Iroquoian peoples

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Pre-contact distribution of Iroquoian languages Iroquoian langs.png
Pre-contact distribution of Iroquoian languages

The Iroquoian peoples are an ethnolinguistic group of peoples from eastern North America. Their traditional territories, often referred to by scholars as Iroquoia, [1] stretch from the mouth of the St. Lawrence River in the north, to modern-day North Carolina in the south.

Contents

Historical Iroquoian people were the Five nations of the Iroquois or Haudenosaunee, Huron or Wendat, Petun, Neutral or Attawandaron, Erie people, Wenro, Susquehannock and the St. Lawrence Iroquoians.

The Cherokee are also an Iroquoian-speaking people.

There is archaeological evidence for Iroquoian peoples "in the area around present-day New York state by approximately 500 to 600 CE, and possibly as far back as 4000 BCE. Their distinctive culture seems to have developed by about 1000 CE.

List of Iroquoian peoples

History

Iroquois mythology tells that the Iroquoian people have their origin in a woman who fell from the sky, [2] and that they have always been on Turtle Island. [3]

Iroquoian societies were affected by the wave of infectious diseases resulting from the arrival of Europeans. For example, it is estimated that by the mid-17th century, the Huron population had decreased from 20,00030,000 to about 9000, while the Petun population dropped from around 8000 to 3000. [4]

Archaeology

The Hopewell tradition describes the common aspects of an ancient pre-Columbian Native American civilization that flourished in settlements along rivers in the northeastern and midwestern Eastern Woodlands from 100 BCE to 500 CE, in the Middle Woodland period. The Hopewell tradition was not a single culture or society, but a widely dispersed set of populations connected by a common network of trade routes. This is known as the Hopewell exchange system.

There is archaeological evidence for Iroquoian peoples "in the area around present-day New York state by approximately 500 to 600 CE, and possibly as far back as 4000 BCE. Their distinctive culture seems to have developed by about 1000 CE." [5]

Ontario Iroquois tradition

The Ontario Iroquois tradition was conceptualized by the archaeologist J. V. Wright in 1966. [6] It encompasses a group of archaeological cultures considered by archaeologists to be Iroquoian or proto-Iroquoian in character. In the Early Ontario Iroquois stage (likely beginning around AD 900), these comprised the Glen Meyer and Pickering cultures, [6] which clustered in southwestern and eastern Ontario respectively. [7]

During the Middle Ontario Iroquois stage, rapid cultural change took place near the beginning of the 14th century, [8] and detectable differences between the Glen Meyer and Pickering cultures disappeared. The Middle Ontario Iroquois stage is divided into chronological Uren and Middleport substages, [9] which are sometimes termed as cultures. [10] Wright controversially attributed the increase in homogeneity to a "conquest theory", whereby the Pickering culture became dominant over the Glen Meyer and the former became the predecessor of the later Uren and Middleport substages. Archaeologists opposed to Wright's theory have criticized it on a number of levels, such as questioning whether the Glen Meyer and Pickering cultures were meaningfully distinct from each other, [8] reclassifying some Uren and Middleport sites as Glen Meyer, [11] and, by the 1990s, becoming increasingly reluctant to classify sub-groups of sites from the period in Ontario into distinct archaeological cultures at all. [12]

In one 1990 paper, Ronald Williamson stated that Glen Meyer and Pickering cultures might represent "two ends of a continuum of spatial variability extending across southern Ontario," in his arguments against the classification of Ontario Iroquoian sites into groups based on material culture. [13] This dispute paralleled other contemporary discussions over the usefulness of the older system of material culture classification which had mostly been devised in the 1960s and 1970s, such as criticism of the usefulness of the pre-Ontario Iroquoian Saugeen complex as a conceptual model. [14] In a 1995 article, Dean Snow took a more middling view, supporting the idea of Glen Meyer and Pickering cultures being distinct, but also acknowledging that the "conquest theory" was not generally accepted by archaeologists by that point. [10]

The Point Peninsula complex was an indigenous culture located in Ontario and New York from 600 BCE to 700 CE (during the Middle Woodland period). [15] This culture, perhaps in interaction with other complexes eventually developed into the several Iroquoian-speaking nations of Pennsylvania and New York.

Culture

The Iroquoian peoples had matrilineal kinship systems. [16] They were historically sedentary farmers who lived in large fortified villages enclosed by palisades thirty feet high as a defence against enemy attack, these settlements were referred to as “towns” by early Europeans and supplemented their diet with additional hunting and gathering activities. [16] Longhouses were also common.

