Huron-Wendat

The Huron or Wendats in language Wendat E (also called with the the United States the Wyandots ) are a First Nation of language iroquoienne, originating in the south of the Ontario, with the Canada.

The “Huron” name their was given by the first French newcomers because of the hairstyle of the men, similar to that of the Mohawks, which pointed out the head Sanglier.

At the time of the first contact franco-wendat at the 17th century, Wendats were, according to the first Europeans entering in contact with them, organized in a confederation of five tribes or distinct tribes: the Attignawantan , the Attignaenongnehac , the Arendaronon , the Tahontaenrat and the Ataronchronons .

Wendats fought against the Iroquois before even the arrival of the French in the area. The alliance franco-wendate and the alliances formed by Iroquois with the Dutch, then with the English, connects this war to that of the colonizing powers. Rifles and the knives in Acier increase the destroying intensity of the war and, as of 1649, Iroquois devastate Wendats. Iroquois took a great number of prisoners: after one year, according to the habits iroquoiennes, the ones are adopted by marriage with a member of the tribe and the others tortured then killed.

A group from approximately 300 Wendats Catholique S took refuge close to the town of Quebec according to the dispersion of their people by Iroquois. Their descendants live there in the Indian Réserve of Wendake, also called the “Huron Village”, located at Loretteville. Another group, current Wyandots, flees towards the west, where they found refuge in the Actual positions of the Ohio and the Michigan.

Towards the end of the 18th century, Wendats of the West obtain a position of importance symbolic system as “uncles” of the Confederation of Wabache which fights in the United States in the years 1790. The descendants of Wendats of the West are divided today into three groups: the certain number which remained in Michigan and Ontario (the Nation Wyandot d' Anderdon), another group led to the Kansas and a third, largest, in the Oklahoma.

: 3000 Huron-Wendats living with the Quebec are for the majority catholics and French-speaking people, although there is currently a movement in favor of the study and the use of the language wendate.

The Huronone of Loretteville are known for a long time for their production of craft industry and traditional objects, inter alia the moccasins and the rackets of babiche.

Localization

Before 1649, Wendats had a territory with the Canada and the the United States. This territory of 880 km ² was delimited by the river the Niagara in the east, the river Holy-Claire in the west, the Lac Erié in the south.

After their defeat vis-a-vis Iroquois in 1649, a group of approximately 300 Huron catholics settles close to Quebec, with Wendake.

The old seigniory of Sillery is asserted by these people of Wendake like Huron territory, just as most of county of Roquemont and the territory of the “Forty Arpents”.

After 1649, another part of Huron flees towards the West and settles in the Michigan and the Ohio then, after the 18th century, they are divided into three groups: one in the Michigan and the Ontario (the Nation Wyandot d' Anderdon), the other with the Kansas and the third in the Oklahoma, the current Huron reserve of Wyandot.

History

Origin of the name

The Indian name of the nation is “Wendat”, which signie “insular” in connection with their place of dwelling on the peninsula of the Baie Georgienne.

The “Huron” name their was given by the first French newcomers because of the hairstyle of the men, similar to that of the Mohawks and Ojibwé S, which pointed out the head Sanglier.

Before the arrival of Europeans (before the 17th century)

The Huron ones formed a confederation of five distinct tribes, according to the first Europeans coming into contact with them: the Attignawantan tribe of the bear, the Attignaenongnehac tribe of the cord, the Arendaronon tribe of the rock, the Tahontaenrat tribe of the Deer and the Ataronchronons tribe of the Marshes.

They trade and have good relationships with the Pétuns and the Neutres, like with certain tribes of the Confederation of the Five-Nations iroquoises and with the algonquiens of the valley of Outaouais: the Outaouais, the Nipissings and the Algonquins.

Before the arrival of the French, they are in war with Iroquois, but this war regularizes the demographic weight of each people, and the prisoners are often adopted.

