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   Illini

   The approximate distribution of the Illini in 1640 was:

   Cahokia: Cahokia, Illinois including most of central and southern Illinois.    Chepoussa: northeast Arkansas and southeast Missouri.
   Coiracoentanon: Des Moines River in southeast Iowa.
   Kaskaskia: upper Illinois River near Utica extending into southern Wisconsin.    Michigamea: northeast Arkansas between St. Francis and Mississippi Rivers.
   Moingwena: mouth of Des Moines River (Riviere de Moingwena) extending into southeast Iowa and northeast Missouri.
   Peoria: northeast Iowa, southwest Wisconsin, and northwest Illinois.    Tamaroa: both sides of Mississippi at the mouths of the Illinois and Missouri.    Tapouaro: eastern Iowa and western Illinois near the mouth of the Iowa River.

Cahokian chief

Kaskaskia chief

Kaskaskia

Peoria

   After the Beaver Wars reached the western Great Lakes during the 1640s, refugee tribes from Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio were forced west. By 1655, the Fox, Sauk, Kicapoo, Miami and Mascouten had occupied lands claimed by the Illini in southern Wisconsin, while groups of the Shawnee had relocated to central Illinois. That same year, the Illini were attacked by the Iroquois and by 1667 had retreated west of the Mississippi. They began returning to Illinois after the French made peace with the Iroquois that year but did not range as far east as before. After 1673 they were concentrated between the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers, but many of their villages were still west of the Mississippi, with one band located near Green Bay, Wisconsin. By 1680 most groups were living along the Illinois River near the new French trading post.

   By 1755 the Illini were confined to southern Illinois and, after their near-extermination in 1769, the vicinity of the French settlement at Kaskaskia. In 1803 they ceded all claim to their homeland and placed themselves under American protection. They surrendered their last Illinois lands and moved to Missouri in 1818, and in 1832 eastern Kansas. After merging with the Wea and Piankashaw in 1854, they moved to northeast Oklahoma in 1867, where their descendents still live.

   Early French estimates of the Illini population vary considerably because the different bands were constantly moving in and out of the large villages. Father Gabriel Dreuillettes in 1658 (written in Montreal) listed 20,000 Illini with 60 villages, but a few years later, Father Dablon at Sault Ste. Marie gave them only 2,000 and five villages. Marquette (1674) and Hennepin (1682), who actually visited them, both said there were 9,000, but neither included the Michigamea and Chepoussa bands in Arkansas. The best answer seems to be somewhere around 12,000. However, few would disagree that their population loss afterwards was dramatic. By the conclusion of the Beaver Wars in 1701, only 6,000 Illini and five of the original tribes remained. Epidemic and war continued their terrible toll, and the French in 1736 counted only 2,500. After neighboring tribes nearly destroyed them in 1769, the Illini were less than 1,800, only of whom 600 survived. Their number continued to fall: 480 in 1778; 250 in 1800; and 84 in 1854 when the remnants merged with the Wea and Piankashaw to become the United Peoria, Kaskaskia, Wea, and Piankashaw. The 1910 census listed the combined tribe at 128, but by 1937 the Peoria had grown to 370. Current enrollment is nearly 2,000.

Illini pottery

Illini bodyart

   Composed originally of as many as twelve distinct bands, the Illini Confederation was a grouping of related tribes bound to each other through kinship and a common language and culture. Although not nearly as cohesive as the Iroquois League, their political unity was sufficient to dominate other tribes in the region.

   The Illini lifestyle in 1670 was a woodland culture similar to neighboring tribes. Their larger villages were gathering points for socializing and trade with the different bands coming and going without a fixed pattern. The locations chosen, however, were almost always in river valleys because of the richer soil for agriculture.

Illini longhouse

Cahokian thatched hut

After planting, the Illini usually separated to hunting villages and returned in the fall for harvest. More than their neighbors, the Illini depended on the large buffalo herds found on the northern Illinois prairies as a food source. Buffalo were so common there during the 1670s, the French took to calling them the "Illinois Ox." Annual buffalo hunts by the Illini were a large affairs conducted by their patrilineal clans involving up to 300 people. Without horses, the usual methods were the "surround" or firing the prairies to trap the huge animals. Although there many rivers in their homeland, the Illini were not especially fond of fish. Canoes were dugouts rather than the lighter birchbark variety used by the tribes in the northern Great Lakes.

Illini making canoe

   Men were primarily hunters and warriors while women tended the fields and gathered. Beyond this division of labor, women had important roles as shamans and leadership roles which paralleled those of the men. Although not common, there was some polygamy (a man marries more than one sister). Punishment of a man for adultery was rare, but unfaithful wives were either mutilated or killed.

   The federal recognition of Illini was not restored until 1978. With a current enrollment of nearly 2,000 and 39 acres of tribal land, the Peoria Tribe of Oklahoma is located in Miami, Oklahoma.

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