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The Tuscarora are an Indigenous people of the Northeastern Woodlands in Canada and the United States. They are an Iroquoian Native American and First Nations people, based in New York and Ontario.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wyandot people</span> Native American ethnic group

The Wyandot people are Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands of North America, and speakers of an Iroquoian language, Wyandot.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beaver Wars</span> 17th c. wars between Hurons and Iroquois

The Beaver Wars, also known as the Iroquois Wars or the French and Iroquois Wars were a series of conflicts fought intermittently during the 17th century in North America throughout the Saint Lawrence River valley in Canada and the Great Lakes region which pitted the Iroquois against the Hurons, northern Algonquians and their French allies. As a result of this conflict, the Iroquois destroyed several confederacies and tribes through warfare: the Hurons or Wendat, Erie, Neutral, Wenro, Petun, Susquehannock, Mohican and northern Algonquins whom they defeated and dispersed, some fleeing to neighbouring peoples and others assimilated, routed, or killed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Onondaga people</span> Ethnic group

The Onondaga people are one of the five original nations of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederacy in the Northeastern Woodlands. Their historical homelands are in and around present-day Onondaga County, New York, south of Lake Ontario.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Three Sisters (agriculture)</span> Agricultural technique of Indigenous people in the Americas

The Three Sisters are the three main agricultural crops of various indigenous peoples of Central and North America: squash, maize ("corn"), and climbing beans. In a technique known as companion planting, the maize and beans are often planted together in mounds formed by hilling soil around the base of the plants each year; squash is typically planted between the mounds. The cornstalk serves as a trellis for climbing beans, the beans fix nitrogen in their root nodules and stabilize the maize in high winds, and the wide leaves of the squash plant shade the ground, keeping the soil moist and helping prevent the establishment of weeds.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Iroquoian languages</span> Native American language family

The Iroquoian languages are a language family of indigenous peoples of North America. They are known for their general lack of labial consonants. The Iroquoian languages are polysynthetic and head-marking.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Neutral Confederacy</span> Historic Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands

The Neutral Confederacy was a tribal confederation of Iroquoian peoples. Its heartland was in the floodplain of the Grand River in what is now Ontario, Canada. At its height, its wider territory extended toward the shores of lakes Erie, Huron, and Ontario, as well as the Niagara River in the east. To the northeast were the neighbouring territories of Huronia and the Petun Country, which were inhabited by other Iroquoian confederacies from which the term Neutrals Attawandaron was derived. The five-nation Iroquois Confederacy was across Lake Ontario to the southeast.

The Great Peacemaker, sometimes referred to as Deganawida or Tekanawí:ta was by tradition, along with Jigonhsasee and Hiawatha, the founder of the Haudenosaunee, commonly called the Iroquois Confederacy. This is a political and cultural union of six Iroquoian-speaking Native American tribes governing parts of the present-day state of New York, northern Pennsylvania, and the eastern portion of the provinces of Ontario, and Quebec Canada, recognized as sovereign by both the USA and Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Erie people</span> Iroquoian group native to the Great Lakes

The Erie people were Indigenous people historically living on the south shore of Lake Erie. An Iroquoian group, they lived in what is now western New York, northwestern Pennsylvania, and northern Ohio before 1658. Their nation was almost exterminated in the mid-17th century by five years of prolonged warfare with the powerful neighboring Iroquois for helping the Huron in the Beaver Wars for control of the fur trade. Captured survivors were adopted or enslaved by the Iroquois.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands</span> Native peoples in Eastern Canada and Northeastern United States

Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands include Native American tribes and First Nation bands residing in or originating from a cultural area encompassing the northeastern and Midwest United States and southeastern Canada. It is part of a broader grouping known as the Eastern Woodlands. The Northeastern Woodlands is divided into three major areas: the Coastal, Saint Lawrence Lowlands, and Great Lakes-Riverine zones.

The St. Lawrence Iroquoians were an Iroquoian Indigenous people who existed from the 14th century to about 1580. They concentrated along the shores of the St. Lawrence River in present-day Quebec and Ontario, Canada, and in the American states of New York and northernmost Vermont. They spoke Laurentian languages, a branch of the Iroquoian family.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Petun</span> North American ethnic group

The Petun, also known as the Tobacco people or Tionontati, were an indigenous Iroquoian people of the woodlands of eastern North America. Their last known traditional homeland was south of Lake Huron's Georgian Bay, in what is today's Canadian province of Ontario

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wenrohronon</span> Iroquoian indigenous nation of North America

