[5] The Natchez are noted for being the only Mississippian culture with complex chiefdom characteristics to have survived long into the period of European colonization.

Other Mississippian societies in the southeast had generally experienced important transformations shortly after contact with the Spanish Empire or other settler colonists from across the ocean.

Most of the captured survivors were shipped to Saint-Domingue and sold into slavery; others took refuge with other tribes, such as the Muskogean Chickasaw and Creek, and the Iroquoian-speaking Cherokee.

Its peoples are noted for their hierarchical communities, building complex earthworks and platform mound architecture, and intensively cultivating maize.

[12] During the early 18th century, according to French sources, the Natchez lived in six to nine village districts with a population estimated at 4,000–6,000 people, and with the ability to muster 1,500 warriors.

The Great Sun had supreme authority over civil affairs, and the Tattooed Serpent oversaw political issues of war and peace, and diplomacy with other nations.

[16] The practice of ritual suicide and infanticide upon the death of a chief existed among other Native Americans living along the lower Mississippi River, such as the Taensa.

[17] During the late 17th and early 18th centuries, French colonists in the American Southeast initiated a power struggle with those living in the colony of Carolina.

Traders from Carolina had established a large trading network among the indigenous peoples of the American Southeast, and by 1700 it stretched west as far as the Mississippi River.

The Chickasaw tribe, who lived north of the Natchez, were frequently visited by Carolinian traders, thus giving them access to a source of firearms and alcohol.

For decades, the Chickasaw conducted slave raids over a wide region in the American Southeast, often being joined by allied Natchez and Yazoo warriors.

In one instance, a 1713 raiding party of Chickasaw, Natchez, and Yazoo raiders attacked the Chaouachas, an Indian tribe living near the mouth of the Mississippi River.

Most Indian tribes in the region sought to maintain trade links with as many Europeans as possible, encouraging competition and price reductions.

Others, including White Apple, Jenzenaque, and Grigra, maintained their distance from the French and entertained the possibility of seeking alliances elsewhere.

The Great Sun and Tattooed Serpent leaders lived in the Grand Village of the Natchez and were generally friendly toward the French.

[22] Perier broke with Bienville's policy of diplomatic engagement with the Natchez and other tribes,[23][24] and refused to recognize Native American ownership of their traditional lands.

[11] On November 28, 1729, the Natchez led by Indian chief the Great Sun, attacked and destroyed the entire French settlement at Fort Rosalie, killing between 229 and 285 colonists and taking about 450 women and children captive.

[27][29][30] After the attack on Fort Rosalie, Perier decided that the complete destruction of the Natchez was required to ensure the prosperity and safety of the French colony.

Two days later a force of about 500 Choctaw attacked and captured the fort, killing at least 100 Natchez, and recovered about 50 French captives and 50–100 African slaves.

[32][33] Although significantly weakened by the defeat, the Natchez managed to regroup and make one last attack on the French at Fort St. Jean Baptiste in October 1731.

With reinforcements from Spain and Native American allies, the French under the fort's commander Louis Juchereau de St. Denis mounted a counter attack and defeated the Natchez.

In January 1730 a group of African slaves fought off a Choctaw attack, giving the Natchez time to regroup in their forts.

In June 1731, a group of enslaved Bambara, inspired by the Natchez revolt, attempted to organize a slave uprising, but French authorities disputed the Samba rebellion before they could act.

This gave them important connections into the colonial society, contributing to their achieving an independent social status between the French colonists and slaves.

[40] During this time, the Natchez enjoyed signatory status and membership within the Creek Confederacy and established their town near the Coosa River in Talladega County, Alabama.

[dubious – discuss] Membership is based on matrilineal descent from people listed on the Dawes Rolls or the updated records of 1973.

[44] Historically small Natchez communities and settlements were dispersed throughout the Southeast as far east as South Carolina, after having been scattered from Mississippi by the French in 1731.

[45] The Governor of the Province of South Carolina, James Glen, permitted this small group, composed of seven men, in addition to women and children, permission to settle near Edisto River.

Researchers who argue for this idea often couple it with the proposal that the Natchez system of noble exogamy in the early 18th century was a relatively recent development in their society.

[52] Lorenz proposes that the entire kinship system was not based on classes, castes, or clans, but rather degrees of genealogical separation from the ruling Sun matriline.