The Seminole emerged from various Muscogee peoples, primarily Creek Indians from Georgia and Alabama, who migrated into the largely uninhabited Florida peninsula in the early 1700s, along with escaped slaves who sometimes joined them, and over time these groups became independent of the Creeks and were known as Seminole, meaning separatist or runaway. They had left their homelands to escape encroaching white settlers and for economic and internal political reasons. In September 1823, most Seminole leaders signed the Treaty of Moultrie Creek under government pressure, surrendering their homes, farms, and cattle ranches in northern Florida and relocating to a four million acre reservation in central Florida. Part of that reservation included the Cove of the Withlacoochee, a roughly 100 square mile region of swamps, wetlands, and hammocks in what is now Citrus County, formed by the bend of the Withlacoochee River and its meeting with the Lake Tsala Apopka Chain. With little assistance, the Seminole had to build new homes, find food in a wild and watery wilderness, and compete with white settlers for land and resources after leaving behind established ranches, including those near the Apalachicola River, Suwannee River, and Alachua Prairie where they had successfully raised cattle and used horses descended from animals brought by the Spanish in the 16th century. In the Cove, they relied on hunting, fishing, gardening, and survival skills to adapt to dense swamps and black waters filled with wildlife, and the difficult landscape also served as a refuge because its waterways limited land access, concealed women and children, and provided warning of approaching American forces. Although many Seminole were later forced by the U.S. Government to relocate to what is now Oklahoma, those who remained in Florida never conceded defeat and continue as an important part of Florida's culture, telling their own stories and speaking with their own voices.