Talk:Natchez revolt

Revolt?
It is unclear from the article, or links, why this is called a 'revolt' as opposed to a 'war' between the Natchez & the French. Can some clarifying citations be added?Tttom1 (talk) 04:16, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Well I certainly wouldn't call it a war because it took place in only one day. Calling it a revolt is more appropriate because the Natchez were protesting the French's intervention in their society and it was relatively short-term. Jsayre64   (talk)  05:00, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
 * A battle during a war then. The article indicates several months of conflict, not one day. Revolt implies the Natchez were subjects of the French but I don't see anything supporting that. Independent peoples & nations don't 'revolt' against other nations, only their own nation. It is certainly a common misapplication in imperial and colonial times to justify aggression against other independent entities as putting down 'revolts' or 'rebellions'. According to Natchez people this was one of 4 wars and it is there called a 'rebellion' without any substantiation that this is about an actual rebellion. Tttom1 (talk) 02:09, 1 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Then how about we just go with "massacre"? That's in the title of the article, anyway. Jsayre64   (talk)  05:21, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

It was neither a revolt nor was it an act of war as their bloodletting was not committed against a military target. It was a massacre perpetrated against innocent French civilians, the majority of whom did not survive. To call it a revolt is an omission of fact to the point of insult to the memory of the innocent French colonials who died at the hands of the Natchez savages that day. Mrjrcash (talk) 02:17, 10 July 2020 (UTC)


 * there's no point in replying to a 7+ years old post. There is a more recent but still old discussion at the bottom. To change it you'd have to show that most reliable sources call it something else. See WP:Article titles. Doug Weller  talk 14:25, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Larger historical context + contradictions
The article currently seems to contradict the article on the Natchez people, which describes the 1730-31 war between the Natchez and the French as a disaster for the Natchez who ended up with no territory living dispersed among Cherokee and Chickasaw, and eventually driven to Oklahoma on the trail of tears. The massacre basically marks the end of the Natchez as a coherent nation. The article currently says that it "did not result in significant setbacks for the natives". Generally the article ignores the larger context of colonization of which the massacre and the French-Natchez wars were part, and it could do a better job at giving attention to the historical events leading up to the massacre and those following it. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:45, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Contemporary French sources
The article uses a number of 18th century accounts by Dumont de Montigny, Le Page du Pratz and as if they were an objective sources of history, when in fact they are historical documents. They obviously are not objective historical accounts, as they were partial to the event and were not writing objective history but memoirs. It seems unlikely for example that the Natchez should have a caste called "stinkards" which is clearly a French word. Any use of 17th century should be as a primary source, i.e. with in text attribution and no interpretation. The article needs to find more contemporary sources written by historians who have critically analyzed primary sources such as those that support the bulk of the article in its current state.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:55, 30 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I would encourage a much greater reliance on sources such as Sayre. Also Barnett's 2007, "The Natchez Indians: A History To 1735", seems to be an excellent source compared to reading the old French memoires.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 21:00, 30 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Also:
 * Patricia D. WoodsThe French and the Natchez Indians in Louisiana: 1700-1731 Louisiana History: The Journal of the Louisiana Historical Association Vol. 19, No. 4 (Autumn, 1978), pp. 413-435
 * Douglas R. White, George P. Murdock and Richard Scaglion. Natchez Class and Rank Reconsidered. Ethnology Vol. 10, No. 4 (Oct., 1971), pp. 369-388 (regarding the "stinkards")
 * ALBRECHT, A. C. (1946), INDIAN-FRENCH RELATIONS AT NATCHEZ. American Anthropologist, 48: 321–354.
 * MOONEY, J. (1899), THE END OF THE NATCHEZ. American Anthropologist, 1: 510–521
 * And finally there is an MA thesis from the LSU history department called "THESE SAVAGES ARE CALLED THE NATCHEZ: VIOLENCE AS EXCHANGE AND EXPRESSION IN NATCHEZ-FRENCH RELATIONS" that is probably not the best source, but at least as good as 300 year old primary sources and which is definitely an interesting read.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 21:08, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Additions
I have added sme information from Arnaud Balvay's 2013 chapter in the edited volume The French and the Indians in the Heart of North America. I have ordered the book through interlibrary loan, but as for now I have been using the google preview which has no page numbers. When the book arrives I will supply page numbers. The chapter which is a summary of his 2008 book in French contradicts a lot of the romantic view of settler harmony and shows that there was increasing tensions between Natchez and French in the decades before the revolt, and he als shows that the retaliations by the French chased destroyed the Natchez as a people forcing them to live scattered among Creek and Cherokees as refugees by 1740.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 00:08, 31 August 2013 (UTC)

Questions to be solved
User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:33, 1 September 2013 (UTC)
 * We give the date of the massacre as November 29th - Barnett 2007:104 gives November 28th. Which is it? Du Pratz says they set out on the eve of St. Andrew which is the night of november 29th.
 * We also claim that the NAtchez woman who warned the French of the attack was Tattooed Arm. This seems unlikely given that she was the Female Chief of the matrilineal Natchez. Barnett states that it was the Natchez lover of a French officer, citing Du Pratz. [Checked Du Pratz and he says that Tattooed Arm told Natchez women to warn their French lovers]
 * The Number of dead. Currently the article says 240. Barnett gives two figures that are quite a bit lower. Ive removed the Conrad source wiwhich was cited for the 240 figure - and which does not seem to be a specialized source regarding the Natchez.

Title: Proposed move to Natchez revolt, or Natchez Wars
I think that the title is a little problematic both because it is somewhat non-neutral focusing solely on the casualties inflicted by Natchez against French and not on the subsequent retaliation by the French which basically amounted to genocide. Secondly most of the recent sources focus on the fact that the massacre of Fort Rosalie was a revolt against an increasingly intrusive and oppresive form of colonization by the French, and call it a revolt. I think Natchez revolt is a better title both because of this, and because it better describes the topic of the article which is the entire situation surrounding the French/Natchez hostilities, and not only the massacre at Fort Rosalie.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 17:39, 2 December 2013 (UTC)


 * OK, you have a pretty convincing argument. I will change the title to "Natchez revolt" and start updating links in other articles, though hopefully this won't be a disruption to the upcoming A-class review? Jsayre64   (talk)  06:11, 3 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Nah, it shouldn't be a disruption, but certainly something we would want to have figured out by the end of the review.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 16:20, 3 December 2013 (UTC)