Iroquoian peoples

Pre-contact distribution of Iroquoian languages

The Iroquoian peoples, also rarely referred to as Nadoueks, are an ethnolinguistic group of peoples in eastern North America. Their traditional territory, sometimes referred to by scholars as Iroquoia, stretchs from the mouth of the St. Lawrence River in the north, to the Cape Fear River in the south. Now they are distributed throughout the United States as far west as Oklahoma.

Some Iroquoian peoples are the member nations of the Haudenosaunee, Wendat, Tionontate and Neutral confederacies. Other peoples include the Erie, Wenro, Susquehannock, Cherokee and Meherrin.

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

List of Iroquoian Tribal governments

Main article: Tribe (Native American)

• Cayuga Nation of New York: of New York, United States
• Cheroenhaka (Nottoway) Indian Tribe: of Virginia, United States (state recognized)
• Cherokee Nation: of Oklahoma, United States
• †Cherokee Nation (1794–1907): of the Southeastern United States
• Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians: of North Carolina, United States
• Mohawks of Kahnawà:ke: of Quebec, Canada
• Mohawks of Kanesatake: of Quebec, Canada
• Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte First Nation: of Ontario, Canada
• Nottoway Indian Tribe of Virginia: of Virginia, United States (state recognized)
• Oneida Indian Nation: of New York, United States
• Oneida Nation of the Thames: of Ontario, Canada
• Oneida Nation of Wisconsin: of Wisconsin, United States
• Onondaga Nation: of New York, United States
• Saint Regis Mohawk Tribe: of New York, United States
• Seneca–Cayuga Nation: of Oklahoma, United States
• Seneca Nation of New York: of New York, United States
• Six Nations of the Grand River: of Ontario, Canada
  • Bearfoot Onondaga First Nation
  • Konadaha Seneca First Nation
  • Lower Cayuga First Nation
  • Lower Mohawk First Nation
  • Niharondasa Seneca First Nation
  • Oneida First Nation
  • Onondaga Clear Sky First Nation
  • Tuscarora First Nation
  • Upper Cayuga First Nation
  • Upper Mohawk First Nation
  • Walker Mohawk First Nation
• Tonawanda Band of Seneca: of New York, United States
• Tuscarora Nation: of New York, United States
• Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory: of Ontario, Canada
• United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians: of Oklahoma, United States
• Wahta Mohawks: of Ontario, Canada
• Wendat Nation: of Quebec, Canada
• Wyandot of Anderdon Nation: of Michigan, United States (peer recognized)
• Wyandot Nation of Kansas: of Kansas, United States (peer recognized)
• Wyandotte Nation: of Oklahoma, United States

List of Iroquoian nations

• Cherokee (Aniyvwiya or Anigiduwagi): of southern Appalachia
• †Coree, of the Carolina Tidewater region
• †Erie (Eriechronon): of the southern coast of Lake Erie
• Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) of Upstate New York, Ohio and the north shore of Lake Ontario
  • Mohawk (Kanienʼkehá:ka)
  • Seneca (Onödowáʼga)
  • Cayuga (Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫʼ)
  • Oneida (Onʌyoteˀa·ká·)
  • Onondaga (Onöñda’gaga’)
  • Tuscarora (Skarù:ręˀ): of the Tidewater and Piedmont of North Carolina, later Upstate New York
    • Akawenteaka
    • Katenuaka
    • Skaruren
• †Honniasont: of the upper Ohio River Valley
• †Massawomeck (identified with Monongahela): of central Appalachia
• †Meherrin (Kauwets'a:ka): of the Tidewater region
• †Neusiok, of the Carolina Tidewater region
• †Neutrals (Chonnonton or Attawandaron): of the Ontario Peninsula
  • Annochiahronon
  • Antouaronon
  • Aondironon
  • Chonnonton
  • Oheroukouarhronon
  • Ondato
  • Ongniaahra
  • Totontaratonhronon
• Nottoway (Cheroenhaka): of the Tidewater region
• †Scahentoarrhonon: of the Wyoming Valley
• †St. Lawrence Iroquoians: of what is the areas around Montreal and Quebec City
• †Susquehannock (Conestoga): of the Susquehanna River watershed
  • †Akhrakouaeronon
  • †Onojutta-Haga
• †Tehotitachsae: of the northern Susquehanna River watershed
• Tionontati (Tobacco or Petun): of the southern shore of the Georgian Bay
  • Hatinnaariska
  • Oskennonton
• Wendat (Huron): of Wendake on the southern shore of the Georgian Bay
  • Attignawantan
  • Attigneenongnahac
  • Arendarhonon
  • Tahontaenrat
  • Ataronchronon
• †Wenrohronon (Wenro): of Upstate New York
• †Westo (Chichimeco or Richahecrian): of the Southeastern United States
• Wyandot (Huron): of what is now Michigan and Ohio

History

Map of the Neutral Confederacy in 1600

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

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 Wendat population had decreased from 20,000–30,000 to about 9000, while the Tionontati population dropped from around 8000 to 3000.

