Tribal, Northern Cheyenne (Morning Star)

NORTHERN CHEYENNE TRIBAL SYMBOL (MORNING STAR) -  The white symbol is the morning star.  However, Grinnell in Volume 1 of his 1923 Cheyenne Indians says the morning star can also be symbolized by a green disc.

The Cheyenne are one of the Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains and their language is of the Algonquian language family. The Cheyenne comprise two Native American tribes, the Só'taeo'o or Só'taétaneo'o (more commonly spelled as Suhtai or Sutaio) and the Tsétsêhéstâhese (also spelled Tsitsistas).  These tribes merged in the early 19th century.  Today, the Cheyenne people are split into two federally recognized Nations: the Southern Cheyenne, who are enrolled in the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes in Oklahoma, and the Northern Cheyenne, who are enrolled in the Northern Cheyenne Tribe of the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation in Montana.

Since separating from what are were called the Southern Cheyenne, and now simply the Cheyenne, in the early 1830s, the Northern Cheyenne stayed in the area around the Upper Platte River. Today it is still the home of the people who call themselves "Tsistsistas" or "beautiful people". The name Cheyenne was originally the name given them by the neighboring Sioux.  It meant "red talkers" or "people of a different speech".  This was because the Cheyenne language is an Algonquin based tongue, while the Lakota speak a Siouan dialect.  Tribal enrollment figures, as of late 2014, indicate that there are approximately 10,840 members, of which about 4,939 reside on the reservation.  Approximately 91% of the population are Native Americans (full or part race), with 72.8% identifying themselves as Cheyenne.  Slightly more than one quarter of the population five years or older spoke a language other than English.