Northeast Native American Nations: History, Culture, and Modern Developments

The Northeast Indians were Native American nations who traditionally lived in southeastern Canada and the northeastern United States. Their territory extended south to North Carolina and west to Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. Major Northeast nations included the Mohican, Abenaki, Penobscot, Pequot, Delaware, Mohawk, Oneida, Ojibwa, Sauk, and Illinois.

The Iroquois Confederacy was the most elaborate and powerful political organization in the Northeast. A loose coalition of nations, its members were the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca — joined later by the Tuscarora. The original intent of the coalition was to establish peace among the member nations.

Most Northeast peoples relied on farming for food. They planted corn, squash, beans, pumpkin, and gourds. They also lived by hunting and gathering. Their diet included deer, elk, moose, waterbirds, turkeys, fish, leaves, seeds, berries, roots, and nuts. People's diets depended largely on where they lived and what resources were available.

In the forests, people boiled sap from sugar maple trees to make sugar, while the nations around the northern Great Lakes relied more on wild rice than on crops. On the Atlantic coast and along major rivers, fish were plentiful and played an important part in the diet of the nations settled there.

The nations that relied most heavily on agriculture tended to form the largest settlements, perhaps because they needed to store and defend the harvest. Iroquoians lived in wood-frame longhouses that could be over 200 feet in length, while Algonquians and Siouans lived in wickiups or wigwams.

Wickiups were made by driving several pointed poles into the ground to make a circular or oval floor plan. The structure would range from 15 to 20 feet in diameter. These poles were tied together with strips of bark and reinforced with other poles to make a dome-shaped framework, covered with bark, reeds, or woven mats. A single fire in the center provided heat for cooking and for warmth. Typically, a wickiup would house a single two- or three-generation family, although two close families would occasionally share a home.

The peoples of the Northeast formed both loosely organized bands and villages. Bands tended to be smaller, and moved often in pursuit of food sources, while villages were formed among people who depended more on farming.

Chiefs, or sachems, led the nations. Sometimes groups of nations joined together to form alliances known as confederacies, which were often very complex political organizations. The most powerful political organization in the Northeast was the Iroquois Confederacy.

The most important social group in the Northeast was the clan. A clan was a large extended family whose members were descended from a common ancestor. Clan names often refer to an animal such as Turtle, Bear, Beaver, Wolf, Deer, or Heron. The animal had a special relationship with the members of its clan. Membership in a clan was for life and did not change upon marriage. Among the Iroquois and the Delaware, a child automatically became a member of the mother's clan, while among the Ho-Chunk and other Algonquian peoples, a child became a member of the father's clan.

Grandparents cared for children from toddlerhood on. Women cared for infants, cooked, made clothing, and typically grew, gathered, or caught the majority of the food eaten by the group. The men warred, built houses, hunted, fished, and made tools.

Animism — the belief that everything in nature has a soul or spirit — played an important role in the life of the Northeast Native Americans.

Medicine societies were groups whose major function was to cure illnesses. The practices of the medicine societies combined the use of medicinal plants with psychiatric care or support. These societies gathered in elaborate meetings where they would perform magical feats.

Others who had the power to cure were called shamans, and their power was often indicated in a vision or dream. Dreams were especially important for the Northeast nations, as they could point out the cause of an illness or help maintain good fortune.

The arrival of Europeans in North America in the 1600s brought disease and devastation to the Native Americans. Nonetheless, extensive trade developed between the Northeast peoples and the English, French, and Dutch, who established colonies in the region. The Europeans sought furs to send back to Europe. The Native Americans wanted European goods such as guns, brass pots, metal needles, glass beads, and cloth.

Conflict with the colonists occasionally erupted, as in the Pequot War of 1636-1637 between the Pequot and the English. Another example is King Philip's War of 1675-1676, also between Native Americans and the English. Some nations knew they could not resist for long, so they began to adopt European ways to survive.

Eventually, the Northeast nations entered into treaties with the U.S. and Canadian governments. The treaties did not protect the Indians, however. All of the Northeast peoples who survived the early colonial period had lost their land by the end of the 1800s, and some were moved to distant reservations.

Nonetheless, many Northeast nations maintained governments and councils and continued their traditional cultural activities. These traditional forms of government were important in the creation of a variety of development projects that today help support members. Such projects include timber mills, manufacturing centers, and casinos.