari with the Christian devil, in order to discourage his worship among the Tupi Indians.” ref

Cannibalism

“According to primary source accounts by primarily European writers, the Tupi were divided into several tribes that constantly warred with each other. During these wars, the Tupi frequently tried to capture their enemies to kill later in cannibalistic rituals. The warriors captured from other Tupi tribes were eaten because the Tupi believed that this allowed them to absorb and digest the captured warriors’ strength; thus, in fear of absorbing weakness, they chose only to sacrifice warriors perceived to be strong and brave. For the Tupi warriors, even when prisoners, it was a great honor to die valiantly during battle or to display courage during the festivities leading to the sacrifice. The Tupi have also been documented to eat the remains of dead relatives as a form of honoring them.” ref

“The practice of cannibalism among the Tupi was made famous in Europe by Hans Staden, a German soldier, mariner, and mercenary, traveling to Brazil to seek a fortune, who was captured by the Tupi in 1552. In his account published in 1557, he tells that the Tupi carried him to their village where they declared that they would devour him at their next festivity. There, he allegedly won the friendship of a powerful chief, whom he cured of a disease, and his life was spared.” ref 

Guarani mythology

“The Guarani mythology is the set of narratives about the gods and spirits of the different Tupi-Guarani peoples, ancient and current. Together with the cosmogonies, anthropogonies and rituals, they form part of the religion of these peoples. The Guarani people live in the south-central part of South America, especially in Paraguay and parts of the surrounding areas of Argentina, Brazil, and Bolivia. The Tupi people were one of the most numerous peoples indigenous to Brazil, occupying largely the Atlantic coast of Brazil and In the Amazon where there are Tupi towns with no connection to the outside.” ref

“The Guarani language was not a written language until modern times, so their religious beliefs have largely been passed down through word of mouth. As such, accounts of the various gods and related myths and legends can vary from one locale to the next, and the regional differences may be so extreme as to completely redefine the role a specific deity plays in the Guarani belief system. Although many of the indigenous Guarani people have been assimilated into modern society and their belief system altered or replaced by Christianity (due in large part to the work of Jesuit missionaries in the 16th century), several of the core beliefs are still active in many rural areas in the Guarani region. As a result, the myths and legends continue to evolve to this day.” ref

 Guarani creation myth

“The primary figure in most Guarani creation legends is Tupã, the supreme god of all creation. With the help of the moon goddess Arasy, Tupã descended upon the Earth in a location specified as a hill in the region of Areguá, and from that location created all that is found upon the face of the earth, including the ocean, forests, and the animals. It is also said that the stars were placed in the sky at this point. Tupã then created humanity (according to most Guarani myths, the Guarani were naturally the first race of people to be made, with every other civilization being born from it) in an elaborate ceremony, forming clay statues of man and woman with a mixture of various elements from nature. After breathing life into the human forms, he left them with the spirits of good and evil and departed.” ref

Early humanity

“The original humans created by Tupã were Rupave and Sypave, whose names mean “Father of the people” and “Mother of the people”, respectively. The pair had three sons and a large but unspecified number of daughters. The first of their sons was Tumé Arandú, considered to be the wisest of men and the great prophet of the Guarani people. Second of their sons was Marangatú, a benevolent and generous leader of his people, and father of Kerana, the mother of the seven legendary monsters of Guarani myth (see below). Their third son was Japeusá, who was from birth considered a liar, a thief and a trickster, always doing things backwards to confuse people and take advantage of them. He eventually committed suicide, drowning himself in the water, but he was resurrected as a crab, and since then all crabs are cursed to walk backwards much as Japeusá did.” ref

“Among the daughters of the Rupave and Supave was Porâsý, notable for sacrificing her own life in order to rid the world of one of the seven legendary monsters, diminishing their power (and thus the power of evil as a whole). Several of the first humans were considered to have ascended upon their deaths and become minor deities. Kerana, the beautiful daughter of Marangatu, was captured by the personification or spirit of evil called Tau. Together the two had seven sons who were cursed of the high goddess Arasy, and all but one were born as hideous monsters. The seven are considered primary figures in Guarani mythology, and while several of the lesser gods or even the original humans are forgotten in the verbal tradition of some areas, these seven were generally maintained in the legends.” ref  

“Tupã or Tupan (also Tupave or Tenondete) is the word for God in the Tupi and Guarani languages, including the Guarani creation myth. Tupã is considered to be the creator of the universe, of humanity and of the spirits of good and evil in Guarani mythology referred to as Angatupyry and Tau respectively. Tupã is more specifically considered the creator of light and his residence is the Sun.” ref

As a post-conquest deity

“Tupã was not actually a god, but rather a manifestation of God, in the form of thunder, according to Daniel H. Candido and Luc H. Nunes of the University of Campinas; he asserts that the Jesuit evangelizers of the period would have misinterpreted it as an actual divinity. The god in question is Nhanderuvuçu (Tupi) or Ñanderuvusu (Guarani), the Tupi-Guarani supreme deity; “Tupã” is solely used to refer to the lightning and thunder phenomenon, which has been called both a “messenger” and a “demon” at various times throughout history; the term “Nhanderuete” would be more suitable to compare to the Christian concept of God.” ref  

“Tupã, according to some sources, is an adaptation of catechism, which also existed in concept for the Amerindians, but as the “sound of thunder” (tu-pá or tu-pã), an unknown (and thus feared) phenomenon. Some writers were of the opinion that “the supreme being’s voice was heard in storms” as tupã-cinunga, “the thunder”, whose reflection was tupãberaba, “the lightning.” ref

Myths: Creation of human race

“Before the creation of the human race, Tupã wedded the goddess Arasy, the mother of the sky whose home was the Moon. According to the myth, Tupã and Arasy descended upon the Earth one morning after their wedding, and together they created the rivers and the seas, the forests, the stars and all the living beings of the universe. It is said that the location they stood while creating these things was atop a hill in Areguá, a city in Paraguay near the capital of Asunción.” ref  

“After the creation of all things in earth, Tupã set to creating the first human couple on the earth. For his creation, Tupã used a mixture of clay, juice extracted from yerba mate, blood from the Short-tailed Nighthawk, the leaves of several kinds of plants, and finally a centipede. He made a paste of this mixture, using the waters from a nearby spring that would become Lake Ypacaraí. From this paste Tupã created a pair of statues in his image, and left them in the sun to dry and filled them with life. The newly created humans were placed in front of the gods, and the woman was named Sypave (literally “mother of the people”) by Arasy, and the man was named Rupave (literally “father of the people”) by Tupã. Tupã and Arasy counselled the humans to live peacefully, to procreate, and to live in peace. Tupã then created the spirits of good and evil, Angatupyry and Tau, and left them to guide the people down one path or another and departed back into the heavens.” ref

ref 

“A chiefdom is a political organization of people represented or governed by a chief. Chiefdoms have been discussed, depending on their scope, as a stateless, state analogue or early state system or institution. Usually a chief’s position is based on kinship, which is often monopolized by the legitimate senior members of select families or ‘houses’. These elites can form a political-ideological aristocracy relative to the general group. Chiefdoms and chiefs are sometimes identified as the same as kingdoms and kings, and therefore understood as monarchies, particularly when they are understood as not necessarily states, but having monarchic representation or government. In anthropological theory, one model of human social development rooted in ideas of cultural evolution describes a chiefdom as a form of social organization more complex than a tribe or a band society, and less complex than a state or a civilization.” ref

“Within general theories of cultural evolution, chiefdoms are characterized by permanent and institutionalized forms of political leadership (the chief), centralized decision-making, economic interdependence, and social hierarchy. Chiefdoms are described as intermediate between tribes and states in the progressive scheme of sociopolitical development formulated by Elman Service: band – tribe – chiefdom – state. A chief’s status is based on kinship, so it is inherited or ascribed, in contrast to the achieved status of Big Man leaders of tribes. Another feature of chiefdoms is therefore pervasive social inequality. They are ranked societies, according to the scheme of progressive sociopolitical development formulated by Morton Fried: egalitarian – ranked – stratified – state. The most succinct definition of a chiefdom in anthropology is by Robert L. Carneiro: “An autonomous political unit comprising a number of villages or communities under the permanent control of a paramount chief.” ref

