Miami and Pottawatomie Indian Burial Customs

Miami and Pottawatomie Indian Burial Customs

History of Dekalb County, Indiana 1885 “The Pottawatomies and Miamies were the principal tribes in De Kalb County. Their manner of burying the dead was to dig a grave eighteen inches deep, put in the dead, cover with leaves, and then build a tight pen of poles over the grave. Sometimes they cut down a tree, split off a piece from the top of the log, dug out a trough, put in the body, and then covered it up closely with poles. They burnt the leaves around these burying places every fall, to keep the fire in the woods from getting to them. They disliked very much to have their dead interfered with, yet it was done by unprincipled whites. It was not uncommon to see their graves opened, the bones scattered around, and the skull of an Indian set out in the log in full sight.

Geographic Origin of the Miami Indians in Wiscsonsin

Geographic Origin of the Miami Indians in Wisconsin

The Miami Indians have always been associated with their village of Kekionga at present day Fort Wayne, but their original homeland was on the western shores of Lake Michigan, in present day Wisconsin.

  The first historical account of the tribe since it became known under the name of Miamis, was in the year 1669, when they were found in the vicinity of Green Bay, by the French missionary, Father Allouez, and later by Father Dablon.  In 1680, both are renowned and devoted priests  visited a town of the Miami and Mascoutins, on the Fox river, above lake Winnebago.
  Gabriel Dreuillettes, stationed at the mission of St. Michael on the west shore of Lake Michigan, reported as early as 1658 that a colony of 24,000 Miamis occupied a portion of the southwest corner of the present state of Michigan and northwestern Indiana. The invasion of the region by the Iroquois about 1670, with firearms provided by the Dutch of New Amsterdam, was the beginning of a long period of years of warfare between the Iroquois and the various branches of the Miami nation. The region of Green Bay, in Wisconsin formed the center of later settlements of the latter tribes.
   The first historical account of the tribe since it became known under the name of Miamis, was in the year 1669, when they were found in the vicinity of Green Bay, by the French missionary, Father Allouez, and later by Father Dablon.  In 1680, both are renowned and devoted priests  visited a town of the Miami and Mascoutins, on the Fox river, above lake Winnebago.
   It appears that at this time — 1682 — the site of Fort Wayne was occupied by the Kiskakons and the Ottawas, branches of the Miamis, for it was in this year that Jean de Lamberville, writing ' to Count de Frontenac, governor of Canada, expressed the fear that an Iroquois army of 12,000 would completely annihilate "the Miamis and their neighbors the Siskakon [Kiskakon] and Ottawa tribes on the headwaters of the Maumee."2 By the year 1700, the Miamis had obtained firearms from the French, and there is a tradition that they met and vanquished their foes near the site of the present Terre Haute.

Video Tour of an Eastern Woodland Algonquin Wigwam or House

Algonquin Indian Wigwam

   A short video tour of what a Wigwam interior and exterior looked like.  This was a typical house of many of the Eastern Woodland Indian tribes.