Muckleshoot

The Muckleshoot (Lushootseed: bəqəlšuł ) are a Lushootseed-speaking Native American tribe, part of the Coast Salish peoples of the Pacific Northwest. They are descendants of the Duwamish peoples whose traditional territory was located along the Green and White rivers, including up to the headwaters in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains, in present-day Washington State. Since the mid-19th century, their reservation is located in the area of Auburn, Washington, about 15 miles (24 km) northeast of Tacoma and 35 miles (55 km) southeast of Seattle.

The federally recognized Muckleshoot Indian Tribe is a group that formed post-Treaty, made up of related peoples who shared territory and later a reservation near Auburn. They organized a government in 1936; the tribe is composed of intermarried descendants of various tribal groups who inhabited Central Puget Sound and occupied the Green and White rivers' watershed, from the rivers' confluence in present-day Auburn to their headwaters in the Cascades. These include the following:

• Buklshuhls (later known as Muckleshoot) (buklshuhls - "from a high point from which you can see," which probably referred to a lookout site between the White and Green rivers) - they lived along the White River, from present-day Kent eastwards to the mountains and eventually to the Green River
• Duwamish - this people formed two bands before the mid-1850s
  • Dxʷ'Dəw?Abš / Dkhw'Duw'Absh ("People of the Inside (the environs of Elliott Bay)", also known as doo-AHBSH - "People of the Doo, i.e. Inside")
  • Xacuabš ("People of the Large Lake (Lake Washington)," also known as hah-choo-AHBSH - "people of HAH-choo," meaning 'a large lake', referring to what is known today as Lake Washington)
• Snoqualmie (S·dukʷalbixʷ / Sduqwalbixw) - they lived along the Tolt River and the Snoqualmie River)
• Upper Pyallup (River) people: Puyallup (Spuyaləpabš or S’Puyalupubsh) bands along the Upper Puyallup River
• White River Valley tribes:
  • Stkamish / Skekomish (Steq-ABSH) ("People of the log jam," named after the village Steq ("log jam") on the White (now Green) River in the Kent vicinity, the people of Steq were the Steq-ABSH; Settlers and government officials anglicized "Steq-ABSH" into Stkamish and applied the term to all villages between Auburn and Renton Junction, also known as White River Indians)
  • Smulkamish / Smalhkamish ("People of White River," named after the term that referred to the former course of the Upper White River) - They lived in villages on the present Muckleshoot Indian Reservation and near present-day Enumclaw)
  • Skopamish (Skop-ABSH / Skwohp-AHBSH) ("The People of the variable stream" or "Green ('fluctuating') River People." They were also known as the Green River Indians, related to their territory.) - They lived in the central Green River Valley, mostly above the former confluence near present-day Auburn. The term skop means "first big and then little," in apparent reference to fluctuations of the Green River. Another source says their name is derived from the village name ill-AHL-koh ("confluence" or "striped water") at the historic confluence of the White and Green rivers at the present-day town of Auburn, possibly from the striped appearance of the Green River below the confluence before the waters merged.
• Tkwakwamish / T'Qua-qua-mish (along the headwaters of the Puyallup River)
• Yilalkoamish tribe
• Dothliuk (they lived in the area of South Prairie, Washington, south of the mouth of Wilkeson Creek at its confluence with South Prairie Creek, a Carbon River tributary)