The name Haliwa is derived from the two counties: Halifax and Warren, which are the ancestral homelands of the Haliwa people dating from the 1730s. They re-organized and adopted their current form of government in 1953 and were recognized in 1965 by the state of North Carolina. In 1979 the tribe added Saponi to their name to reflect their descent from the historical Saponi peoples, part of the large Siouan languages family, who were formerly located in the Piedmont of present-day Virginia and the Carolinas.