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vii Foreword GreG o’Brien Few geographical areas of north America experienced the dynamism of indian-european interaction that the ohio Valley and southern Great Lakes offered prior to the mid-nineteenth century. Here was the land marked by native spiritual revitalization movements and prophets such as neolin (the delaware Prophet) and tenskwatawa (the shawnee Prophet) and their nascent pan-indian movements. Here too were the great conflicts enacted during the seven Years’ War (French and indian War); Pontiac’s rebellion; Lord dunmore’s War, the American revolution; the multitribal wars against the United states in the 1790s led by chiefs such as Little turtle (Miami), Blackhoof and Blue Jacket (shawnee), and Buckongahelas (Lenape); and the pan-indian resistance to American expansion in the old northwest led by tecumseh and his prophet brother that coincided with the War of 1812. trade and interethnic cooperation also characterized the region from the time when French fur traders first entered the region in the seventeenth century through to the era of indian removal between 1830 and the 1840s. trade brought material and cultural change to indian peoples that sometimes worked in their favor and other times contributed to the many conflicts that characterized the region in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Missionaries and euro-American settlers, especially prominent in the region after the formation of the United states, further added to both cultural change and occasional instability as they encouraged indian religious and cultural conversion along Christian patriarchal lines. in this region can be found all of the issues deriving from indian-european relations, and as such, the ohio Valley and southern Great Lakes continues to offer up new insights into the fundamental frontier experience that characterized the colonial and early national periods of United states history. the array of peoples in this territory during the era covered in this essay collection demonstrates the multi-cultural reality of early America. Among indian peoples, we find ottawas, ojibwas, Potawatomis, Hurons, Miamis, Weas, Kickapoos, Mascoutens, Piankashaws, delawares (Lenapes), shawnees , Wyandots, Mingos, senecas, and other iroquoian peoples. of course, viii| Foreword over the eighteenth century and beyond, many native villages here counted inhabitants from various different tribes, including French and British citizens . French farmers, fur traders, and missionaries lived in the region from the seventeenth century, and many of them stayed as France lost claims to the area after the seven Years’ War ended in 1763. during and after the seven Years’ War, British soldiers and farmers, as well as those from the German principalities, scotland, ireland, Wales, or born in the American colonies, came to live in the area. After the American revolution, Americans of many stripes and european immigrants sought their future in the northwest. With them came Quaker, Moravian, Methodist, and Baptist believers and missionaries to join Catholics already there. native people followed a variety of belief systems too, from primarily traditional cultural outlooks, to the nativist teachings of neolin and tenskwatawa, to partial and full conversion to some version of Christianity. Historians have long focused on this region because of its colorful personalities , and as the place where fundamental questions of colonialism and intercultural relations became and remained sharply focused. For over a hundred years before the 1830s indian removal actions, this locale became a border zone between european empires, between opposing indian groups, and between indians and euro-Americans. From the seminal works of Francis Parkman in the mid-nineteenth century to the late twentieth-century studies by Gregory dowd, richard White, david edmunds, and several others who helped establish the new indian History, the ohio Valley and southern Great Lakes remains a place that can help those studying indianeuropean /American relations to find new perspectives into this formative period of north American history. this collection makes a significant contribution to literature on native people in the ohio Valley and southern Great Lakes. the essays reflect the work of a new generation of historians and anthropologists who fill in some gaps in our understanding of native–colonist relations in the region. the collection provides a solid ethnohistorical approach by incorporating historical and archaeological approaches and evidence. Most of the essays break new ground by studying this region and its various peoples in a crucial time period of rapid cultural, economic, and political change during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. As a whole, the essays reflect newer scholarly concerns with gender analysis, religion and prophetic movements, material culture, trade, and the internal political dynamics within native groups. especially noteworthy...

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