Mythologies of the Nanticoke Tribes

The Nanticoke tribes are a Native American Algonquian people, whose traditional homelands are in Chesapeake Bay and Delaware. Today they live in the Northeastern United States and Canada, especially Delaware; in Ontario; and in Oklahoma. The Nanticoke people consisted of several tribes: The Nanticoke proper (the subject of this article), the Choptank, the Assateague, the Piscataway, and the Doeg. The Nanticoke people may have originated in Labrador, Canada, and migrated through the Great Lakes region and the Ohio Valley to the east, along with the Shawnee and Lenape peoples. In 1608, the Nanticoke came into European contact, with the arrival of British captain John Smith. They allied with the British and traded beaver pelts with them. They were located in today's Dorchester, Somerset and Wicomico counties. In 1668, the Nanticoke Emperor Unnacokasimon signed a peace treaty with the proprietary government of the Province of Maryland. In 1684, the Nanticoke and English governments defined a reservation for their use, situated between Chicacoan Creek and the Nanticoke River in Maryland, see Vienna. Non-native peoples encroached upon their lands, so the tribe purchased a 3,000-acre tract of land in 1707 on Broad Creek in Somerset County, Maryland (now Sussex County, Delaware). In 1742, the tribe met with neighboring tribes in nearby Wimbesoccom Neck to discuss a Shawnee plot to attack the local English settlers, but the gathering was discovered, and the leaders involved were arrested. Some moved up to Pennsylvania in 1744, where they gained permission from the Iroquois Confederacy to settle near Wyoming, Pennsylvania, and along the Juniata River. The city of Nanticoke is named after one of their settlements. While settled along the Susquehanna River, the Nanticoke used a path that they had established during their migration to return to the Delmarva Peninsula for seasonal gathering and fishing. They moved upriver a decade later. They joined the Piscataway tribe, and were both under the jurisdiction of the League of the Iroquois. The reservation on Broad Creek was sold in 1768. Some Nanticoke migrated slightly north into New York, where they established a settlement in what became the town of Nanticoke there.

First contact with the Nanticoke Tribe was recorded by Captain John Smith in 1608. While exploring the Chesapeake Bay, Smith and his crew sailed onto the Kuskarawaok River. The Kuskarawaoks, later known as the Nanticoke Indians, cautiously watched Smith’s ship from the shore, climbing into the trees for a better look. When Smith approached the shore in a boat, the Nanticoke answered with arrows. Smith prudently put down anchor for the night in the middle of the river. The next morning, the Nanticoke appeared on the shore with baskets of food. Still cautious, Captain Smith had his men fire muskets over the heads of the Nanticoke. Later that afternoon, Smith noticed the Indians were gone, and he and his men came to shore. He found fires still burning, but no Indians were seen. Smith discovered glass beads, shells, and copper pieces left as gifts of friendship. The following day, four Indians who had been fishing approached Smith’s ship in a canoe. Smith convinced them he came in friendship, and they returned with twenty villagers. Food, water, and furs were exchanged for gifts the English brought. Several Nanticokes agreed to serve as guides for Smith to continue his exploration of the Kuskarawaok, now known as the Nanticoke River. Smith described the Nanticoke as “the best merchants of all.” In Algonquian, the common Indian language of Northeastern tribes, the word Nanticoke is translated from the original Nantaquak meaning the tidewater people or people of the tidewaters. Smith recorded that nearly 200 warriors lived with their families on the Nanticoke River, making their tribe more significant in population than many other tribes on the Eastern Shore at that time. However, the Nanticoke were allied with the Powhatan Confederacy in what is now Virginia. Such alliances allowed smaller bands of Indians to have protection from enemy tribes. The Nanticoke enjoyed the best of native lifestyles. They were proficient farmers who planted corn and beans, and dried them for later use. The women and children cared for lush gardens of corn, beans, squash, pumpkins, sunflowers, and tobacco. They gathered nuts, berries, birds’ eggs, and edible plants in season. As they lived close to the rivers, in warmer months, they dined on delicious seafood, including clams, oysters, mussels, crabs, eels, and fish. Nets, snares, baskets, and spears were fashioned by the men to harvest the water’s bounty. The men hunted the forests and meadows of the Eastern Shore for squirrels, turkeys, deer, opossums, rabbits, bear, partridges, ducks and geese. Food was roasted over open fires or boiled in clay pots as a stew. Bows, arrows, and spears were used for larger game and snares or traps were set for smaller animals. All parts of the animals and sea creatures were utilized. Shells were used for spoons, bowls, wampum, and ornate decorations. Porcupine quills, furs, skins, sinew, and bones were used for clothing and tool implements.

