Haudenosaunee

Haudenosaunee country is the lake and river land of what is now upstate New York, with large communities across the border in Ontario and Quebec: Six Nations of the Grand River, Akwesasne, Kahnawake, Tyendinaga and others. Together the confederacy counts over one hundred thousand citizens across the two countries, and Six Nations of the Grand River is the most populous First Nations community in Canada.

The confederacy itself is the achievement: under the Great Law of Peace, received in tradition at Onondaga Lake long before Europeans arrived, five warring nations bound themselves into one longhouse with the Onondaga as firekeepers. It is among the oldest continuously operating political institutions on Earth, and its ideas were studied by the men who framed the United States constitution.

The Haudenosaunee never stopped acting as nations: they declared war on Germany independently in 1917 and 1942, travel on their own passports, and field the national lacrosse team of a game that is theirs to begin with. Land claims across New York remain open, and the confederacy council still sits at Onondaga.

This is an introduction, the first layer. A full collection, like the Mapuche collection that opened this atlas, follows as research and review are completed for each people.