At the beginning of eighteenth century many Indian nations were interacting with European nations—primarily England, France, and Spain—in three key areas: (1) the demand for land by the European colonists, (2) the fur and hide trade which brought Indians into a world-wide economic system, and (3) the European insistence that Indians convert to Christianity.
European colonists wanted land which they could farm, and they generally overlooked the fact that Indian people had been farming the lands for centuries. Initially, European justification for taking Indian land was that it was terra nullius: unoccupied land. In other words, if the land was unoccupied, then it could be legally taken. However, European concepts of occupancy differed greatly from those of the Indian. The European doctrine of terra nullius meant that if the land was not cultivated—meaning cultivated in a European fashion with fences enclosing it—then it was terra nullius.
Indian nations considered land to be sovereign territory, a fact which Europeans conveniently ignored to justify their theft of the land. The Indians viewed land as communally owned rather than privately owned. While the Europeans thought of land as a form of wealth, the Indians did not.
The fur and hide trade were important because the European tanneries were unable to produce leather as supple and white as that produced by the Indians. In her chapter in Robes of Splendor: Native North American Painted Buffalo Hides, Anne Vitart notes:
“The cost of Indian leather, on the European market, was twice that of the regular leather from European tanneries.”
In her book Slavery in Indian Country: The Changing Face of Captivity in Early America, Christina Snyder reports:
“Beginning in the eighteenth century, a European cattle plague threatened the British leather industry, but American deerhides provided an acceptable substitute used by manufacturers in bookbinding, in saddles and saddlebags, and in deerskin breeches favored by American colonists.”
The fur trade changed the economies of many Indian nations. In the southeast, for example, Indians had traditionally hunted only to supplement their agricultural efforts. By the end of this century, however, hunting had grown to be a vital element of Indian lives and the means by which they could obtain European goods. Items such as guns, housewares (iron pots, brass and tin kettles, pans, canisters), tools, blankets, textiles, and rum were frequently considered necessities rather than luxuries. At the French trading posts of Detroit and Green Bay, cloth, blankets, gunpowder, and shirts were the dominant trade goods.
The European trade goods were not only used by the Indians “as is,” but they were often recycled. Thus, iron pot rims were made into wedges, brass kettles were refashioned into tinkling cones, iron frying pans were used in making arrow heads, and so on. Archaeologist George Odell, in his chapter in Stone Tool Traditions in the Contact Era, reports:
“Native Americans were ingenious in their re-employment of scrap metal once it became obvious that European trade goods would not be resupplied.”
While the fur and hide trade brought Indians and Europeans into closer contact and into business relationships, it also carried with it the seeds for the destruction of the traditional Indian economies and the spiritual relationship between Indians, the land, and the animals. The fur trade undercut the traditional native economies and made them more and more reliant upon European goods. At the same time, the new economy meant that Indian hunters must now harvest a surplus of deer and other animals to have hides for trade. This began to upset the ecology by overhunting, and also violated a spiritual relationship between the people and the animals who had spiritually given themselves to the people since before there was time.
Prior to the European invasion, Indians had viewed themselves and the animal people as equals. With the hunting for the fur trade, a new world view emerged: Indian men began to see the world in a hierarchical fashion in which they had dominion over the animals. In addition, this hierarchical view placed men at the top of the human hierarchy and upset the traditional balance between men and women.
Briefly described below are some of the events of 1721.
The English in 1721
The primary concern of the English in North America was land. In the English view of America, the land was a wilderness which was occupied by wild animals and wild Indians, both of which needed to be exterminated in order for the land to be civilized. With regard to individual Indians and the legal system, Indians were generally not allowed to testify or be admitted as a witness against any Christian non-Indian.
In Connecticut, most of the Pequot living in the reservation community of Noank moved to the reservation at Mashantucket. The Pequot allowed colonial authorities to lay out two contiguous parcels of land for their community. In exchange, they were to get clear title to their land.
The Mashantucket Reservation was described as a 1,000-acre parcel of land around Cedar Swamp as well as a 600-acre parcel on Walnut Hill. The Pequot were allowed to use land along the west side of Long Pond, where they had formerly planted their orchards, until the trees died.
