Atakapa

The Atakapa əˈtækəpə,_-pɑː or Atacapa were an Indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands, who spoke the Atakapa language and historically lived along the Gulf of Mexico in what is now Texas and Louisiana. They included several distinct bands. They spoke the Atakapa language, which was a linguistic isolate. After 1762, when Louisiana was transferred to Spain following French defeat in the Seven Years' War, little was written about the Atakapa as a people. Due to a high rate of deaths from infectious epidemics of the late 18th century, they ceased to function as a people. Survivors generally joined the Caddo, Koasati, and other neighboring peoples, although they kept some traditions. Some culturally distinct Atakapan descendants survived into the early 20th century. The Atakapa called themselves the Ishak iːˈʃæk, which translates as "the people." Their name was also spelled Attakapa, Attakapas, or Attacapa. Atakapa is either a Choctaw or Mobilian term meaning "eater of human flesh". The Choctaw used this term, meaning "man-eater", for their practice of ritual cannibalism. Europeans encountered the Choctaw first during their exploration, and adopted their name for this people to the west. The peoples lived in river valleys, along lake shores, and coasts from present-day Vermilion Bay, Louisiana to Galveston Bay, Texas. The Atakapa language was a language isolate, once spoken along the Louisiana and East Texas coast and believed extinct since the mid-20th century. John R. Swanton in 1919 proposed a Tunican language family that would include Atakapa, Tunica, and Chitimacha. Mary Haas later expanded this into the Gulf language family with the addition of the Muskogean languages. As of 2001, linguists generally do not consider these proposed families as proven. Atakapa oral history says that they originated from the sea. An ancestral prophet laid out the rules of conduct. The first European contact with the Atakapa may have been in 1528 by survivors of the Spanish Pánfilo de Narváez expedition.