The Avoyel or Avoyelles were a small
Native American tribe who at the time of European contact inhabited land near the mouth of the
Red River at its confluence with the
Atchafalaya River near present-day
Marksville, Louisiana. Today, the Avoyel are a member of the federally recognized Native American tribe and sovereign nation of the
Tunica Biloxi Tribe of Louisiana.
The
U.S. Department of the Interior determined that: "The contemporary
Tunica-Biloxi Indian Tribe is the successor of the historical
Tunica,
Ofo, and Avoyel tribes, and part of the
Biloxi tribe. These have a documented existence back to 1698. The component tribes were allied in the 18th century and became amalgamated into one in the 19th century through common interests and outside pressures from non-Indian cultures."
Name
Also called variously ''Shi'xkaltī'ni'' (Stone-Arrow-Point people) in
Tunican and ''Tassenocogoula'', ''Tassenogoula'', ''Toux Enongogoula'', and ''Tasånåk Okla'' in the
Mobilian trade language; all names (including the
autonym ''Avoyel'') are said by early
French chroniclers to mean either "Flint People" or "People of the Rocks". This is thought to either reflect their active trading of
flint
Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Historically, flint was widely used to make stone tools and start ...
for tools from local sources on their land in the eponymously named modern
Avoyelles Parish or more likely as their status as middlemen in trading flint from
Caddoan peoples to their north to the stone deficit
Atakapa and
Chitimacha peoples of the Gulf Coast.
French explorer
Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville misleadingly called the Avoyel ''petits Taensas'' in 1699.
[ However, they are a different group than the Natchez–speaking Taensa, whom the French called the ''grand Taensas''.]
Language
The Avoyel language may have been related to the Natchez language.
Described by some historians as being a Caddoan group,
History
17th century
At the time of European contact, the Avoyel lived in several villages on the Red River in locations near present-day Alexandria
Alexandria ( ; ) is the List of cities and towns in Egypt#Largest cities, second largest city in Egypt and the List of coastal settlements of the Mediterranean Sea, largest city on the Mediterranean coast. It lies at the western edge of the Nile ...
and a palisade
A palisade, sometimes called a stakewall or a paling, is typically a row of closely placed, high vertical standing tree trunks or wooden or iron stakes used as a fence for enclosure or as a defensive wall. Palisades can form a stockade.
Etymo ...
d village near Marksville. They controlled the river to its confluence with the lower Black River, Upper Atchafalaya River and the Mississippi.[
Never numerous, the Avoyel numbered 280 in 1698, according to French records. Their population declined markedly after that. The Avoyel likely experienced the same drastic decimation as ]Native American tribe
In the United States, an American Indian tribe, Native American tribe, Alaska Native village, Indigenous tribe, or Tribal nation may be any current or historical Tribe (Native American)#Other uses, tribe, band, or nation of Native Americans in ...
s, primarily due to newly introduced European infectious diseases
infection is the invasion of tissues by pathogens, their multiplication, and the reaction of host tissues to the infectious agent and the toxins they produce. An infectious disease, also known as a transmissible disease or communicable dise ...
to which they had no acquired immunity.
18th century
The Avoyel survivors were believed to have been absorbed by marriage into the neighboring Tunica, Ofo, and Biloxi peoples who had moved to the area sometime in the late 1780s or 1790s because of encroachment by Euro-Americans at their previous locations.
19th century
Indian Agent John Sibley wrote in 1805 that the only surviving Avoyel were two or three women living along the Washita River.[Swanton, ''Indian Tribes of the Lower Mississippi Valley'', p. 17]
Descendants
Since the 19th century, descendants of the Avoyel people have been part of the Tunica-Biloxi.[
]
Notes
References
*
External links
Tunica-Biloxi Tribe of Louisiana
{{authority control
Extinct Native American tribes
Native American tribes in Louisiana
Plaquemine Mississippian culture
Unattested languages of North America
Tunica-Biloxi