The contact with the French

The first contact with the French goes back to 1609, when they decided to form a military and commercial alliance with Samuel Champlain. This one was effective in 1616. The French are free to circulate in Huron territory, and must intervene in the event of conflict. Besides that involves the French in a war with the Iroquois.

In 1615, missionaries récollets are sent at the Huron ones, followed by the Jésuite S in 1625. In 1633, in the renewal of alliance, the French add a clause: the Huron ones are held to lodge Christian missionaries. A big number of missionaries Jésuites settled in the years 1640 among Wendats from which they learned the language and the social organization. However, certain Huron have a resentment for the Jesuits, going until regarding them as wizards, who baptize people with the article of died and who themselves are not touched by the epidemics.

The first conversions go back to this time: indeed, the Huron Christian has advantages, because it can acquire goods at low price, and especially it can have a firearm. However, it disunites remainder of the village because it refuses to go to the combat and to take part in ritual not Christians.

The war against Iroquois

The Huron ones are in war against the Iroquois before even the arrival of the French. The Attignawantan and the Attignaenongnehac are devoted to engagements against the five tribes iroquoises of New York, and are joined soon by the three other Huron tribes which leave southern bank and the bank is Ontario to join them.

The origin of this war is little known, however a Huron oral tradition tells that at a place, on northern bank is Lake Ontario, a winter ceremony joined together the Huron ones and Mohawks, one of the principal tribes iroquoises. A desired Indian mohawk to make interpret one of its dreams by a Huron Shaman, as it was the habit on their premises. It was a very violent dream, in which it was killed. Requiring of the Huron Shaman to interpret his dream, Iroquois was killed by the Shaman, who took this dream for reality (the Huron ones thinking that the dreams are messages intended to be carried out in the real life). Killed Mohawk being an important character, Mohawks set out again and declare the war with the Huron ones. The 17th century century however, geographical, economic and demographic realities allow a less allusive interpretation of the conflict. Indeed, it can prove that the simple contribution of metal can be at the origin of the new situation.

The Amerindians, by the trade with Europeans, discover the considerable technological contribution which constitute the metal blades. The Amerindian request is thus important and increasing (until becoming a dependence). The European counterpart, as for it, is simple: the fur, because in Europe, the fashion is with the felt and the requirement out of leather is constant. Consequently, the access to the European goods becomes the engine of an unrestrained hunting for furriery. But, for this reason, all the Amerindians are not equal. Indeed, the axis of French penetration of the St. Lawrence as well as Free-Huron alliance early made impose a NORTH-SOUTH division of the area. Thus, by their geographical location (around the lake Simcoe), the Huron ones as residents on the large ones sees penetration northern and western, are quickly impossible to circumvent in the area (the north and west of the big lakes proving much richer in skins than the south). Moreover, Iroquois, already blocked in their own country by their (others) many enemies (Mohicans in the east, Nation of fire in the south and the west), cannot reach more wide zones of hunting.

The demographic factor is also to take into account. The impact of the wars and the epidemics on the population iroquoise is enormous. The practice iroquoise wants that one mitigates the variations of populations by adopting members of other tribes. Thus, the raids and the assimilation of broad sides of the Huron company will be made in an increasingly systematic way.

In 1647, an attempt at peace fails, refused Mohawk S and Sénéca S, and the conflicts begin again in 1648.

Because of their numerical inferiority (also related to the diseases brought by the missionaries) and of the alliance of Iroquois with the Dutchmen then with the British and other Indian nations, the Huron ones lose little by little the war, which becomes increasingly destroying with the use of European weapons (rifles, knives).

The Huron ones, of course, were not stripped these weapons, but there exists for this reason a notable difference between Huron and Iroquois. Thus, in News-France, the trade of firearms was subjected to the règlemention of the governor, and under control of the Jesuits. These weapons were thus distributed only with much parsimony, with the only Amerindian converts (and still).

