Discussing historical knowledge is based upon the stories that have been passed down to us through verbal accounts, cultural myths, or other avenues. Understanding what these myths are, we can begin to see the ethics of the culture in terms of how the people understood their relationship with their environment relating to other people and within their own community. For example, the Iroquois nation’s creation myth provides a great deal of insight regarding the deep connection the people felt toward the earth as well as some sense of how they viewed the world. Building from what can be or has been implied from myths such as the Iroquoian creation myth, the purpose of my study was to discover a ‘true’ picture of the Iroquois based on their connection to their myths, legends, and traditions.
Much of what we know of ancient culture is brought to us in the form of stories; either the stories of the descendants of the stories of outsiders. A preliminary look at the myths or legends of the Iroquois as compared to actual cultural values reveals how the stories of the culture have contributed to the people’s identity. The study will begin with an investigation of myth; this will prove to be an essential component for the illustration of the Iroquois culture, in terms of its diversity and its reliance on mythology and tales.
Exploring the myths of the Iroquois belief systems gives us a solid foundation on which to base some of our assumptions regarding their formation of identity. To help fill in this understanding, researchers analyze the Iroquoian daily practices related to the subjects of myths, including the formation of the confederacy.
From our textbook This Land Was Theirs we understand that the Iroquois people were avid gamblers and participated in a variety of recreational activities such as lacrosse. The nations were traders with the French to obtain goods and services of their own. The wampum served as currency and was also the term used to denote a gift to binding treaties. The Iroquois, like other Native American tribes, had strong religious beliefs.
They believed in certain elements such as Thunder and Wind. They had a number of myths and legends that helped to explain the various natural events they observed around them. The people were dreamers and integrated dreams into their belief system. Also by way of their dreams they had a multitude of masks that would represent something they envisioned. The visions could be used in religious ceremonies to communicate to the rest of the tribe. These ceremonies, myths, and legends were able to be passed down from one generation to the next as a means of preserving the heritage and identity of the tribe.
However, as they encountered Europeans and the vastly different beliefs they held, the Iroquois tribe began to find it difficult to retain this identity.
In Iroquois creation legend, the world was formed as a result of the combined efforts of the animals which were already there. There are various versions of the story, but the basic concept holds that the nature of the earth is as a bit of mud spread across the back of a giant turtle that floats in the sea below the island of the Sky People. The versions shift regarding the origin of the Sky-Woman who was the first being to come down to our level of existence. Some reporters say she was the child of the Great Spirit who had become pregnant without having taken marriage vows and was punished by being sent to the lower seas (Klinck & Talman, 1979).
Others suggest she was the wife of a man who became angry that she was pregnant and threw her off of the Sky Island (Iroquois Creation Myth, 1997). There are also other versions that indicate this woman loved the sea below Sky Island and wanted to live closer to it so she started a new people which were the ancestors of the Iroquois People (Hooker, 1996). To prevent her from drowning, the aquatic animals already living in this realm dove down to the bottom of the ocean and brought back mud and muck, but couldn’t hold it together. The turtle volunteered and the mud was spread across his back to become the continent of North America. The legends vary slightly again in discussing just how the continent was formed from this original piece of mud, but either by being shaped by the Sky-Woman or through another means, it eventually grew and expanded to create the continent.
This creation myth goes a long way toward explaining the human role on the planet. The origin of the continent highlights the people’s dependence on the goodwill of the animals as a means of support and sustenance. Without the animals, there would have been no earth and without the turtle, the earth sinks back under the sea. Natural events such as earthquakes and volcanoes are explained as shifts of the turtle in his eternally floating state or as attempts by the bad twin to disrupt life on the surface where the good twin was busily making life as sweet as possible for the people.
From this myth, it can be determined that the Iroquois people had a largely benevolent outlook on life in which all life was sacred and to be respected.
They generally lived in harmony with their environment and with the other peoples of the continent whom they recognized as their brothers. However, they also understood that sometimes brothers made the fiercest enemies and that sometimes it was necessary to fight with one another in order to preserve the sweet life.
As a result of this understanding, it is probable that within the tribe, the people worked hard to ensure peace among them but had concessions in place of recognition that sometimes it was necessary to fight.
Depending on the version of the myth, it might also be recognized that there is an element of gender relations contained in it, emphasizing both the extreme importance of the woman as the source of all human life and her concern for the population of the continent as well as her lower status as compared with the Sky-Men. Reports of the tribe indicate this somewhat contradictory position.
“The Iroquois sought guns and ammunition, beaver pelts, as well as captives to satisfy mourning women” (Oswalt 386). The satisfaction in the latter example refers to the women mourning the family they lost to the enemy and accordingly urging the warriors and the chiefs to seek revenge for relatives killed. While the women were not considered overly important on a day-to-day basis, they were important enough to drive trade negotiations and to have their feelings considered.