Archaeologist Kevin McBride, in his chapter in The Pequots in Southern New England: The Fall and Rise of an American Indian Nation, reports:
“Almost immediately the Pequots began to complain to the Connecticut government of encroachment upon these lands by English settlers, particularly the 600-acre Walnut Hill parcel on the west side of the reservation.”
In South Carolina, a Catawba chief presented the English governor with a deerskin map showing the central towns associated with the Catawba Confederacy. Nasaw was the principal town of the Confederacy at this time. On the map, Indian groups were represented by circles and European communities were represented with squares. They were connected by lines. In an article in Archaeology, Marley Brown writes:
“The circle and squares vary in size, likely in proportion to the importance accorded the communities by the mapmaker. The connecting lines illustrate social and political relationships among people throughout the South Carolina Piedmont and the greater Southeast.”
In Maine, the Norridgewock began attacking English settlers. The English claimed that Sebastian Rale, a Jesuit who had lived with the Indians for years and spoke their language, was inciting them to violence against the English.
The Spanish in 1721
In Texas, a Catholic priest, in the name of the King of Spain, formally gave the Caddo permanent possession of their land and water rights. This was probably a puzzling ceremony to the Caddo, if they understood the priest who spoke to them in Spanish and Latin. According to Caddo cultural representative Cecile Elkins Carter, in her book Caddo Indians: Where We Come From:
“They knew that the land they stood on was theirs and had been since the time of their forefathers.”
The French in 1721
With regard to the French invasion of North America, Historian William Eccles, in his chapter in North American Exploration. Volume 2: A Continent Defined:
“In the eighteenth century the French had four main aims in their thrust into the Far West: to discover new supplies of furs; to find new tribes to proselytize the faith of the Church of Rome, a motive that was considerably diminished as the century wore on; to penetrate and dominate the Spanish commercial empire by land; and to be the first to discover the inland sea that would lead to the Pacific.”
In Arkansas, the French established a garrison among the Quapaw on the Arkansas River. In addition, 80 French colonists were sent into the area. The Quapaw at this time were living in three villages. One of the Quapaw villages, Ouyapes, was suffering from smallpox which had immobilized the entire village. A Frenchman infected with the disease was the source of the smallpox.
In Mississippi, the French imposed a tariff on the deerskins produced by the Choctaw and they formally announced their approval of the ongoing war between the Choctaw and the Chickasaw. The French promised to give Choctaw warriors a gun, a pound of powder, and two pounds of bullets for each Chickasaw scalp and 80 livres (a French monetary unit worth 20 sols) of merchandise for each Chickasaw slave. In addition, the French and the Choctaw agreed to the following prices for trade goods: 1 dressed deerskin for 2/3 of pound of gunpowder or 20 gunflints; 2 dressed deerskins for 1 blanket or tomahawk; and 4 dressed deerskins for a quarter of an ell (an ell is about one meter) of woolen cloth or 1 axe.
In Quebec, the Iroquois of the Mountain moved their Nouvelle Lorette village to the Lake of Two Mountains on land that had been granted to the Sulpician missionaries. They were joined by some Nipissing and Algonquin groups.
Indian Nations in 1721
A group of Mahicans from New York migrated to Indiana where they settled on the Kankakee River with the Miamis. The Mahicans, whose name means wolf, were an Algonquian-speaking nation whose homelands were in the northern end of the Hudson Valley. The Miamis were also an Algonquian-speaking people whose homelands were in the southern Great Lakes area.
In Minnesota, the Algonquian-speaking Fox (Mesquakie) once again established peace with the Sioux.
Indians 101
Twice each week this series presents American Indian topics. More eighteenth-century histories from this series:
Indians 101: The Cherokees 300 years ago, 1721
Indians 101: American Indians 300 years ago, 1720
Indians 101: The French and Indians 300 years ago, 1719
Indians 101: Indians and Europeans 300 Years Ago, 1719
Indians 101: American Indians in 1717
Indians 101: Russians and Native Americans in the 18th century
Indians 101: The Tuscarora & the Iroquois League
Indians 101: The Pueblos, 1700 to 1725