Iroquois take the principal village of the Teanaostanaie S , representing 10% of the Huron population, which causes the fear inside the country, the women refusing to go to cultivate the fields, which causes a famine. Then, Iroquois launch attacks on the principal Huron villages, making many deaths and wounded, in particular in Saint-Louis, but they are pushed back in Sainte-Marie by the Huron ones, which draws advantage from the French fortifications. Seeing itself all the same overcome, the Huron ones empty their villages and decide to disperse. Iroquois took during the war a great number of captifs ; the ones are adopted, the others killed. The Huron ones were weakened by the European diseases, the such small pox. It was the great cause of death at the Huron ones.

After the defeat: Dispersion (1649-1651)

After 1649, certain Huron flee towards the east and they find a sanctuary in the Actual positions of the Ohio and the Michigan: it is these people which received the name of “wyandot (you)” by the Anglo-American ones (in particular in the novel of James Fenimore Cooper, Wyandotte , published in 1843). Today in current the Oklahoma is the Wyandot reserve.

The most important group flees Iroquois until the Baie Georgienne, Wendat winter with the island Chrétienne, where most of their population dies of hunger, because of the lack of food and places. The Jesuits, who had temporarily moved their mission at this place, are killed at the same time and will be known under the name of Canadian Martyrs. In spring 1650, principal Wendats meet and decide to go to be established in Quebec. A little later Wendats are dispersed: a small portion settles at the Tionontatte S but they are the target of attacks iroquoises, then they will take refuge in the Michigan.

Of all the Huron tribes, only the Tahontaenrat remain plain and will settle in the country of the Neutres then, in 1650-1651, they will be established in the Sénéca country and are naturalized Iroquois.

An small group of Wendats Catholique S took refuge close to the town of Quebec ; their descendants remain there in a reserve called Wendake or Village-of-Huron.

The installation in Quebec (1650-1700)

Approximately 300 Huron thus decided to settle close to Quebec. They establish their village close to Quebec but often move it, in order to find a ground suitable: they live successively the Île of Orleans, Quebec, Sillery, Beauport, Notre-Dame de Foye and Old-Lorette the, before being fixed at the News-Lorette, where they live still today.

When the French sign an exclusive peace with Iroquois, in 1653, the Huron ones must only be defended. In 1797, the Huron ones settle definitively with the Young person-Lorette.

XVIIIe and the XIXe century

In the United States

Towards the end of the 18th century, Wendats of the West obtain a position of importance symbolic system, like “uncles” of the Confederation of Wabache, which fights in the United States in the years 1790. The descendants of Wendats of the West are divided today into three groups: a certain number which remained in Michigan and Ontario (the Nation Wyandot d' Anderdon), another group led to the Kansas by the government of the United States in 1842 and one third (largest) in the Oklahoma. It should be noted that the US government, regarding the Huron ones as civilized enough, will émancipera them in 1855. Those which will refuse the American citizenship will be transferred in the reserve from Wyandot in Oklahoma.

In Quebec

The Huron community of Quebec, counts at the beginning of the 18th century only a few hundreds of inhabitants. It establishes with the " Forty Arpents" , territory yielded by the Jesuits to Huron, a satellite community in 1742.

Traditional Huron company (Before 1649)

Social organization

The Huronones had adopted filiation matrilénaire: the child belongs to the clan of his mother and not of his father. The maternal uncle informs the enfant. There was a great sexual freedom: indeed, the women could change companion or husband like them it voulaient. The Huron families are very few, the women being the downward ones of the same mother or grandmother, who directs the businesses. Each Huron belongs to the one of the eight clans matrilinéaires, the members of the same clan which cannot marry between them.

Demography

In 1535, the Huron population counted 30 000 with 40 000 individuals. At the beginning of the 17th century, there was in Canada between 20 000 and 30 000 Huron. In 1634, the population rises with 18 000 individuals. From 1634 to 1640, their population is reduced to 9 000 by a series of epidemics, in particular the Variola in 1639, small the Pox, the Influenza or the Measles, diseases against which the Huron ones are not immunisés. .

