What did traditional Seminole shelters look like?

Traditional Seminole homes, known as chickees, were log-cabin style homes with palmetto thatched roofs. The chickees sometimes had two stories, with the sleeping rooms located on the second floor. The Seminole tribe first developed this housing style in the early 1800s.

The Seminole designed the chickee as temporary, disposable housing. They used chickees while trying to escape the U.S. military moving into Florida to relocate them. The housing had no walls; instead, its construction featured a thatched roof added to cypress logs placed upright in shallow earth. Once the Seminole had a more permanent settlement, they added second floors to their chickees.