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[[James Mooney]], a prominent [[anthropologist]] and [[historian]] of the Cherokee people, quoted a cousin as saying that as a little boy, Sequoyah, spent his early years with his mother in the village of [[Tuskegee, Tennessee|Tuskegee]]. Estimates of his birth year ranged from 1760 to 1776. His name is believed to come from the Cherokee word ''siqua'' meaning '[[Hog (swine)|hog]]'. This is a reference either to a childhood deformity or to a later injury that left Sequoyah [[Disability|disabled]].<ref>London, 193</ref>
[[James Mooney]], a prominent [[anthropologist]] and [[historian]] of the Cherokee people, quoted a cousin as saying that as a little boy, Sequoyah, spent his early years with his mother in the village of [[Tuskegee, Tennessee|Tuskegee]]. Estimates of his birth year ranged from 1760 to 1776. His name is believed to come from the Cherokee word ''siqua'' meaning '[[Hog (swine)|hog]]'. This is a reference either to a childhood deformity or to a later injury that left Sequoyah [[Disability|disabled]].<ref>London, 193</ref>


His mother ''Wut-teh'' was known to be Cherokee, belonging to the [[Cherokee Clans|Paint Clan]]. Mooney stated that she was the niece of a Cherokee [[Tribal chief|chief]]. McKinney and Hall noted that she was a niece of chiefs that have been identified as the brothers [[Old Tassel]] and [[Doublehead]]. Since [[John Watts (Cherokee chief)|John Watts]] (also known as Young Tassel) was a nephew of the two chiefs, it is likely that ''Wut-teh'' and John Watts were siblings. Sources differ as to the identity of Sequoya's father. Mooney and others suggested that he was possibly a [[fur trader]], who would have been a man of some social status and financial backing.<ref>[http://turtletalk.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/bieder-sault-ste-marie-and-the-war-of-1812.pdf Robert Bieder, "Sault-ste-marie-and-the-war-of-1812"], ''Indiana Magazine of History'', XCV (Mar 1999), accessed 13 Dec 2008</ref> Grant Foreman identified him as [[Nathaniel Gist]], a commissioned officer with the [[Continental Army]] associated with [[George Washington]].<ref name="Sequoya">{{cite web |url=http://digital.library.okstate.edu/chronicles/v015/v015p003.html |title=The Father of Sequoyah: Nathaniel Gist |author=Samuel C. Williams |date= March 1937 |work=Volume 15, No. 1 |pages= 10-11 | he ate pp publisher=Chronicles of Oklahoma |accessdate=27 September 2010}}</ref> In one Cherokee source, his father is said to be a half-blood and his grandfather a white man.<ref name="gc">{{cite news|author=G. C.|date=1820-08-13|title=Invention of the Cherokee Alphabet|work=Cherokee Phoenix|volume=1|number=24}}</ref>
His mother ''Wut-teh'' was known to be Cherokee, belonging to the [[Cherokee Clans|Paint Clan]]. Mooney stated that she was the niece of a Cherokee [[Tribal chief|chief]]. McKinney and Hall noted that she was a niece of chiefs that have been identified as the brothers [[Old Tassel]] and [[Doublehead]]. Since [[John Watts (Cherokee chief)|John Watts]] (also known as Young Tassel) was a nephew of the two chiefs, it is likely that ''Wut-teh'' and John Watts were siblings. Sources differ as to the identity of Sequoya's father. Mooney and others suggested that he was possibly a [[fur trader]], who would have been a man who ate pp of some social status and financial backing.<ref>[http://turtletalk.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/bieder-sault-ste-marie-and-the-war-of-1812.pdf Robert Bieder, "Sault-ste-marie-and-the-war-of-1812"], ''Indiana Magazine of History'', XCV (Mar 1999), accessed 13 Dec 2008</ref> Grant Foreman identified him as [[Nathaniel Gist]], a commissioned officer with the [[Continental Army]] associated with [[George Washington]].<ref name="Sequoya">{{cite web |url=http://digital.library.okstate.edu/chronicles/v015/v015p003.html |title=The Father of Sequoyah: Nathaniel Gist |author=Samuel C. Williams |date= March 1937 |work=Volume 15, No. 1 |pages= 10-11 | he ate pp publisher=Chronicles of Oklahoma |accessdate=27 September 2010}}</ref> In one Cherokee source, his father is said to be a half-blood and his grandfather a white man.<ref name="gc">{{cite news|author=G. C.|date=1820-08-13|title=Invention of the Cherokee Alphabet|work=Cherokee Phoenix|volume=1|number=24}}</ref>


