Iowas

The Iowa, also known as Ioway, and the Bah-Kho-Je or Báxoje (English: grey snow; Chiwere: Báxoje ich'é) are a Native American Siouan people. Today, they are enrolled in either of two federally recognized tribes, the Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma and the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska. The Iowa, Missouria, and Otoe tribes were all once part of the Ho-Chunk people; and they are all Chiwere language-speaking peoples. They left their ancestral homelands in Southern Wisconsin for Eastern Iowa, a state that bears their name. In 1837, the Iowa were moved from Iowa to reservations in Brown County, Kansas, and Richardson County, Nebraska. Bands of Iowa moved to Indian Territory in the late 19th century and settled south of Perkins, Oklahoma to become the Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma. The Ioway tribe is also known as the Báxoje tribe. Their name has been said to come from the Sioux ayuhwa ("sleepy ones."). Early European explorers often adopted the names of tribes from the ethnonyms which other tribes gave them, not understanding that these differed from what the peoples called themselves. Thus, ayuhwa is not an Ioway word. The word Ioway comes from Dakotan ayuxbe via French aiouez. Their autonym (their name for themselves) is Bah-Kho-Je, pronounced b̥aꜜxodʒɛ (alternate spellings: pahotcha, pahucha, báxoje,), which translates to "grey snow". Báxoje has been incorrectly translated as "dusted faces" or "dusty nose". The state of Iowa, where they once lived, was named after this tribe. Their name has been applied to other locations, such as Iowa County, Iowa City and the Iowa River. Their estimated 1760 population of 1,100 dropped to 800 and by 1804, a decrease caused mainly by smallpox, to which they had no natural immunity. Their numbers were reduced to 500 by 1900. In 1960, 100 Iowa lived in Kansas and 100 in Oklahoma. By 1980 their population had recovered to 1,000 (of which only 20 spoke Iowa). In 1990 there were 1,700 people.