Tangipahoa Indians (from tandshi,’maize’; apa, ‘stalk,’ ‘cob’; ava, ‘to gather’: ‘those who gather maize stalks or cobs.’ Wright. Pénicat explains the river name Tandgepao erroneously as ‘white wheat or corn’ ). An extinct tribe, supposed to be Muskhogean, formerly living on the lower Mississippi and on Tangipahoa river, which flows south into Lake Pontchartrain, south east Louisiana. Tonti mentions this people as residing, in 1682, on the Mississippi, 12 leagues from the. Quinipissa village; but, according to Iberville 1, the Bayogoula informed him that the Tangipahoa had never lived on the Mississippi; nevertheless both statements agree in making their town one of the 7 villages of the Acolapissa. When La Salle reached their village he found that it had recently been burned, and saw dead bodies lying on one another. According to the information given Iberville by the Bayogoula,, the village had been destroyed by the Huma. Nothing definite is known of the language and affinities of the tribe, but their apparent relations with the Acolapissa indicate Muskhogean affinity. Their village was one of those said to belong to the Acolapissa.
Citations:
- Iberville, Margry, Dec., iv, 168, 1880[↩]