Dakota, Lakota, and Teton -- The Lakotas and the Black Hills

From pages 6 - 7:

The earliest written evidence of the Lakotas comes form the mid- and late 1600s, when French explorers, traders, and missionaries arrived in the woodlands of the western Great Lakes and the upper Mississippi river. There the French met tribes that included the Ottawas, Foxes, Pottawatomis, Hurons, Ojibwas, and a group they called the Sioux (after an Ottaw term the French wrote as "Nadouessioux"), which was divided into the Sioux of the East (living near the Mississippi River) and the Sioux of the West (living toward the Missouri River). The Sioux later cam to call themselves Oceti Sakowin Kin, "the Seven Council Fires," referring to the seven people of which the tribe is composed.

The westernmost of these were the Titonwan, or Tetons, commonly known today as Lakotas after the dialect they speak. The six other Council Fires speak the closely related dialect of Dakota. (Lakota speakers use "l" wehre Dakotas use "d." For example, they say kola for "friend," while Dakota speakers say koda.)

The Lakotas, in turn, are divided into seven tribes -- Oglalas, Brules, Minneconjous, Hunkpapas, Two Kettles, Sihasaps, and Sans Arcs. Based on early observations, most scholars think that the Lakota lived at the time in the tallgrass prairies of southwestern Minnesota and the eastern Dakotas ansd were a buffalo-hunting people.

And that's your lesson today: the origin of "Dakota" and the difference among the words Dakota, Lakota, and Teton.