TRIBAL SYNONYMY
Ähyä′to—Kiowa name; meaning unknown; the Kiowa call the wild plum by the same name.
Ano′s-anyotskano—Kichai name.
Ärä′păho—popular name; derivation uncertain; but, perhaps, as Dunbar suggests, from the Pawnee word tirapihu or larapĭhu, “he buys or trades,” in allusion to the Arapaho having formerly been the trading medium between the Pawnee, Osage, and others on the north, and the Kiowa, Comanche, and others to the southwest (Grinnell letter).
Äräpăkata—Crow name, from word Arapaho.
Bĕtidĕĕ—Kiowa Apache name.
Detseka′yaa—Caddo name, “dog eaters.”
Hitäniwo′ĭv—Cheyenne name, “cloud men.”
Inûna-ina—proper tribal name, “our people,” Or “people of our kind.”
Kaninahoic or Kanină′vish—Ojibwa name; meaning unknown.
Komse′ka-K̔iñahyup—former Kiowa name; “men of the worn-out leggings;” from komse′, “smoky, soiled, worn out;” kati, “leggings;” k̔̔iñahyup, “men.”
Maqpi′ăto—Sioux name, “blue cloud,” i. e., clear sky; reason unknown.
Niă′rharĭ′s-kûrikiwă′s-hûski—Wichita name.
Sani′ti′ka—Pawnee name, from the Comanche name.
Särĕtĭka—Comanche and Shoshoni name, “dog eaters,” in allusion to their special liking for dog flesh.
Sarĕtika—Wichita name, from the Comanche name.
TRIBAL SIGNS
Southern Arapaho, “rub noses;” northern Arapaho, “mother people;” Gros Ventres of the Prairie, “belly people.”
SKETCH OF THE TRIBE
The Arapaho, with their subtribe, the Gros Ventres, are one of the westernmost tribes of the wide-extending Algonquian stock. According to their oldest traditions they formerly lived in northeastern Minnesota and moved westward in company with the Cheyenne, who at that time lived on the Cheyenne fork of Red river. From the earliest period the two tribes have always been closely confederated, so that they have no recollection of a time when they were not allies. In the westward migration the Cheyenne took a more southerly direction toward the country of the Black hills, while the Arapaho continued more nearly westward up the Missouri. The Arapaho proper probably ascended on the southern side of the river, while the Gros Ventres went up the northern bank and finally drifted off toward the Blackfeet, with whom they have ever since been closely associated, although they have on several occasions made long visits, extending sometimes over several years, to their southern relatives, by whom they are still regarded as a part of the “Inûna-ina.” The others continued on to the great divide between the waters of the Missouri and those of the Columbia, then turning southward along the mountains, separated finally into two main divisions, the northern Arapaho continuing to occupy the head streams of the Missouri and the Yellowstone, in Montana and Wyoming, while the southern Arapaho made their camps on the head of the Platte, the Arkansas, and the Canadian, in Colorado and the adjacent states, frequently joining the Comanche and Kiowa in their raids far down into Mexico. From their earliest recollection, until put on reservations, they have been at war with the Shoshoni, Ute, Pawnee, and Navaho, but have generally been friendly with their other neighbors. The southern Arapaho and Cheyenne have usually acted in concert with the Comanche, Kiowa, and Kiowa Apache.
They recognize among themselves five original divisions, each having a different dialect. They are here given in the order of their importance:
1. Na′kasinĕ′na, Ba′achinĕna or Northern Arapaho. Nakasinĕna, “sagebrush men,” is the original name of this portion of the tribe and the divisional name used by themselves. The name Baachinĕna, by which they are commonly known to the rest of the tribe, is more modern and may mean “red willow (i. e., kinikinik) men,” or possibly “blood-pudding men,” the latter meaning said to have been an allusion to a kind of sausage formerly made by this band. They are commonly known as northern Arapaho, to distinguish them from the other large division living now in Oklahoma. The Kiowa distinguished them as Tägyä′ko, “sagebrush people,” a translation of their proper name, Baachinĕna. Although not the largest division, the Baachinĕna claim to be the “mother people” of the Arapaho, and have in their keeping the grand medicine of the tribe, the sĕicha or sacred pipe.
2. Na′wunĕna, “southern men,” or Southern Arapaho, called Nawathi′nĕha, “southerners,” by the northern Arapaho. This latter is said to be the archaic form. The southern Arapaho, living now in Oklahoma, constitute by far the larger division, although subordinate in the tribal sociology to the northern Arapaho. In addition to their everyday dialect, they are said to have an archaic dialect, some words of which approximate closely to Cheyenne.
3. Aä′ninĕna, Hitu′nĕna, or Gros Ventres of the Prairie. The first name, said to mean “white clay people” (from aäti, “white clay”), is that by which they call themselves. Hitunĕna or Hitunĕnina, “begging men,” “beggars,” or, more exactly, “spongers,” is the name by which they are called by the other Arapaho, on account, as these latter claim, of their propensity for filling their stomachs at the expense of someone else. The same idea is intended to be conveyed by the tribal sign, which signifies “belly people,” not “big bellies” (Gros Ventres), as rendered by the French Canadian trappers. The Kiowa call them Bot-k̔iñ′ago, “belly men.” By the Shoshoni, also, they are known as Sä′pani, “bellies,” while the Blackfeet call them Atsina, “gut people.” The Ojibwa call them Bahwetegow-ēninnewug, “fall people,” according to Tanner, whence they have sometimes been called Fall Indians or Rapid Indians, from their former residence about the rapids of the Saskatchewan. To the Sioux they are known as Sku′tani. Lewis and Clark improperly call them “Minnetarees of Fort de Prairie.” The Hidatsa or Minitari are sometimes known as Gros Ventres of the Missouri.