The Mohawk, also known by their own name, Kanien'kehá:ka (lit. 'People of the Flint'), are an Indigenous people of North America and the easternmost nation of the Haudenosaunee, or Iroquois Confederacy (also known as the Five Nations or later, the Six Nations).
Mohawk are an Iroquoian-speaking people with communities in southeastern Canada and northern New York State, primarily around Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River. As one of the five original members of the Iroquois Confederacy, the Mohawk are known as the Keepers of the Eastern Door. They were the guardians of the confederation against invasions from the east.
Today, Mohawk people belong to the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne, Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte First Nation, Mohawks of Kahnawà:ke, Mohawks of Kanesatake, and Six Nations of the Grand River, all in Canada; and Saint Regis Mohawk Tribe, a federally recognized tribe in the United States whose members share history with Akwesasne.
At the time of European contact, Mohawk people were based in the valley of the Mohawk River in present-day upstate New York, west of the Hudson River. Their territory ranged north to the St. Lawrence River, southern Quebec and eastern Ontario; south to greater New Jersey and into Pennsylvania; eastward to the Green Mountains of Vermont; and westward to the border with the Iroquoian Oneida Nation's traditional homeland territory.
Mohawk communities
Members of the Kanienʼkehá:ka people now live in sovereign settlements in northern New York State and southeastern Canada.
Many Kanienʼkehá:ka communities have two sets of chiefs, who are in some sense competing governmental rivals. One group are the hereditary chiefs (royaner), nominated by Clan Mother matriarchs in the traditional Mohawk fashion. The Mohawk of most of the reserves have established governments based on constitutions and elected chiefs and councilors. The Canadian and U.S. governments usually prefer to deal exclusively with the elected representatives.
The self-governing communities are listed below, grouped by broad geographical cluster, with notes on the character of community governance found in each.
Northern New York:
Kanièn:ke (Ganienkeh) "Place of the flint". Traditional governance.
Kanaʼtsioharè:ke "Place of the washed pail". Traditional governance.
Along the St Lawrence in Quebec:
Ahkwesáhsne (St. Regis, New York and Quebec/Ontario, Canada) "Where the partridge drums". Traditional governance, and band/tribal elections.
Kahnawà:ke (south of Montréal) "On the rapids". Canada, traditional governance, and band/tribal elections.
Kanehsatà:ke (Oka) "Where the snow crust is". Canada, traditional governance, and band/tribal elections.
Tioweró:ton (Sainte-Lucie-des-Laurentides, Quebec). Canada, shared governance between Kahnawà꞉ke and Kanehsatà꞉ke.
Southern Ontario:
Kenhtè꞉ke (Tyendinaga) "On the bay". Traditional governance, and band/tribal elections.
Wáhta (Gibson) "Maple tree". Traditional governance, and band/tribal elections.
Ohswé:ken "Six Nations of the Grand River". Traditional governance, and band/tribal elections. The Mohawk form the majority of the population of this Iroquois Six Nations reserve. There are also Mohawk Orange Lodges in Canada.
Increased activism for land claims, a rise in tribal revenues due to establishment of gaming on certain reserves or reservations, competing leadership, traditional government jurisdiction, issues of taxation, and the Canadian Indian Act have contributed to a rise in considerable internal conflict within the reserves and communities since the late 20th century.
Language
The Mohawk language, or its native name, Kanyen'kéha, is a Northern Iroquoian language. Like many other Indigenous languages of the Americas, Mohawk is a polysynthetic language. Written in the Roman alphabet, its orthography was standardized in 1993 at the Mohawk Language Standardization Conference.
Name
In the Mohawk language, the Mohawk people call themselves the Kanienʼkehá꞉ka ("people of the flint"). The Mohawk became wealthy traders as other nations in their confederacy needed their flint for tool making. Their Algonquian-speaking neighbors (and competitors), the people of Muh-heck Haeek Ing ("food area place"), the Mohicans, referred to the people of Ka-nee-en Ka as Maw Unk Lin, meaning "bear people". The Dutch heard and wrote this term as Mohawk, and also referred to the Kanienʼkehá꞉ka as Egil or Maqua.
The French colonists adapted these latter terms as Aignier and Maqui, respectively. They also referred to the people by the generic Iroquois, a French derivation of the Algonquian term for the Five Nations, meaning "Big Snakes". The Algonquians and Iroquois were traditional competitors and enemies.
