Cherokee
A Native North American Nation whose lands once stretched from Alabama to West Virginia. They called themselves Ani‘-Yun’wiya, meaning ‘the real people’. Sedentary farmers, hunters, gatherers and fishers, they spoke an Iroquoian language.
The largest of the so-called FIVE CIVILIZED TRIBES, the Cherokee became heavily involved in the fur trade in the 18th century. They also undertook a remarkable transformation from the 1790s, adopting white culture wholesale in their religion, agriculture and education. They developed their own written language and had their own press. Their relative prosperity, however, highlighted the value of their lands to settlers, who called for them to be dispossessed.
© Weidenfeld & Nicolson 2005
