Description
The Entiat are a Native American tribe who exclusively used and occupied an area extending from the Columbia River to the Cascade Mountains along the drainage system of the Entiat River. The Entiat are members of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, a federally recognized tribe. It is located on the Colville Indian Reservation in eastern Washington state. The Confederated Tribes have over 9,000 descendants from 12 aboriginal tribes. In addition to the Entiat, the tribes are known in English as the Colville, the Nespelem, the Sanpoil, the Lake (Sinixt), the Palus, the Wenatchi, the Chelan, the Methow, the southern Okanagan, the Sinkiuse-Columbia, and the Nez Perce of Chief Joseph's Band.
Language
The Entiat speak English. The native language of the tribe is a Salishan language made up of several different dialects among the tribes.
Culture
Villages were the basic political units of the region's tribes, usually composed of related individuals and essentially autonomous. Bonds between villages and between tribes were strengthened by shared habitat, shared language, intermarriage, and similar customs and values. Although considered by some ethnographers to be a subdivision of the larger Wenatchi tribe, the Entiat appear to have been an independent entity, as evidenced by the mark of Lahompt (or La-Hoom), the son of Entiat chief Chilcosahaskt, on the 1855 Yakama Treaty.