Chiefdoms in archaeological theory

“In archaeological theory, Service’s definition of chiefdoms as “redistribution societies with a permanent central agency of coordination” (Service 1962: 134) has been most influential. Many archaeologists, however, dispute Service’s reliance upon redistribution as central to chiefdom societies, and point to differences in the basis of finance (staple finance v. wealth finance). Service argued that chief rose to assume a managerial status to redistribute agricultural surplus to ecologically specialized communities within this territory (staple finance). Yet in re-studying the Hawaiian chiefdoms used as his case study, Timothy Earle observed that communities were rather self-sufficient. What the chief redistributed was not staple goods, but prestige goods to his followers that helped him to maintain his authority (wealth finance).” ref

“Some scholars contest the utility of the chiefdom model for archaeological inquiry. The most forceful critique comes from Timothy Pauketat, whose Chiefdom and Other Archaeological Delusions outlines how chiefdoms fail to account for the high variability of the archaeological evidence for middle-range societies. Pauketat argues that the evolutionary underpinnings of the chiefdom model are weighed down by racist and outdated theoretical baggage that can be traced back to Lewis Morgan‘s 19th-century cultural evolution.” ref

“From this perspective, pre-state societies are treated as underdeveloped, the savage and barbaric phases that preceded civilization. Pauketat argues that the chiefdom type is a limiting category that should be abandoned, and takes as his main case study Cahokia, a central place for the Mississippian culture of North America. Pauketat’s provocation, however, has been accused of not offering a sound alternative to the chiefdom type. For while he claims that chiefdoms are a delusion, he describes Cahokia as a civilization. This has been debated to uphold rather than challenge the evolutionary scheme he contests.” ref

Simple category

“Chiefdoms are characterized by the centralization of authority and pervasive inequality. At least two inherited social classes (elite and commoner) are present. (The ancient Hawaiian chiefdoms had as many as four social classes.) An individual might change social class during a lifetime by extraordinary behavior. A single lineage/family of the elite class becomes the ruling elite of the chiefdom, with the greatest influence, power, and prestige. Kinship is typically an organizing principle, while marriage, age, and sex can affect one’s social status and role.” ref

“A single simple chiefdom is generally composed of a central community surrounded by or near a number of smaller subsidiary communities. All of the communities recognize the authority of a single kin group or individual with hereditary centralized power, dwelling in the primary community. Each community will have its own leaders, which are usually in a tributary and/or subservient relationship to the ruling elite of the primary community.” ref

Complex category

“A complex chiefdom is a group of simple chiefdoms controlled by a single paramount center and ruled by a paramount chief. Complex chiefdoms have two or even three tiers of political hierarchy. Nobles are clearly distinct from commoners and do not usually engage in any form of agricultural production. The higher members of society consume most of the goods that are passed up the hierarchy as a tribute.” ref

“Reciprocal obligations are fulfilled by the nobles carrying out rituals that only they can perform. They may also make token, symbolic redistributions of food and other goods. In two- or three-tiered chiefdoms, higher-ranking chiefs have control over a number of lesser ranking individuals, each of whom controls specific territory or social units. Political control rests on the chief’s ability to maintain access to a sufficiently large body of tribute, passed up the line by lesser chiefs. These lesser chiefs in turn collect from those below them, from communities close to their own center. At the apex of the status hierarchy sits the paramount.” ref

“Anthropologists and archaeologists have demonstrated through research that chiefdoms are a relatively unstable form of social organization. They are prone to cycles of collapse and renewal, in which tribal units band together, expand in power, fragment through some form of social stress, and band together again. An example of this kind of social organization were the Germanic Peoples who conquered the western Roman Empire in the 5th century CE. Although commonly referred to as tribes, anthropologists classified their society as chiefdoms. They had a complex social hierarchy consisting of kings, a warrior aristocracy, common freemen, serfs, and slaves.” ref

“The Native American tribes sometimes had ruling kings or satraps (governors) in some areas and regions. The Cherokee, for example, had an imperial-family ruling system over a long period of history. The early Spanish explorers in the Americas reported on the Indian kings and kept extensive notes during what is now called the conquest. Some of the native tribes in the Americas had princes, nobles, and various classes and castes. The “Great Sun” was somewhat like the Great Khans of Asia and eastern Europe. Much like an emperor, the Great Sun of North America is the best example of chiefdoms and imperial kings in North American Indian history. The Aztecs of Mexico had a similar culture.” ref 

“A big man is a highly influential individual in a tribe, especially in Melanesia and Polynesia. Such a person may not have formal tribal or other authority (through, for instance, material possessions or inheritance of rights), but can maintain recognition through skilled persuasion and wisdom. The big man has a large following, both from his clan and from other clans. He provides his followers with protection and economic assistance, in return receiving support which he uses to increase his status.” ref

Big man “system”

“The American anthropologist Marshall Sahlins studied the big man phenomenon. In his much-referenced 1963 article “Poor Man, Rich Man, Big Man, Chief: Political Types in Melanesia“, Sahlins uses analytically constructed ideal-types of hierarchy and equality to compare a larger-scale Polynesian-type hierarchical society of chiefs and sub-chiefs with a Melanesian-type big-man system. The latter consists of segmented lineage groups, locally held together by faction-leaders who compete for power in the social structure of horizontally arranged and principally equal groupings (factions). Here, leadership is not ascribed, but rather gained through action and competition “with other ambitious men.” ref

On the Discussion of the Concepts of ‘Chiefdom’ and ‘Tribe’ in Current Political Anthropology and History of Primitive Society

“According to the degree of structural complexity, it is customary to distinguish between simple, complex (compound), and supercomplex (maximum) chiefdoms.” ref

Political Anthropology: A Cross-Cultural Comparison

“Each type of political integration can be further categorized as egalitarian, ranked, or stratified. Band societies and tribal societies generally are considered egalitarian—there is no great difference in status or power between individuals and there are as many valued status positions in the societies as there are persons able to fill them. Chiefdoms are ranked societies; there are substantial differences in the wealth and social status of individuals based on how closely related they are to the chief. In ranked societies, there are a limited number of positions of power or status, and only a few can occupy them. State societies are stratified. There are large differences in the wealth, status, and power of individuals based on unequal access to resources and positions of power. Socio-economic classes, for instance, are forms of stratification in many state societies.” ref

“A related concept in both politics and law is legitimacy: the perception that an individual has a valid right to leadership. Legitimacy is particularly applicable to complex societies that require centralized decision-making. Historically, the right to rule has been based on various principles. In agricultural states such as ancient Mesopotamia, the Aztec, and the Inca, justification for the rule of particular individuals was based on hereditary succession and typically granted to the eldest son of the ruler. Even this principle could be uncertain at times, as was the case when the Inca emperor Atahualpa had just defeated his rival and brother Huascar when the Spaniards arrived in Peru in 1533.” ref

“In many cases, supernatural beliefs were invoked to establish legitimacy and justify rule by an elite. Incan emperors derived their right to rule from the Sun God and Aztec rulers from Huitzilopochtli (Hummingbird-to-the-Left). European monarchs invoked a divine right to rule that was reinforced by the Church of England in Britain and by the Roman Catholic Church in other countries prior to the Reformation. In India, the dominance of the Brahmin elite over the other castes is justified by karma, cumulative forces created by good and evil deeds in past lives. Secular equivalents also serve to justify rule by elites; examples include the promise of a worker’s paradise in the former Soviet Union and racial purity of Aryans in Nazi Germany. In the United States and other democratic forms of government, legitimacy rests on the consent of the governed in periodic elections (though in the United States, the incoming president is sworn in using a Christian Bible despite alleged separation of church and state).” ref