History
First contact with European settlers
In the upper Hudson and Mohawk Valley regions, the Mohawks long had contact with the Algonquian-speaking Mohican people who occupied territory along the Hudson, as well as other Algonquian and Iroquoian peoples to the north around the Great Lakes. The Mohawks had extended their own influence into the St. Lawrence River Valley, which they maintained for hunting grounds.
The Mohawk likely defeated the St. Lawrence Iroquoians in the 16th century, and kept control of their territory. In addition to hunting and fishing, for centuries the Mohawks cultivated productive maize fields on the fertile floodplains along the Mohawk River, west of the Pine Bush.
On June 28, 1609, a band of Hurons led Samuel De Champlain and his crew into Mohawk country, the Mohawks being completely unaware of this situation. De Champlain made it clear he wanted to strike the Mohawks down after their raids on the neighboring nations. On July 29, 1609, hundreds of Hurons and many of De Champlain's French crew fell back from the mission, daunted by what lay ahead. Sixty Huron Indians, De Champlain, and two Frenchmen saw some Mohawks in a lake near Ticonderoga; the Mohawks spotted them as well. De Champlain and his crew fell back, then advanced to the Mohawk barricade after landing on a beach. They met the Mohawks at the barricade; 200 warriors advanced behind four chiefs. They were equally astonished to see each other—De Champlain surprised at their stature, confidence, and dress; the Mohawks surprised by De Champlain's steel cuirass and helmet. One of the chiefs raised his bow at Champlain and the Indians. Champlain fired three shots that pierced the Mohawk chiefs' wooden armor, killing them instantly. The Mohawks stood in shock until they started flinging arrows at the crowd. A brawl began and the Mohawks fell back seeing the damage this new technology dealt on their chiefs and warriors. This was the first contact the Mohawks had with Europeans. This incident also sparked the Beaver Wars.
Beaver Wars
In the seventeenth century, the Mohawk encountered both the Dutch, who went up the Hudson River and established a trading post in 1614 at the confluence of the Mohawk and Hudson Rivers, and the French, who came south into their territory from New France (present-day Quebec). The Dutch were primarily merchants and the French also conducted fur trading. During this time the Mohawk fought with the Huron in the Beaver Wars for control of the fur trade with the Europeans. Their Jesuit missionaries were active among First Nations and Native Americans, seeking converts to Catholicism.
In 1614, the Dutch opened a trading post at Fort Nassau, New Netherland. The Dutch initially traded for furs with the local Mohican, who occupied the territory along the Hudson River. Following a raid in 1626 when the Mohawks resettled along the south side of the Mohawk River, in 1628, they mounted an attack against the Mohican, pushing them back to the area of present-day Connecticut. The Mohawks gained a near-monopoly in the fur trade with the Dutch by prohibiting the nearby Algonquian-speaking peoples to the north or east to trade with them but did not entirely control this.
European contact resulted in a devastating smallpox epidemic among the Mohawk in 1635; this reduced their population by 63%, from 7,740 to 2,830, as they had no immunity to the new disease. By 1642 they had regrouped from four into three villages, recorded by Catholic missionary priest Isaac Jogues in 1642 as Ossernenon, Andagaron, and Tionontoguen, all along the south side of the Mohawk River from east to west. These were recorded by speakers of other languages with different spellings, and historians have struggled to reconcile various accounts, as well as to align them with archeological studies of the areas. For instance, Johannes Megapolensis, a Dutch minister, recorded the spelling of the same three villages as Asserué, Banagiro, and Thenondiogo. Late 20th-century archeological studies have determined that Ossernenon was located about 9 miles west of the current city of Auriesville; the two were mistakenly conflated by a tradition that developed in the late 19th century in the Catholic Church.
While the Dutch later established settlements in present-day Schenectady and Schoharie, further west in the Mohawk Valley, merchants in Fort Nassau continued to control the fur trading. Schenectady was established essentially as a farming settlement, where the Dutch took over some of the former Mohawk maize fields in the floodplain along the river. Through trading, the Mohawk and Dutch became allies of a kind.