Urbanization

At the 17th century, the Huronones lived in 18 to 25 villages, of which some counted until 3 500 inhabitants, which represents nearly 10% of the population at the time. Of 1615 with 1649, they occupy a territory of some 880 km ², with an average density of settlement of 23 inhabitants per km ². The villages are located close to a river and grounds cultivable, necessary to Huron agriculture. The villages change sites all the 10 to 15 years (12 years on average), according to the state of the grounds and of the firewood available near to the village, the Huron population is thus semi-sedentary. Their villages, generally raised, are generally strengthened with palisades allowing an effective defense. They generally occupy a surface from 2 to the 3 hectares, largest being able to go up to 8 hectares.

These villages are generally composed of Long Houses (which shelter each one only one family or clan), of a width of approximately 7 meters and whose size varies according to the size of the family, the majority measuring between 45 and 55 meters length, some being able to reach 90 meters length. Longest never discovered measurement 125 meters length - it was in the current State of New York. The largest villages could have forty long houses. These long houses were made arched logs then covered with bark of Cèdre, Orme and Frêne. In along the central corridor fires were, and on the side were located elevated platforms in order to be able to sleep.

Policy

The Huronones formed a confederation of five tribes. Other people iroquoiens of the time organized themselves in confederations. Most famous is the League of the Five-Nations of the Iroquois ; but the people of the Pétuns and the Neutres were also composed them of several tribes. The councils bring together all the clans (i.e. families), like the clan of the Roe-deer, the Bear, the Epic Pig, the Snake, the Wolf, the Tortoise, the Falcon…

Two councils manage the life of the village, and all the men of more than 30 years are members. The first council deals with the civil cases and the second of the military businesses. Theoretically, the decisions are caught by consensus, but in practice the old men and the household heads direct really the council, because of qualities of speaker of their members as well as theirs statute. The government must convince and link with the manner of a Démocratie, and the insubordination very often leads to social exclusion. The chiefs are named by the mothers of clans.

The Huron company in Quebec (after 1649)

Statute of the community

The Crown of France would have granted the Huron Christians the seigniory of Sillery. Because the Huron ones were not informed any of the French system of land property, their territory was managed by the Jésuite S, and those would have taken a good part of the territory to the detriment of the Huron ones. As from 1791, the Huron ones claim the possession of the ground, then in 1825 the chief of the Huron community goes to England to go to plead his cause in front of the king George IV. In 1853, Canada grants to them grounds in the canton of Roquemont.

Demography

At the beginning, the community counts only a few hundreds the Huron ones, especially of the Attignaenongnehac . One counts only of 400 with 1 000 members in 1740, then not more than 179 in 1829. Today, there is 3 000 Huron-Wendats in Quebec.

Urbanization

So at the beginning the Huron ones build traditional long houses, those abandoned and are quickly replaced by houses with the European one.

However, the structure of the village is influenced by the culture wendate: there does not exist interior court, the principal door of a house being directed towards the back of another. That comes owing to the fact that in the Huron culture, there is not delimitation such a marked between the private sphere and the public sphere. All the houses are close from/to each other.

Policy

The Huron ones form a network of alliance with many Christian communities of the area, creating the Fédération of Seven Fires.

There exist four Huron clans in the area: the clan of the Roe-deer, that of the Bear, that of the Tortoise and that of the Wolf. Each clan elects a civil chief, who deals with the businesses of his clan and which can be relieved only by this one. The civil chiefs elect, with life, a big boss who will represent the whole of the community. It is possible to name war leaders, those being elected thanks to their courage or with their acts of bravery.

Importance of the Christian religion

The majority of Huron installed with the Young person-Lorette are catholics converted by the Jesuits. They learn French and the mixed marriages are numerous. The crucifixes replace the old amulets then. In 1700, the first vault east creates in the city, where they preserve many liturgical objects. This vault is replaced in 1730 by a stone vault. It is restored in 1835 and is increased in 1904. The church shelters goods of great cultural or artistic value.