Nanticoke, a confederacy of Algonquian-speaking North American Indians who lived along the eastern shores of what are now Maryland and southern Delaware; their name means “tidewater people.” They were related to the Delaware and the Conoy. Nanticoke subsistence depended largely on fishing and trapping, and their social organization probably included a head chief, as well as subordinate chiefs of the various tribes. They were at war with the Maryland colonists from 1642 to 1678; in 1698 reservations were set aside for them. Sometime after 1722 most of the Nanticoke began moving northward, some settling with the Iroquois in what is now western New York state; many emigrated westward about 1784 and were incorporated into the Delaware tribe in what have become Ohio and Indiana. Early 21st-century population estimates indicated approximately 2,500 individuals of Nanticoke descent.

Our Nanticoke ancestors, called the "Tidewater People," dwelled along the Indian River in Southeastern Delaware, having migrated from the Nanticoke River of the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Our Nanticoke ancestors were among the first of the Northeastern Indian Nations to resist European colonial intrusion into our homeland as early as the 1650's. The history of our tribe in its homeland goes back over 10,000 years. We are the descendants of those Nanticoke and Lenape who remained, or returned, to our ancient homeland after many of our relatives suffered removals and forced migrations to the mid-western United States or into Canada. Our Lenape ancestors were those who inhabited New Jersey, Delaware, southern New York and eastern Pennsylvania at the time the Europeans came. We called ourselves "Lenni-Lenape," which literally means "Men of Men", but is translated to mean "Original People." From the early 1600's, the European settlers called the Lenape people "Delaware Indians." Three main dialect clans, each made up of smaller independent but interrelated communities, extended from the northern part of our ancient homeland at the headwaters of the Delaware River down to the Delaware Bay. The Munsee (People of the Stony Country) lived in the north. The Unami (People Down River) and the Unalachtigo (People Who Live Near the Ocean) inhabited the central and southern areas of the homeland of the Lenni-Lenape. The peace loving Lenni-Lenape are called the "grandfathers" or "ancient ones" by many other tribes and are considered to be among the most ancient of the Northeastern Nations, spawning many of the tribes along the northeastern seaboard. We were known as warriors and diplomats, often keeping the peace and mediating disputes between our neighboring Native Nations and were admired by European colonist for our hospitality and mediation skills.

The Nanticoke Lenni-Lenape Indian Tribe (headquartered in Bridgeton, New Jersey) and the Lenape Indian Tribe of Delaware (headquartered in Cheswold, Delaware) and the Nanticoke Indian Tribe of Delaware are in an intertribal union, "The Confederation of Sovereign Nanticoke-Lenape Tribes." The purpose of the confederation is to promote the common good of our people, to defend our right to govern ourselves under our own laws, to protect and maintain our tribal culture and preserve the legacy of our ancestors. The confederation is an expression of the sovereignty given by the Creator to our tribal communities, a sovereignty that has continued from ancient times to the present. It is also an affirmation of the shared history and common ancestry between our interrelated tribal communities, made up of Lenape and Nanticoke (originally, "Nentego") families, which have remained in the area of their ancient homeland. For more than 10,000 years, our tribes called the area of the Delaware River and Bay down through to the Chesapeake Bay, "Home." Our three tribal communities are the modern Lenape and Nanticoke offspring of those 17th, 18th, and 19th Century Lenape Indian communities which history refers to by such names as the Indians of Cohansey Bridge, The Alloways, The Siconese, and The Sewapois... Unami and Unalachtigo families who remained from the Brotherton Reservation in New Jersey, also the Cheswold Indians of Delaware, and the Nanticoke Indians from the Chicone, Broad Creek and Indian River Reservations on the Delmarva Peninsula. Anthropologist and historians from the late 19th and early 20th century called us "Moors" and "Nanticokes." Over the past several centuries, our tribal communities and tribal families have been studied and documented by Brainerd, Fisher, Babcock, Speck, Gilbert, Weslager, Porter, Kraft, The Smithsonian Institute and many others. Our core families include those of documented descent from Lenape and Nanticoke treaty and land grant signers. Since the early days of Swedish, Dutch and English settlement, almost a half a millennia ago, our Lenape and Nanticoke ancestors intermingled and intermarried in order to survive the swift changes brought by the European incursion into our ancient homeland. While many from our tribes were forced west and north, eventually settling in the mid-western United States and Ontario Canada, the families that remained gathered into interrelated tribal communities and continued our tradition as "keepers of the land."

