Warning: this post contains distressing details. Recent news coming from Canada, particularly from the grounds of Kamloops Indian Residential School, Marieval Indian Residential School, St. Eugene’s Mission School and just recently the Kuper Island Residential School, has illuminated a sobering truth: for many Indigenous children, school was a place of suffering, trauma, and death. U.S….
Category: Frequently Asked Question (FAQ)
Dictionary Update!
Today we announce that the new Myaamiaataweenki dictionary is going live as both a new app and a new website! The app can be found on the app store or google play by searching “ILDADictionary” and the web version can be found at https://mc.miamioh.edu/ilda-myaamia/dictionary. In the next month, we will be discontinuing the old app,…
niikinaana – Our Homes (FAQ)
Over time, Myaamia people have lived in a wide variety dwelling types. The traditional home of the Myaamia is called wiikiaami. A wiikiaami is a domed structure that could be covered in cattail reed mats or bark depending on the season. Often these were also lined with bulrush mats, which were decorated. The layers of mats…
FAQ: Pre-Contact Miami Indian Population?
What was the population of Myaamia (Miami Indian) villages pre-contact with Europeans? The short answer is at least 10,000 to 12,000. However, the longer answer is trickier. It is extremely difficult to estimate Miami Indian population numbers prior to the period of European contact for at least three main reasons. First, it is extremely difficult…
FAQ’s for SALT: A Story of Friendship in a Time of War
In the niipinwi 2013 edition of aatotankiki myaamiaki – the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma’s newspaper, I recently wrote a brief summary of Helen Frost’s SALT: A Story of Friendship in a Time of War. This book was partly a product of a collaborative effort that included Myaamia people living in the Fort Wayne area, the…
Was “Aquenackwe” Little Turtle’s Father? (FAQ)
Was “Aquenackwe” Little Turtle’s Father? Was “Aquenackwe” Little Turtle’s father? Probably not. Like many Myaamia (Miami) children, I grew up with stories of family genealogy. One common story that I heard was that my family descended from Little Turtle’s sister, Tahkamwa (Maria Louisa Richardville). In family genealogies, Little Turtle and Tahkamwa’s father was always listed…
FAQ: Origins of the name Twigh Twee?
In many historical works readers encounter the term Twigh Twee as one name for Myaamia (Miami) People. So where did this unique name come from? The short answer is that we don’t know for sure, but the name probably came from the Cherokee or the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois). The longer and more complicated answer is a…
How did Myaamia (Miami Indian) people govern themselves? (FAQ)
Individual independence was highly valued in Myaamia village communities and examples abound of leaders informing Europeans that they could “order” nothing and that in fact the more they gave orders the more they diminished their status. In 1721, Father Pierre Francois Xavier de Charlevoix stated: “These chiefs generally have no great marks of outward respect…
Is there a word, in Myaamia, for the Mound Builders and/or the mounds themselves? (FAQ)
We have never found any language relative to the mound complexes or mound building in general. It is also interesting to note that in the vast historical record there is no mention of the Myaamia having any association with the mounds other than they knew they were there and did not disturb them. There are,…
How did the Myaamia (Miami Indians) punish crime? (FAQ)
There were very few behaviors that were considered “criminal.” Murder is the most discussed crime in the historical record and in most cases the treatment of the murderer was decided by the victim’s family. They could avenge their relative’s death by executing the murderer or they could accept gifts to “cover their dead” (symbolically burying…
Aacimotaatiiyankwi 