Sequoyah first married Sally Waters, with whom he had four children. Another wife was ''Utiyu'', with whom he had three children. He may have also had three other wives, since polygamy was common among the Cherokees. At some point before 1809, Sequoyah moved to [[Willstown, Cherokee Nation]], in present-day northeast [[Alabama]]. There he established his trade as a silversmith.<ref>Feeling, Durbin. ''Cherokee-English Dictionary: Tsalagi-Yonega Didehlogwasdohdi''. Tahlequah, Oklahoma: Cherokee Nation, 1975: xvii</ref> In 1813 George Guess served as one of the warriors of the Cherokee Regiment (Col. Gideon Morgan, Commander) at the [[Battle of Horseshoe Bend (1814)|Battle of Horseshoe Bend]] against the "Red Sticks", Creek or Muskogee renegades.
Sequoyah first married Sally Waters, with whom he had four children. Another wife was ''Utiyu'', with whom he had three children. He may have also had three other wives, since polygamy was common among the Cherokees. At some point before 1809, Sequoyah moved to [[Willstown, Cherokee Nation]], in present-day northeast [[Alabama]]. There he established his trade as a silversmith.<ref>Feeling, Durbin. ''Cherokee-English Dictionary: Tsalagi-Yonega Didehlogwasdohdi''. Tahlequah, Oklahoma: Cherokee Nation, 1975: xvii</ref> In 1813 George Guess served as one of the warriors of the Cherokee Regiment (Col. Gideon Morgan, Commander) at the [[Battle of Horseshoe Bend (1814)|Battle of Horseshoe Bend]] against the "Red Sticks", Creek or Muskogee renegades.

Revision as of 00:04, 3 November 2010

For other uses, see Sequoyah (disambiguation).

Template:Contains Cherokee text

Sequoyah
SE-QUO-YAH - a lithograph from Indian Tribes, McKinney and Hall, 1856. This lithograph is from the portrait painted by Charles Bird King in 1828.
Bornc. 1770
Taskigi, Cherokee Nation (near present day, Knoxville, Tennessee)[1]
DiedAugust 1843 (1843-09)
Tamaulipas, Mexico
NationalityCherokee
Other namesGeorge Guess or Gist
Occupation(s)Silversmith, Blacksmith, Teacher, Soldier, Chief
Spouse(s)1st:Sally (maiden name unknown), 2nd:U-ti-yu
ChildrenFour with first wife, three with second
Parent(s)Nathaniel Gist, Wut-teh
Signature
File:ᏍᏏᏉᏯ

Sequoyah (ᏍᏏᏉᏯ Ssiquoya, as he signed his name,[2][3] or ᏎᏉᏯ Se-quo-ya, as his name is often spelled today in Cherokee) (circa 1767–1843), named in English George Gist or Guess, was a Cherokee silversmith who in 1821 completed his independent creation of a Cherokee syllabary, making reading and writing in Cherokee possible. This was the only time in recorded history that a member of an illiterate people independently created an effective writing system.[1][4] After seeing its worth, the Cherokee Nation rapidly began to use his syllabary and officially adopted it in 1825. Their literacy rate rapidly surpassed that of surrounding European-American settlers.[1]

Early life

Sequoyah's heroic status has led to several competing accounts of his life that are speculative, contradictory, or fabricated.[5]

James Mooney, a prominent anthropologist and historian of the Cherokee people, quoted a cousin as saying that as a little boy, Sequoyah, spent his early years with his mother in the village of Tuskegee. Estimates of his birth year ranged from 1760 to 1776. His name is believed to come from the Cherokee word siqua meaning 'hog'. This is a reference either to a childhood deformity or to a later injury that left Sequoyah disabled.[6]