“In some societies, dominance by an individual or group is viewed as unacceptable. Christopher Boehm (1999) developed the concept of reverse dominance to describe societies in which people rejected attempts by any individual to exercise power. They achieved this aim using ridicule, criticism, disobedience, and strong disapproval and could banish extreme offenders. Richard Lee encountered this phenomenon when he presented the !Kung with whom he had worked over the preceding year with a fattened ox. Rather than praising or thanking him, his hosts ridiculed the beast as scrawny, ill-fed, and probably sick. This behavior is consistent with reverse dominance. Even in societies that emphasize equality between people, decisions still have to be made. Sometimes particularly persuasive figures such as headmen make them, but persuasive figures who lack formal power are not free to make decisions without coming to a consensus with their fellows.” ref

“To reach such consensus, there must be general agreement. Essentially, then, even if in a backhanded way, legitimacy characterizes societies that lack institutionalized leadership. Another set of concepts refers to the reinforcements or consequences for compliance with the directive and laws of a society. Positive reinforcements are the rewards for compliance; examples include medals, financial incentives, and other forms of public recognition. Negative reinforcements punish noncompliance through fines, imprisonment, and death sentences. These reinforcements can be identified in every human society, even among foragers or others who have no written system of law. Reverse dominance is one form of negative reinforcement.” ref

Chiefdoms: From Archaic Polities to Modern Terrorist Organizations

“The Notion of Chiefdom

“The processes of growing societal complexity, emergence of new forms of social and political inequality, and formation of pre-state or complex stateless polities are among the most intriguing subjects of anthropology and social philosophy. The chiefdom concept plays a special role within the theories that try to account for the transition from simple social systems to systems of greater complexity. Following its emergence in the 1950s, this notion became an important heuristic means to advance anthropology and archaeology. It was also subjected to vigorous debates within which the participants denied both the methodological significance and the very notion of the chiefdom. As seen in the dispute over chiefdoms between Timothy Pauketat and Robert Carneiro, these debates are becoming even more vigorous in connection with the rapid accumulation of information on ancient societies. There is also much discrepancy in the definition of chiefdom since some scholars consider it a standard phase of cultural evolution, a natural transition between the ‘Big Man’ society and the states of the ancient world.” ref

“First, we must ask if the very notion of the chiefdom has become outdated. Can the chiefdom be regarded as an evolutionary stage? Do archaeological data adequately correspond to it? Does it make sense to provide definitions to the chiefdom, and is not the value of all typologies rather limited? Has the introduction of this notion been beneficial to archaeology? Or has it only obscured the situation? (Compare the above-mentioned discussion; see also the discussion about the emergence of chiefdoms and states in connection with the theory of Robert Carneiro, with the participation of leading political anthropologists, in the September 2012 issue of Social Evolution & History).” ref

“We believe the current discussion indicates that the notion of the chiefdom remains rather useful. Of course, the theory of the chiefdom is in need of further refinement, and the rapid accumulation of knowledge on ancient societies demands a revision of some stereotypes and rejection of certain rigid theoretical constructions. Thus, there is a rather urgent need for further development and amendment of evolutionary theory as it concerns the chiefdom concept. Аlthough at first glance the problems associated with the analysis of chiefdoms and other alternative forms of political organization of the pre-state and early state epochs may look purely academic, in fact they can be understood as rather practical.” ref

“A careful analysis allows us to see many similarities between those ancient epochs and the current era. The discerning eye will see that some of the characteristics of chiefdoms and early states can be detected in many modern states, not only in the least developed ones (for more details see Grinin 2009a, 2012; Hagesteijn 2008). And there are many such states and the problems that arise within those modern chiefdoms and chieftaincies are very complex and acute. Some features of chiefdoms and other archaic polities can be found in purely modern systems, especially within large-scale terrorist organizations. The role of the leader (chief) within them, unique combinations of formal and informal modes of management, specific forms of structuring in accordance with social distance from the chief, and so on – the analysis of such structures can be facilitated by using some achievements of political anthropology.” ref

“What we can at least aim for is to develop a language for understanding such political groups, in their varied and intricate complexities, that will cut across disciplines. What are the characteristic features of modern chieftaincies? This is a subject of intense debate. For ancient chiefdoms one could use population size criteria (see also Carneiro 2012a, 2012b; Grinin 2004, 2009b; Grinin and Korotayev 2009). However, in today’s world – where almost all demographic proportions of antiquity and ancient environmental constraints have long been broken and changed – such criteria are not appropriate. Therefore, it is necessary to proceed from organizational and institutional frameworks.” ref

“A chiefdom is a polity that is headed by a chief whose rights are recog­nized by the chiefdom members on certain grounds, originating either from his hereditary or personal qualities. There are chiefdoms where chiefly status is hereditarily based, but there are also ones where it is based on a chief’s personal merits – allowing him to become the head of the chiefdom. Note that the state can also be monarchic or democratic. But the distinction is not absolute. In any case, the chief must possess adequate personal abilities or chiefdoms can disintegrate – but not necessarily monarchic states, which often avoid disintegration even with very weak monarchs.” ref

“However, unlike a gang, a chiefdom is a much more stable formation. This formation can reproduce itself and the death or disappearance of the chief tends not to lead to the disappearance of the chiefdom itself. Thus, there is a certain institutional framework that holds a chieftaincy together, even if this framework is entirely immoral or extremely cruel. This is expressed rather cynically in the famous saying that organized crime is immortal, and it makes some forms of organized crime similar to the state. However, unlike the state, for chiefdoms (and especially for modern chieftaincies) their connection with territory is much less important. We can say that a chiefdom is primarily its people. The members of the chiefdom are not serfs, although their rulers often have a desire to bind them as tightly as possible; in archaic chiefdoms they were often united through the affiliation to a particular clan or ramage structure. In modern chieftaincies this is often achieved by criminal, religious, or political recruitment. The state usually claims its sovereignty over people living within a certain territory.” ref

“This is why we believe that such an organization as A1-Qaeda (banned in Russia) has some features of modern chieftaincies. It has some interest in territory, but primarily in terms of ease of deployment. At the same time, an organization like ISIL seems to be closer in type to the early states, since it claims sovereignty over certain areas and requires the submission of those living within this area. Chiefdoms and chieftaincies, rather, claim authority over certain people (although of course the distinction here is not perfectly rigid, since organized crime networks and similar illegal structures often claim their power over certain territories). However, the early states (even centralized ones), as shown in various studies, were very loose and heterogeneous polities. And often those chiefdoms that recognized the early states’ suzerainty constituted integral parts of their structure.” ref

“So within the ISIL system one seems to be able to detect certain chieftaincies. But at the moment this can only be maintained very hypothetically, because little is known of the actual structure of ISIL. Note also that the early imperial-type states (or the ones with imperial claims, which is seen in ISIL) are very often characterized by mass brutality over the conquered population (often accompanied by demonstrative cruelty). Also, not enough is known about the structure of such a notorious terrorist organization as Boko Haram in Nigeria, but at first glance it seems to be combining in a rather peculiar way features of the chiefdom and the early state – the first observed more in the type of organization and its ‘manpower’, according to some sources between seven thousand and ten thousand men; the second observed in its ideology and objectives.” ref

“In ancient times, for people living within chiefdoms, there was almost no choice; nor had they ability to imagine another possibility. What keeps modern people within chieftaincies’ zones of influence? In traditional societies this was largely the power of tradition. In modern chieftaincies – in addition to tradition – a very significant role is played by the forces that are related to meeting basic human needs in material resources, or ideas of self-realization. And when the state is weak, corrupt, or indifferent, its people may well fall under the influence of other forces or into the zone of influence of various modern chieftaincies.” ref

