While we know our northern friends may not feel it, in the South, Spring is
here. So we thought we'd share a few of our gardening sites appropriate
for this time of the year. Along with gardening, there's grilling, and getting
ready to diet so that you can fit back into that bathing suit this summer!
Oneida. One of the chief and first town, known villages of
the Oneida people, and which within historical times has been removed to
several new situations. It seems to have been originally a town of the
Wolf clan, for it is so enumerated in the Chant of Welcome of the
Condolence Council of the League of the Iroquois; the Wolf clan
constituted one of the two phratries in the tribal council of the Oneida.
Arent Van Curler, who visited this town in 1634, wrote that it was
situated on a high hill and defended by two rows of palisades; in the
ramparts were two gates, one on the west side, over which were standing "3
wooden images, of cut (carved?) wood, like men," adorned with 3 scalps,
and the other, on the east side, adorned with only one scalp; the western
gate was 3½ ft wide, while the other was only 2 ft. He wrote that this
palisade was 767 paces in circumference, and that within it were 66
lodges, much better, higher, and more finished than all those others we
saw." Those seen by Van
Curler and his companions were the Mohawk castles. Of the first Mohawk
castle Van Curler wrote: "There stood but 36 houses, in rows like streets,
so that we could pass nicely. The houses are made and covered with bark of
trees, and mostly flat at the top. Some are 100, 90, or 80 paces long, and
22 or 23 ft high. The houses were full of corn that they lay in
store, and we saw maize; yes, in some houses more than 300
bushels." His description of the third Mohawk castle, then called
Sohanidisse, or Rehanadisse, follows: "On a very high hill stood 32
lodges, like the other ones. Some were 100, 90, or 80 paces long; in every
lodge we saw 4, 5, or 6 fireplaces where cooking went on." Some of the
lodges were finished with wooden fronts, painted with all sorts of beasts,
and in some of them were found very good axes, French shirts, coats, and
razors, and lodges were seen where "60, 70 and more dried salmon were
hanging." While in the Oneida castle Van Curler witnessed the conclusion
of a temporary peace compact between the Oneida and the French Indians for
purposes of trade for four years. To this he gave the name "Castle
Enneyuttehage, or Sinnekens." The Oneida, the Onondaga, and the Cayuga
were named respectively Onneyatte, Onondaga, and Koyockure (for Koyockwe),
which indicates that the tribal divisions of the Iroquois were well known
to the narrator at this period. This town was probably on one of the early
Oneida village sites in the upper valley of Oneida creek, not far from
Oriskany creek, and according to Van Curler's estimate, 75 or 80 miles
west of
the Mohawk castle of Tenotoge (Tionontogen?); it was situated on the east
side of Oneida creek, and Van Curler saw north west of it, on the left bank of
the creek, " tremendously high land that seemed to lie in the clouds."
Just before reaching the castle he saw three graves, "just like our graves
in length and height; usually their graves are round." These graves were
surrounded with palisades, nicely closed up, and painted red, white, and
black. The grave of a chief had all entrance, and at the top there was " a
big wooden bird, and all around were painted dogs, and deer, and snakes,
and other beasts. Such was the chief Oneida town of 1634.
While with the Oneida Van Curler witnessed apparently a
part of the New Year
ceremonials of the Iroquois, which he regarded as so much foolery."
According to Greenhalgh, who visited the Oneida in 1677, they had only one
town, " newly settled, double stockadoed," containing about 100 houses and
200 warriors, situated 20 (sic) miles from Oneida creek and 30 miles south of
Mohawk river; it had but little cleared land, "so that they are forced to
send to ye Onondago's to buy corne." This village, therefore, was not
situated on the site visited by Van Curler. In Aug. 1696 a principal town
of the Oneida was burned by Vaudreuil, a lieutenant of Count Frontenac.
In 1756 Sir William Johnson (N. Y. Doc. Col. Hist., vii, 101, 1856)
employed the name Onawaraghhare to designate a place regarded as suitable
for the erection of a fort, thus showing that at that time there was a
village called "Canowaroghere." In 1762 Lieut. Guy Johnson, starting from
German Flats, visited the Oneida (N. Y. Doc. Col. Hist., vii, 512, 1856).
The first town reached he called " Upper Oneida Castle," and also simply
"Oneida." Thence he went to "Canowaroghere, a new village of the
Oneidas." On Sauthier's map of Jan. 1, 1779, 3 Oneida villages are placed
in the valley of Oneida creek:
(1) Old Oneyda Cast(le), placed east of the
headwaters of Oneida creek and north of the junction of the trails from Ft
Schuyler and from Ft Herkermer;
(2) Canowaroghare, lower down the valley
at 'the junction of the trails from Ft Schuyler and Ft Stanwix, and on the
left bank of Oneida creek;
(3) New Oneyda Castle, on the right bank of
Oneida creek, at the junction of the trails from his Canowaroghare and from
Ft Stanwix, and on the trail leading from Canowaroghare to the Royal
Blockhouse on Wood creek. Two of these, if not all of them, were
contemporary. In 1774 the Montauk Indians were to be settled at Canowaroghare.
At Oneida in 1667 was founded the mission of Saint François
Xavier.
In a note attached to the original of a Paris
document of 1757 (N. Y. Doc. Hist., 1, 526, 1849) the "great Oneida
village" is said to be "two leagues from the Lake," and that within it the
English had constructed a "picket Fort with four bastions," which however
had been destroyed by the Oneida in pursuance of a promise made by them to
the Marquis de Vaudreuil. This
note adds that a second Oneida village, called "the little village," was
situated "on the bank of the Lake."
It is thus seen that the site and the name have
shifted from place to place, but were restricted to the valleys of Oneida creek and upper Oriskany
creek. The name Canowaroghare is the modern name of the city of Oneida and of
the Indian settlement situated about 2 miles south, in Madison county, N. Y. In
1666-68 (Jes. Rel., Thwaites ed., x.x, 121, 1899) Father Bruyas wrote that
" Onneiout" was situated on an eminence whence a great portion of the
surrounding country could be seen, were the environing forest cut away;
that "there is no river or lake, except at 5 leagues distant from the
town;" that more than half the population was composed of "Algonquin and
Hurons," and that the Oneida had never spoken of peace until within two
years. The Oneida have settlements in Canada and in Wisconsin at Green
Bay, but these are not towns.
