Four Centuries of Southern Indians

Book excerpt: The Indians of the Southeast had the most highly centralized and complex social structure of all the aboriginal peoples in the continental United States. They lived in large towns and villages, built monumental mounds and earthworks, enjoyed rich religious and artistic achievements, and maintained a flourishing economy based on agriculture and complemented by time-honored hunting and gathering techniques. Yet they have remained relatively unknown to most scholars and laymen, in part because of a lack of collaboration between historians and anthropologists. Four Centuries of Southern Indians is a collection of nine essays which allow both historians and anthropologists to make their necessary contributions to a fuller understanding of the southern Indians. The essays span four hundred years, beginning with French and Spanish relations with the Timucuan Indians in northern Florida in the sixteenth century and ending with the modern Cherokees transported to Oklahoma. The interim topics include the social structure of the Tuscaroras of North Carolina in the eighteenth century, the role southern Indians played in the American Revolution, the removal of the southern Indians to the Indian Territory, and Cherokee beliefs about sorcery and witchcraft. This collection of essays and the cooperation between historians and anthropologists which it incorporates signify the beginning of what will undoubtedly prove a fruitful approach to the study of southern Indians.