Who was here when the French arrived?
Long before the French arrived, the ecosystem of what we today call Indiana had nurtured Native peoples. Indiana is situated at the intersection of two biomes: the Eastern hardwood forest biome and the prairie biome that characterizes Illinois and points west. While some of western Indiana was grassland, much of the territory was covered with deciduous forests, and some areas in the northeast and northwest corners of today’s state of Indiana were home to significant marshes. Across the entire territory—the northern and central glaciated areas of the state as well as the upland hills of the southern part stretching to the Ohio River—Native people had for centuries adapted to the natural resources that the environment provided.
The river systems of Indiana provided resources for Native people and also connected them to one another and to other parts of the continent. In the north, the St. Joseph River flows into Lake Michigan, and the Maumee River, farther east, into Lake Erie. Looking toward the west, the Kankakee River in northern Indiana flows into the Illinois River and then to the Mississippi, while the Wabash River, dominating much of Indiana from northeast to southwest, flows into the Ohio River and thus also to the Mississippi. Thus, the waterways of Indiana provided Native people, and the French who came later, access to both the Atlantic Ocean and to the Gulf of Mexico.
Prior to the period when written records exist, Indiana was inhabited by people of several cultures, including the mound-builders of the Upper Mississippian culture. Residing in the Ohio River valley between around 1000 and 1600 A.D., they built large population centers complete with stockades, houses, significant agricultural production, and large platform mounds. These centers served as important religious and socio-cultural sites. Archaeologists have found multiple artifacts at sites such as Angel Mounds near Evansville in southwest Indiana, indicating that these societies were complex and well-organized.
Several groups of Native people lived in what is now Indiana when the first French people arrived in the late 1600s; these are groups that we now often know by the names they were called by Europeans. The Miami (Myaamiaki) were present in large swathes of the state, along with the Wea (Waayaahtanooki) and Piankeshaw (Peeyankihšia), groups that had split off from the Miami at some point in the past to live farther down the Wabash River. In the north, the Potawatomi (Bodewadmi) had a large presence, and Kickapoo and Mascouten people were resident in the western part of today’s Indiana.
Native Lifeways
The lifeways of these Native peoples were similar, taking advantage of the resources that the plains, forests, marshes, and waterways offered. In summer, they lived in large villages, often sited on rivers and frequently on rich river bottomland, where they cultivated corn, squash, and beans. In winter they split up into smaller groups and moved to places where they could hunt for large animals like deer, elk, and bison. In spring they went to spots where they could gather the sap from maple trees. Throughout the year, hunting for smaller game took place, as did fishing. In the large villages, there was usually a large council house with smaller family lodges built of saplings covered with bark or rush mats.
The environment provided materials for clothing and coverings, as well. Women sewed clothing from deerskin, while buffalo robes and other furs provided warmth. Stone was used for grinders or for sharp objects like spear points, and ceramic pieces were also produced to be used for storage and for some cooking. Work was divided by gender, with women responsible for agricultural work and creation of material products like clothing or ceramics, while men were responsible for hunting, fishing, and relationships with outside groups.
The period when the French began to explore the territory of present-day Indiana and when they began trade relationships with the Native peoples here in the late seventeenth century was in fact a time of considerable disruption for the people of this region as well as in present-day Ohio and Michigan. By this time, the English and French had begun settlements in eastern North America and had established fur trade relationships with Native tribes. The Iroquois Confederacy (also known as the Haudenosaunee Confederacy) and other Native nations living in the eastern Great Lakes area had been trading with the Europeans, but as the supply of beaver—the main fur desired by the Europeans—in their principal territory was exhausted, they began moving west into land occupied by numerous other tribes.
The ensuing wars, known as the Beaver Wars, and the Iroquois’ aggressive occupation of territory to the west of their traditional homeland, created a cascading set of moves west and north by other Native people, including the Potawatomi and the Miami, who moved into what are today Illinois and Wisconsin from their traditional homelands in today’s Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio. When the Wars ended with the Peace of Montreal in 1701, many of the Miami and Potawatomi moved back into their ancestral lands in Indiana.
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