The Occaneechi (also Occoneechee, Akenatzy, etc.)

are Native Americans who live primarily on a large, 4-mile (6.4 km) long Island surrounded by the Dan and Roanoke rivers near current day Clarksville, Virginia at the time of European contact.

They are Siouan-speaking, and thus related to the Saponi, Tutelo, Eno and other Southeastern Siouan-language peoples living in the Piedmont region of present-day North Carolina and Virginia.Eastern Siouan tribes also inhabit approximately half of South Carolina and parts of Georgia, West Virginia, and Ohio.In 1676, the tribe is attacked by European settlers and decimated.

Also under demographic pressure from European settlement and newly introduced infectious diseases, the Saponi and Tutelo come to live near the Occaneechi on adjacent islands.

By 1714, the Occaneechi move to join the Tutelo, Saponi, and other Siouan people living on a 36-square-mile (93 km2) reservation in current-day Brunswick County, Virginia.

It includes a fort called Christanna.

The Siouan people have been drastically reduced to approximately 600 people.

Fort Christanna is closed in 1717, after which there are few written references to the Occaneechi.

Colonists record that they left the area in 1740 and migrated north for protection with the Iroquois.During the 19th and 20th centuries, some remnant Siouan peoples gather together and work o retain their identity as Native Americans.

Over the years, some marry people of other ethnicities, but generally bring them within the tribe.

In the late 20th century, they organize as the self-named Occaneechi Band of the Saponi Nation.

In 2002 the tribe is formally recognized by the state of North Carolina.

About 900 tribal members live primarily in Alamance County.