Making Pictures in Stone: American Indian Rock Art of the Northeast

Algonquian People in the Northeast

1 Algonquian People in the Northeast When the first European explorers arrived on the coast of northeastern North America in the sixteenth century, they were met by Indians who were speakers of the Algonquian language. Algonquian speakers occupied an area extending along the east coast and adjacent inland regions from the eastern maritime provinces of Canada to North Carolina (Figure 1). During this early Historic Contact period the Indians in what are now the provinces of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick were referred to as the Mi’kmaq. In New England they were referred to as the Eastern Abenaki, Western Abenaki, Maliseet, Passamaquoddy, Penacook, Sokoki, Pocumtuck, Massachusett , Narragansett, Pequot, Nipmuck, and Wampanoag. In east-central New York, southwestern Massachusetts, and northwestern Connecticut they were known as the Mahicans. Southeastern New York, New Jersey, eastern Pennsylvania, and northern Delaware were the homeland of the Lenape, later called the Delaware Indians.Within each of these broad tribal territories were smaller bands of Indians known by a variety of names to the Europeans ( Johnson 1995:6, 12, 14, 19;Kraft 2001:2;Trigger, ed. 1978:ix). Several Eastern Algonquian languages were spoken in the region covered by this rock art study. In the Canadian maritime provinces Mi’kmaq was spoken, while in western New Brunswick and eastern Maine the language spoken was Maliseet and Passamaquoddy.The Indians of Maine spoke four languages of the eastern branch of the Algonquian family: Mi’kmaq, Passamaquoddy/Maliseet, Eastern Abenaki, and Western Abenaki.Western Abenaki speakers, who included the Sokoki, occupied the upper Connecticut River valley and north-central Massachusetts. Several dialects of the Massachusett language were spoken in the area extending from southeastern New Hampshire to Massachusetts Bay, Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket Island,and southeastern Rhode Island.The Narragansett language was spoken by Indians living on the west side of Narragansett Bay and Conanicut Island. Mohegan-Pequot dialects were spoken in southeastern Connec- 2 / Chapter 1 ticut between the Connecticut and Pawcatuck rivers (Goddard 1978a:70–73; Simmons 1986:11). The Mahican language was spoken by the Indians in the upper Hudson River valley in New York (Brasser 1978:198). Munsee dialects were spoken in southeastern New York, northern New Jersey, and northeastern Pennsylvania . Northern Unami/Unalachtigo dialects were spoken by people living in east-central Pennsylvania and central New Jersey, while people in southFigure 1. Map of northeast region with general locations of Indian cultural groups. Adapted from Trigger, ed. 1978:ix. Algonquian People in the Northeast / 3 eastern Pennsylvania,southern New Jersey,and northeastern Delaware spoke southern Unami dialects (Kraft 2001:3). The Algonquian people, despite having a common language, did not have the same or identical cultural elements. Their language and dialect boundaries reflected social and cultural differences. Algonquian dialects were mutually intelligible,however,which permitted Indians of one area to converse with Indians of another area. Iroquoian speakers lived along the upper Saint Lawrence River valley around Lake Ontario and eastern Lake Erie and in central New York including the Mohawk and Susquehanna river valleys. These people are referred to as the Saint Lawrence Iroquoians, Mohawks, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca, Huron, the Petun and Neutral confederacies, Erie, and Susquehannock (Trigger, ed. 1978:ix). These Iroquoian speakers were surrounded by the Algonquian-speaking peoples,and the relationships between these two language groups were both hostile and friendly.In the seventeenth century the five Iroquois tribes of NewYork—the Mohawk,Oneida,Onondaga , Cayuga, and Seneca—were at war with nearly every other tribe in the Northeast. The subsistence economy of all Algonquian peoples consisted of hunting, fishing, and the gathering of wild foods. In addition to these subsistence activities , horticulture or gardening was practiced in southern New England and portions of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Corn and several varieties of beans and squashes were the primary food plants grown by the Indians. The tribes generally lived in small independent villages or hamlets consisting of several hundred people.Each village or hamlet had its own leader,a sachem or chief, whose authority and rule was based on persuasion and consensus . Each tribe occupied its own geographic territory and had its own set of family or clan symbols known as totems.Totems were emblems or names that identified members of a family or clan and were usually those of animals ,birds,or fish.In 1723,for example,several Mohawk,Mohegan,and Mahican Indians traveled to Boston to meet with the lieutenant governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.Each tribal group was given...