Timeline story
Yuchi on the Green River maps
In his 1953 handbook of North American tribes, Smithsonian ethnologist John R. Swanton wrote that "according to some early maps, the Yuchi had a town in this State on a river which appears to be identical with Green River." He did not name the maps or give a date.
No Yuchi town in Kentucky is otherwise documented, so the Green River mark is a single colonial map placement, not a known settlement.
The Yuchi (Euchee) speak a language unrelated to any other. The Tennessee Encyclopedia places their documented towns of the early 1700s on the Tennessee River: a town on an island near Muscle Shoals in 1701, and Chestua, near the mouth of the Hiwassee in east Tennessee, by 1712. Cherokee warriors destroyed Chestua in 1714.
Later Yuchi towns stood on the Savannah and Chattahoochee rivers. After removal in the 1830s, most Yuchi settled in Indian Territory, in present-day Oklahoma.
- Swanton, The Indian Tribes of North America, BAE Bulletin 145 (1953), Internet Archive on archive.org (opens in a new tab)
- Kentucky section of Swanton 1953, reproduced (Access Genealogy) on accessgenealogy.com (opens in a new tab)
- Yuchi Indians (Tennessee Encyclopedia) on tennesseeencyclopedia.net (opens in a new tab)
Cite this story
Published . Last revised .
Chicago
Snowden, Shannon. "Yuchi on the Green River maps." Kentucky History Drive. Published September 12, 2026. Last revised October 12, 2026. https://kyhistorydrive.com/stories/yuchi-on-the-green-river-maps/.
MLA
Snowden, Shannon. "Yuchi on the Green River maps." Kentucky History Drive, published 12 Sept. 2026, last revised 12 Oct. 2026, https://kyhistorydrive.com/stories/yuchi-on-the-green-river-maps/.
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