THE CONFEDERATION OF THE IROQUOIS, Page 23.--When the Europeans
discovered North America they found that portion of the continent lying
east of a line about as far west as the city of Cleveland, Ohio, and
from the great lakes on the north to the Chesapeake Bay on the south,
practically under the control of a confederacy of tribes, to which the
French in after years applied the term Iroquois, and which the English
called the Five Nations. This confederacy was composed of the Senecas,
Mohawks, Onondagas, Oneidas and Cayugas. In the year 1712 the Tuscaroras,
a tribe previously located in North Carolina, were defeated in a war
with their white neighbors, and about one thousand eight hundred of them
fled to what is now New York State, then the actual dwelling-place of
most of the Iroquois, and were adopted into the confederacy. The new
tribe did not possess the energy and courage of their associates, and
for several years after their coming the men wore the tobacco pouches of
the women, thus acknowledging upon all occasions that they were inferior
to the other five nations comprising the union which had become their
protectors. After the coming of the Tuscaroras the confederacy was known
as the Six Nations of Indians--a designation which is often used at the
present time in law in matters pertaining to the Indians of New York
State.
The date of the formation of this confederacy has never been settled with
any degree of certainty, and all attempts have ended in mere conjecture
and speculation. The most authentic tradition heretofore published places
the date about the year 1589, but there is no positive proof that this
date is accurate. The legend of its formation here published is not only
based upon what was considered reliable authority by Cornplanter, but has
also the sanction of that other noted Seneca chief, Governor Blacksnake
(the Nephew), who was contemporaneous with Cornplanter, and who was
probably born about the year 1736 and died in 1859, at the supposed age
of one hundred and twenty-three years. These chiefs both claimed to have
seen a string of wampum in their early years that placed the formation
of the confederacy at a time when there occurred a total eclipse of the
sun--"a darkening of the Great Spirit's smiling face"--that took place
when the corn was receiving its last tillage, long before events that
could be reliably ascribed to the year 1540.
At this point it will be well to say that the Indians possessed strings
of wampum which actually recorded historical events. They were made
upon the skins of some animal and were formed of small pieces of bone,
variously shaped and colored, small stones, and a variety of small
shells, quills and sometimes the teeth or claws of animals. These were
strung upon the tanned skin by piercing holes through them and tying them
securely with sinews. Certain ones in the tribe were selected as keepers
of the wampum and it was their duty to store all necessary facts in their
memory and associate with them the successive lines and arrangement of
the stones, shells, quills, etc., so that they could be readily called to
mind. At general councils these records were brought before the people
and solemnly expounded. As these people possessed remarkable memories,
the meaning of the wampum string was accurately carried down from
generation to generation.
The place of holding the council that formed the confederacy has also
been the subject of some dispute, but it is pretty certain that it was
near the northern end of either Seneca or Cayuga Lake, and that it took
place in that year previous to 1540 in which occurred an eclipse of the
sun in the month when the corn receives its last tilling.
Professor Lewis Swift, of the Warner Observatory, Rochester, kindly
furnished the following table of dates: