The Iroquois Confederacy, known to its own members as the Haudenosaunee, is a confederacy of Iroquoian speaking indigenous nations in what is now northeastern North America, traditionally established under the Great Law of Peace by the Great Peacemaker, Hiawatha and Jigonhsasee, though scholars debate whether this founding occurred between 1142 and 1660. It originally united five nations arranged from east to west, the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga and Seneca, and around 1722 the Tuscarora joined after migrating north, creating the Six Nations structure that persists today. The confederacy governed through a Grand Council, an assembly of fifty chiefs each representing a clan of a nation, which allowed consensus based decision making across member nations while each retained its own territory and autonomy.
Facts
Partially Attested
Status (Extant or Former)Sources distinguish a ceremonial Grand Council said to still exist from a formal political confederacy one account says dissolved after the American Revolutionary War, while also noting the Haudenosaunee continue to consider themselves sovereign and govern today, so this is recorded as extant. Government type (class) In the Other Atlases
- Also in Society and Culture Atlas: Confederation, government type there.
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Haudenosaunee Confederacy
Names section
the Haudenosaunee League is the ceremonial and cultural institution embodied in the Grand Council, which still exists, while the Haudenosaunee Confederacy was the decentralized political and diplomatic entity that emerged in response to European colonization and was dissolved after the British defeat in the American Revolutionary War.
Government section (infobox)
Confederation with consensus government
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