'Peoria' entry from Hodge's Handbook
Abstract: The 'Peoria' entry from Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, edited by Frederick Webb Hodge (Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 30. GPO: 1910.).Authors: James Mooney and Cyrus Thomas, both of the Bureau of American Ethnology
Peoria (through French Peouarea, from Peoria Piwarea, 'he comes carrying a pack on his back': a personal name. -- Gerard). One of the principal tribes of the Illinois confederacy. Franquelin in his map of 1688 located them and the Tapouaro (q. v.) on a river w. of the Mississippi above the mouth of Wisconsin r., probably the upper Iowa r. Early references to the Illinois which place them on the Mississippi, although some of the tribes were on Rock and Illinois rs. must relate to the Peoria and locate them near the mouth of the Wisconsin. When Marquette and Joliet descended the Mississippi in 1673, they found them and the Moingwena on the w. side of the MS near the mouth of a river supposed to be the Des Moines, though it may have been one farther N. When Marquette returned from the S., he found that the Peoria had removed and were near the lower end of the expansion of Illinois r., near the present Peoria. At the close of the war carried on by the Sauk and Foxes and other northern tribes against the Illinois, about 1768, the Kickapoo took possession of this village and made it their principal settlement. About the same time a large part of the Peoria crossed over into Missouri, where they remained, building their village on Blackwater fork, until they removed to Kansas. One band, the Utagami, living near Illinois r., was practically exterminated, probably by the northern tribes, during the Revolutionary war (Gatschet, Sauk and Fox MS., B. A. E., 1882). Utagami according to Dr Wm. Jones, may mean the Foxes who were known to the northern Algonquians as Utugamig, 'people of the other Shore.' The Foxes claim to have annihilated the Peoria for the help they gave the French and other tribes in the wars against them (the Foxes). The main body of the Peoria remained on the E. bank of Illinois r. until 1832, when, together with the other tribes of the old Illinois confederacy, they sold to the United States their claims in Illinois and Missouri, and to the consolidated tribes, under the names of Peoria and Kaskaskia, was assigned a reservation on Osage r., Kans. In 1854 the Wea and Piankashaw united with them, and in 1868 the entire body removed to Indian Ter. (Oklahoma), where they now reside. The Peoria made or joined in the treaties with the United States at Edwardsville, Ill., Sept. 25, 1818; Castor Hill, Mo., Oct. 27, 1832; Washington, D. C., May 30, 1854, and Feb. 23, 1867.The early estimates of the numbers of the Peoria are altogether unreliable, and later estimates shed no light on their population from the fact that several Illinois tribes were then consolidated under the same name. In 1736 Chauvignerie estimated the Peoria at about 250 souls. They were so nearly exterminate soon afterward by the northern tribes that about the year 1800 Gov. William Henry Harrison of the Northwest Ter, could find only 4 men of the tribe living. In 1829 the Indians consolidated under that name numbered 120. According report of the Indian Office the Peoria and allied tribes in Oklahoma numbered 192 in 1906.
(J. M. C.T.)
Opea. -- Whiteside (1811) in Am. St. Papers, Ind. Aff., I, Payories. -- Volney, View of U.S.A.., 352, 1804. Peaouarias. -- Cadillac (1695) in Margry, Déc., V, 124 1883. Pecuarias. -- Jefferys, Fr. Doms., pt. 1, map 1761. Peoiras. -- Hunter, Narr., 178, 1823. Peola. -- Long, Exped. Rocky Mts., II, 285, 1823. Peonas. -- Sen. Misc. Doc. 53, 45th Cong., 3d sess., 73, 1879. Peonies. -- Porter (1829) quoted by Schoolcraft, Ind. Tribes, III. 592, 1853. Peores. -- Writer of 1812 quoted by Schoolcraft, ibid., 555. Peorians. -- Knox (1792) in Am.St. Papers,. Ind. Aff., I, 319, 1832. Peorias. -- Joutel (1687) in Margre, Déc., III, 481, 1878. Peouarawi. -- Shea, Rel, de la Mission du Miss., 26, 1861. Peouarias. -- Homann Heirs' Map, 1756. Peouarius.-Jefferys, Fr. Doms. Pt.1, 138,1761. Peoüaroüa.-Gravier (ca.1680) in Shea, Early Voy., 116, 1861. Peoucaria. -- La Salle (1681) in Margry, Déc., II, 134, 1877. Peoueria. -- La Salle (1682), ibid., 201. Peouria. -- Allouez (1816), ibid., 96. Péouryas . -- Vater, Mith.,pt.3,sec.3, 351, 1816. Perouacca. -- Marquette(ca. 1673), Discov., 349,1698. Perouasca. -- Ibid.,333. Peroueria. -- Joutel 91688) in French, Hist. Coll. La., I, 185, 1846. Piantias. -- Smith (1875) quoted by Schoolcraft, Ind. Tribes, III, 555. 1853. Piorias. -- Bouquet (1764) quoted by Jefferson, Notes, 143, 1825. Pioüaroüi. -- Gravier (1701) in French, Hist. Coll. La., II, 88, 1875. Pronaria . -- Morse, Hist. N. Am., 266. 1776. Proneseas. -- Salle (ca. 1682) quoted in Hist. Mag., 1st s., V 197, 1861. Pronevoa. -- Hennepin, New Disc., 310, 1698. Prouaria. -- Coxe, Carolana, map, 1741.
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