Page 21 - 23, 1880 History of Pike County ILL by Chas. M. Chapman INDIANS.
Following the Mound-Builders as inhabitants of North America, were, as it is supposed, the people who reared the magnificent cities the ruins of which are found in Central America. This people was far more civilized and advanced in the arts than were the Mound-Builders. The cities built by them, judging from the ruins of broken columns, fallen arches and crumbling walls of temples, palaces and pyramids, which in some places for miles bestrew the ground, must have been of great extent, magnificent and very populous. When we consider the vast period of time necessary to erect such colossal structures, and again, the time required to reduce them to their present ruined state, we can conceive something of their antiquity. These cities must have been old when many of the ancient cities of the Orient were being built.
The third race inhabiting North America, distinct from the former two in every particular, is the present Indians. They were, when visited by the early discoverers, without cultivation, refinement or literature, and far behind the Mound-Builders in the knowledge of the arts. The question of their origin has long interested archaeologists, and is the most difficult they have been called upon to answer. Of their predecessors the Indian tribes knew nothing; they even had no traditions respecting them. It is quite certain that they were the successors of a race which had entirely passed away ages before the discovery of the New World. One hypothesis is that the American Indians are an original race indigenous to the Western hemisphere. Those who entertain this view think their peculiarities of physical structure preclude the possibility of a common parentage with the rest of mankind. Prominent among those distinctive traits is the hair, which in the red man is round, in the white man oval, and in the black man flat.
A more common supposition, however, is that they are a derivative race, and sprang from one or more of the ancient peoples of Asia. In the absence of all authentic history, and when even tradition is wanting, any attempt to point out the particular location of their origin must prove unsatisfactory. Though the exact place of origin may never be known, yet the striking coincidence of physical organization between the Oriental type of mankind and the Indians point unmistakably to some part of Asia as the place whence they emigrated, which was originally peopled to a great extent that the meeting of the Europeans, Indians and Africans on the continent of America, is the fulfillment of a prophecy as recorded in Genesis ix. 27: "God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant." Assuming the theory to be true that the Indian tribes are of Shemitic origin, they were met on this continent in the fifteenth century by the Japhetic race, after the two stocks had passed around the globe by directly different routes. A few years afterward the Hamitic branch of the human family were brought from the coast of Africa. During the occupancy of the continent by the three distinct races, the children of Japheth have grown and prospered, while the called and not voluntary sons of Ham have endured a servitude in the wider stretching valleys of the tents of Shem.
When Christopher Columbus had finally succeeded in demonstrating the truth of his theory that by sailing westward from Europe land would be discovered, landing on the Island of Bermuda he supposed he had reached the East Indies. This was an error, but it lead to the adoption of the name of "Indians" for the inhabitants of the Island and the main land of America, by which name the red men of America have ever since been known.
Of the several great branches of North American Indians the only ones entitled to consideration in Illinois history are the Algonquins and Iroquois. At the time of the discovery of America the former occupied the Atlantic seaboard, while the home of the Iroquois was as an island in this vast area of Algonquin population. The latter great nation spread over a vast territory, and various tribes of Algonquin lineage sprung up over the country, adopting, in time, distinct tribal customs and laws. An almost continuous warfare was carried on between tribes; but later, on the entrance of the white man into their beloved homes, every foot of territory was fiercely disputed by the confederacy of many neighboring tribes. The Algonquins formed the most extensive alliance to resist the encroachment of the whites, especially the English. Such was the nature of King Philip’s war. This King, with his Algonquin braves, spread terror and desolation throughout New England. With the Algonquins as the controlling spirit, a confederacy of continental proportions was the result, embracing in its alliance the tribes of every name and lineage from the Northern lakes on the gulf. Pontiac, having breathed into them his implacable hate of the English intruders, ordered the conflict to commence, and all the British colonies trembled before the desolating fury of Indian vengeance. |
