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Houma

  

 

Ethnie: HOUMA
Language Group: Choctaw
Family: Choctaw
Stock: Western Muskhogean
Phylum: Macro-Algonquian
Macro-Culture: Eastern Woodlands
Speakers None among Houma
      The Houma were a sedentary hunter/farmer nation which separated late from the Chakchiuma.  They allied early with the French.  At contact, they were located on the Mississippi about present Pickney, Mississippi.  They absorbed some other peoples and some joined the Atakapa.  They slowly migrated southward to their present territory at the mouth and delta of the Mississippi River.
Aboriginal Locations (# of Villages)
MS  (2)
Present Locations
United Houma Nations, Inc., Golden Meadow
Year History
1682 Mentioned by LaSalle; had separated from the Chakchiuma; living a few miles inland from the east bank of the Mississippi just below the present Louisiana/Mississippi border
1686 Alliance with Tonti
1699 Visited by Iberville, dysentary apidemic
1700 Visited by Iberville, constructed church, visited by Gravier
1706 Joined and later attakced by the Tunica who killed more than half of the tribe, moved south to just above New Orleans, two settlements, Great Houmas and Little Houmas
1722 Moved upstrean to Ascension Parrish  
1728 Smallpox epidemic killed half of tribe
1729 Assisted the French against Natchez
1731 Assisted the French against the Chickasaw
1739 In the process of fusion with the Bayougoula and Acolapissa
1755 Houma had only 60 warriors
1776 Sold part of land to two French creoles
1792 Choctaw agression against Houma due to drought
1805 Some joined the Atakapa near Lake Charles
1836 Mixed blood descendants later settled along Gulf Coast and grew in numbers
1987 Applied for federal recognition
1994 Federal recognition denied
2005 Tribe devastated by Hurricane Katrina
Year Total Population LA MS Source
1650 1,000 Mooney estimate
1699 1,225 Iberville
1700 1,200 1,200 NAHDB calculation
1718 700 LaHarpe estimate
1739 300 French officer estimate
1758 210 Swanton estimate
1784 85 Swanton estimate
1800 100 100 NAHDB calculation
1803 60 Swanton estimate
1900 100 100 NAHDB calculation 
1910 125 Census
1920 639 Census
1930 936 US Indian Office
1994 17.800 Tribal roles
2000 20,000 NAHDB calculation 
Other speakers of the same language:
Acolapissa, Bayougoula, Chakchiuma, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Mobile, Napochi, Okelusa, Pascagoula, Pensacola, Tohome
Houma Sites:
Bayou Healers Youth Council  http://www.geocities.com/houmaindians/Healers.html
Building Pride, Providing Safe Space  http://gbgm-umc.org/response/articles/Native_Am_Centers.html
Choctaw Language  http://www.louisianafolklife.org/LT/Virtual_Books/Keeping_It/creole_book_keep_choc.html
Choctaw Language  http://www.angelfire.com/al2/gasaguali/CHOCTAW.HTM
Choctaw Language  http://www.turtle-tracks.org/issue84/i84_10.html
Choctaw Language  http://www.native-languages.org/choctaw.htm
Choctaw Language  http://www.ethnologue.com/14/show_language.asp?code=CCT
Choctaw Linguistic Lineage  http://www.ethnologue.com/14/show_language.asp?code=CCT
Ethnogenesis of the New Houma Indians  http://ethnohistory.dukejournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/48/3/473
Houma Chief Busy Tracking Down Tribe  http://www.nola.com/katrina/stories/index2.ssf?/katrina/stories/heroes_robichaux.html
Houma History  http://www.dickshovel.com/hou.html
Houma Indian Language  http://www.native-languages.org/houma.htm
Houma Indian Palmetto Basket  http://www.acadianmuseum.com/boutique.html
Houma Indians Entertain Masses at Jazz Fest  http://www.turtletrack.org/Issues02/Co05182002/CO_05182002_Houma.htm
Houma, Louisiana History  http://www.angelfire.com/realm/shades/nativeamericans/houma.htm
Houmas Indians  http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~laterreb/indian.htm
Houma Tribe  http://www.answers.com/topic/houma-tribe
Katrina Pushes Houma Indians Toward Cultural Extinction  http://www.ww4report.com/node/1068
Parfait, Roy  http://www.nsula.edu/folklife/database/biography/parfaitR.html
Pow Wow Celebrates Louisiana's Indigenous History  http://www.dailycomet.com/article/20080315/NEWS/803150322/-1/category=hometown06
Still Down on the Bayou  http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2007/08/cp_katrina.html
Story of the Houma Indians  http://www.gbgm-umc.org/dulac/houma.html
United Houma Nation Genealogical Research  http://www.rootsweb.com/~laterreb/houmaindians.htm
United Houma Nation http://www.unitedhoumanation.org/
United Houma Nation in Need  http://indymedia.us/en/2005/09/10657.shtml
Untied Houma Nation Relief Fund  http://ms.foundation.org/wmspage.cfm?parm1=387
United Houma Tribe  http://www.nsula.edu/folklife/database/cultures/NativeAmer/Houma.html

Last updated 04/03/08  Copyright © 2008 by Four Directions Press