The Mosopelea or Ofo (also Ofogoula) were a Siouan-speaking Native American people who historically lived near the upper

Ohio River The Ohio River () is a river in the United States. It is located at the boundary of the Midwestern and Southern United States, flowing in a southwesterly direction from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to its river mouth, mouth on the Mississippi Riv ...

. In reaction to

Iroquois Confederacy The Iroquois ( ), also known as the Five Nations, and later as the Six Nations from 1722 onwards; alternatively referred to by the Endonym and exonym, endonym Haudenosaunee ( ; ) are an Iroquoian languages, Iroquoian-speaking Confederation#Ind ...

invasions to take control of hunting grounds in the late 17th century, they moved south to the lower

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the main stem, primary river of the largest drainage basin in the United States. It is the second-longest river in the United States, behind only the Missouri River, Missouri. From its traditional source of Lake Ita ...

. They finally settled in central Louisiana, where they assimilated with the Tunica and the Siouan-speaking

Biloxi Biloxi ( ; ) is a city in Harrison County, Mississippi, United States. It lies on the Gulf Coast of the United States, Gulf Coast in southern Mississippi, bordering the city of Gulfport, Mississippi, Gulfport to its west. The adjacent cities ar ...

. They spoke the Ofo language, generally classified as a Siouan language.John Reed Swanton, ''The Indian Tribes of North America,'' p. 232.

History

17th century

According to the 1684 French map of Jean-Baptiste-Louis Franquelin, the Mosopelea had eight villages just north of the Ohio River, between the Muskingum and Scioto rivers, within the present-day state of Ohio, corresponding with the heart of Ohio Hopewell country. (The Miami-Illinois name ("river of the Mosopelea") referred to what is now called the Ohio River. Shortened in the

Shawnee language Shawnee ( ) is a Central Algonquian languages, Algonquian language spoken in parts of central and northeastern Oklahoma by the Shawnee people. Historically, it was spoken across a wide region of the Eastern United States, primarily north of the Oh ...

, the name evolved to "Pelisipi" or "Pellissippi" and was also later applied to what is now called the

Clinch River The Clinch River is a river that flows southwest for more than through the Great Appalachian Valley in the U.S. states of Virginia and Tennessee, gathering various tributaries, including the Powell River, before joining the Tennessee River in ...

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...

and

Tennessee Tennessee (, ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders Kentucky to the north, Virginia to the northeast, North Carolina t ...

.) Tribal territory of Ofo during the 17th century highlighted Franquelin noted the villages on the map as "destroyed". La Salle recorded that the Mosopelea were among the tribes conquered by the Seneca and other nations of the

in the early 1670s, during the later

Beaver Wars The Beaver Wars (), also known as the Iroquois Wars or the French and Iroquois Wars (), were a series of conflicts fought intermittently during the 17th century in North America throughout the Saint Lawrence River valley in Canada and the Great L ...

. In 1673, Marquette, Joliet, and other early French explorers found that the Mosopelea likely abandoned Ohio and moved south along the

. They briefly lived with the

Quapaw The Quapaw ( , Quapaw language, Quapaw: ) or Arkansas, officially the Quapaw Nation, is a List of federally recognized tribes in the United States, U.S. federally recognized tribe comprising about 6,000 citizens. Also known as the Ogáxpa or � ...

before joining the Tunica, who were allied with the French colonists. In 1699, the Ofo/Mosopelea were referred by French Jesuits as the ''Houspé'', and were encountered living among the Tunica.

18th century

Around 1700, French travelers reported Ofo villages in Mississippi on the Yazoo River. Refusing to join the Natchez in their war against the French in the 1710s and 1720s, the Ofo moved further south. They and other remnant peoples became assimilated into the Biloxi and Tunica. Their language became extinct.

Descendants

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." The Tunica-Biloxi Indian Tribe has a reservation in Avoyelles Parish, Louisiana.

Notes

References

* Hanna, Charles. ''The Wilderness Trail'', Vol 2, pp. 94–105. *

External links

Tunica-Biloxi Indian Tribe
official website {{authority control Siouan peoples Native American tribes in Ohio Native American tribes in Louisiana Tunica-Biloxi