Onondaga (tribe)

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For other uses, see Onondaga.

Onondaga


Total population
Regions with significant populations	United States (New York) Canada (Ontario)
Language	English, Onondaga
Religion	Indigenous <tr> <th style="background-color:#fee8ab;">Related ethnic groups</th> <td style="background-color:#fff6d9;">other Iroquoians</td> </tr>

Image:Onondaga Village Allen.jpg The Onondaga (Onundagaono or the People of the Hills) are one of the original five constituent tribes of the League of the Iroquois (Hodenosaunee). Their traditional homeland is in and around Onondaga County, New York. Being centrally located, they were the keepers of the fire in the figurative longhouse, with the Cayuga and Seneca to their west and the Oneida and Mohawk to their east. For this reason, the League of the Iroquois historically met at Onondaga, as indeed the traditional chiefs do today.

In the American Revolutionary War, the Onondaga were at first officially neutral, although individual Onondaga warriors were involved in at least one raid on American settlements. The Onondaga later sided with the majority of the League and fought against the United States in alliance with the British Crown, after an American attack on their main village on April 20, 1779. Many Onondaga therefore followed Joseph Brant to Six Nations, Ontario after the United States was accorded independence. Those remaining in New York are under the government of traditional chiefs nominated by clan mothers, rather than elected.

On November 11, 1794, the Onondaga Nation, along with the other Haudenosaunee nations, signed the Treaty of Canandaigua with the United States.

On March 11, 2005, the Onondaga Nation of Nedrow, New York, filed a land rights action in federal court, seeking acknowledgement of title to over 3,000 square miles of ancestral lands centering in Syracuse, New York. In doing so they hope to obtain increased influence over environmental restoration efforts at Onondaga Lake and other EPA Superfund sites in the claimed area. This lawsuit is facing a motion to dismiss based on the precedent established in the Cayuga nation's land claim[1] and other defenses.

1 Historically Notable Onondaga
2 Onondaga bands today
3 Other spellings encountered
4 See also
5 External Links
6 References

[edit] Historically Notable Onondaga

Garakontie
Chief Canasatego delivered an address in 1774 embodying the Native opinion of colonial education in response to an offer from the College of William and Mary to accept Onondaga students.[2]
Leon Shenandoah