Analyzing the lifestyle of Iroquois tribes, the majority of Iroquois historians recognize that agriculture was the basis of Iroquois’ settled life development, their complex social and political organization, their religious representations, and rituals that were important. At the same time, inconsistent judgments were expressed regarding the proportion of the importance of agriculture and hunting in the Iroquois’ economic life. In this question, the judgments of Lewis Henry Morgan on the importance of agriculture and hunting were also inconsistent in his first work “League of the Iroquois”. On the one hand, noticing, that cultivation of corn, beans, and pumpkins was known to Iroquois since the remotest period reached by tradition, and underlining the value of corn as fundamental to their life, Morgan wrote: ” It cannot, therefore, be affirmed with correctness, that the Indian subsisted principally by the chase [hunting]… After the formation of the League, they resided in permanent villages, and within certain well-defined territorial limits. The fruits of the chase [the hunting bag] then became a secondary, although a necessary means of subsistence” (Morgan League of the Iroquois).
Despite the hunting nature of many Iroquois tribes, the emphasis on agriculture and some cultivated plants can be seen in one of the legends about a spirit resembling a cultivated plant. The legend of the three spirits that sustain life, Corn, Beans, and Squash, tells a myth of a no-face doll. The myth states that the Corn spirit wanted to help the people more, so the spirit asked the Creator for a new way to do that. The Creator formed a doll from the husks of the corn, with a beautiful face, and gave it to the Iroquois children. The doll was passed from a child to a child, changing villages and tribes proclaiming her beauty. The Creator saw the vanity of the doll and disapproved of such narcissistic behavior. The creator demanded that the doll stop it, otherwise the doll would be punished. The doll listened to the Creator and became more humble. Nevertheless, one day the doll, walking by a creek and disobeyed the Creator’s instructions and admired her reflection in the water, watching the beauty of her face. The Creator sent a giant screech owl from the sky, which took her reflection from the water. The doll was no longer able to see her reflection and admire her beauty. Since that time, when a mother gives a doll to a child she makes a doll with no face and tells the story of the Corn-Husk doll. In such a way the children learn to admire the gifts that are given to them by the creator, learning how to be humble with each other, without emphasizing the physical appearance (Yupanqui). The myth is important in two ways, one of which is the reference to cultivated plants as spirits, and thus emphasizing the importance of agriculture. On the other hand, the moral of the myth is the denial of the physical-external beauty, in favor of the internal modesty, that should be taught to children.
In terms of religion, mysticism and spirituality were combined in their essence. Derived from the myths of the creation, it can be said that the religious practices were communicating with the higher power, i.e. the Great Spirit. The religious ceremonies were integrated into daily life, including such concerns as farming, curing illness, and thanksgiving. (“Iroquois Religion and Expressive Culture”) Religion can be related to the myth of creation, although indirectly. Looking at the story of the creation of the Iroquois people, the two twin’s Sapling and Flint from the creation myth can be seen as two opposing entities, Like Yin and Yang.
Accordingly, there is a similar opposition in the religion, “[w]hile the religious system of the Iroquois taught the existence of the Great Spirit Ha-wen-no-yu, it also recognized the personal existence of an Evil Spirit, Ha-me-go-ate-geh, the Evil-minded.” (Morgan League of the Iroquois). Through such division, it can be seen that the Iroquois religion manifested many basic principles seen in other religions, which is the division between good and evil.
Additionally, the religion of Handsome Lake, which was based on the revision of the traditional elements of the Iroquois religion along with some aspects of the white western culture, is an influence of the Europeans, which have a mythical context. This is related to the importance of visions in the life of the Iroquois people, as it was believed that “dreams expressed the desire of the soul, and as a result, the fulfillment of a dream was of paramount importance to the individual.” (“Iroquois Religion and Expressive Culture”) The new religion was formed as a vision that came to Geneodiyo or Handsome Lake. Four messengers from the creator were sent to him instructing the new religion. Geneodiyo started preaching and telling people about the visions he saw until this new religion became the established religion of the Iroquois people, wherein in 1960, at least half of the Iroquois people accepted this religion as their own (Paper).
Vital importance was given to the cult of the dead, in which the Iroquois believed that after death the soul is embarked on a journey. An example of the manifestation of the cult can be seen in Remembrance Day and the second burial of their remains. The latter might be conducted by the community because of the resettlement of the tribe. Generally, the mourning for the dead lasted a year, after which a fest was held signifying that the soul’s journey was complete.
