Seneca

As “guardians of the western door” in the metaphorical longhouse of the Iroquois Confederacy, the Seneca (People of the Big Hill) consisted of two main groups occupying two principal villages (along with several smaller ones) at the time of contact by Europeans.

The western band of the Seneca lived around the Genessee and Allegheny Rivers, and the eastern one near Canandaigua Lake in present-day New York State (Livingston and Ontario Counties). Their location put them closest to the western beaver hunting grounds that came to figure so prominently in the 17th-century fur trade. They were also the most populous tribe within the alliance, probably surpassing the combined numbers of the other Iroquois nations (Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, and Cayuga).

Despite their numbers, the Seneca held only eight seats (the fewest of any of the Five Nations) in the league’s Grand Council. Together with the Onondaga and Mohawk, they represented the “Older Brothers” in this political structure. Nevertheless, their role as protectors of the western flank of Iroquoia from encroachment by whites and their

Native allies and as guarantors of access to hunting territory pivotal in the fur trade was instrumental in the preservation and power of the confederacy. In fact, the Seneca had helped expand the league’s influence by the mid-16th century by moving their villages northward and continued to bargain from a position of strength during most of the colonial period. While they did not escape the changes wrought by contact, including losses to DISEASE and warfare, they held onto cherished ideals and homelands in the face of such adversity and thrived in the area until after the American Revolution.

Further reading: Thomas S. Abler and Elisabeth Tooker, “Seneca,” in William Sturtevant, ed., Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 15, Northeast, vol. ed. Bruce G. Trigger (Washington, D. C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1978), 505-517; Marilyn L. Haas, Seneca and Tuscarora Indians: An Annotated Bibliography (Hamden, Conn.: Library Professional Publications, 1994); Arthur C. Parker, History of the Seneca Indians (Port Washington, N. Y.: I. J. Friedman, 1967); Anthony F. C. Wallace, with the assistance of Sheila C. Steen, The Death and Rebirth of the Seneca (New York: Knopf, 1970).

—Eric P. Anderson