“In modern societies, even the most archaic ones, any real power vacuum is never really observed. If the state is not able to influence people, they are influenced by other forces (including modern chieftaincies). Here we see another very significant difference between the state and modern chieftaincies. In the state one may find much more noticeable formal management practices and attitudes, whereas in chieftaincies they tend to be informal and personal – similar to those that existed between a prince and his entourage, a feudal lord and his vassals, or a senior and a junior. Informal relationships are often more attractive to people than formal, and this is another reason for the amazing vitality of modern chieftaincies.” ref

“Derlugian and Earle note that chieftaincies constructed of personal power networks emerge recurrently within states and their business corporations, political parties, mafias, insurgencies and artistic cliques. Modern states were built by incorporating chieftaincies as internal organs. Nevertheless, ‘neopatrimonialism’, ‘political machines’, ‘oligarchy’, caudillismo, and warlordism – the various names that designate different facets of chieftaincy – represent neither aberrant nor atavistic phenomena. They refer to an immensely adaptable strategy of manipulation in arenas where formal institutional controls prove impractical or undesirable. A modern globalizing world increasingly takes to the broad arena of action various marginal – but very energetic and aggressive – structures and organizations seeking to oppose global civilization and the established order, in the form of terrorist acts, war without any rules, or drug trafficking.” ref

“Sometimes they act under the banner of religious ideas, and sometimes they do not hide behind anything. Thanks to modern means of communication, these archaic forces can now demonstrate their strength and ideas. Most often, these forces emerge and find sufficiently broad support in regions where state structures are weak. The tribal zone of the Middle East (where many tribes should be identified as chiefdoms rather than true tribes) is the most prominent focus. However, in some regions of Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, and else­where this may also be the case. Thus, there is a conflict between complex statehood and certain archaic chieftaincies or early state structures and forces.” ref

Chiefs, Chieftaincies, Chiefdoms, and Chiefly Confederacies: Power in the Evolution of Political Systems

“Chiefdom is a social category, continuous with non-stratified social groups and states. The defining process of chiefdoms is an emergent political economy that mobilized resources used to finance institutions of rule and social stratification. Chiefdoms are highly variable, but they are all about power. This article reviews concepts of chiefs, chiefdoms and chiefly confederacies, and illustrates how Polynesian chiefdoms operated prior to state formation. The chief is a political actor seeking to control rather opportunistically the elemental powers of economy, warrior might, and ideology. The history of Kamehameha, first King of the Hawaiian Islands, illustrates how a chief fashioned a state superstructure. Following the formation of states, chiefs continue to operate as sub-state actors controlling interstitial spaces (illegal operations, rural areas, and the like) in competition and collaboration with an overarching state.” ref

Chiefs, Chieftaincies, Chiefdoms, and Chiefly Confederacies

“Power dynamics in the world of chiefs require some definition of terms and concepts. Each word has a long and often confused history of usage and meaning that I will not attempt to summarize. For the sake of clarity, I present how I use the terms: chief, chieftaincy, chiefdom, and chiefly confederacy. The chief is the original political agent, he or sometimes she is able to amass and extend power over populations larger than the intimate, village-scale community. In a seminal article, Sahlins (1963) defined the difference between the big man and chief according to scale, stability, and institutionalization of political leadership. A big man is seen as a political entrepreneur, who personally builds his power by amassing prestige; in contrast, a chief comes to a position of power in an established social structure. This typological division has been criticized, because a continuum exists in leadership forms throughout Melanesia and elsewhere.” ref

“As power becomes increasingly consolidated, the numbers of people, who can become chief is constrained, but chiefs like big men must create and extend their support base much like an unusually successful big man. Rule may be consolidated in a single paramount or divided among a ruling pair or council of chiefs. Chiefs grade into kings to the extent that they are able to expand the scale of their control and their political economy and to stabilize rule through institutionalization. A chieftaincy is the chiefs’ political body, a personalized network of supporters, who act as agents for his or her rule. They are the chief’s warriors, priests, managers, and others involved in the collection of revenues and support for power strategies. Although often based on principles of kinship and rank, the chieftaincy is better understood as personalized through patterns of fealty as described for the early stages of feudalism.” ref

“Chiefdom is the society associated with the chief’s polity. The social forms of chiefdoms can often be quite heterarchical, meaning that competing hierarchies and spheres of action exist, as between a political, religious, and social hierarchies, between the regional polity and constituent communities and kin groups, and between ethnic and gendered divisions (Ehrenreich et at. 1995). Views of chiefs as central redistributors, organizers, and governors of everyday life are most probably false (Earle 1977, 1987). The chief is involved in things chiefly, and could be expected to meddle with community and household activities in only quite specific ways that affect the operation of the chieftaincy. This means that the chiefdom as a form is highly variable (Feinman and Neitzel 1984) based on conditions of household and community structure, each with their own histories. Chiefdoms thus have little coherence as a type, except for the flexible power strategies of chiefs and their chieftaincies.” ref

“Chiefly confederacies are pragmatic associations of chiefly polities, typically involving alliance, intermarriage, and specialists (warriors, priests, architects, and the like), who move between polities relatively freely. Such confederacies are highly contingent, based on common interests between chiefs and their chieftaincies; they are inherently dynamic, forming and dissolving opportunistically according to changing strategic openings and interests in the political arena. They have no permanent structural form. All relations of chiefs to chiefs and to non-chiefs in their chieftaincies and confederacies are political, contingent and negotiated. The degree of formal political institutional development in chiefdoms is limited and unstable, creating a constant cycling of political structures (Anderson 1994). Although chiefs would love to consider themselves the centers of stable and persistent polities, the reality is structural instability. The weakness of chieftaincies as institutions is, however, part of their continuing strength, as they rapidly adjust to changing political and economic realities.” ref

The Chief as A Political Actor

“The chief comes to power because of his or her ability to access, centrally control and manipulate elemental power through his personalized chieftaincy of supporters. Political strategies rely on an emergent political economy. All complex societies, both chiefdoms and states, require finance grounded in their economies. To understand the nature of political complexity, I argue, requires a description of the currencies, channels, and conversions in the flows of goods used in finance and particularly a description of the bottlenecks whereby flows of currencies can be interdicted and mobilized to support and institutionalize political power. The currencies of finance in chiefdoms and states could have been staples including cereal grain and domestic animals, wealth such as metal display items and weapons, and/or money.” ref

“The chief’s supremacy is based on elemental powers derived from the economy, warrior might, and ideology. These powers are elemental in the sense that they are evident and without protest from social actors. The chief with such powers made requests not easily refused. Economic power is based on the ability to give or deny necessary and desired goods, which included food, housing, and prestige goods and wealth. Goods mobilized from the political economy support many diverse actions of the chief as he distributed his largess to his followers. Warrior power is based on an ability to coerce by force or the treat of force. No one questions armed muscle. ‘Fear is maintained by a dread of punishment, which never fails’. And ideological power was based on the ability to present followers with religiously sanctioned narratives for compliance and support. Those familiar with Mann’s (1986) analysis of the sources of power note that I do not include institutional power. This omission recognizes the flexible nature of chieftaincies, for which institutional forms are less significant as a source of power. With the emergence of states, however, leaders established ‘permanent’ (long lasting) institutions of governance, bureaucracies, and law, and these institutions provided a fourth source of political power built on the elemental three.” ref

“Elemental powers are distributive, meaning that they tend to spread out evenly, or at very least broadly, across society’s members. Thus a freeholder farmer could act largely as an independent agent responsible for defending his family, animals, and other possessions. Attempts to concentrated power are problematic; long in human history, leadership was small scale, group sanctioned, and largely situational. For an egalitarian society as existed prior to the emergence of stronger chiefs, individuals had fairly open or at least corporately sanctioned access to all powers to retain independence of action. The ideology of American governance actually stresses similar principles encapsulated in the freedom to bear arms, free markets, and religious freedoms. Framers of the Constitutions saw the evils of dominant state powers and so wanted constitutional limits on their intrusion into private and local spheres. This political opposition to the state is a return to the primitive in terms of the nature of power. In the political process, however, leaders whether of the state or below try to centralize power by controlling access to the sources of power. Sometimes they are successful, and often they fail. They regulate economies, limit access to weapons, and establish religions, but their abilities to monopolize access to one or more of the sources of elemental power depend on the distribution and creative fashioning of bottlenecks in the political economies on which power is based.” ref

