Historians and anthropologists studying the Native South have long aimed to explain eighteenth-century Creek political organization. They agree that Creek peoples prioritized local governance, allowing individual clans and communities to exercise autonomous decision-making that influenced the actions of headmen beyond the town level. Yet localism was complicated, and ethnohistorians continue to grapple with how a consensus-based town governance structure evolved into a Creek nation.
Rivers of Power joins this ongoing conversation. Steven Peach agrees that localism prevailed before 1815 but argues that Creeks conceptualized of their own governance, power, and sovereignty as an alliance of provinces. This province-centered form of government protected a cadre of visionary leaders while preserving community-based autonomy, allowing local people to exercise significant influence over decisions of diplomacy, war, and trade. Peach argues that this provincial analysis produces an “ethno-ethnohistorical” interpretation of Creek history that prioritizes Creek viewpoints to show how the actions and decisions of...
