Americana
THE CHETIMACHES. 163
They formerly inhabited the vicinity of the Lake Barataria, but, though
once a warlike people, were subdued by the Europeans early in the last century;
for Charlevoix, writing in the year 1722, says that the Chetimaches, were nearly
all destroyed at that time, and that the few of the tribe then remaining were
slaves to the French colony.
PLATE XIX *
CHETIMACHES.
The late Dr. Justus Le Beau, of New Orleans, presented me with two
genuine skulls of this tribe, which were exhumed from a cemetery in the Parish
of St. Mary, in Louisiana. Of these heads I have figured the largest, which
presents a singularly massive development. The nearly vertical occiput, the great
height of the skull, and the size and strength of the bones of the face, are not
surpassed by those of any Indian cranium I have seen. The measurements are
as follow:
MEASUREMENTS.
Longitudinal diameter, . . . .
Parietal diameter, . . . . .
Frontal diameter, . . . . .
Vertical diameter, . . . . •
Inter-mastoid arch, . . . . .
Inter-mastoid line, . . . . .
Occipito-frontal arch, . . . .
6.9 inches.
5.6 inches.
4.2 inches.
5.9 inches.
15.5 inches.
4.3 inches.
14. inches.
* In the regular order the Chetimaches should have preceded the Natchez.