“Bottlenecks, or choke points, are limits to flows of resources, personnel, and knowledge. In the economy, bottlenecks are created when production is limited by technological knowledge or resource available or when trade must flow through narrowed channels as along roads, caravan routes through deserts, or a few major rivers. Chiefs enforce a trade bottleneck, acting as stationary raiders or pirates requiring payments for safe passage. Commodity chains describe the highly variable routes, along which goods are produced and transported. Because of the highly dispersed nature of many commodity chains, production and trade is often difficult to control, but conditions arise or are created that make control possible. Systems of property, for example, provide ideal bottlenecks in the agricultural base, common to most primary (independently developing) chiefdoms and states. For warrior power, bottlenecks are created by circumscription, whereby natural or political boundaries limit possibilities of escape, the ability to protest with one’s feet. The institutionalization of religion with elaborate ceremonies and a built landscape of temples and sanctuaries similarly create limits on who has access to or interpretation of sacred knowledge and its meaning.” ref

“The sources of power become closely interlocked by flows of resources, personnel, and knowledge. Thus surplus generated from an economic bottleneck can be invested in training and supporting specialized warriors, who protect the chief and his ownership over lands. The warriors are controlled by their chief’s patronage with special weapons and training. Finance of ceremonial events and temple construction further created the chief’s control over religion that justifies rule; religion establishes social order including correct pattern of property ownership and warrior loyalty. The power strategies of the chief involve a creative and constantly changing intersection of flows based on bottlenecks for control that maximized surplus extraction, military might, and religious legitimacy.” ref

The Chief before States

“Before the emergence of bureaucratic states and their rules of law, the primary political institution was the chieftaincy. Starting perhaps, 7000 years ago, chieftaincies developed independently and variably throughout the Americas, Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Pacific. Chieftaincies have also retained separate power in some regions down to modern times. We know details about how they operated from archaeology, historical accounts, and ethnographies from the colonial period of European expansion. Although highly variable according to specific historical, ecological and economic conditions, the ingredients of chieftaincy can be summarized. A paramount chief or a group of chiefs organized and directed a network that dominated more or less successfully populations in thousands and tens of thousands. Prior to chieftaincies, most polities were fairly small with populations typically in the hundreds, a village-size group that had characterized much of the Neolithic Age. Chiefs, in contrast, came to power by their ability to extend rule laterally over many formally independent groups and their headmen to create the regional chiefdom with a scalar jump in polity size. The two essentials of the new chieftaincy were: first, elemental powers of central rule; and second, new structures of rule. Both were highly variable from place to place, but the essential adaptive strategy of chieftaincies was remarkably similar.” ref

“Although elemental powers of chiefly rule were intertwined and self-reinforcing, they were necessarily based on bottlenecks in the economy that generate ‘surpluses’, which the chief ‘reinvested’ in power strategies. The most common bottleneck was probably ownership of highly productive lands. As described for the Hawaiian case, intensification of land often created a constructed bottleneck in the highest productive lands improved with irrigation, terracing, drainage and the like. Alternatively, higher volume trade often created bottlenecks in either the best transport technology (long-distance boats) or in the best transport routes, often rivers or caravan roads. In the changes from Europe’s Neolithic to the Bronze Age, for example, trade shifted from primarily land-based transport to higher-volume water based transport of wealth (especially metals) along major rivers. The surplus derived from the political economy could then be invested in an attached warrior elite who could expand and retain the chiefs’ ownership rights and dominate trade in wealth. The mobilized surplus was then invested in the priests who presented the ideology of chiefly rule, materialized in sumptuous ceremonies and in a burial and monumental landscape of permanence (Earle 2004). In northern and western Europe, for example, over the course of a few generations, a landscape of elite burial monuments and housing was built to represent the emergent social hierarchy and probably claimed ownership over the most productive pasture lands critical for the society’s wealth in cattle.” ref

“Of course, the surplus could also be used to develop the economic base, by the construction of irrigation systems or of ships to ply the waters of commerce. The success of ruling chiefs depended on a continuously creative balancing of powers and interests, dealing with circumstances that could change at any moment. Chieftaincies were highly variable and adaptive, and, as a result, in different areas they have taken on historically variable forms, distinguished by specific types of leadership; those types, however, obscure their common political nature. Probably most important, chieftaincies were based on a positive feedback mechanism that reinvested surpluses to expand power in a competitive political world. In this ways, chiefdoms and early states were quite similar; the Inka Empire was based on a staple-based political economy that looked very much like a chieftaincy. Chieftaincies tend to expand until they were broken by a competitive power, reaching a barrier to further expansion such as state superstructures, but I am getting ahead of myself.” ref

“Governance of the chiefdom depended on fashioning new institutions of rule that could reach down to the local communities. Typical of chieftaincies, the hierarchy of chiefs was either of two levels (villages and the region), typically ruling a few thousand, or of three levels (villages, districts, and the macro-region), typically ruling tens of thousands. In either case the hierarchy itself was highly personal, the local leaders at the village and region being closely bound (often by kinship or pseudo-kinship) directly to their ruling chief. The chieftaincy as an institution of rule maintained a family-like ethos that fits Weber’s (1978 [1922]) concept of patrimonialism. This ethos was part of a chief’s legitimacy, but it depended first and foremost on power strategies. Included in chieftaincies were the specialists of power, including highly trained and ruthless warriors, irrigation managers who put people to work, priests responsible for monumental constructions and ceremonies, and various attached specialists making special dress, culturally significant symbols, and weapons. Although typically conceived in kinship terms, such political hierarchies, like those found in the feudal world, were in fact highly malleable and based rather on personal commitments of fealty. When states were first created, typically one chieftaincy conquered competing neighbors and promoted itself to govern a new superstructure. At least at its beginning and often continuing, states can be visualized as a ruling chiefdom extending power through state institutions of marshal law and established religion.” ref

Chiefdom Confederacies and State Origins

“A number of historical political systems of regional scale in varied locales across the globe have been described as confederacies, and some, such as those of Early Medieval Ireland, as chiefdom confederacies. In light of recent mulling as to whether some complex political systems of prehistoric and early historic North America could be considered to have been chiefdom confederacies, this article surveys the political systems of the historic Iroquois league, Early Medieval Ireland, Late Iron Age Britain, Archaic Boiotia, Bronze Age and Iron Age Korea, and 19^th – 20^th century Western Iran with the objective of determining the essential characteristics of chiefdom confederacies. Subsequent discussion is given over to the question as to whether the states that arose out of chiefdom confederacies possessed organizational characteristics attributable to their origins in them.” ref

“Chiefdom confederacies have not had a high profile in the literature of social or political anthropology, and only pop up from time to time in historical literature. This relative neglect is odd considering that, as this survey will demonstrate, they occurred among populations in nearly every culture area of the world, and once carpeted Europe. Quite possibly, not much attention has been lavished upon chiefdom confederacies because most came into existence and declined prior to the appearance of written documents in most regions where they existed. A second likely reason for their obscurity is due to an unspoken consensus among scholars that chiefdom confederacies never evolved into, or had an imprint upon the character of early states. As this study will hopefully demonstrate nothing could be farther from the truth. Indeed, it will emerge that the organizational characteristics and values that maintained chiefdom confederacies had a decided impact on the character of states that are termed ‘feudal’, or which are said to exhibit a network strategy of economic and political organization.” ref

What is a chiefdom confederacy?

