Osage

Osage

noun \ō-ˈsāj, ˈō-ˌ\

plural Osag·es or Osage

Definition of OSAGE

1

: a member of an American Indian people originally of Missouri

2

: the Siouan language of the Osage people

Origin of OSAGE

French, probably from an Algonquian language, from Osage wažáže, a self-designation

First Known Use: 1698

Osage

geographical name \ō-ˈsāj, ˈō-ˌ\

Definition of OSAGE

river E Kansas & Missouri flowing E into Missouri River; now partly submerged in Lake of the Ozarks

Osage

noun    (Concise Encyclopedia)

North American Plains Indian people living mostly in Oklahoma, U.S. Their language is Siouan. The name Osage is a French alliteration of Wazhazhe, the name for one of the two ancient kin groups (Tsishu is the other) from which the tribe descended. They lived variously in the Piedmont and Ozark plateaus and the western Missouri and southeastern Kansas prairies. Their culture was marked by the combination of village agriculture and buffalo hunting. Their villages consisted of longhouses; tepees were used during the hunting season. Their religious ceremonies divided clans into symbolic sky and earth groups. In the late 19th century the Osage were removed to a reservation in Oklahoma. The discovery of oil there made them an unusually prosperous tribe. Early 21st-century population estimates indicated some 16,000 individuals of Osage descent.