A stop sign with both English and Cherokee lettering in Tahlequah, Oklahoma
12 January 2022
Oklahoma is an Indigenous name, but it is not a traditional name for the region. Rather, it was coined in 1866 by Allen Wright, born Kiliahote, principal chief of the Choctaw Nation. The name Oklahoma is formed from the Choctaw (Muskogean) words oklah (people) + homma (red) and was created in the context of the forced resettlement of Indigenous peoples to the region.
The inhabitants of the region now known as Oklahoma at the time of first contact with Europeans included the Plains Apache, Caddo, Comanche, Kiowa, Osage, and Wichita peoples.
The name Oklahoma is first recognized in print in an 1866 treaty between the United States and the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations. Wright was one of the negotiators for the Choctaw:
And it is further agreed that the superintendent of Indian affairs shall be the executive of the said territory, with the title of “governor of the Territory of Oklahoma.”
In 1828, the US Congress had set aside the land that would become Oklahoma for Indigenous peoples, and eventually over sixty tribes were forcibly resettled there. In 1889, the United States reneged on its agreements and opened the territory to settlement by white people. Oklahoma became the forty-sixth state in 1907.
Sources:
Bright, William. Native American Placenames of the United States. Norman: U of Oklahoma Press, 2004.
Everett-Heath, John. Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Place Names, sixth ed. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2020. Oxfordreference.com.
“Official. Department of State.” Daily Morning Chronicle (Washington, DC), 20 July 1866, 4. Readex: America’s Historical Newspapers.
Oxford English Dictionary, third edition, March 2004, modified March 2019, s.v. Oklahoma, n.
Image credit: Uyvsdi, 2007. Public domain image.