Creek Language Archive
About Creek
Creek (or Muskogee) is a living language spoken in Oklahoma and Florida. Creek was originally spoken in northern Alabama and southern Georgia. In the 1700s and early 1800s, some Creek speakers moved to Florida and became known as Seminoles. In the 1830s, most Creeks and Seminoles were forced to move to Indian Territory.
Today Creek is spoken by several thousand citizens of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma, and the Seminole Tribe of Florida.
Some of the earliest written records of Creek were made near Savannah, Georgia. The drawing below is from 1736:
From Kristian Hvidt, ed. (1980), Von Reck's Voyage: Drawings and Journal of Philip Georg Friedrich von Reck. Savannah: The Beehive Press.
Underneath the Uchi (Euchee) word "Taweg Zene" is "Creek" and then "Ta-fo-lope", the word for butterfly.
Laws were being written in Creek as early as 1849:
Creek article in law from Aspberry (1849).
A ‘National Alphabet’ was adopted by many interpreters and chiefs in 1853. Readers in this spelling appeared after the Civil War:
W. S. Robertson’s and David Winslett’s 1867 Nakcokv Es Kerretv Enhvteceskv, Creek First Reader.
By the 1870s, newspaper articles and advertisements were being written in Creek:
Creek advertisement by Grayson Brothers, from the Indian Journal, Thursday, November 2, 1876. The ad offers 12 yards of ribbon at $1.00, women’s shoes at $2.50, and pant fabric at 25 cents a yard.