Shoshone

The Shoshone or Shoshoni (ⁱ/ʃoʊˈʃoʊniː/ or ⁱ/ʃəˈʃoʊniː/) are a Native American tribe with four large cultural/linguistic divisions:

They traditionally speak the Shoshoni language, part of the Numic languages branch of the large Uto-Aztecan language family. The Shoshone were sometimes called the Snake Indians by neighboring tribes and early European-Americans.

Name origin

The name "Shoshone" comes from Sosoni, a Shoshone word for high-growing grasses. Some neighboring tribes call the Shoshone "Grass House People," based on their traditional homes made from soshoni'. Shoshones called themselves Newe, meaning "People."

Meriwether Lewis recorded the tribe as the "Sosonees or snake Indians" in 1805.

Language

The Shoshoni language is spoken by approximately 1,000 people today. It belongs to the Central Numic branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Speakers are scattered from central Nevada to central Wyoming with the largest numbers of speakers (including children) on the Duck Valley and Goshute Reservations. The Idaho State University has Shoshoni language classes.

Shoshone (Snake River sternwheeler)

The Shoshone was the first steamboat built on the Snake River, Idaho, above Hells Canyon and the first of only two steamboats to be brought down through Hells Canyon to the lower Snake River. This was considered one of the most astounding feats of steamboat navigation ever accomplished.

Design and construction

In the mid-1860s there was a mining boom in the area of Boise, Idaho. The Oregon Steam Navigation Company had tried to run a steamboat, the Colonel Wright, up the Snake River through Hells Canyon, but this proved impossible. As an alternative, O.S.N. decided to build a steamboat on the upper Snake River; this vessel, the Shoshone, was launched in 1866 at Old Fort Boise, Idaho.

All the iron and machinery had to be packed in by mule overland, and a forge was set up to hammer the iron into fittings. The timber for her hull and cabins was cut in the mountains and hauled or floated to the construction site, where it was sawn into planks and other components for the vessel. It cost the company as much to build Shoshone as it took to build three boats elsewhere. Although she was a large boat and expensive, Shoshone drew less than two feet of water and had no difficulty navigating the river to Old's Ferry, Idaho.

Shoshone (disambiguation)

The Shoshone, also spelled Shoshoni, are a Native American people.

Shoshone and Shoshoni may also refer to:

Places

Other