His mother Wut-teh was known to be Cherokee, belonging to the Paint Clan. Mooney stated that she was the niece of a Cherokee chief. McKinney and Hall noted that she was a niece of chiefs that have been identified as the brothers Old Tassel and Doublehead. Since John Watts (also known as Young Tassel) was a nephew of the two chiefs, it is likely that Wut-teh and John Watts were siblings. Sources differ as to the identity of Sequoya's father. Mooney and others suggested that he was possibly a fur trader, who would have been a man who ate pp of some social status and financial backing.[7] Grant Foreman identified him as Nathaniel Gist, a commissioned officer with the Continental Army associated with George Washington.[8] In one Cherokee source, his father is said to be a half-blood and his grandfather a white man.[9]

Sequoyah first married Sally Waters, with whom he had four children. Another wife was Utiyu, with whom he had three children. He may have also had three other wives, since polygamy was common among the Cherokees. At some point before 1809, Sequoyah moved to Willstown, Cherokee Nation, in present-day northeast Alabama. There he established his trade as a silversmith.[10] In 1813 George Guess served as one of the warriors of the Cherokee Regiment (Col. Gideon Morgan, Commander) at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend against the "Red Sticks", Creek or Muskogee renegades.

Creation of the syllabary

Sequoyah's syllabary in the order that he originally arranged the characters.

As a silversmith, Sequoyah dealt regularly with whites who had settled in the area. The Native Americans were impressed by their writing, referring to their correspondence as "talking leaves." Around 1809[1], Sequoyah began work to create a system of writing for the Cherokee language. At first he sought to create a character for each word in the language. He spent a year on this effort, leaving his fields unplanted, so that his friends and neighbors thought he had lost his mind.[9][11] His wife is said to have burnt his initial work, believing it to be witchcraft.[1]

Sequoyah did not succeed until he gave up trying to represent entire words and instead developed a symbol for each syllable in the language. After approximately a month, he had a system of 86 characters, some of which were Roman letters that he obtained from a spelling book.[9] “In their present form many of the syllabary characters resemble Roman, Cyrillic or Greek letters or Arabic numerals," says Janine Scancarelli, a scholar of Cherokee writing, "but there is no apparent relationship between their sounds in other languages and in Cherokee.”[1]

Unable to find people willing to learn the syllabary, he taught it to his daughter Ayokeh, also spelled Ayoka,[1] and then traveled to present-day Arkansas where some Cherokee had settled. When he tried to convince the local leaders of the syllabary's usefulness, they doubted him, believing that the symbols were merely ad hoc reminders. Sequoyah asked each of them to say a word, which he wrote down, and then called his daughter in to read the words back. This demonstration convinced the leaders to let him teach the syllabary to a few more people. This took several months, during which it was rumored that he might be using the students for sorcery. After completing the lessons, he was further tested by writing a dictated letter to each student, and reading a dictated response. This test convinced the Arkansas Cherokee that he had created a practical writing system.[11]

When Sequoyah returned east, he brought a sealed envelope containing a written speech from one of the Arkansas Cherokee leaders. By reading this speech, he convinced the eastern Cherokee also to learn the system, after which it spread rapidly.[9][11]

In 1825 the Cherokee Nation officially adopted the writing system. From 1828 to 1834 writers and editors used Sequoyah's syllabary to print the Cherokee Phoenix, the first newspaper of the Cherokee Nation, with text in English and Cherokee.[4]

Life in Arkansas and farther west

After the acceptance of his syllabary by the nation in 1825, Sequoyah walked to the new Cherokee territory in Arkansas. There he set up a blacksmith shop and a salt works. He continued to teach the syllabary to anyone who came to him. In 1828, Sequoyah journeyed to Washington, D.C. as part of a delegation to negotiate a treaty for land in Indian Territory.

His trip brought him into contact with representatives of other Native American tribes from around the nation. With these meetings he decided to create a syllabary for universal use among Native American tribes. With this in mind, Sequoyah began to journey to areas of present-day Arizona and New Mexico seeking tribes there.