The death also had a connection to the Iroquois mythology. This myth is connected to the Niagara Falls, or Nee-ah-gah-rah (Thundering Waters), which was considered as the most sacred waters of the Iroquois people. It was said that the sound of the waterfall was the voice of the mighty spirit of the water. The Iroquois people pleased this spirit by throwing a maiden to the waterfall, a practice that was abandoned only in the middle of the 18th century. Practicing the sacrifice, the Iroquois people asked the spirit for happy ground in the afterlife. In 1976, Chief Eagle Eye’s daughter Lela-wall was chosen for the sacrifice. Lela-wala was the chief only child after his wife died, and his grief was intolerable, that after she was thrown he followed her over the waterfall and disappeared. After that incident, the Iroquois people believe that “After their death, they were changed into pure spirits of strength and goodness. They live so far beneath the falls that the roaring is music to them… He is the ruler of the cataract; she is the maiden of the mist.” (Yupanqui) The myth might be related to the position of sacrifice in the Iroquois people’s culture, as well as the importance of spiritual strength and goodness.
The formed spirits represent the attributes that the Iroquois should follow, with the myth showing the highest forms of such attributes. Additionally, the myth can be translated into a tale of souls separated in life meeting each other in the afterlife.
Regarding the league or the Confederacy of the Iroquois tribes, there was a lot written not only in the ethnographic literature but also in historical works. The military and the political value of the league, in the history of the colonization of North America, are well shown by the European powers. It is known that the first description of the structure of this League has been given by Morgan in the “League of the Iroquois”, and in his classical work “Ancient society”, there is a chapter devoted to the Iroquois Confederacy.
The Iroquois Confederacy in Morgan’s research appears as the highest advances in the development of a patrimonial system of American Indians; “The plan of government of the American aborigines commenced with the gens and ended with the confederacy, the latter being the highest point to which their governmental institutions attained.”(Morgan Ancient Society) How long five related, but independent tribes, which in consequence have made the Iroquois Confederacy, remained isolated from each other, is not clear. The fact that this condition continued for some centuries is undoubted. The origins of the confederacy are different from Iroquois myths, in terms that the first is history while the latter is a story.
Nevertheless, they both have similarities as both have several versions and the origin of the league also got mythical with time. Reading the story there are many mythical elements in the story of the creation of the confederacy.
A short version of the confederacy creation story, which was published as “White Roots of Peace”, states that there was a boy born to a virgin woman, and was named Deganawida. Growing up he realized his gift as a peacemaker, went preaching and urging the hunters to accept his message of peace. Stopping among the Onondagas, he converted Ayonhwathah from cannibalism and charged him to convert the tribe’s shaman. As Ayonhwathah failed to do so, he went wandering in grief after the shaman killed his three daughters. Meanwhile, Deganawida succeeded to convince the Mohawks of his power, and accepting his message of peace they became the founders of the league.
Ayonhwathah, with the help of Deganawida, learned the ritual of peace, which in turn was taught to the Mohawks. One after another the other tribes were joining the league, starting with Oneidas and Cayugas as the younger brothers, and Onondagas and Senecas as the older brothers. (Snow). It’s an important notion to acknowledge that the myth factor in one of the versions of the creation of confederacy reflects the overall interdependence between history and myths in documenting their life.
Probably completed by 1525, the next addition to the league formation comes from Tuscarora. Although Tuscaroras were treated as equals in the general council, they “formed no part of the ruling body.” (Morgan Ancient Society).
In conclusion, it can be said that despite the apparent changes in the life of contemporary Iroquois tribes, there are still some glimpses of their ancient traditions. Although some of their traditions gained some flexibility, in other aspects they are still united in their communities as in the days of the confederacy, and the authority remains the same. In the conditions of modern Canada and the USA, such preservation of the culture and the tradition is really admirable. The gender issue is also given a clear idea of the influence of the myths in their life in preserving the role of women in the community. Thus, it can be stated that the world outlook of the Iroquois allowed them not only to show early demonstrations of unions of nations but also to transfer their values into the modern setting. Finally, the most important is that the Iroquois people still have a place for myths and legends in their life, where the interaction of life and myths hold the system of their values, beliefs, and traditions.
References
- Oswalt, Wendell H. This Land Was Theirs. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.
- Klinck, Carl F. & Talman, James J. (Eds.). The Journal of John Norton, 1816. Toronto: Champlain Society, 1970: 88-91.
- “Iroquois Creation Myth.” (1997). Web.
- Hooker, Richard. “The Iroquois Creation.” World Civilizations. (1996).
- “Iroquois Religion and Expressive Culture“. 2008. Every Culture. Web.
- Morgan, Lewis Henry. Ancient Society. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2000.
- Morgan, Lewis Henry. League of the Iroquois. The American Experience Series,. New York,: Corinth Books, 1962.
- Paper, Jordan D. Native North American Religious Traditions : Dancing for Life. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2007.
- Snow, Dean R. The Iroquois. The Peoples of America. New York: Wiley-Blackwell, 1996.
- Yupanqui, Tika. “Iroquois Myths and Legends”. 1998. Web Winds.