Since my move to New York 26 years ago, it has puzzled me why North American archaeologists seemingly do not pay more attention to ongoing developments in Iroquoian archaeology in present-day New York, Ontario, and Québec (northern Iroquoia). After all, this is a region where it is possible to investigate archaeologically a dynamic sociopolitical landscape dating from the fourteenth century AD onward that included the formation of egalitarian nations (“tribes”) and confederacies that are extremely well documented ethnohistorically and in which there are descendant communities. Whatever the reasons, the apparent disinterest on the part of many archaeologists (based, admittedly, on only my personal observations) is unfortunate. As Anthony Wonderley and Martha L. Sempowski demonstrate in this book, the combination of ethnohistory and archaeology enables the development of empirically strong understandings of the whys and hows of egalitarian nation and confederacy formations in this region, which may have broader applicability.
As the book's title indicates, Wonderley and Sempowski are concerned with the origins of the Haudenosaunee confederacy, or Iroquois League, in present-day New York. The confederacy consisted originally of five nations (Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca) whose members spoke Iroquoian languages. A sixth nation, the Iroquoian-language-speaking Tuscarora, joined the confederacy later after migrating to New York from North Carolina in the early eighteenth century. The book is composed of seven chapters, including a coauthored Introduction and a Summary and Conclusions. The remaining chapters are individually authored, with Wonderley focusing on the eastern (Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga) and Sempowski the western (Cayuga, Seneca) nations. The introduction provides enough background on New York Iroquoian archaeology and the confederacy that the rest of the book should be accessible to just about any archaeologist.
The big question addressed by Wonderley and Sempowski is when exactly the original confederacy formed. This has been a topic of interest to Iroquoianists for decades. Many of the archaeological estimates have been based on evidence derived from versions of legends and myths recorded by or from confederacy members dating to the eighteenth century onward (the “Deganawida epic”) and correlations to inferences derived from the archaeological record. Importantly, in the book's second chapter, Wonderley analyzes myths and legends recorded as early as 1743 through those recorded during the early twentieth century. He traces how the story about the origins of the confederacy has changed through time, with some versions adopting elements paralleling the Christ mythos of Christianity, and argues the necessity of returning to the earliest recordings as primary evidence. He points out the problems of archaeologists relying on questionable versions of the epic to select the specific event of a solar eclipse to identify a year for the confederacy's origin.
Subsequent chapters draw on the archaeological record, providing analyses of effigy pipes, marine shell artifacts (including beads), changes in mortuary practices, and evidence of warfare. The penultimate chapter discusses the importance of metaphor in confederacy functions, focusing specifically on the confederacy's longhouse metaphor. Through these analyses, Wonderley and Sempowski build strong cases for timings of the developments of the five nations, and eastern and western regional confederacies preceding the Haudenosaunee confederacy, and a reasonable argument for the formal origin of the Haudenosaunee confederacy in the early seventeenth century.
As it was in the last few centuries in northern Iroquoia prior to the permanent presence of Europeans, Iroquoian archaeology is in a state of flux. Through the applications of contemporary methods, techniques, and theories, there are rapid changes in knowledge of subregional chronologies, social interactions, the roles of women in confederacy dynamics, artifact sourcing, and the early circulations of artifacts manufactured from European metals. As a result, there are some aspects of the authors’ interpretations, such as the role of St. Lawrence Iroquoians of northern New York in a pre-five-nation eastern confederacy, that may need to be changed. Rather than being part of a pre-Haudenosaunee eastern New York confederacy, recent social network analysis of pottery decorations has shown that northern New York Iroquoians acted as intermediaries (liaison brokers) between southern Ontario and eastern New York Iroquoians from the mid-fifteenth through mid-sixteenth centuries when they dispersed from the St. Lawrence Valley (Hart, Birch, and Gates St-Pierre, Science Advances 3(8):e1700497). Complementary analysis of steatite beads from contemporaneous southern Ontario sites identified their source as northern New York, which indicates presumably peaceful interactions between northern New York and southern Ontario Iroquoians (Jones et al., Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 20:506–515). Wonderley and Sempowski's suggestion, based on multiple lines of evidence, that the Haudenosaunee confederacy is likely to have arisen in the early seventeenth century—at the same time as confederacies in adjoining areas (e.g., Wendat/Huron, Neutral, Erie)—as a result of warfare is compelling, and it is likely to stand the test of time.
This book is well worth reading by Iroquoianists. It is also a book that should be read by archaeologists elsewhere in North America interested in not only sociopolitical developments and dynamics but also the way ethnohistory and archaeology can be used together to advance our knowledge of the past.
