Please read the feature articles on "Indians in Pennsylvania" before continuing. Much of the basic material in those articles is essential for understanding this writing. I consider this a continuation of that text.
The Haudenosaunee and The Great Law of Peace
The Haudenosaunee (HO-den-o-SAW-nee)/Iroquois have existed for hundreds of years, so far back that no one is really certain of the date. In the 1600's when Jesuit missionaries traveled through these lands and made contact with the Haudenosaunee, they judged the league to be "very ancient" even then.
But we begin our story before the landfall of the "newcomers", even before the Haudenosaunee. To do so we must step outside contemporary culture and envision a land where old growth forests stretched from Ontario to Florida and the people who lived here thought of this place as a life sustaining home and not as a wilderness. It was a time before the Mohawk, Oneida, Cayuga, Onondaga and Seneca nations, residing in what is now New York and Northern Pennsylvania, came together to create the Haudenosaunee---what Europeans would later call The Great Confederacy of the Iroquois (or Five Nations). It was what the Haudenosaunee call "the time of great sorrow and terror."
In the "time of great sorrow and terror" people had lost their path.
They had forgotten their way. The five separate nations warred against one another.
They were embroiled in blood feuds and revenge killings. No one was respected.
None were safe. People were always afraid. Out of the misery of this horrible
time, there appeared a man from the north. He was of the nation of people called
Huron. His name was Deganawidah (DE-gan-a-WI-dah). He was a great thinker, a
man of good character and strong convictions. At considerable risk, he traveled
into the lands of the five nations. He first came to the Mohawk and brought
the "good news of peace and power" to the people. The Mohawk people
listened. He impressed them with his ideas and they soon adopted him, as was
their custom. The first person to accept Deganawidah's message of peace was
a woman named Jigonsasee (JI-gon-SA-see) or some say Jakohnsaseh . She would
come to be known as the "Mother of Nations."
Over time Deganawidah (his name today is never spoken), became known and is
still known as "The Peacemaker." His message to strengthen the nations
and protect the people by putting an end to the warfare among them would later
be formalized in "The Great Law of Peace."
The Peacemaker continued to work among the people of his adopted family, the Mohawks, to help them understand his message. It was at this time that he met with Hayanwatah (HA-yan-WA-tah). Most people of European decent know him as Hiawatha. Hayanwatah was an Onondaga man respected for his gifts of oratory and leadership. Together, The Peacemaker, Jigonsasee and Hayanwatah visited the sister nations to present their principle message of peace and unity. But the Onondaga were difficult to convince. Jigonsasee held council with The Peacemaker and Hayanwatah, coming up with a plan to win a reluctant and cruel Onondaga leader "whose hair was twisted around his head like snakes." To accomplish their goal, they offered the Onondaga sachem the position of spiritual leader in the Great Council of the Five Nations, which would be convened under the Great Law of Peace. Symbolically it is said that Hayanwatah "combed the snakes from his hair." The Onondaga leader finally consented and so all five nations joined together for the first time to form the league called the Haudenosaunee, "The people of the Long House."
The people uprooted a large pine tree and placed all their weapons of war into the ground. Then they replanted "The Great Tree of Peace" over the weapons. The leaders of the nations held council under the Peace Tree, "whose white roots spread out to the east, west, north and south."
The peacemaker said, many families live together in a longhouse, each with a separate fire. Now the five Nations live in a Great Longhouse, each keeping its own fire (the nations remained separate), but living in peace under one roof (under one system of law). The Peacemaker said if any other people want to obey the laws of the Great Peace, "they may trace their source....and they shall be welcomed to take shelter beneath the Tree."
During the times to come, when European colonists pushed other peoples from their homelands, as many as sixty tribes came under the protection of the Haudenosaunee. Europeans did not understand this process very well and often misinterpreted it. But, in the early days of immigration, even they were offered a chance to unite under the Great Law of Peace.
Parts of this text are referenced from: Exiled in the land of the Free
John Mohawk et al
If You lived with the Iroquois
Ellen Levine and Shelly Hehenberger
And to knowledge given freely by Indian People.