Week 4: Lifestyles
Seasonal Cycles Part 1
- Fall and Winter
- Hunting Camps
Viewing Assignment 1
View the following short video for an overview of the Anishnaabeg lifestyle
Viewing Assignment 2
Now view the Haudenosaunee overview
In the first half of the 17th century, two very different linguistic groups of First Nations occupied the Great Lakes basin. Southern Ontario supported three Iroquoian-speaking First Nations from the Ganaraska River to the waterway between Lake Huron and Lake Erie. Members of the linguistic group are matriarchal. Their political structure used a complex system of councils.
Iroquoian people are mainly agricultural, cultivating corn, beans and squash, supplemented with hunting and fishing. They lived in palisaded towns containing numerous longhouses. The average longhouse would house up to forty people from multiple families.
The Tionontati or Tobacco Nation lived in what today are Bruce and Simcoe counties. They occupied eight to ten towns having a total population of several thousand. The Tionontati is also called the Pétun Nation. Pétun comes from an old French word for tobacco. The French called them the Pétun Nation because their main crop was tobacco which they grew in large quantities for trade purposes. They were an Iroquoian-speaking people closely related to their neighbours, the Ouendat or Wendat.
The Ouendat or Wendat lived in Wendake, located in central Ontario between Lake Ontario to Georgian Bay. They consisted of a confederation of four nations, the Attinniaoenten (“people of the bear”), Hatingeennonniahak (people of the cords), Arendaenronnon (“people of the rock”), Atahontaenrat (people of the deer) and Ataronchronon (“people of the bog”).
The French call them Huron. The word Huron comes from the old French word huré, meaning ruffian. They were also Iroquoian. Wendake had eighteen to twenty-five towns, with the larger ones having a population of up to 3,500. Their total population estimated at 20,000 was much greater than the Pétun. The Ouendat acted as middlemen in the fur trade between the French and the other two nations during the first half of the seventeenth century.
The third Iroquoian nation in southern Ontario, the Attawanderon, occupied the land north of Lake Erie from the straits between Lakes Huron and Erie to the Niagara peninsula and the western end of Lake Ontario. They had an estimated population at the beginning of the 17th century of 40,000, at which time it went into decline due to epidemics. By 1640 the population had dwindled to 12,000. They are also known as the Neutral Nation. They were called Neutral by the French Jesuits because they often continued trading with both the Ouendat and Haudenosaunee during their skirmishes.
Reading Assignment 1
For life in Huronia in the year, 1636 as viewed by the Jesuit Missionaries, read Chapter Two of http://moses.creighton.edu/kripke/jesuitrelations/relations_10.html
Other Iroquoian peoples were living south of Lakes Erie and Ontario as well. The Erie Nation or the Nation du Chat lived along the southern shore of Lake Erie. They were called Eriehronon or Eriquehronon by the Ouendat, which Gabriel Segard translated as the Cat People. They lived in longhouses in numerous palisaded towns and were agrarian, growing the traditional Iroquoian “three sisters,” corn, beans and squash. The Erie Nation had an estimated population of ten thousand plus.
Viewing Assignment 3
Erie Nation
The Wenrohronon, also known as the Wenro, was a small Iroquoian-speaking nation of about 2000 people. They lived east of the Erie Nation around the present-day town of Cuba, NY. They were allied with the Neutral Nation, but their culture and language were more closely related to the Ouendat. Trading relationships were with the Neutral Nation and the Ouendat. Oil springs on their lands provided a valuable trading commodity. The Wenro traded their oil, a highly prized commodity used medicinally for other goods.
To the east of the Wenro lived the powerful Haudenosaunee Confederacy. They were known to the French as the Iroquois League. The league had five members, including the Mohawk, Oneida, Onandaga, Cayuga and Seneca nations.
The Haudenosaunee also had vast corn, beans, and squash fields and supplemented farming with hunting, trapping, and fishing. They lived in longhouses situated in towns protected by wooden palisades.
Their lands stretched from the Finger Lakes region to the Hudson River in Upstate New York. Although very powerful, their population in the early 17th century numbered approximately 20,000. That number dropped somewhat due to epidemics and warfare. But due to adoptions of defeated enemies by the latter part of the century, it had increased to about 25,000.
Colonial Impact
The impact of colonialism on indigenous societies was immediate. The Beaver Wars, also known as the French and Iroquois Wars of 1640 to 1698, are an excellent example of this. Early in the 17th century, the French had begun a trading relationship with the Ouendat Confederacy. The Ouendat acted as a middleman trading with the Attawandaron and the Tionontoti nations.
The Haudenosaunee began trading with the Dutch at the same time. The Ouendat and the Haudenosaunee traded fur pelts for European trade goods, the most prized item being firearms. The Dutch exchanged guns freely from the beginning. However, the French, under pressure from the Catholic Church, limited guns to Christian converts only. The highest quality of fur was the beaver hence the name Beaver Wars.
The Haudenosaunee beaver hunting grounds in Upstate New York had become depleted by 1640. They began sending raiding parties into Ouendat hunting grounds, attacking Ouendat hunting groups and stealing their furs. During this time, the Ouendat had been suffering from an epidemic of smallpox that caused a famine. They were In a severely weakened state. The Haudenosaunee increased their assault by assailing their towns which included Jesuit missions. Over the following decade, the Ouendat became decimated, their once-proud confederacy reduced to approximately 2,000 people. The remnant split with half going back to Quebec with the missionaries and the other half seeking refuge with their old allies, the Odawa to the north.
The trade policies of the colonists created an imbalance of firepower between the Haudenosaunee and their neighbours. Disease brought by the missionaries contributed to the weakening of their surrounding First Nations. The Haudenosaunee took advantage to decimate the Erie and Wenro to their west. They also annihilated the Attawandaron and Tionontoti to their north and the Susquehanna to their east. Colonialism had created the fur trade, which had devastating consequences on the indigenous population of North America.
Reading Assignment 2
Read Chapters I, III and IV for the attack on Huronia http://moses.creighton.edu/kripke/jesuitrelations/relations_34.html
Viewing Assignment 4
Synopsis of the Beaver Wars
Questions
It took a more significant landmass to support Algonquian indigenous populations than Iroquoian. Why do you think that was?
What are two of the greatest fears of the people of Huronia in the year 1636? What were the Ouendat people doing that made mission work difficult in the summer months?