During their alliance, the Mohawks allowed Dutch Protestant missionary Johannes Megapolensis to come into their communities and teach the Christian message. He operated from the Fort Nassau area for about six years, writing a record in 1644 of his observations of the Mohawk, their language (which he learned), and their culture. While he noted their ritual of torture of captives, he recognized that their society had few other killings, especially compared to the Netherlands of that period.
The trading relations between the Mohawk and Dutch helped them maintain peace even during the periods of Kieft's War and the Esopus Wars, when the Dutch fought localized battles with other native peoples. In addition, Dutch trade partners equipped the Mohawk with guns to fight against other First Nations who were allied with the French, including the Ojibwe, Huron-Wendat, and Algonquin. In 1645, the Mohawk made peace for a time with the French, who were trying to keep a piece of the fur trade.
During the Pequot War (1634–1638), the Pequot and other Algonquian Indians of coastal New England sought an alliance with the Mohawks against English colonists of that region. Disrupted by their losses to smallpox, the Mohawks refused the alliance. They killed the Pequot sachem Sassacus who had come to them for refuge, and returned part of his remains to the English governor of Connecticut, John Winthrop, as proof of his death.
In the winter of 1651, the Mohawk attacked on the southeast and overwhelmed the Algonquian in the coastal areas. They took between 500 and 600 captives. In 1664, the Pequot of New England killed a Mohawk ambassador, starting a war that resulted in the destruction of the Pequot, as the English and their allies in New England entered the conflict, trying to suppress the Native Americans in the region. The Mohawk also attacked other members of the Pequot confederacy, in a war that lasted until 1671.
In 1666, the French attacked the Mohawk in the central New York area, burning the three Mohawk villages south of the river and their stored food supply. One of the conditions of the peace was that the Mohawk accept Jesuit missionaries. Beginning in 1669, missionaries attempted to convert Mohawks to Christianity, operating a mission in Ossernenon 9 miles west of present-day Auriesville, New York until 1684, when the Mohawks destroyed it, killing several priests.
Over time, some converted Mohawk relocated to Jesuit mission villages established south of Montreal on the St. Lawrence River in the early 1700s: Kahnawake (used to be spelled as Caughnawaga, named for the village of that name in the Mohawk Valley) and Kanesatake. These Mohawk were joined by members of other Indigenous peoples but dominated the settlements by number. Many converted to Roman Catholicism. In the 1740s, Mohawk and French set up another village upriver, which is known as Akwesasne. Today a Mohawk reserve, it spans the St. Lawrence River and present-day international boundaries to New York, United States, where it is known as the St. Regis Mohawk Reservation.
Kateri Tekakwitha, born at Ossernenon in the late 1650s, has become noted as a Mohawk convert to Catholicism. She moved with relatives to Caughnawaga on the north side of the Mohawk river after her parents' deaths. She was known for her faith and a shrine was built to her in New York. In the late 20th century, she was beatified and was canonized in October 2012 as the first Native American Catholic saint. She is also recognized by the Episcopal and Lutheran churches.
After the fall of New Netherland to England in 1664, the Mohawk in New York traded with the English and sometimes acted as their allies. During King Philip's War, Metacom, sachem of the warring Wampanoag Pokanoket, decided to winter with his warriors near Albany in 1675. Encouraged by the English, the Mohawk attacked and killed all but 40 of the 400 Pokanoket.
From the 1690s, Protestant missionaries sought to convert the Mohawk in the New York colony. Many were baptized with English surnames, while others were given both first and surnames in English.
During the late 17th and early 18th centuries, the Mohawk and Abenaki First Nations in New England were involved in raids conducted by the French and English against each other's settlements during Queen Anne's War and other conflicts. They conducted a growing trade in captives, holding them for ransom. Neither of the colonial governments generally negotiated for common captives, and it was up to local European communities to raise funds to ransom their residents. In some cases, French and Abenaki raiders transported captives from New England to Montreal and the Mohawk mission villages. The Mohawk at Kahnawake forcibly adopted numerous young women and children to add to their own members, having suffered losses to disease and warfare. For instance, among them were numerous survivors of the more than 100 captives taken in the Deerfield raid in western Massachusetts. The minister of Deerfield was ransomed and returned to Massachusetts, but his daughter was forcibly adopted by a Mohawk family and ultimately assimilated and married a Mohawk man.
