Coos people
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This article relies largely or entirely upon a single source. (March 2010) |
The Coos are a Native American tribe from the U.S. state of Oregon and one of the three Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians. They live on the southwest Oregon Pacific coast. The Coos language is either extinct or nearly extinct.
Their neighbors were Siuslauan, Kalapuyan, and the Umpqua Indians. On February 8, 1806 the Coos people were first mentioned by Euro-Americans. William Clark, wintering at Fort Clatsop near the Columbia with Meriwether Lewis and the Corp of Discovery, reported the existence of the "Cook-koo-oose nation". His journal entry stated: "I saw several prisoners from this nation with the Clatsops and Kilamox, they are much fairer than the common Indians of this quarter, and do not flatten their heads." The Coos joined with the Umpqua and Siuslaw tribes and became a confederation with the signing of a Treaty in August 1855. In 1857, the U.S. Government removed the Coos Indians to Port Umpqua. Four years later they were again transferred to the Alsea Sub-agency at Yachats Reservation where they remained until 1876. In 1876, the subagency was handed over to white settlement and the Indians were assigned to relocate to the Siletz Reservation, which created a major disruption among the tribal members.
Several Oregon landmarks are named after the tribe, including Coos Bay, the city of Coos Bay, Oregon, and Coos County.
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[edit] Life
There were 40–50 villages in the Coos tribes (they lived around the Coos bay and North Bend area). Most of them were hunters, fishermen, and gatherers. For entertainment, they held foot races, canoe races, dice (bone or stick) games, target ilu practice, and also shinny (field hockey).[1]
[edit] See also
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ "Traditional Culture of the Coos, Lower Umpqua, and Siuslaw". Culture and History. Confederated Tribes of the Coos, Lower Umpqua, and Siuslaw Indians. Archived from the original on 2006-09-06. Retrieved 2006-10-07.
[edit] Further reading
- Leo J. Frachtenberg, "Coos," in Franz Boas (ed.), Handbook of American Indian Languages, Part 2. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1922; pp. 297-430.
[edit] External links
- Confederated Tribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua, and Siuslaw — Official site homepage
- Languages of Oregon - Coos
- Coos, Lower Umpqua & Siuslaw Tribes profile
- Coos Texts — Collection of origin myths and lore by Leo J. Frachtenberg (1913), on Internet Sacred Text Archive
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