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13 2 The Confluence of Rivers The Indigenous Tribes of Idaho Rodney Frey and Robert McCarl L ike the confluence of great rivers, the histories of the indigenous tribes of Idaho represent the intermingling of the waters of distinct rivers. Among the many rivers, there are two pivotal rivers that are essential to understanding these rich histories. One carries the waters of each tribe’s particular oral traditions, its indigenous culture. These waters are rich with languages, songs, and aesthetics, with family, kinship, and ecological orientations, and with stories of creation, such as those of Coyote, Grizzly Bear, and other Animal Peoples. This is a river expressive of the unique heritage and dreams of sovereign peoples. Flowing between the banks of another, altogether different river are the waters of Euro-American contact history.1 These are waters expressive of the effects of the horse and smallpox, and of encounters with the Lewis and Clark Expedition, fur traders , missionaries, military generals, and treaty commissioners. This is the river of federal acts creating reservations and allotments, of federal acts of reorganization, self-determination, and gaming, of Euro-American influences continuing into the present. Found here are the waters that have fortuitously, or more often by intent, sought to redefine, modify, destroy, or deny the sovereignty of the tribes. An appreciation of the specific intermingling of both rivers, at the point of confluence, is essential to understanding the history of any given tribe. That confluence differs in specific character and content from locale to locale, contributing to the unique histories of each tribe. Nevertheless, common to the confluences of all the tribes are certain shared experiences related to the quest to maintain tribal sovereignty in the face of assimilation by Euro-American influences. As the histories of the Idaho tribes are far too Figure 2.1. Indigenous Idaho Indigenous peoples of idaho Ktunaxa (Kootenai) Qlispe (Kalispel) Schitsu’umsh (Coeur d’Alene) Washington Montana Nimiipuu (Nez Perce) Oregon Newe   Bannaqwate (Shoshone) (Bannock) Numa (Northern Paiute) Wyoming The Indigenous Tribes of Idaho 15 extensive to be adequately conveyed here, the intent in this chapter is to highlight but a few representative currents from both rivers and provide a historical overview of Idaho’s indigenous peoples. In so doing, we are sensitive to Indian perspectives on their own histories and seek to integrate their viewpoints into this essay.2 There are seven indigenous peoples of Idaho, each with its own distinctive ancestry linking it to the aboriginal landscape. Reflecting the influences of both the Animal Peoples and Euro-American rivers, each of these peoples is known by two sets of names—the name asserted by the people themselves and the name given to them by newcomers. In their aboriginal homeland and extending far beyond the boundaries of what would become Idaho, from north to south, are the Ktunaxa (Kootenai), the Qlispé (Kalispel ), the Schitsu’umsh (Coeur d’Alene), the Nimíipuu (Nez Perce), the Newe (Shoshone), the Bannaqwate (Bannock), and the Numa (Northern Paiute). Today, these tribal groups reside on six reservation communities in Idaho, as well as in reservation communities in neighboring British Columbia, Alberta , Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington.3 The Ktunaxa (a term of self-designation, applied to all Kootenai bands, the meaning of which is unclear) or Kootenai (derivative of Ktunaxa) have traditionally resided in a large region that would become southern British Columbia and Alberta and the northwest, northern, and northeastern areas of what would become Montana, Idaho, and Washington respectively. This is the region of the Kootenay/Kootenai and Columbia Rivers and the banks of the Arrow Lakes. Their language is an isolate, linguistically unrelated to any other tribal language in the region. In Idaho, one band of the Ktunaxa, the ʔaq’anqmi (“People of the island” [pronounced with an initial glottal stop], in reference to the band’s location on the Kootenai River near Bonners Ferry), reside on the 19-acre Kootenai Indian Reservation near Bonners Ferry, with an enrolled tribal membership of more than two hundred individuals. Other Ktunaxa bands reside on the 1.3-million-acre Flathead Indian Reservation of Montana or on various reserves throughout southeastern British Columbia and southwestern Alberta, Canada.4 The Qlispé (meaning unknown, though it may refer to a place-name location) or Kalispel (from the Salishian term qlispé) were a river-oriented people, traditionally living along the Clark Fork River in Montana, the 16Rodney Frey and Robert McCarl shores of Lake Pend Oreille, and along the Pend Oreille...

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