“A confederacy was the centerpiece of one of the earliest monographs in anthropology, Lewis Henry Morgan’s League of the Ho-De‘-No-Sau-Nee or Iroquois, and the Iroquois League also figured prominently in his theoretical work on social evolution in Ancient Society. However, the Iroquois League should not be considered to have been a confederacy of chiefdoms. Morgan characterized the political system of the Haudenosaunee as a ‘League of Tribes’, and by this he meant that sachems did not represent their nations, but were rather the spokesmen of totemic clans. Within the league and within the nation the councils of the sachems constituted the only corporate activities. The various ‘nations’ that made up the Haudenosaunee were distinguished from each other on the basis of dialectical differences and occupied territories with recognized boundaries, but were otherwise politically not integrated.” ref

“Iroquoian society seems also to have been minimally socially stratified. In contrast to the situation observed in the more complex chiefdom societies of Early Medieval Ireland and pre-contact Polynesia where warfare was most often directed by aristocrats, Morgan reports that the Iroquoian warfare was undertaken by local leaders and communities. Furthermore, these local leaders were village headmen who had become chieftains on the basis of merit. Seen in this light, the Haudenosaunee could be viewed as constituting a confederacy of what Johnson and Earle have termed ‘regional groups’, somewhat akin to the alliances that existed among the Grand Valley Dani of New Guinea described by Heider (1991: 68). The eighteenth century Creek Confederacy of the southeastern US should also be considered in a similar light, though ascribed social status played a greater role in the selection of its leaders. Richard Tapper has referred to such confederacies of populations lacking unitary leadership as coalitions.” ref

“In discussing the potential for the organization of supratribal political entities in the past among the Arabs and the Turco-Mongolian peoples of Asia, Thomas Barfield contrasts the egalitarian ethos of the former with the conical clan organization and hierarchical social relations of the latter (1990). He says of the latter ‘…the acceptance of hierarchical authority and hereditary right to leadership was already deeply embedded in their culture and was reflected in the organization of tribal confederacies’. Chiefdom confederacies must then be composed of chiefdoms, which in turn must possess an aristocratic social stratum (Tapper 1990: 68). With the objective of drawing a distinction between chiefdom confederacies in Early Medieval Munster and another smaller and more stable configuration of Irish chiefdoms termed a composite chiefdom, I offered the following definition of a chiefdom confederacy: ‘A chiefdom confederacy consists of a number of genealogically related and unrelated chiefdoms which were unified through coercion or common agreement’.” ref

“This definition reflected the existence of charters in the form of written genealogies or lists of chieftains as part of the documentary record of Early Medieval Ireland, which laid out the purported kin relations that existed between the founding ancestors of each of the constituent chiefdoms within a chiefdom confederacy. The genealogies in turn reflect the fact that as in Polynesia and among the Turco-Mongolians, the leading families of the chiefdoms of the Irish exhibited ramage or conical clan organization. In Early Medieval Ireland, the structure of the conical clan was promulgated in the political sphere to link the leaders of otherwise unrelated ramages together into the web of fictive descent. It is conceivable that in other regions of the world where chiefdom confederacies are encountered, no attempt may have been made to link the leading families of the various chiefdoms making up a confederacy together through genealogies. It must be admitted, though, that a documentary record comparable to Ireland’s in terms of the number and variety of texts that reflect upon the political makeup of chiefdom confederacies does not exist anywhere else with the exception of Archaic Greece, so this issue cannot really be examined.” ref

Chiefdom confederacies in Early Medieval Ireland

“In Early Medieval Ireland, the chiefdoms of a chiefdom confederacy were located in near proximity to each other within a region but were not always geographically contiguous. In contrast, the chiefdoms that made up Irish composite chiefdoms were arrayed into circular clusters and had adopted a corporate identity. This identity was premised upon the genealogical ties between the leaders of the constituent chiefdoms that linked them into a ramage in the sense of Firth (1963 [1936]) and Sahlins (1958). Irish composite chiefdoms often endured for centuries – the Corcu MoDruad, a composite chiefdom that was located in the far north of Thomond, can be traced back to an Iron Age composite chiefdom named the Ruadraige. This composite chiefdom changed its name to Corcu MoDruad in the Early Middle Ages, and retained this identity despite experiencing catastrophic defeats at the hands of the Uí Fidgeinti and Dál Cais in the eighth century AD. What remained of it was partitioned in the 12^th century into two descendant composite chiefdoms. One of them retained the name Corcu MoDruad, and this composite chiefdom persisted until the end of the sixteenth century.” ref

“Though Irish chiefdom confederacies would seem to have been less tightly integrated than composite chiefdoms, they may also have lasted for considerable stretches of time. The chiefdom confederacy for which the best historical documentation exists is the Dál Cais confederacy of Thomond (coextensive with modern Co. Clare). The first annals entry to allude to them dates from CE 934. In the early tenth century they were probably expanding aggressively under the leadership of the Uí Tairdelbaich ramage. The evidence of the chieftain lists shows that at the time they were imposing their members into the succession of the Corcu MoDruad chieftains in the far north of Thomond, and the tenth-century Psalter of Cashel describes the ramages of Cenél Fermaic as members of the confederacy, though this chiefdom was located beyond the core chiefdoms of the Dál Cais composite chiefdom to the north. The Dál Cais confederacy was superseded in the early 12^th century CE when Muirchertaich Uí Brian created the first state in Munster, though the appellation Dál Cais would endure for centuries thereafter in the literary sources of Munster.” ref

“The Early Medieval Irish text that is called by scholars the ‘West Munster Synod’ describes the formation of a chiefdom confederacy in the western half of the Munster region of southern Ireland, possibly in the eighth century CE. The text expresses a rationale of mutual defense for the formation of the confederacy, but it also seems likely from historical examples such as the confederacy of the Dál Cais that confederacies were created to facilitate predatory military expansion on the part of the confederacies’ leaders. As stated above, the emergence of the Dál Cais coincided with the defeat and imposition of Dál Cais chieftains upon the Corcu MoDruad, a composite chiefdom that bordered the confederacy in far north of Thomond. These imposed chieftains were drawn from ramage of the Uí Tairdelbach chiefdom of the Dál Cais confederacy. Thereafter, the descendants of Lorcán, the leaders of the Uí Tairdelbach and of the Dál Cais, undertook to attack the Èoganacht confederacy of Munster and fended off an attack from the leader of the Uí Néill confederacy in Leinster. Eventually Lorcán’s grandson, the famous Brian Boroimhe (Boru), would go on to defeat his rivals in Munster, attack Connacht to the north, and challenge the Uí Néill for supremacy within the province of Leinster in the east of Ireland.” ref

Chiefdom confederacies throughout history and around the world: the Celts, Germans, and Greeks

“Surveys of the literary sources and the archaeological record has lead to a consensus among archaeologists that the named Celtic ‘tribal’ groupings encountered by the Greeks and Romans in Gaul and Britain amounted to collections of allied chiefdoms. Indeed, the archaeological record leaves little room for any other kind of political system to have existed. In 1972 David Clarke indicated the cellular character of settlement within the territory of the Iron Age Celtic Dumnonii of modern Cornwall, Devon and Somerset, which he described as a ‘loose confederation of sea-linked Celtic tribes’. Barry Cunliffe has said the same about the neighboring Durotriges of Dorset, calling them a ‘loose confederacy of smaller units…’. Cunliffe’s appraisal of the more centralized British ‘tribes’ of southeastern England reveals them as concatenations of ‘smaller socio-economic units’. Nico Roymans reached the same conclusion regarding the organization of the Celtic civitas of the tribes of Northern Gaul ‘The Gallic-Germanic civitas … consisted of a confederation of a number of sub-tribes, or pagi’. There are indications in Tacitus’ descriptions of the Germanic tribes of the first century CE that they were organized in an analogous fashion, e.g., ‘[the Batavi] … were once a people of the Chatti, and on occasion of civil war migrated to their present home – destined there to become part of the Roman Empire. But the honor and distinction of their old alliance remains’. ‘The Bructeri were ousted and almost annihilated by a league of neighboring tribes’.” ref

