A Sacred Path: The Way of the Muscogee Creeks

By Jean Chaudhuri and Joyotpaul Chaudhuri, 2001.

A Sacred Path explains and documents Creek persistence as a people despite having been defrauded and dispossessed of their ancient homelands. The book connects the Muscogee sacred history with the land, the spirit world, the confederacy’s sociopolitical organization, and its ceremonial cycle in a carefully researched and well-written single volume. It is an exploration of Muscogee Creek values and views, including concepts of nature, genesis, gender relations, religion, and history. Written from a traditional full-blood Muscogee citizen’s perspective and compiled through the teachings of many traditional elders and leaders, the book is a valuable addition to the current body of literature on the tribe.

191 pp.

$15 paper; ISBN 978-0-935626-54-9

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Dedication

1. The Muscogee Creek Path: An Introduction

2. Links to the Cosmos: Mounds, Sun, Moon, and Stars

3. Muscogee Genesis: The Creation of the Earth and the Emergence of the Clans

4. Way of the Spirit: The First Principles of Religion

5. The Formation of Community: The Masculine Elements of Red Sticks and White Sticks

6. The Formation of Community: The Feminine Principle

7. Around the Ceremonial Fire

8. Ethnicity and Diversity in Creek Traditions: Natives, Mixed-Bloods, African Americans, and Whites

9. The Muscogee Political System: The Authoratative Allocation of Values

10. The Harmony of Nature, Norms, and Production

11. Placating Nature: Medicine, Magic, Myth, Transformation, and Trickery

12. Culture and Continuity: A preface to Creek History

Maps, Photos, Illustrations

Early Muscogee Alphabet and English Equivalent

Glossary

Appendix

About the Authors

Index