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 BC to 500 AD, 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 AD, and possibly as far back as 4000 BC. Their distinctive culture seems to have developed by about 1000 AD."

Ontario Iroquois tradition

The Ontario Iroquois tradition was conceptualized by the archaeologist J. V. Wright in 1966. 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, which clustered in southwestern and eastern Ontario respectively.

During the Middle Ontario Iroquois stage, rapid cultural change took place near the beginning of the 14th century, and detectable differences between the Glen Meyer and Pickering cultures disappeared. The Middle Ontario Iroquois stage is divided into chronological Uren and Middleport substages, which are sometimes termed as cultures. Wright originally 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 since criticized it on a number of levels, such as questioning whether there is substantial evidence that the Glen Meyer and Pickering cultures were meaningfully distinct from each other. Their work led to the reclassification of some Uren and Middleport sites as Glen Meyer, and, by the 1990s, archaeologists were increasingly unable with the evidence avaliable to distinguish sub-groups of sites from the period in Ontario into distinct archaeological cultures.

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. 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. 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 considered lacking enough evidence by archaeologists by that point.

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

Culture

Many Iroquoian speaking peoples have matrilineal kinship systems and lived in large multi-family longhouses. They were historically semi-sedentary farmers who lived in large towns enclosed by palisades as a defence against enemy attack. Iroquoian speaking peoples supplemented their diet with hunting and gathering. Many scholars have argued that Iroquoian-speaking peoples have a belief in a powerful force called Orenda.

See also

• Algonquian-speaking peoples

References

Sources

• Anderson, Chad L. (2020). The Storied Landscape of Iroquoia: History, Conquest, and Memory in the Native Northeast. Borderlands and Transcultural Studies. University of Nebraska Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctvzpv65x. ISBN 9781496218650. S2CID 219044376.
• Ferris, Neal; Spence, Michael W. (July–December 1995). "The Woodland Traditions in Southern Ontario". Revista de Arqueología Americana (9). Pan American Institute of Geography and History: 83–138. JSTOR 27768356.
• McMillan, Alan D.; Yellowhorn, Eldon (2004). First Peoples In Canada (3rd ed.). Douglas & McIntyre. ISBN 1-55365-053-0.
• Snow, Dean R. (January 1995). "Migration in Prehistory: The Northern Iroquoian Case". American Antiquity. 60 (1). Cambridge University Press: 59–79. doi:10.2307/282076. JSTOR 282076. S2CID 164163259.
• Williamson, Ronald F. (1990). Ellis, Chris J.; Ferris, Neal (eds.). "The Early Iroquoian Period of Southern Ontario". The Archaeology of Southern Ontario to A.D. 1650. No. 5. pp. 291–320.
• Wright, J. V. (1992). "The Conquest Theory of the Ontario Iroquois Tradition: a Reassessment" (PDF). Ontario Archaeology. 54. Ontario Archaeological Society: 3–16.