“Chiefdom confederacies can also be located in Archaic Period Greece in the ethnos; political systems which consisted either of a loose association of towns, as in the case of the Boiotian League, or villages and territories as in the case of Lokris, Doris, or Aetolia. Political systems described as ethnos predominated in central and western Greece. The ethnos was integrated solely by religious and political assemblies. The Boiotian League has been the subject of recent intensive scrutiny by both archaeologists and historians. In the early Archaic Period, c. 1000 BCE – 650 BCE, the governments of Boiotian towns and villages consisted of councils composed of the heads of noble clans, presided over by an elected leader, the archon, who is presumed to have served a one-year term. This form of government is not unique in the context of societies of the ethnographic record that were organized into chiefdoms.” ref

“It can be equated to the Samoan councils of matai (chieftains), called fono, from Polynesia. The councils of Boiotian towns in turn selected delegates to serve on religious councils called amphictyony which were involved with organizing the festivals which drew participation from all Boiotian communities. Beginning in the mid-seventh century BC, or perhaps earlier in the case of Orchomenus, larger towns such as Thebes, Thespiae, and Plataea compelled the formation of tributary associations with smaller towns, a form of association termed hegemony. These early political formations seem to have been equivalent in spatial extent to Irish composite chiefdoms, that is around 400 km², and the three-tiered settlement hierarchy (homestead, secondary town, primary town) encountered by the Bradford – Cambridge survey of Southwestern Boiotia reinforces this impression.” ref

Echoing Aristotle’s statements in Politics, modern historians also frequently point out the social significance of a change in warfare tactics during this period. Heavily armed hoplite forces organized into phalanxes became the prevailing military formation, displacing cavalry in importance. The ascendancy of the hoplites supposedly reflects a broadening of social participation in warfare to the middle ranks of society. However, this change cannot be taken as an indication of state formation as the hoplites were aristocratic and self-supporting. Furthermore, the extant records fail to note the existence of any officials beyond the councils of oligarchs. Therefore, no state bureaucracy can be said to have come into being. Around 520 BCE in response to external wars with the Thessaloi and Phokis to the north and threats from Athens from the south the Boiotean League was formed. This league was dominated by Thebes, though each major participating town was represented in the governing assembly, or halia, and each nominated boeotarchs, who were dedicated military leaders.” ref

“Still, even though the governing system had become more formal the towns making up this alliance cannot be said to have been states, nor could the alliance itself be termed a state as these changes did not involve instituting a bureaucracy, a legal system, regular taxation, or a full-time military. Instead, the Boiotian League could be better thought of as a chiefdom confederacy since the functions of the halia were restricted to military and diplomatic undertakings. It certainly behaved like an Irish chiefdom confederacy as the League proved to be highly fissiparous – the Boiotian town of Orochomenos, an early rival of Thebes for dominance, initially resisted membership. Plataea, and several other Boiotian villages in the south steadfastly refused to join, and Thespiae deserted the league following the battle of Thermopylae. The extent of the territory of the Boiotian League would also seem to fit the chiefdom confederacy model. The land area that was contained within the collective territories of the members of the Boiotian League is roughly equivalent, if not somewhat smaller in extent, than the land area dominated by the Dál Cais chiefdom confederacy of Early Medieval Co. Clare.” ref

“Chiefdom confederacies were a fact of early Korean history since the first millennium BCE. The first may have been Old Joseon (also Kochosŏn, Gojoseon), said to be a confederacy of three tribes. ‘The Hwanug tribe formed an aggregation with adjacent tribes or villages and then subjugated other aggregations…’. ‘Old Joseon was basically a confederation and could not be easily ruled from the center’. Old Joseon’s counterpart in South Korea was Jin (also Chin), also described as a loose confederacy. These confederacies ultimately broke apart into their constituent units (geosuguk), which then reformed into new confederacies: Puyŏ (also Buyeo), Koguryŏ (also Goguryeo), Ye, the Three Han (Samhan), and Gaya.” ref

“These chiefdom confederacies were eclipsed by the consolidation of three of these polities into the states of Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla in the first century CE. However, even these polities did not really develop centralized systems of territorial administration until the fourth century CE. Chiefdom confederacies have also been suggested for the Himalayan region, though the data are not as solid as they are in Korea or Europe. Nancy Levine has concluded that a chiefdom confederacy founded by Rajput invaders called the Kalyal or Kalial came into being in western Nepal during the 1^st century CE. The indigenous Magar people of Nepal may also have been organized into chiefdom confederacies.” ref

Chiefdom confederacies among pastoral nomads? The historic confederacies of Iran

“Fredrik Barth’s Khamseh confederacy of South Persian nomadic Persians, Arabs, and Turks had been created de novo by Naser ed-Din Shah in 1861 and placed under the leadership of a wealthy urban merchant family in order to protect their economic interests and those of the British from depredations by the larger but similarly multiethnic Qashqa’i confederacy. Apart from the chief and his family an aristocratic social stratum cannot be said to have existed – the leaders under the chieftain were mere heads of lineages. The authority of the headmen was limited to formulating consensus, and headmen imposed no exactions upon the members of their section or camp. Hence the Khamseh confederacy was not composed of chiefdoms.” ref

“The same cannot be said about the Qashqa’i confederacy. Within this confederacy there were three levels of leadership, and both Khan and headmen appropriated taxes and labor from members of their groups, though only the lineages of the Khans and Ilkhanis (paramount chieftains) constituted an aristocracy. Thus the Qashqa’i confederacy can be considered to have been a true chiefdom confederacy. It is the contention of Lois Beck that this confederacy was a product of the interaction of nomads with the economy and institutions of the Persian state over the last 300 years. Similarly, Richard Tapper credits Nader Shah with the creation of the Shahsevan confederacy in Northern Persia in the eighteenth century.” ref

“These examples drawn from Iran’s history mirror the thesis of William Irons (1979) whereby any amount of social stratification among pastoral nomads is attributed to contact with state-level societies. Thomas Barfield takes this thesis further, tracing the origins of not only chiefdom confederacies among pastoral Turco-Mongolians, but also what he calls state-level ‘imperial confederacies’ to contact between nomadic pastoralists and agricultural states. The appearance of chiefdom confederacies in Korea during the last two centuries of the first millennium BC has been similarly attributed to sustained contact with the Chinese Yan and Han states.” ref

“It does not fall within the scope of this paper to examine the influence of state-level societies upon the political constitution of the peoples described in this paper. It should be evident from this survey that chiefdom confederacies had existed in places distant from states such as Iron Age England, Scotland, and Ireland where the subsistence economy could be described as agricultural or agro-pastoral. So even though the paramount chieftains of the Turco-Mongolians and of Iranian confederacies may have owed their prominence to their role as conduits of trade goods and booty obtained from states, those of the British Iron Ages did not. It is likely that the circumstances of the peoples so far described who attained not only chiefdom-level social complexity but who also formed chiefdom confederacies were varied.” ref

“Clearly these political systems were supported by economies productive enough to support a high degree of social stratification, but at the same time there were other factors which worked against the monopolization of political power. In societies with an agro-pastoralist subsistence base, such as prevailed in Early Medieval Ireland, settlement nucleation was largely absent, population densities were relatively low, and vital immovable capital investments such as irrigation systems, vineyards and orchards did not exist. These conditions posed considerable challenges to the centralization of power. In Boiotia, towns and fixed capital investments did exist, but the preponderant settlement was still the isolated farmstead.” ref

Confederacy and democracy

“In their very constitution, chiefdom confederacies would seem to have embodied a mixture of coercion and voluntarism. Their leaders had often come to prominence as able and successful military commanders against a backdrop of constant infighting between chiefdoms. However, this success was brought about through the exercise of skills in building and maintaining alliances. The central leader of a confederacy will not have been able to exercise power in sufficient measure to eliminate or bypass subordinate leaders, and these can (and frequently do) withhold or switch support away from unpopular apical leaders. In Medieval Ireland, followers were known to go further and kill or expel failed leaders.” ref