Economy

Agriculture

At the beginning, the Huron ones cultivate the Maïs, the Haricot S, the Courge (called “Three Sisters”, agriculture being often practiced by the women) and even, to a lesser extent, of the Tabac, less good quality that cultivated by the Pétun S and the Neutre S, as well as Tournesol, useful for its oil like for the manufacture of paintings of war. They extracted the sap from maple and made it boil to concentrate sugars in order to obtain maple syrup. Fishing is an principal activity, with in particular the construction of stoppings to be able to capture more easily of fish, the hunting being of less importance because of the lack of game.

The corn is the base of the food, and all the daily activities were rythmées by corn, guarantees abundance of food. Two species were privileged: the Zea Mays Amylacea and the indurata , one for the bread and the other for the sagamity (see Kitchen). Thanks to corn, the famines were rare. The season of vegetation lasted 195 days and that of freezing 140 days.

The trees were initially cut. One burned the branches and the external part of the tree, by making sure thanks to mud that fire is not propagated, and one extracted the rotted stock. To note that certain wood were used as construction or firewood. In May, after grubbing, the women cleaned the ground and planted the best grains of preceding harvest, ten grains per monticule gave a harvest from 100 to 650 grains.

Trunk of the corn seedling one sucked the sap, and the sheets were used to pack food been useful out of pulp, or they were braided to make a layer (a bed). With the sheets and the hardened stem, one could also make headstocks for child.

After 1649 and their installation close to Quebec, the Huron ones adopt the Occidental cultures, like corn or rye.

The Huron ones practice also the gathering, in particular of bays, medicinal plants.

Trade

The Huronones are tradesmen who trade with many tribes: the Pétun S, Neutral S, the Outaouais, the Nipissing S and the Algonquins of the valley of Outaouais. They trade in particular the corn, which they have in abundance, in exchange of fur or meat. Their system of trade being developed more, the Huron ones refused to learn another language that theirs: also the tradesmen of the other tribes were to learn the Huron language.

Then they trade with the French, in their in particular selling furs, of which they become the leading vendors, and they do not hesitate to get furs by capturing the cattle iroquois at the time of the war. In exchange, the French offer metal products, such of the cauldrons or axes to them.

Drive out

At the beginning, the Huronones did not make hunting an principal activity, driving out then with arrows, lances and arcs. With the arrival of the French, hunting intensifies, for the trade of the fur, but remains an activity of less importance: they privileged the trapping of the animals.

After their installation in Quebec, the Huron ones do not give any more the priority to the culture of corn, but to hunting. The territories of hunting of Huron are in the north of the the St. Lawrence, between the Saguenay and the Saint-Maurice.

For hunting for big game, the such moose and with the caribou, the families must often move in winter.

The meat was preserved by drying, just as fish or marrow. The skin was boucannée and used to create clothing.

Craft industry

After 1850, the Huron ones must give up hunting for various reasons: opening of new areas to colonization, formation of many private clubs of hunting, creation of the Park of Laurentides. The Huron ones specialize then in the craft industry and its sale: rackets, baskets, boats, moccasins. Today, Wendake is one of the Amerindian communities most prosperous of the Quebec.

Huron traditional culture

Language

The language wendate is a language iroquoienne. The Huron ones being dominating in the area of the south of Ontario until 1649, and being the principal tradesmen, Huron had become the language of the trade and the diplomacy.

In Quebec, the mixed marriages made fall in disuse the Huron language.

Traditional religion

The Huron ones were Animiste S: they believed that all the inanimate objects as well as the animals and the people had a “spirit” (a heart), and that the “spirits had absolutely to be respected”.

The Huron one honors also the Creator.

The dream is important in the Huron company: the dream contains a message which one must take with the serious one. Everyone is held to tell its dreams and to obey the messages which they contain.

