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THE
SAHNISH (Arikara)
The oral history of the Sahnish people is taken from sacred
bundles and is verified by archeological findings. Ancient
objects and ceremonies are part of the oral history of the people.
The Sahnish history has its roots in eastern Nebraska where
numerous village sites were found. Oral history tells
of a person called "Chief Above" who brought these
villages together in a union for protection against waiting
tribes. Archeologists confirm there was a drawing
together into large villages on the Elk Horn River in what is
now called Omaha, Nebraska, at the end of the prehistoric and
beginning of the proto-historic period.
In 1714, explorer "Etienne Veniard de Bourgmont, who spent
several years with the Sahnish, described three Sahnish villages
on the west bank of the Missouri above the Niobrara River and
40 villages still farther up river on both banks. B y 1723,
the Sahnish had gone up the Missouri into South Dakota near
the Arickara River (called Grand River today).
In 1738, Pierre de Vamess Gaultier de La Verendrye, a French
fur trader from Montreal, seeking a route to the Pacific Ocean,
reported villages of the Panaux and Panai (Sahnish) living a
day's journey from the Mandan villages near the mouth of the
Cannonball River. In 1743 La Verendrye's son arrived at
the Sahnish villages at the mouth of the Bad River and
was met by the Little Cherry Band of Sahnish. La Verendrye
commemorated the event by planting a tablet that today is kept
in a museum at Pierre, South Dakota. Jean Baptist Trudeau, a
French fur trader, found the Sahnish living at the mouth of
the Grand River around 1794-95. Trudeau was the first trader
to live with the Sahnish for a long period of time.
Their westward movement has sometimes prompted historians to
promote the myth that the " Arikara seemed to have wandered
aimlessly up the Missouri River." According to Sahnish
oral historians, the extensive movements of the tribe were not
at random or without purpose, but was the westward migration
in fulfillment of the directive given to them by Neesaau ti
naacitakUx, Chief Above, through an ancient tradition
and from a sacred being called "Mother Corn." (Dorsey,
1904). Lewis and Clark encountered the Sahnish people at the
mouth of the Grand River in 1804, and found them living in three
villages that numbered about 3,000.
The first village was on an island two miles above the Oak Creek
and contained about sixty lodges. The whole island was
under cultivation. The other two villages were on each
side of a creek, which from its references, appears to be the
Cottonwood Creek of today. On June 10, 1833, George Catlin passed
the Sahnish villages at the Grand River but did not come ashore
because he considered them hostile. He sketched their
villages from the deck of the steamer "Yellowstone."
That same year, the Sahnish left the banks of the Missouri River
after two successive crop failures and conflicts with the Mandan.
They rejoined Pawnees in Nebraska on the Loop River, where
they stayed for three winters. Because this location made
them susceptible to attack by the whites and the Sioux, after
only a few years, the Sahnish moved back to the Missouri River
area. Upon their arrival back to the Missouri River area, they
were stricken with an old enemy, smallpox. In June 1836
and into 1837 the Sahnish people were decimated by the third
epidemic of smallpox at their village below the Knife River
near Ft. Clark.
In 1856, the fourth smallpox outbreak occurred in the Star Village
at Beaver Creek. The smallpox outbreak and the constant
raids by the Sioux forced the move in August of 1862 of some
Sahnish to Like-a-Fishhook Village, while some remained at Star
Village at Beaver Creek. Their bout with smallpox was the final
blow that left the Sahnish people weak. They lost almost
half of their population. Later, fire destroyed the old
Mandan lodges, and they built a new village their and remained
until the abandonment and destruction of Fort Clark in 1861.
In 1862, the Sahnish moved up to join the Mandan and Hidatsa
at Like-A-Fishhook Village.
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Phone: 701-627-4781
Three Affiliated Tribes, 404 Frontage Road, New Town, North Dakota,
58763
Copyright ® 2004-2011 Mandan, Hidatsa & Arikara Nation.
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