Definify.com

Webster 1913 Edition

(să′chem)

Noun.

A chief of a tribe of the American Indians; a sagamore.

See

Noun.

In America, a chief among some of the native Indian tribes. [See Sagamore.]

sachem ‎(plural sachems)

A chief of a tribe of the American Natives; a sagamore.
- 1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick, chapter 16
  Planted with their broad ends on the deck, a circle of these slabs laced together, mutually sloped towards each other, and at the apex united in a tufted point, where the loose hairy fibres waved to and fro like the top-knot on some old Pottowottamie Sachem’s head.