of other tribes being designated as Creek, Catawba, etc.,
as the case may be. On ceremonial occasions they frequently speak of
themselves as Ani'-Kitu'hwagi, or "people of Kitu'hwa," an ancient
settlement on Tuckasegee river and apparently the original nucleus of
the tribe. Among the western Cherokee this name has been adopted
by a secret society recruited from the full-blood element and pledged
to resist the advances of the white man's civilization. Under the
various forms of Cuttawa, Gattochwa, Kittuwa. etc.. as spelled by dif-
ferent authors, it was also used by several northern Algonquian tribes
as a synonym for Cherokee.
Cherokee, the name by which they are commonly known, has no
meaning in their own language, and seems to be of foreign origin.
As used among themselves the form is Tsa'lagi' or Tsa'ragi'. It first
appears as Chalaque in the Portugueseboth the application and the etymology of this last name there
has been much dispute, but there seems no reasonable doubt as to the
identity of the people.
Linguistically the Cherokee belong to the Iroquoian stock, the
relationship having been suspected by Barton over a century ago, and
by Gallatin and Hale at a later period, and definitely established by
Hewitt in 1887. ] While there can now be no question of the connec-
tion, the marked lexical and grammatical differences indicate that the
separation must have occurred at a very early period. As is usually
the case with a large tribe occupying an extensive territory, the lan-
guage is spoken in several dialects, the principal of which may. for
want of other names, be conveniently designated as the Eastern. Middle,
and Western. Adair's classification into "Aviate" (.'///<//), or low,