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Show 1 8 MYTH8 OF THE CHEROKEE [ ETH. ANN. 19 the Delaware tradition of the expulsion of the Talligewi from the north, as first noted by the missionary Heckewelder in 1819, and published more fully by Brinton in the Walam Olum in 1885. According to the first account, the Delawares, advancing from the west, found their further progress opposed by a powerful people called Alligewi or Talligewi, occupying the country upon a river which Heckewelder thinks identical with the Mississippi, but which the sequel shows was more probably the upper Ohio. They were said to have regularly built earthen fortifications, in which they defended themselves so well that at last the Delawares were obliged to seek the assistance of the " Mengwe," or Iroquois, with the result that after a warfare extending over many years the Alligewi finally received a crushing defeat, the survivors fleeing down the river and abandoning the country to the invaders, who thereupon parceled it out amongst themselves, the " Mengwe" choosing the portion about the Great lakes while the Delawares took possession of that to the south and east. The missionary adds that the Allegheny ( and Ohio) river was still called by the Delawares the Alligewi Sipu, or river of the Alligewi. This would seem to indicate it as the true river of the tradition. He speaks also of remarkable earthworks seen by him in 1789 in the neighborhood of Lake Erie, which were said by the Indians to have been built by the extirpated tribe as defensive fortifications in the course of this war. Near two of these, in the vicinity of Sandusky, he was shown mounds under which it was said some hundreds of the slain Talligewi were buried. 1 As is usual in such traditions, the Alligewi were said to have been of giant stature, far exceeding their conquerors in size. In the Walam Olum, which is, it is asserted, a metrical translation of an ancient hieroglyphic bark record discovered in 1820, the main tradition is given in practically the same way, with an appendix which follows the fortunes of the defeated tribe up to the beginning of the historic period, thus completing the chain of evidence. ( 5) In the Walam Olum also we find the Delawares advancing from the west or northwest until they come to " Fish river"- the same which Heckewelder makes the Mississippi ( 6). On the other side, we are told, " The Talligewi possessed the East." The Delaware chief " desired the eastern land," and some of his people go on, but are killed by the Talligewi. The Delawares decide upon war and call in the help of their northern friends, the " Talamatan," i. e., the Wyandot and other allied Iroquoian tribes. A war ensues which continues through the terms of four successive chiefs, when victory declares for the invaders, and " all the Talega go fcouth." The country is then divided, the Talamatan taking the northern portion, while the Delawares fc4 stay south of the lakes." The chronicle proceeds to tell how, after eleven more chiefs have ruled, the Nanticoke and Shawano separate from the 1 Heckewelder, John, Indian Nations of Pennsylvania, pp. 47- 49, ed. 1876. |