Further reading

• Abel, Timothy J.; Vavrasek, Jessica L.; Hart, John P. (October 2019). "Radiocarbon Dating the Iroquoian Occupation of Northern New York". American Antiquity. 84 (4). Cambridge University Press: 748–761. doi:10.1017/aaq.2019.50. JSTOR 26818405. S2CID 198409952.
• Bamann, Susan; Kuhn, Robert; Molnar, James; Snow, Dean (1992). "Iroquoian Archaeology". Annual Review of Anthropology. 21. Annual Reviews: 435–460. doi:10.1146/annurev.an.21.100192.002251. JSTOR 2155995.
• Birch, Jennifer (October 2012). "Coalescent communities: settlement aggregation and social integration in Iroquoian Ontario". American Antiquity. 77 (4). Cambridge University Press: 646–670. doi:10.7183/0002-7316.77.4.646. JSTOR 23486483. S2CID 163563683.
• Birch, Jennifer (September 2015). "Current Research on the Historical Development of Northern Iroquoian Societies". Journal of Archaeological Research. 23 (3). Springer: 263–323. doi:10.1007/s10814-015-9082-3. JSTOR 43956789. S2CID 254595251.
• Braun, Gregory Vincent (2015). Ritual, Materiality, and Memory in an Iroquoian Village (PDF) (Thesis). University of Toronto.
• Bursey, Jeffrey A. (2003). "Discerning Storage and Structures at the Forster Site: A Princess Point Component in Southern Ontario". Canadian Journal of Archaeology. 27 (2). Canadian Archaeological Association: 191–233. JSTOR 41103448.
• Crawford, Gary W.; Smith, David G. (October 1996). "Migration in Prehistory: Princess Point and the Northern Iroquoian Case". American Antiquity. 61 (4). Cambridge University Press: 782–790. doi:10.2307/282018. hdl:1807/96508. JSTOR 282018. S2CID 163859412.
• Creese, John Laurence (2011). Deyughnyonkwarakda – "At the Wood's Edge": The Development of the Iroquoian Village in Southern Ontario, A.D. 900-1500 (PDF) (Thesis). University of Toronto.
• Hart, John P.; Engelbrecht, William (June 2012). "Northern Iroquoian Ethnic Evolution: A Social Network Analysis". Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory. 19 (2). Springer: 322–349. doi:10.1007/s10816-011-9116-1. JSTOR 23256843. S2CID 254600558.
• Jamieson, James Bruce (January 2016). Bone, Antler, Tooth and Shell: A Study in Iroquoian Technology (PDF) (Thesis). McGill University.
• Jamieson, Susan M. (1992). "Regional Interaction and Ontario Iroquois Evolution". Canadian Journal of Archaeology. 16. Canadian Archaeological Association: 70–88. JSTOR 41102851.
• Johnston, Richard B. (1979). "Notes on Ossuary Burial Among the Ontario Iroquois". Canadian Journal of Archaeology (3). Canadian Archaeological Association: 91–104. JSTOR 41102198.
• Jones, Eric E.; Creese, John L., eds. (2016). Process and Meaning in Spatial Archaeology: Investigations into Pre-Columbian Iroquoian Space and Place. University Press of Colorado. ISBN 9781607325093. JSTOR j.ctt1kc6hk0.
• Kapches, Mima (Fall 1980). "Wall Trenches on Iroquoian Sites". Archaeology of Eastern North America. 8. Eastern States Archeological Federation: 98–105. JSTOR 40914190.
• Kerber, Jordan E., ed. (2007). Archaeology of the Iroquois: Selected Readings and Research Sources. Syracuse University Press.
• Manning, Sturt W.; Birch, Jennifer; Conger, Megan A.; Dee, Michael W.; et al. (5 December 2018). "Radiocarbon re-dating of contact-era Iroquoian history in northeastern North America". Science Advances. 4 (12). eaav0280. Bibcode:2018SciA....4..280M. doi:10.1126/sciadv.aav0280. PMC 6281431. PMID 30525108.
• Noble, William C. (1979). "Ontario Iroquois Effigy Pipes". Canadian Journal of Archaeology (3). Canadian Archaeological Association: 69–90. JSTOR 41102197.
• Parmenter, Jon (2010). The Edge of the Woods: Iroquoia, 1534–1701. Michigan State University Press.
• Traphagan, John W. (2008). "Embodiment, Ritual Incorporation, and Cannibalism Among the Iroquoians after 1300 c.e.". Journal of Ritual Studies. 22 (2): 1–12. JSTOR 44368787.
• Warrick, Gary (December 2000). "The Precontact Iroquoian Occupation of Southern Ontario". Journal of World Prehistory. 14 (4). Springer: 415–466. doi:10.1023/A:1011137725917. JSTOR 25801165. S2CID 163183815.
• Wesler, Kit W. (October 1983). "Trade Politics and Native Polities in Iroquoia and Asante". Comparative Studies in Society and History. 25 (4). Cambridge University Press: 641–660. doi:10.1017/S0010417500010653. JSTOR 178668. S2CID 145308030.
• Whyte, Thomas R. (Summer 2007). "Proto-Iroquoian Divergence in the Late Archaic-Early Woodland Period Transition of the Appalachian Highlands". Southeastern Archaeology. 26 (1). Taylor & Francis: 134–144. JSTOR 40713422.