After the Great Spirit and creator of all, “He-Who-Creates-Us-By-Thought,” brought the world into being, there came a time very long ago when the animals were living in deep water with no dry land. They grew weary of being wet and wanted to find a way to bring up the mud from under the water. From the greatest to the least, each one dove under the water. One by one they tried to dive deep enough to bring up some of the mud. And, one by one, they failed, being unable to dive so deep and so long. It seemed as though none could bring up the mud from the bottom. All came back to the surface, gasping for air. It seemed an impossible task, for none was willing to risk their life to bring up the mud. Finally, after all the others had tried and failed, humble Muskrat took his turn. Muskrat dove deep and was under the water for a very long, long time. The other animals feared that Muskrat had drowned, for he stayed below the water much longer than any of them had. When Muskrat finally came back up to the surface, he was exhausted and close to death. The animals saw that there was a clump of mud scraped from the bottom in Muskrat’s paw. Humble Muskrat had risked his life to dive deeper than any of them had in order to bring the mud up from the bottom. “He-Who-Creates-Us-By-Thought” summoned Turtle to the surface of the water and placed the mud from Muskrat’s paw upon the back of Turtle. “He-Who-Creates-Us-By-Thought” caused the mud to grow, covering Turtle’s back. As Turtle continued to raise his back, more water drained off and the mud that grew and grew became dry, becoming the land. And the animals had dry land to live upon. One day, in the middle of the land upon Turtle’s back, there grew a tree. From that tree grew a shoot. And, from that shoot sprouted a man. The Man would have been all alone, but then the tree grew another shoot. And, from that shoot sprouted a woman. This was the first man and the first woman. They are the ancestors of us all. The Delawares say, that the heavens are inhabited by men, and that the Indians descended from them to inhabit the earth: That a pregnant woman had been put away by her husband, and thrown down upon the earth, where she was delivered of twins, and thus by degrees the earth was peopled. The Nanticokes pretend, that seven Indians had found themselves all on a sudden sitting on the sea-coast, but knew not how they came there, whether they were created on the spot, or came from some other place beyond the seas, and that by these the country was peopled.

The Nanticoke tribe was a northeast tribe located around Delaware. They later moved to Canada and Oklahoma. The Nanticoke Tribe can trace its origins to Labrador, Canada, where they migrated through the Great Lakes region into the Ohio Valley and then to the east. This was a similar migration pattern to the Shawnee and Lenape tribes. The English sought to establish a colony in the New World, and after failing in Roanoke, they were successful at Jamestown in 1605. Three years after Jamestown was founded, Captain John Smith came into contact with the Nanticoke tribe. The Nanticoke quickly saw the English as powerful allies and created an alliance. They also traded beaver pelts with the colonists. In the mid-17th century, the Nanticoke tribe signed a peace treaty with the Maryland Colony, which again helped them increase their security among many more powerful Native American tribes. In 1684, the Nanticoke and English governments came to an agreement as to how to share the land among the natives and colonists.

The Nanticoke Indian tribe was an Algonquian-speaking North American Indian people who lived on the eastern shore of what is now Maryland and southern Delaware. The name “Nanticoke” means “tidewater people.” The Nanticoke people were part of the larger Powhatan Chiefdom, which also included tribes such as the Pocomoke, Choptank, and Assateague tribes. Before colonization by the English, they were skilled farmers and fishermen, and their village sites have been found along the Nanticoke River, Wicomico River, and other waterways of the Chesapeake Bay. During the early colonial period, the Nanticoke people had contact with European settlers, particularly the English. Relations between the two groups were generally peaceful, but as the number of European settlers in the region increased, the Nanticoke people began to lose control of their lands and resources. In the 1600s, many Nanticokes began to migrate away from their original homeland. Nanticoke Indians have a long history with early 17th century colonists and were culturally similar to Lenape people, whom they considered elder kinfolk. They supported the British during the American Revolutionary War, but afterwards lost much of their power and land. In the 18th century, the Nanticoke people faced increasing pressure from European settlers. They were forced to cede their lands and move to reservations, or to assimilate into European-American culture. This included the forced removal of Native American children from their families and communities to attend boarding schools, where they were forced to adopt European-American customs and ways of life. By the 1800s, many had settled along the banks of Indian River Bay in what is now Delaware. Today, most of their descendants still live in parts of Maryland’s Eastern Shore and Southern Delaware, where they continue to teach about the history and culture of this small, indigenous nation through tribal gatherings, educational programs, museums, and more. Despite the significant challenges and losses they have faced, the Nanticoke Indian Tribe of Maryland has not disappeared. The tribe is officially recognized by the state of Maryland, but they are still working towards federal recognition. The Nanticoke Indian Tribe of Maryland continues to exist today and actively participate in various cultural and community events, to raise awareness and educate people about their history and heritage. They also preserve their traditional customs and practices, such as hunting, fishing, basket-making and traditional dances. The Nause-Waiwash tribe, numbering roughly 300, is an offshoot of the Nanticoke tribe. They are centered in Wicomico County, also along the Chesapeake and its many tributaries.