Canadian History 11 Notes - First Nations Arrival of First Canadians

The general belief is that the rst people to enter North America were the First Nations people. They arrived in prehistoric times when low sea levels created a temporary land bridge between Asia and Alaska. It is believed that early hunters, following the woolly mammoth, migrated overland into North America. The most accepted time for this migration is roughly 15,000 years ago. The oldest conrmed cultural site in the Americas is dated to 13,350 years ago (the Clovis Culture, near present day New Mexico). There are sites in Alaska and Yukon which suggest human occupation as long as 20,000 to 25,000 years ago.

Regardless of what year you choose to believe on thing is true, the migration happened a long time ago; long before the birth of Christ, long before the pyramids were built and long before Moses led his people out of Egypt and into the Promised Land.

Some people argue that we are all immigrants to Canada, event the Natives this statement is a distortion of the facts. Any group whose roots in a land go back to before the days of the pharaohs has a legitimate claim at being considered original inhabitants and rst nations. By the time the Europeans arrived, a wide variety of native societies had long since evolved and spread across every region of North and South America. The diversity of the native societies was remarkable. In what is present day Canada, there were more than 50 separate Native languages, many of which were as different as Mandarin and English. Today only three of these languages are strong enough to survive, Cree, Ojibwa and Inuktitut.

People of the Longhouse

Terms: 1. Iroquoian - Native people who lived in the St. Lawrence-Great Lakes region. They shared a similar language and culture. 2. Iroquois - one specic group of Iroquoian people, the Five nations who inhabited key lands south of Lake Ontario. The Iroquoian people were the northernmost farmers in North America. They lived in fortied town and tended to large farming elds. Each community could contain as many as 2,000 people. Because of the large populations they relied very heavily on agriculture. Their major productions were maize, squash and beans.

In the villages their life style focused on the longhouse dwellings. Longhouses sometimes reached 100 meters in length and contained the members of an entire extended family, this could sometimes reach as many as 50 people. The Iroquois were fearsome in battle but their home life was quite the opposite. They had a very stable society and were very well integrated with each other. Iroquoian Society was matrilineal, which means: Clans and extended families of the longhouse traced their decent along their mothers side of the family. Women owned the land (acted as the lands caretaker) and men protected it. Chiefs were men, but women held the balance of power. Clan Mothers chose the members of the Grand Council of Chiefs and if any leader failed to follow the Great Law, he would be removed by the Clan Mothers. The Iroquois lived in a representative democracy, with votes given to the delegates of each nation, and a unanimous decision was needed to go to war. Sometimes individual nations would go to war (without the collective, they only needed the unanimous decision from their clan). Iroquois society also had a system of Faith-keepers and shamans responsible for attending to the spiritual and health related needs of the community.

Community / Village!

Longhouse