The Wenrohronon or Wenro people were an Iroquoian indigenous nation of North America, originally residing in present-day western New York, who were conquered by the Confederation of the Five Nations of the Iroquois in two decisive wars between 1638–1639 and 1643. This was likely part of the Iroquois Confederacy campaign against the Neutral people, another Iroquoian-speaking tribe, which lived across the Niagara River. This warfare was part of what was known as the Beaver Wars, as the Iroquois worked to dominate the lucrative fur trade. They used winter attacks, which were not usual among Native Americans, and their campaigns resulted in attrition of both the larger Iroquoian confederacies, as they had against the numerous Huron.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Iroquois</span> Indigenous confederacy in North America

The Iroquois, also known as the Five Nations, and later as the Six Nations from 1722 onwards; alternatively referred to by the endonym Haudenosaunee are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of Native Americans and First Nations peoples in northeast North America. They were known by the French during the colonial years as the Iroquois League, and later as the Iroquois Confederacy, while the English simply called them the "Five Nations". The peoples of the Iroquois included the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca. After 1722, the Iroquoian-speaking Tuscarora people from the southeast were accepted into the confederacy, from which point it was known as the "Six Nations".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Point Peninsula complex</span> Archaeological culture in North America

The Point Peninsula complex was an indigenous culture located in Ontario and New York from 600 BCE to 700 CE. Point Peninsula ceramics were first introduced into Canada around 600 BCE then spread south into parts of New England around 200 BCE. Some time between 300 BCE and 1 CE, Point Peninsula pottery first appeared in Maine, and "over the entire Maritime Peninsula." Little evidence exists to show that it was derived from the earlier, thicker pottery, known as Vinette I, Adena Thick, etc... Point Peninsula pottery represented a new kind of technology in North America and has also been called Vinette II. Compared to existing ceramics that were thicker and less decorated, this new pottery has been characterized by "superior modeling of the clay with vessels being thinner, better fired and containing finer grit temper." Where this new pottery technology originated is not known for sure. The origin of this pottery is "somewhat of a problem." The people are thought to have been influenced by the Hopewell traditions of the Ohio River valley. This influence seems to have ended about 250 CE, after which they no longer practiced burial ceremonialism.

The Draper Site is a precontact period Huron-Wendat ancestral village located on a tributary of West Duffins Creek in present-day Pickering, Ontario, approximately 35 kilometres northeast of Toronto. The site is found in a wooded area on existing farmland and may be reached by walking from the end of North Road.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Younge site</span> Archaeological site in Michigan, United States

The Younge site is an archeological site located in Goodland Township, Lapeer County, Michigan. It is classified as a prehistoric Late Woodland site and was designated as a Michigan State Historic Site on October 29, 1971. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on October 29, 1976.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Huronia (region)</span> Historical region between the Great Lakes of North America

Huronia is a historical region in the province of Ontario, Canada. It is positioned between lakes Simcoe, Ontario, and Huron. Similarly to the latter, it takes its name from the Wendat or Huron, an Iroquoian-speaking people, who lived there from prehistoric times until 1649 during the Beaver Wars when they were defeated and displaced by the Five Nations of the Iroquois who lived in New York.

A Dish With One Spoon, also known as One Dish One Spoon, is a law used by Indigenous peoples of the Americas since at least 1142 CE to describe an agreement for sharing hunting territory among two or more nations. People are all eating out of the single dish, that is, all hunting in the shared territory. One spoon signifies that all Peoples sharing the territory are expected to limit the game they take to leave enough for others, and for the continued abundance and viability of the hunting grounds into the future. Sometimes the Indigenous language word is rendered in English as bowl or kettle rather than dish.

The Princess Point complex is an archaeological culture of the Middle to Late Woodland period of northeastern North America.

References

Citations

  1. Anderson 2020, p. 4.
  2. "Iroquois | History, Culture, & Facts | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 2022-01-22.
  3. "Iroquois Creation Story - Lesson Four". www.collectionscanada.gc.ca. Retrieved 2022-01-22.
  4. McMillan & Yellowhorn 2004, p. 78.
  5. "Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) | The Canadian Encyclopedia". www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca. Retrieved 2022-01-22.
  6. 1 2 Snow 1995, p. 67.
  7. "Summary of Ontario Archaeology". Ontario Archaeological Society. Retrieved 8 January 2023.
  8. 1 2 Wright 1992, p. 4.
  9. Wright 1992, p. 5.
  10. 1 2 Snow 1995, p. 68.
  11. Wright 1992, p. 3.
  12. Wright 1992, p. 8.
  13. Williamson 1990, p. 295.
  14. Ferris & Spence 1995, p. 98.
  15. "Middle Woodland Natives" . Retrieved 2009-10-08.
  16. 1 2 "The Iroquois Peoples". WorldAtlas. 2017-04-25. Retrieved 2022-01-23.

Sources

Further reading