In addition, Sequoyah dreamed of seeing the splintered Cherokee Nation reunited. Between 1843 and 1845, he died during a trip to Mexico seeking Cherokees who had moved there. His burial location is believed to be at the border of Mexico and Texas. Cherokee Nation Principal Chief J. B. Milam funded an expedition to find Sequoyah's grave in Mexico.[12] A party of Cherokee and non-Cherokee scholars embarked from Eagle Pass, Texas on January 1939. They found a grave site near a fresh water spring in Coahuila, Mexico but could not conclusively determine the grave site did in fact belong to Sequoyah.[13]

Addressing the exalted place Sequoyah holds in Cherokee imagination, ethnographer Jack Kilpatrick wrote: "Sequoyah was always in the wilderness. He walked about, but he was not a hunter. I wonder what he was looking for."[13]

Sequoyah's Cabin, a frontier cabin which he lived in during 1829-1844, is located in Oklahoma. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1965.

Lee Lawrie, sculpted bronze figure of Sequoyah (1939). Library of Congress John Adams Building, Washington, D.C.

See also

Sequoyah's namesakes and honors

Notes

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Wilford, John Noble. "Carvings From Cherokee Script’s Dawn ." New York Times. 22 June 2009 (retrieved 23 June 2009)
  2. ^ Morand, Ann (2003). Treasures of Gilcrease: Selections from the Permanent Collection. Tulsa, OK: Gilcrease Museum. ISBN 0-9725657-1-X. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  3. ^ Holmes, Ruth Bradley (1976). Beginning Cherokee: Talisgo Galiquogi Dideliquasdodi Tsalagi Digoweli. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 0-8061-1362-6. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  4. ^ a b "Sequoyah", New Georgia Encyclopedia, accessed 3 Jan 2009
  5. ^ Fogelson, Raymond D. (1974). "On the Varieties of Indian History: Sequoyah and Traveller Bird". Journal of Ethnic Studies. 2.
  6. ^ London, 193
  7. ^ Robert Bieder, "Sault-ste-marie-and-the-war-of-1812", Indiana Magazine of History, XCV (Mar 1999), accessed 13 Dec 2008
  8. ^ Samuel C. Williams (March 1937). "The Father of Sequoyah: Nathaniel Gist". Volume 15, No. 1. pp. 10–11. Retrieved 27 September 2010. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |he ate pp publisher= ignored (help)
  9. ^ a b c d G. C. (1820-08-13). "Invention of the Cherokee Alphabet". Cherokee Phoenix. Vol. 1, no. 24.
  10. ^ Feeling, Durbin. Cherokee-English Dictionary: Tsalagi-Yonega Didehlogwasdohdi. Tahlequah, Oklahoma: Cherokee Nation, 1975: xvii
  11. ^ a b c Boudinot, Elias (1832-04-01). "Invention of a new Alphabet". American Annals of Education.
  12. ^ J. B. Milam, McFarlin Library, University of Tulsa. Libraries & Cultures: Bookplate Archive. 2001 (retrieved 23 June 2009)
  13. ^ a b Meredith, Howard L. Bartley Milam: Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation. Muskogee, Oklahoma: Indian University Press, 1985: 47. ISBN 0-940392-17-8
  14. ^ Scheidt, Laurel. Hiking Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks. Guilford, CT: Globe Pequot Press, 2002: 68. ISBN 978-0-7627-1122-2 (retrieved through Google books, 23 June 2009)
  15. ^ Sequoyah Birthplace Museum
  16. ^ Sequoyah Caverns and Ellis Homestead
  17. ^ "Welcome to Sequoyah Country Club". Retrieved 2 September 2010.

References

  • Bender, Margaret. (2002) Signs of Cherokee Culture: Sequoyah's Syllabary in Eastern Cherokee Life. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
  • Feeling, Durbin. Cherokee-English Dictionary: Tsalagi-Yonega Didehlogwasdohdi. Tahlequah, Oklahoma: Cherokee Nation, 1975: xvii
  • Holmes, Ruth Bradley; Betty Sharp Smith (1976). Beginning Cherokee: Talisgo Galiquogi Dideliquasdodi Tsalagi Digoweli. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 0-8061-1362-6.
  • Foreman, Grant, Sequoyah, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman,OK, 1938.
  • McKinney, Thomas and Hall, James, History of the Indian Tribes of North America. (Philadelphia,PA, 1837-1844).

External links

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