Acolapissa

The Acolapissa were a small Muskogean-speaking people of the Southeastern Woodlands who lived along the Pearl River, between present-day Louisiana and Mississippi, in at least six villages. Their language was close to Choctaw and Chickasaw, and their name is read in Choctaw as okla pisa, those who look out for people.

In 1699 a band of Chickasaw led by two English slave traders raided their villages to carry off captives for sale in Charleston. Around 1702 the Acolapissa moved to a bayou north of Lake Pontchartrain and gave shelter to the Natchitoches, then in 1722 shifted west toward the future site of New Orleans.

Weakened by French settlement and European diseases, they merged with the Bayogoula and by 1739 had been absorbed into the Houma, disappearing as a separate tribe.