The Creek Indians in the Atlantic World

Abstract

The Creek Indians (Mvskoke) are a nation of Native Peoples recognized by the US federal government today. Historically, though, the Creeks were a multiethnic group of Indigenous Peoples in the Southeast descended from Mississippian societies. European colonialism in the 16th and 17th centuries disrupted Mississippian societies—primarily due to the mortality associated with diseases and the Indian slave trade—and they gradually dispersed throughout the region. Several of these peoples, led by the Muskogean-speaking Abihkas, Tallapoosas, and Apalachicolas, formed a loose coalition of towns during the mid-17th century. The emergent Creek Indians eventually incorporated non-Muskogean groups, such as the Yuchis, Chickasaws, Hitchitis, Natchez, and Apalachees. By the turn of the 18th century, Europeans identified the existence of a Creek Confederacy, a political entity noted for its divisions between Lower and Upper towns. Throughout the 18th century, the Creek Confederacy perfected a strategy of playing Europeans powers—Great Britain, Spain, and France—against one another. Despite being a confederacy of towns, Creek peoples remained distinct from one another. The primary source of identity in the Creek world was the talwa, one’s home community. From political mediation and ceremonial gatherings to hosting the annual Busk festival, one’s town meant everything. Within the town it was the micos, or civil leaders, who spearheaded political life in the Creek world. However, the authority of a mico did not involve coercion but persuasion, which forced town leaders to abide by their community’s will. The authority of a mico also hinged on sustaining a steady flow of trade between his town and Europeans, which revolved around the exchange of deerskins harvested by Creek hunters. This deerskin trade was the basis for the Creeks’ engagement with the Atlantic world. The Confederacy again experienced profound transformations after the American Revolution, when, faced with an expansionist United States. Conflict with the United States varied between restrained acts of violence and outright war, but eventually a new generation of leaders, born of Euro-American and Creek worlds, reimagined the Creek Confederacy. The resulting “Plan of Civilization,” which included everything from a written constitution to adopting racial slavery, was intended to prove that the Creek peoples could become “civilized,” even though such a status came at the expense of the distinct identities that previously defined the Confederacy. Nevertheless, the efforts to convince the United States to accept Creeks on a nation-to-nation basis failed and produced the removal of Creek peoples during the 19th century. Today, though, despite centuries of colonialism, the Creek (Muscogee) peoples continue to adapt to the world around them, whether in Oklahoma, Alabama, Texas, or Louisiana.