Traditional Mahican and Munsee Culture PART 1

Traditional Mahican and Munsee Culture

Like other Natives peoples of the Woodlands, the ancestors of the
Stockbridge-Munsee Tribe spoke languages of the Algonkian language
family. Prior to European contact, they were farming, hunting, and
fishing people and their ways of life were adapted to the area's
environments: forests and park-like woods, rivers, streams, and lakes.
Algonkian people worked out consensual agreements in village and
inter-village councils. /p>

In greater New England and the mid-Atlantic region, Native people
relied on agriculture. Women raised corn, beans, squash, and
sunflowers, while men hunted deer, moose, and smaller animals with bow
and arrow, and fished on land and from dugout and bark canoes using
nets, hooks, and fish traps. Men collected freshwater shellfish and
women also collected wild foods. In the late summer, green corn
ceremonies were held, followed by large fall deer hunts. Winters were
spent dispersed in the deep forests for intensive hunting. /p>

When fish came upstream and spawned in the spring, the people from
different villages often came together to harvest and dry these the
fish for use later. These spring gatherings also provided opportunities
for visiting, games and contests, feasts, and other socializing. Prime
hunting areas were periodically burned to clear the undergrowth and
create better forage for deer as well as encourage the growth of
smaller wild food plants and shrubs, including strawberries,
raspberries, and blueberries. Harvests of wild food resources-such as
nuts, berries, and roots-were celebrated with first fruits ceremonies,
and in late summer, the people held a green corn ceremony to offer
thanks for their harvests. Oral traditions-often told around the fire
during winter-included stories of the Creator, various culture heroes,
giants, little people, and particular places. These oral traditions
helped shape young people's ideas about the order of the world and
proper behavior. /p>

The Mahican built hilltop palisaded villages of three to sixteen
extended-family longhouses. The longhouses, built of saplings covered
with bark or woven mats, were furnished with sleeping mats and furs,
pottery cooking vessels, wooden spoons and bowls, baskets and bags, and
other tools and equipment. Chiefs' houses were larger and more
decorated, and served for meetings and ceremonial gatherings. Leather
and fur clothing provided opportunities for painted and other
decorations, including designs symbolized plants and animals. Corn was
pounded in large wooden mortars and cooked in large ceramic pots over
the fire.

The Mahican were originally matrilineal, that is they traced their
family descent through their mother's family. There were three
matrilineal clans-groups of people who considered themselves related
through their mother's families and were identified by mythic descent
from a totemic animal: Bear, Wolf, and Turtle. Leadership positions
were usually held by men but also tended to follow through the female
line. Some families and those they descended from were considered more
important than others. Each clan had a chief. Tribal leaders-called
sachems-were often chosen from these leading families. Sachems were
seen as having authority over particular territories and guided the
people in decision-making. Important men such as sachems occasionally
had more than one wife. Between different villages, trading and other
cooperative relationships existed, and furs, shell beads, food stuffs,
and other resources could be spread over wider areas. Trading also
existed across wider areas to adjacent tribes.

Besides the sachems, each group also a shaman who was known for his
more intimate contacts with the spirit world. Shamans oversaw seasonal
rituals including the green corn and other ceremonies, naming
ceremonies, and could also provide cures for illnesses caused by
supernatural forces. They also maintained significant knowledge of the
use of medicinal plants, as did a number of elder women in the group.