Miami

Member of a northeastern American Indian people who lived in parts of Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, and Wisconsin by the mid-17th century. Their language, now extinct, belonged to the Algonquian family. The Miami farmed permanent summer settlements, and hunted buffalo in the winter. Religion centred on the Midewiwin, or ‘Grand Medicine Society’, believed to have access to the spiritual world. The Miami resisted the European colonists throughout the 18th century, but eventually withdrew to Indiana. In the 19th century the majority moved to Oklahoma, where most Miami live today, although some remain in Indiana. They number about 2,000 (1990).

The Miami social system was based on exogamous clans (marriage being outside the clan by custom) with hereditary clan chiefs serving as members of the village council; one of their number was elected civil chief. A separate war chief was chosen on the basis of ability in leading raids. At the time of the first French contact the Miami were divided into six independent groups of which two, the Wea and Painkashaw, had split into separate tribes.

The staple diet of the Miami was a particular type of white maize (corn) that was considered superior to that cultivated by their neighbours. During the summer they occupied permanent agricultural villages. They moved to the prairies in winter for communal bison hunts. In addition to domed framed longhouses covered with mats of thatch, each village had a large house in which councils and ceremonies were held. Members of the Midewiwin were believed to be able to secure supernatural aid for tribal welfare, as well as being able to cure the sick.

The Miami originally inhabited the southern end of Lake Michigan in northeastern Illinois and northern Indiana and adjacent Ohio. Although the majority of the Miami were unaffected by the expansion of the Iroquois, the Wea and Painkashaw had been pushed back to Wisconsin when first encountered by the Europeans in the mid-17th century; these groups moved back to Indiana between 1680 and 1710.

The Miami offered steady resistance to the European colonists throughout the 18th century, although epidemics 1714-1717 seriously weakened their numbers. One celebrated Miami leader, Little Turtle (1752-1812), successfully defended Ohio territory against white settlers and the US army from 1783 to 1794. Noticing the American army's growing strength and numbers, Little Turtle then advocated for peace. However, in 1794, the Miami, along with neighbouring tribes, fought again, losing the Battle of Fallen Timbers to US troops led by General Anthony Wayne. After ceding their territory in southern and eastern Ohio, they withdrew to Indiana.

In the 19th century the Miami ceded most of their lands to the US government. The Wea and Piankashaw were removed to Missouri in the 1820s, then to Kansas in 1832, and finally relocated to Oklahoma. Of the remaining Miami in Indiana, one band remained in their original northeastern homeland, the rest were removed to Kansas in 1846, and then to a reservation in Oklahoma in 1867.