“We deduce from the Medieval Irish sources that the impetus for the creation of a confederacy came initially from a militarily powerful chiefdom: for instance the paramount chieftain of the Cíarraige Lúachra was the instigator of the chiefdom confederacy described in the ‘West Munster Synod’, and other textual sources indicate the military prominence of the Cíarraige Lúachra in West Munster and Thomond in the seventh and eighth centuries CE. The lead role taken by the Uí Tairdelbach in the expansion of the Dál Cais chiefdom confederacy has been described above. However, the evidence is equally ample that coercive force was only part of the equation. Member chiefdoms of confederacies would change their chiefdom’s name to go along with the conceit of common descent. There is also ample evidence from the Irish documentary sources of two ramages within a confederacy agreeing to alternate the paramountcy between them with every change in succession. Secondarily powerful chiefdoms of a confederacy also assumed a kingmaker role with respect to the dynasty in power, as in the case of the Mac Con Mara and their relationship to the Uí Briain within the Dál Cais confederacy in the Middle Ages.” ref

“The pervasive distribution of democratic procedures for selecting leaders within Celtic and Germanic chiefdom confederacies across northern Europe, as well as in Archaic Period Greece, might be seen then as a natural outgrowth of the system of confederation, and of this dimension of voluntarism (Gibson 2010). Within these groups, the succession to leadership was restricted to a given aristocratic lineage; however, the successful new apical leader was chosen by subordinate chieftains, and the choice was validated in an assembly. Over the two hundred-year course of its existence, the Boiotian League progressed from a loose alliance of sovereign towns to develop a federal government with four councils consisting of elected aristocratic representatives. In all stages of its existence, aristocrats elected representatives and voted on policy in assemblies at both the town and federal levels.” ref

“Outside of Europe, however, the evidence for democratic mechanisms for determining chiefly succession is scant or lacking. Chiefly succession seems to have followed along lines of primogeniture among the Turco-Mongolians . Chiefly titles would seem to have been inherited patrilineally in Korea as well. The paramount chieftain of the Korean Old Joseon confederacy, the Dangun, functioned as the head of a shamanistic religion. His successors and the holders of other high religious offices were restricted to his clan. It would seem that the only truly universal manifestation of democracy within chiefdom confederacies lay in the fact that the constituent member chiefdoms of a confederacy retained and exercised the right to withhold support or leave a confederacy if they became displeased with the leadership.” ref

The emergence of states from chiefdom confederacies

“As has been stated above, most authorities on Asian chiefdom confederacies cited in this work lay stress upon the fact that the confederacies were either created by states or that their unification under a single apical leader came about as a result of their economic relations with states. Barfield and Pai similarly argue that when states arose from chiefdom confederacies in Central and East Asia, it was a result of a strategy to obtain luxury goods from Chinese states through the threat or application of force. This argument may hold for states with a background in nomadic pastoralism, but is less persuasive in the context of societies with agro-pastoral or agricultural subsistence economies. In Europe, states arose from chiefdom confederacies against a background of constant internecine warfare between confederacies, or in Greece between chiefdom confederacies and poleis. To argue that status rivalry between rival elites or rival groupings of elites in the form of warfare was as important as a desire for luxury imports in first-millennium Korea as well.” ref

“States emerged from chiefdom confederacies in Scotland in the tenth century CE and in Munster in Ireland in the early twelfth century. Both Scotland and Munster were at some remove from more complex societies, though both regions had experienced sustained contact with Vikings in the form of permanent settlements, and the Viking economy was dedicated to a large measure to the trade in a wide range of commodities and the manufacture of goods for trade. By the 12^th century, however, the Irish had had relations with Viking towns and exposure to their trade goods for two hundred years, so it is difficult to view Viking influence as having played a pivotal role in the emergence of Irish statehood. Korean chiefdom confederacies had also been in contact with the Yan and Han states for over two hundred years before beginning to assume the character of states. I would therefore consider these to have been primary, rather than secondary states.” ref

“In the late fifth century BCE the Boiotian League began to acquire a more state-like organization, for the Hellenica Oxyrhynchia describes a formal constitution that had been adopted by 446 BCE. The constitution set out qualifications for selection for service on town councils, limiting service to a limited section of the nobility. This significance of the constitution is that a federal government was now dictating the social constitution of the political bodies of its member polities. The Hellenica Oxyrhynchia document further describes the payment of taxes by the member polities to the state and the selection of judicial officers (dicasts). The federal Council of the Boiotians consisted of 540 members who were apportioned into four sub-councils, and these representatives were now paid for their service. The council continued to select military officials for one-year terms of office, and to name commanders for specific military operations. The sub-councils possessed executive committees, and there were always councilors present at the citadel of Kadmeia in Thebes. The Boiotean League had therefore acquired a formal full-time government, but it persisted in being federal in character with nobles sharing administrative functions rather than devolving them to non-noble professionals.” ref

“Thomas Barfield’s discussion of ‘imperial confederacies’ – states that emerged out of chiefdom confederacies with a pastoralist orientation – highlighted their lack of knowledge, interest, and aptitude for developing systems of administration for their conquered agriculturalist subjects. Organizational simplicity may be viewed as another characteristic of the administration of the state-level polities that evolved out of chiefdom confederacies with agro-pastoral or agricultural subsistence economies. In both Medieval Scotland and in Munster the only novel addition to the stewards (rechtaire, maer) used as functionaries by Gaelic chieftains since the Early Medieval Period was the appointment of mórmaer (‘great stewards’) as higher-level administrators, occupying a position just below the king and above subordinate chieftains. Their appearance would seem to have reflected a concomitant diminishment of the autonomy and status of the chieftains under the king’s authority, connoted by a change of terminology relating to the title of these individuals from rí to toísech.” ref

“The lack of complex administrative apparatus meant that the king still ruled indirectly through the local chieftains. This was apparently also the case in the early centuries of existence of the Korean States of the Multiple Kingdoms Period. An interesting corollary to these organizational aspects of the states that emerged from chiefdom confederacies is to be found among the Classical Period lowland Maya. Despite rapid advances in the decipherment of Mayan hieroglyphic texts, there are very few titles that can be interpreted as having designated state functionaries or which refer to administrators. This has led to characterizations of the Mayan polities of this period by scholars as ‘weak states’, ‘segmentary states’, ‘galactic polities’, or even as complex chiefdoms. It is well known that major centers such as Tikal and Calakmul were linked with less powerful centers in extensive alliance networks. It is therefore entirely possible that Mayan states may also have emerged from chiefdom confederacies and continued to preserve their devolved power structure.” ref

Conclusions

“This survey of chiefdom confederacies has hopefully established the significance of this kind of political system as an analytical concept. From the data that have been examined here, it should seem evident that chiefdom confederacies were not confined solely to nomadic pastoralists or were always the creations of states, and were therefore not always the parasitic or predatory entities that they were in Inner Asian contexts. In Greece, Western Europe, and Korea, they seem to have been born of the centuries of violent interactions between chiefdom societies in varied geographical contexts. In each region there were probably a number of conditions such as broken topography, food transportation costs, or the requirements of livestock which in turn led to a prevailing dispersed pattern of settlement or a lifestyle premised upon transhumance. These conditions worked against the nucleation of populations and resources, and so fostered alliance formation as a favored strategy for political survival within a climate of constant internecine warfare.” ref

“In the same localities, continuing violence often led very gradually to the transformation of chiefdom confederacies into states, accompanied by changes in territorial administration and only slight elaboration of administrative structure. Territorial administration largely devolved to local leaders, and so the institution of kingship was as a consequence weaker than it would have been in a more centralized state, if it existed at all. As we have seen, the institution of kingship was altogether lacking in the Boiotean League. We may conclude then that the states that evolved from chiefdom confederacies would then have a federal or feudal character – and so the legacy of chiefdom confederacies was the kingdoms found in the Germanic and Slavic regions, such as the Merovingian state or the Rus, that exhibited strong oligarchies and weak kings.” ref