The History of the Pawnee Indians

Olivia Turner

AP English 3
T. Myslinski
19 October 2015

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The Pawnee Indians
Thesis: The Pawnee tribe was important in American history because of their interactions with
Americans.

I.

Background Information
A. History
B. Customs
1. Culture
2. Religion

II. Literature
A. Legends
1. Language
2. Stories
III. Impact/Significance to American History

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The History of the Pawnee Indians
The Pawnee Indians lived in the plains of Oklahoma and Nebraska for hundreds of years
before white men came to America. Their importance in United States history came through their
interactions with Americans. At their peak, they had a population of about 10,000 people. Around
1850, there was an outbreak of smallpox and cholera, causing their numbers to decline to around
600 people by the 20th century. Today, the official count of Pawnee is around 2,500 people (The
Pawnee Indians). The Pawnee tribe consists of four main bands: the Skidis, who were known to
be the leading tribe, the Chauis, the Kitkehahkis, and the Pitahauerats (Carlisle, Jeffrey D.).
Mature women in the tribe did most of the labor. While the older women would take care
of young children, the jobs of the younger women were to learn their responsibilities in the tribe.
The men of the tribe were divided mainly into three groups. These groups were medicine men or
priests, warriors, and hunters (Pawnee Indians). The Pawnee tribe built large, permanent
settlements, but spent over half of each year living in tipis while roaming the plains hunting
buffalo and other game (Emergence). The Pawnee Indians went on a large buffalo hunt two
times a year. Every household unit was broken into smaller groups, each with a skilled and able
hunter as a leader (Carlisle, Jeffrey D.). Their meals mainly consisted of buffalo, raccoons, quail,
skunks, and prairie chickens.
The name for their God was Tirawa Atius, which means Father Above. The Pawnee
practiced a religion that balanced nature and the gods, and they also equated the stars with the
gods. The Skidi band of the Pawnee tribe is said to have been one of the most advanced star
watchers of North America. The social rank in their tribes was according to the ranking of the
star gods. The first ranking of the star gods is The Red Morning Star Warrior, which was

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probably Mars. He mated with Evening Star, which was most likely Venus, to create the first
humans. Second is the four gods who supported the heavens. These gods were located in the
northeast, northwest, southeast, and southwest. Third and last in ranking were the sun, the moon,
and lastly the gods of the four primary directions. These four gods were located in the north,
south, east, and west. The Pawnee Indians didnt have calendars, but instead watched the
positions of the stars to know when it was in the year. They did, however, make star charts to
map out where the stars were in relation to one another (Windows).
All of the Pawnee Indians spoke a Caddo language. In this language, all nouns were
singular and the verbs were third person singular. The words werent spelled phonetically, so it
was very different from the way we speak today. The vowels the Pawnee used in this language
were a, aa, e, ee, i, ii, u, and uu. The fact that they spoke this language was extremely different
from any other Nebraskan indian tribe. Many of their legends and myths, on the other hand, were
shared with other tribes. Red-Woman is an ogress in Pawnee and other indian folklore who is
sometimes identified as a cannibal, but in other versions of stories, a monster who kills just for
the sake of killing. In some tales, witchcraft is used to trick her victims. Part of one story about
her reads:

Once upon a time there lived a couple, the woman being pregnant. The man
went hunting one day, and in his absence a certain wicked woman named RedWoman came to the tipi and killed his wife and cut her open and found boy
twins.

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She threw one behind the tipi curtain, and the other she threw into a spring. She
then put a stick inside the woman and stuck one end in the ground, to give her
the appearance of a live person, and burned her upper lip, giving her the
appearance as though laughing.

When her husband came home, tired from carrying the deer he had killed, he
saw his wife standing near the door of the tipi, looking as though she were
laughing at him, and he said: "I am tired and hungry, why do you laugh at me?"
and pushed her. As she fell backwards, her stomach opened, and he caught hold
of her and discovered she was dead. He knew at once that Red-Woman had
killed his wife. (Native)

During the 17th century, Apache indians raided Pawnee settlements, killing as many men
as they could. They captured women and children to sell as slaves to the Spanish and Pueblo
Indians of New Mexico. These slave trades became so frequent that Pawnee came to have the
same meaning as slave. Its been said that in 1790, the Pawnee defeated the expedition of
Pedro de Villasur. He had led forty Spaniards and seventy Pueblo Indians through Pawnee
villages in order to avoid the French traders, but were instead attacked by the Pawnee. Around
the time that this happened, Pawnee had begun to befriend and trade with the French located in
Louisiana. By 1750, the two were allies. The French helped their new allies by providing the
Pawnee with weaponry so they were able to defend themselves against attacks from Apache
Indians. In 1793, however, the French were removed from the Louisiana Treaty of Paris act, and

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the Pawnee Indians were attacked by British-armed Sioux and Osage Indians. In order to escape
these attacks, many members of the tribe fled south and joined their Wichita kin on the Red
River. The Pawnee Indians that migrated south and the Wichita tribe eventually merged to create
the Asidahesh (Carlisle, Jeffrey D.).
Reporting injuries at the hands of Americans, Pawnee Indians, along with other tribes,
offered to secure friendship and ally with the Spanish. Instead of going through with this,
however, Pawnee decided to turn to the United States. They signed the first of many treaties with
the United States in 1818. Despite many small grievances and disputes with the United States,
such as them pressuring the Pawnee to constantly sign over their land, Pawnee Indians never
went to war with them. In fact, many were very faithful to the United States. In 1892, Pawnee
Indians signed over the last of their land and became official United States citizens.

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Works Cited
Carlisle, Jeffrey D., "PAWNEE INDIANS," Handbook of Texas Online (http://
www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/bmp52), accessed October 12, 2015.
Uploaded on June 15, 2010. Published by the Texas State Historical Association.
Emergence of Historic Tribes: The Pawnee. www.nebraskastudies.org. Nebraska Educational
Telecommunications, 2002. 12 October 2015.
Native Languages of the Americas: Pawnee Legends, Myths, and Stories. www.nativelanguages.org. Native Languages of the Americas website, N.D. 15 October 2015.
Pawnee Indians. www.indians.org. 2015. Web. 12 October 2015.
The Pawnee Indians. www.essortment.com. Demand Media, 2011. Web. 12 October 2015.
Windows to the Universe team. The Skidi Band of the Pawnee Tribe. http://
www.windows2universe.org. National Earth Science Teachers Association, 2000. Web.
15 October 2015.