The New International Encyclopædia/Cheyenne (tribe)

CHEYENNE, shī̇-ĕn′ or shē̇-. A brave and warlike plains tribe of Algonquian stock. They lived at one time on the Cheyenne River, of Minnesota, but, owing to pressure from the hostile Sioux, crossed the Missouri and drifted down into the plains. They have an interesting social organization, with eleven subdivisions and a council of five chiefs, besides the military organization known to the whites as the ‘Dog Soldiers.’ They are high-spirited and honorable, and have been prominent in nearly all the wars upon the plains up to a very recent period. They call themselves by a name which signifies ‘our people,’ the name Cheyenne being of Sioux origin and signifying ‘red’—i.e. ‘alien.’ They number now about 3450, of whom about 1400 (Northern Cheyenne) are on a reservation in Montana, the remainder (Southern Cheyenne) being associated with the Arapahoes in Oklahoma, their reservation having been opened to settlement in 1892.