Alabama and Coushatta EAGLE Pins from Zazzle.com

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The Coushatta (also Koasati) are a Native American people living primarily in the U.S. state of Louisiana. Most Coushatta live in Allen Parish, just north of the town of Elton, Louisiana, though a smaller number share a reservation near Livingston, Texas with the Alabama people. There is also an Alabama-Quassarte Tribal Town in Oklahoma. The Coushatta were traditionally agriculturalists, growing maize and other food crops, and supplementing their diet by hunting game. They are also known for their skill at basketry. In the 20th century they began cultivating rice and crawfish on tribally owned farms. The Coushatta language, in the Muskogean family, is still spoken, although in the early 21st century fewer young people are learning it. In the 17th and 18th centuries, some of the Coushatta (Koasati) joined the emerging Creek Confederacy, where they became known as part of the "Upper Creeks" and said to be closely related to the Alabama Indians. Earlier, nearly all the Spanish expeditions into the interior of Spanish Florida encountered the original town of the tribe, referring to them as "Coste", with their nearby neighbors being the Chiaha, the Chisca Yuchi, the Tasquiqui, and the Tali. This town was most likely in the Tennessee Valley.********************The Alabama or Alibamu (Albaamaha in the Alabama language) are a Southeastern culture people of Native Americans. The two tribes are closely related. The Alibamu and Koasati tribes were part of the Creek Confederacy. They had less contact with British settlers than other Creek tribes, so it is no surprise that they were the first to leave when the British settlers swarmed into the area by the middle of the 18th century. By 1820, there were three main Alabama towns and three large Coushatta towns in east Texas, in the region known as the Big Thicket. In 1854, the Alabamas were given 1280 acres in Polk County. The following year, 640 acres, also in Polk County, were given to the Coushattas. The Coushatta claim was disputed by white settlers in 1859. When the Coushatta lost the land claim, the Alabama asked them to come live on their land claim. The federal government approved a large grant to purchase land near the reservation in 1928. It was granted to the "Alabama and Coushatta tribes." Since that time, the reservation has officially been known as “Alabama-Coushatta.” The two tribes also share cultural characteristics. In a hearing before the Indian Claims Commission in 1974, Dr. Daniel Jacobson suggested that the Alabama and Coushatta tribes were culturally related because of intermarriage. The Handbook of Texas reports that the languages come from the same stock, even though there could be some word variance. Certainly, origin myths focus on the interconnectedness of the tribes. One myth states that the two tribes sprouted from either side of a cypress tree. Another legend was recorded in 1857 from Se-ko-pe-chi, one of the oldest Creeks in Indian Territory. He said that the tribes “sprang out of the ground between the Cohawba and Alabama Rivers.” Finally, the very symbol of the Alabama-Coushatta tribe, featured on their website, portrays two intertwined waterfowl, symbolic of the connection between the two tribes.