Winyah

Close-up of Emanuel Bowen's 1752 map, Provinces of North & South Carolina, Georgia, depicting the location of the Winyah or 'Winyou' Indians.
Total population
106[1] (1715)
Regions with significant populations
United States ( South Carolina) Winyah Bay, Black River, and the lower course of the Pee Dee River.[2]
Languages
Siouan-Catawban[3] (Catawban)
Religion
Native American religion
Related ethnic groups
Cape Fear, Pedee, Waccamaw

The Winyah (/ˈwɪnjɑː/ WIN-yah) are a historic Indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands within the Carolinas. Their traditional territory lay in the South Carolina Lowcountry, near Winyah Bay, the Black River, and the lower course of the Pee Dee River, in the present-day counties of Clarendon, Williamsburg, and Georgetown. Their language is considered by academics to have belonged to the Catawban language family.

Despite often siding with the Province of South Carolina during the American Indian Wars, the Winyah were enslaved and exported in large numbers during the late 17th century.^[4] They are regarded by academics and historians as having persisted in the region longer than similarly enslaved tribes, despite their small size, due to having sided with colonists in a successful war against the Waccamaw in 1720.^[4][5] By 1755, all of the tribes of the region had disappeared from the historical record, with the Winyah appearing as late as 1752 on a map between the Black and Pee Dee rivers.^[4][5][6] After disappearing from historical records, the remaining Winyah are presumed, like other other small coastal tribes, to have been assimilated into English culture, being scattered about the settlements.^[7][8]