Moreover, the corn, by its dominating place, strongly influences the Huron beliefs. Time being vital for the culture of corn, the rain is strongly awaited. In the event of dryness, the Huron ones call upon a Chaman, harmonisator of the universe. It safeguards the perpetual cycle, it is addressed to the ancestor Louskeha , who takes care of the cosmic forces, making the life cosmic.

There exists, in addition to the feasts necessary to the Huron life, an important festival: the All Souls' Day. During the displacement of the village, the bones of all deaths were unearthed and transported in a central cemetery common to several villages. One then buried the bones in a Tumulus. Before putting the bones in the ossuary, one removed the last pieces of flesh and clothing to the skeleton, and one threw then all the bones which one mixed and which one buried. This festival allowed cohesion between the various villages and was one privileged moment where stories were told, where one had fun the festival all the night.

The contact with the Christian missionaries brought certain Huron to regard these missionaries as Shamans, because they included/understood only little their religious lesson. Those are then regarded as wizards: indeed, they baptize the Huron ones little before their death and they are not touched by the epidemics. However, several Huron converts with Christianity.

Cook

Among the kitchen utensils resulting from the Huron craft industry, one can retain the pots which were used to cook, to store food or to transport water. They are provided with a spout out of V and their size varies being able to reach one meter in diameter. The ustensils used were the knives, the spoons and the bowls, dug in the nodes of trees with teeth of beaver. At the time of the Huron meals, it was common to bring back its own ustensils for a meal like bringing back the remainders of food at home.

The basic meal consists of Amerindian bread as well as thick soup called sagamity, composed of corn, pea, broad beans or wild rice with grease of stag, meat or fish.

The corn constitutes the ingredient of bottom of the Huron kitchen, and there exists also enormously in way of preparing it, in particular: to make boil, cook it under ashes, make it ferment several months in water… One then separated the flour from the envelope of the grain, the flour being used to create bread or paste, whereas the envelope was used for soup with fish.

The meat meals consisted of wild turkey, stag, wolf, dog, wildcat (raccoon), small game or fish.

The Huron tradition of the feasts is very important. It was necessary to return thanks to the Creator and to thank it, and to organize festivals during which that which invited could not eat. It is each time an obligatory festival which could last up to twenty-four hours. These meals are described by the Jésuite S. It exists several types of meal: those where one does nothing but smoke the pipe, the feast where one eats and where one dances, the feast of grace, the feast for the cure of a disease or the feast for a person with the article of death.

The Huron ones today

The 3.000 Huronones of Loretteville, with the Quebec are especially catholic and French-speaking, although there is currently a movement in favor of the study and the use of the language wendate. They are known for a long time for their production of craft industry and traditional objects, inter alia the moccasins and the rackets of babiche (skin of stag).

In 1999, the representatives of the wendats groups in Quebec, in Kansas, Oklahoma and Michigan meet, with their old fatherland with Midland, in Ontario, in order to restore the Wendate Confederation formally.

References (literature, cinema, video games)

In a novel of Voltaire, Ingenuous the , the hero is a Huron young person who arrives to France. The foreign glance of Huron makes it possible Voltaire to wonder about some of the French habits which can appear odd with a foreigner, and allow him in particular to criticize the Jésuite S and the Janséniste S. It is of this novel that comes the expression Huron to nominate a person with wild manners.

the Last of Mohicans puts in scene the war between the Huron ones combined of the French and Iroquois allied of the English.

The video game American Conquest makes it possible to direct the Huron nation. The architecture of civilization is similar to reality: long houses…

The Communities wendates

Huron-Wendate Nation of Wendake, wedged in the Town of Quebec: 2 999 members of which 1 307 residents and 1 692 non-résidants.
Nation Wyandot d' Anderdon in Ontario of the south and Michigan, HQ with Trenton, Michigan: 800 members approximately.
Wyandot Nation of Kansas, HQ with Kansas City, Kansas: some 400 members.
Wyandotte Nation of Oklahoma with Wyandotte, Oklahoma: between 3 000 and 4 000 members.

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