Nottoway Tribe
Chief Walter D. "Red Hawk" Brown III of the Cheroenhaka (Nottoway) Indian Tribe
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| Total population | |
|---|---|
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(Enrolled members: Cheroenhaka (Nottoway): Southampton County, Virginia: 272) |
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| Regions with significant populations | |
 United States Virginia
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| Languages | |
| English, Iroquoian Nottoway (historical) | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Meherrin, Tuscarora |
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| (Nottoway Indian Tribe of VA: Southampton County into Surry County: 180) | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
|
United States Virginia
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|
| Languages | |
| English, Iroquoian Nottoway (historical) | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Meherrin, Tuscarora |
(Enrolled members:
The Nottoway (in their own language Cheroenhaka) are an Iroquoian-
language tribe of Virginia Indians. The Nottoway Indian Tribe of Virginia and the Cheroenhaka (Nottoway) Indian Tribe have both been recognized as tribes by the state of Virginia. The Nottoway Indian Tribe of Virginia live from Southampton County into Surry County and the Tidewater region, and the Cheroenhaka (Nottoway) Indian Tribe live in Southampton County and surrounding counties in Virginia and North Carolina. Since colonial times, treaties by regional government with the Nottoway attested to their presence as a distinct people.
Both contemporary tribes received state recognition in February 2010. Among several Virginia tribes that were deprived of their land during the colonial era, they are not federally recognized.
The meaning of the name Cheroenhaka (Tuscarora: Čiruʼęhá·ka·ʼ) is uncertain. (It has been spelled in various ways: Cherohakah, Cheroohoka or Tcherohaka.) The late Iroquoian scholar Dr. Blair Rudes analyzed the second element as -hakaʼ meaning "one or people who is/are characterized in a certain way". He conjectured that the first element of the name was related to the Tuscarora term čárhuʼ (meaning tobacco, as both tribes used this in ceremonies). The term has also been interpreted as "People at the Fork of the Stream".
The term Nottoway may derive from Nadawa or Nadowessioux (widely translated as "poisonous snake"), an Algonquian-language term which speakers used to refer to members of competing language families, specifically the Iroquoian- or Siouan-speaking tribes. Because the Algonquian occupied the coastal areas, they were the first tribes met by the English. The colonists often adopted use of such Algonquian ethnonyms, names for other tribes, not realizing at first that these differed from the tribes' autonyms or names for themselves.
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