During the era of the French and Indian War (also known as the Seven Years' War), Anglo-Mohawk partnership relations were maintained by men such as Sir William Johnson in New York (for the British Crown), Conrad Weiser (on behalf of the colony of Pennsylvania), and Hendrick Theyanoguin (for the Mohawk). Johnson called the Albany Congress in June 1754, to discuss with the Iroquois chiefs repair of the damaged diplomatic relationship between the British and the Mohawk, along with securing their cooperation and support in fighting the French, in engagements in North America.
American Revolutionary War
During the second and third quarters of the 18th century, most of the Mohawks in the Province of New York lived along the Mohawk River at Canajoharie. A few lived at Schoharie, and the rest lived about 30 miles downstream at the Tionondorage Castle, also called Fort Hunter. These two major settlements were traditionally called the Upper Castle and the Lower Castle. The Lower Castle was almost contiguous with Sir Peter Warren's Warrensbush. Sir William Johnson, the British Superintendent of Indian Affairs, built his first house on the north bank of the Mohawk River almost opposite Warrensbush and established the settlement of Johnstown.
The Mohawk were among the four Iroquois people that allied with the British during the American Revolutionary War. They had a long trading relationship with the British and hoped to gain support to prohibit colonists from encroaching into their territory in the Mohawk Valley. Joseph Brant acted as a war chief and successfully led raids against British and ethnic German colonists in the Mohawk Valley, who had been given land by the British administration near the rapids at present-day Little Falls, New York.
A few prominent Mohawk, such as the sachem Little Abraham (Tyorhansera) at Fort Hunter, remained neutral throughout the war. Joseph Louis Cook (Akiatonharónkwen), a veteran of the French and Indian War and ally of the rebels, offered his services to the Americans, receiving an officer's commission from the Continental Congress. He led Oneida warriors against the British. During this war, Johannes Tekarihoga was the civil leader of the Mohawk. He died around 1780. Catherine Crogan, a clan mother and wife of Mohawk war chief Joseph Brant, named her brother Henry Crogan as the new Tekarihoga.
In retaliation for Brant's raids in the valley, the rebel colonists organized Sullivan's Expedition. It conducted extensive raids against other Iroquois settlements in central and western New York, destroying 40 villages, crops, and winter stores. Many Mohawk and other Iroquois migrated to Canada for refuge near Fort Niagara, struggling to survive the winter.
After the Revolution
After the American victory, the British ceded their claim to land in the colonies, and the Americans forced their allies, the Mohawks and others, to give up their territories in New York. Most of the Mohawks migrated to Canada, where the Crown gave them some land in compensation. The Mohawks at the Upper Castle fled to Fort Niagara, while most of those at the Lower Castle went to villages near Montreal.
Joseph Brant led a large group of Iroquois out of New York to what became the reserve of the Six Nations of the Grand River, Ontario. Brant continued as a political leader of the Mohawks for the rest of his life. This land extended 100 miles from the head of the Grand River to the head of Lake Erie where it discharges. Another Mohawk war chief, John Deseronto, led a group of Mohawk to the Bay of Quinte. Other Mohawks settled in the vicinity of Montreal and upriver, joining the established communities (now reserves) at Kahnawake, Kanesatake, and Akwesasne.
On November 11, 1794, representatives of the Mohawk (along with the other Iroquois nations) signed the Treaty of Canandaigua with the United States, which allowed them to own land there.
The Mohawks fought as allies of the British against the United States in the War of 1812.
20th century to present
In 1971, the Mohawk Warrior Society, also Rotisken’rakéhte in the Mohawk language, was founded in Kahnawake. The duties of the Warrior Society are to use roadblocks, evictions, and occupations to gain rights for their people, and these tactics are also used among the warriors to protect the environment from pollution. The notable movements started by the Mohawk Warrior Society have been the Oka Crisis blockades in 1990 and the Caledonia Ontario, Douglas Creek occupation of a construction site in summer of 2006.
On May 13, 1974, at 4:00 a.m, Mohawks from the Kahnawake and Akwesasne reservations repossessed traditional Mohawk land near Old Forge, New York, occupying Moss Lake, an abandoned girls camp. The New York state government attempted to shut the operation down, but after negotiation, the state offered the Mohawk some land in Miner Lake, where they have since settled.