Alabama was once home to various Native American tribes, including the Alabama, Cherokee, Choctaw, Koasati, Muskogee Creek, and Chicksaw. Most were relocated to reservations in Texas and Oklahoma in the 1800s, leaving only the Poarch Creek Indians in Alabama today. Prehistory in Alabama is divided into four phases, with Paleoindians, Archaic Indians, Woodland Indians, and Mississippians developing societies headed by chiefs. The Contact Period lasted from about 1500 to 1750, and settlers began moving to Alabama in the early 1800s to grow cotton, forcing most of the state’s Native Americans to leave. The Poarch Creek Indian Band is the only federally recognized tribe with a reservation in Alabama today.
The original Indians of Alabama include the Alabama Tribe, the Cherokee Tribe, and the Choctaw Tribes. Other Alabama Indians are the Koasati tribe, the Muskogee Creek tribe, the Choctaw tribe, and the Chicksaw tribe. During the 1800s, most of these Native Americans were relocated to Indian reservations in Texas and Oklahoma. Today, only one federally recognized Native American tribe has a reservation in Alabama, the Poarch Creek Indians, who are Muskogee. Among other Native American tribes that continue to have a presence in Alabama today are the Cherokee and Choctaw.
Much less is known about the Alabama Indians in prehistory than about the Native Americans who lived during and after the European discovery of the Americas. Prehistory in Alabama is divided into four phases, the Paleoindian phase, the Archaic phase, the Woodland phase and the Mississippi phase. Archaeologists who have studied artifacts that have survived over the centuries have developed theories about the peoples who inhabited Alabama during prehistoric times.
Paleoindians, descendants of those who migrated from Asia to North America, lived in Alabama about 11,000 years ago and were nomadic hunters and gatherers who lived in small groups. Paleo-Indians evolved into Archaic Indians — a people who, while less nomadic than Paleo-Indians, still moved seasonally to follow food sources. The Woodland Indians, who emerged about 3,500 years ago, were increasingly dependent on farmed food and built conical mounds. In the Mississippi phase, these mounds were flat-topped. Additionally, the Mississippians developed societies headed by chiefs.
The Contact Period, or the period during which Native Americans in Alabama learned about Europeans, lasted a little over 200 years, from about 1500 to 1750. Until the early 1800s, most of the people who lived in Alabama were Alabama Indians. In 1814, U.S. General Andrew Jackson defeated the Red Sticks, a Creek faction, at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend, forcing the Creek surrender about 40,000 square miles (103,600 square kilometers). Settlers began moving to Alabama, hoping to grow cotton. By 1839, virtually all of Alabama’s Indians had been forced out of Alabama and settled in Indian Territory.
Today’s Poarch Creek Indian Band are descendants of Muskogee Creeks who were allowed to remain in Alabama after other Alabama Indians were forced to leave. Their reservation was established in 1984. The Parch Creek Indian Reservation is approximately 57 miles (about 92 kilometers) from Mobile, Alabama.
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