ATAKAPA

The Atakapa and related tribes—Akokisa, Bidai, Deadose, Opelousa, and Patiri—lived in coastal, bayou, lagoon, and lake areas from Vermillion Bay, an inlet of the Gulf of Mexico in present-day southwestern Louisiana, to Trinity Bay, a northeast arm of Galveston Bay in present-day southeastern Texas. They are classified as SOUTHEAST INDIANS. Their language, Atakapan, is considered part of the macro-Algonquian language phylum, of which the Algonquian language family is also a part. Atakapan is generally considered an isolate, although some scholars group it with Tuni-can, spoken by the TUNICA and YAZOO, living to the northeast of the Atakapa, and with Chitimachan, spoken by the CHITIMACHA, to the east. The Atakapa proper had villages along the Neches, Sabine, and Calcasieu Rivers in eastern Texas and western Louisiana. A group referred to as Eastern Atakapa lived along the Mermentou River in Louisiana. The Akokisa lived along the Trinity River and Trinity Bay in Texas. The Opelousa lived in the Vermillion Bayou in Louisiana. The Bidai, Deadose, and Patiri lived along the middle course of the Trinity River. The name Atakapa, also spelled Attacapa, and pronounced uh-TAK-uh-paw, means “man-eater” in the Choctaw dialect of Muskogean, because of the Atakapa’s reported eating the flesh of enemies. Their Native name Yuk’hiti ishak probably means “the people” and is sometimes written simply as Ishak.

The Atakapa, like other tribes of the region, are considered to have been MOUND BUILDERS in precontact times, their ancestors part of the Mississippian culture. Evidence of mound building endures in the placing of dwellings of chiefs and shamans on shell mounds. Conical dwellings of poles interwoven with vines and sometimes covered with thatch, with smokeholes at the top, were situated on these mounds.

Fish, shellfish, wildfowl, and wild plants were the main foods of the Atakapa. They used a variety of hunting weapons, including spears, blowguns and darts, and bows and arrows. Nets, bone hooks, and weirs (enclosures) were also used in fishing. Dugout canoes provided transportation on coastal and inland waters. At times, the water was poisoned to cause fish to rise to the surface. Tribal members sometimes captured alligators and sometimes cooked them whole. They applied alligator oil to their skin to protect from the sun and repel mosquitoes. To hunt buffalo they traveled to the interior plains. They gathered nuts, berries, wild grapes, roots, wild honey, persimmons, and other plants. Part of a trade network in the region, the Atakapa supplied dried fish, shark teeth, and feathers to other peoples in exchange for flint, pottery, and animal skins. Sedges, rushes, and mosses were utilized in the making of mats and baskets. In summertime, the Atakapa wore minimal clothing, such as breechcloths; in wintertime, they wore hide clothing. Tattooing and cuts on the nose and chin served as symbolic decoration, especially among the elderly. Head deformation—the reshaping of infants’ heads through pressure—was also practiced.

Two Atakapan creation myths have been recorded: One relates that their people came from the ocean in large oyster shells; the other, according to some Texas groups, states that they were deposited on mountaintops by a flood. The Atakapa are said to have believed that those humans eaten by other humans were denied life after death, which perhaps contributed to their practice of cannibalism. An afterlife was also supposedly denied to individuals who died from a snakebite.

Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca and a number of other Spanish, part of the Panfilo de Narvaez expedition of 1528, after being shipwrecked off the coast of Texas, stayed among Indians whom Cabeza de Vaca called Han but are assumed to be Atakapan (although bands of KARANKAWA also lived in the vicinity). The Indians welcomed the Spanish survivors at first, but they turned on them because of competition for food and because of the outbreak of European diseases. There was no reported contact for years after. Two centuries later, in 1721, the French explorer Bernard de la Harpe captured some tribal members and took them to New Orleans. Some years later, in 1729, Atakapa warriors helped the NATCHEZ in their war with the French. Others later became auxiliaries for the French. In the mid-18th century, the Spanish established a number of missions among the Texas groups. In 1779, the Eastern Atakapa supported the Spanish against the British. By the early 19th century, many Louisiana groups had been displaced by French Creoles; some of them had joined other tribes.

The Texas groups had also relocated or taken refuge among other tribes by that time.

An Atakapa band near Lake Charles in Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, maintained its tribal identity until the early 20th century, at which time their language was recorded. In 1932, the Smithsonian Institution published a dictionary of the Atakapan language. A number of contemporary Native Americans consider themselves Atakapa descendants. Some of them are considered to have helped develop zydeco music. In 1998, part of U. S. Highway 190, between the Sabine River and DeRidder in Louisiana, once part of Atakapa and COUSHATTA foot trails, was dedicated as the Atakapa-Coushatta Trace.