When the Iroquois Confederacy was formed, comprising the Seneca, Onondaga, Oneida, Cayuga, and Mohawk, the five nations occupied large land areas in the Northeast United States and Southeast Canada. The dating of an oral tradition mentioning a solar eclipse indicates 1142 AD as the year for the Seneca joining the Iroquois. The Seneca were by far the most populous of the Iroquois Confederacy, numbering about 4,000 by the 17th century.

The historical Seneca occupied territory throughout the Finger Lakes area in central New York and the Genesee Valley in Western New York. Recent archaeological evidence indicates their territory eventually extended to the Allegheny River in present-day northwestern Pennsylvania, particularly after the Iroquois destroyed both the Wenrohronon and Erie Nations, who were native to the area, in the 17th century.

Seneca people lived in villages and towns well fortified with wooden palisades. They traditionally lived in longhouses, large buildings up to 100 feet long and approximately 20 feet wide. The houses were shared among related families and could hold up to 60 people. Hearths were located in the central aisle, with two families sharing a hearth. These towns were relocated every ten to 20 years as soil, game, and other resources were depleted.

During the 19th century, many Seneca adopted the customs of their immediate American neighbors by building log cabins, practicing Christianity, and participating in the local agricultural economy.

The Iroquois have a matrilineal kinship system, with inheritance and property descending through the maternal line. The main form of social organization was clans, descended from one woman. Children are born into their mother’s clan and inherit their social status from their mother’s family. Their mother’s eldest brother was traditionally more significant than their biological father, who did not belong to their clan. The presiding elder of a clan is called the “clan mother.”

Seneca women generally grew and harvested corn, beans, and squash, as well as gathering and processing medicinal plants, roots, berries, nuts, and fruit. They also tended to domesticate animals such as dogs and turkeys.

Seneca men were responsible for finding and developing town sites, which included clearing forests to create fields. They also dedicated significant time to hunting and fishing, often leaving the towns or villages for these activities. Highly skilled in warfare, they were regarded as fierce adversaries. The Seneca men held the traditional title of war sachems, gathered the warriors, and led them into battle within the Iroquois Confederacy.

After Europeans arrived, the Iroquois were known to the French during the colonial years as the Iroquois League, later as the Iroquois Confederacy, and to the English as the Five Nations. After 1722, they accepted the Tuscarora people from the Southeast into their confederacy and became known as the Six Nations.

In 1622, the Montagnais, the Algonquin, and the Huron sought to conclude peace with the Iroquois because “they were weary and fatigued with the wars which they had had for more than 50 years.” The truce was concluded in 1624 but was broken by the continued guerrilla warfare of the Algonquin warriors.

The Seneca made peace with them after defeating the Huron in the spring of 1634. The Huron, in the following year, sent an embassy to Sonontouan, the chief town of the Seneca, to ratify the peace, and while there, learned that the Onondaga, the Oneida, the Cayuga, and the Mohawk were desirous of becoming parties to the treaty.

The Huron renewed the war in May 1639 when they captured 12 prisoners from the Seneca. The war continued with varying success.

By 1643, the Seneca, including the Cayuga, the Oneida, and the Onondaga, equaled, if they did not exceed, in number and power, the Huron, who previously had had this advantage and that the Mohawk at this time had three villages with 700 or 800 men of arms who possessed 300 long guns that they had obtained from the Dutch and which they used with skill and boldness.

The Seneca warriors comprised the most significant part of the Iroquois warriors who, in 1648-49, assailed, destroyed, and dispersed the Huron tribes. In 1649, they sacked the chief towns of the Tionontati or Tobacco tribe and also played a leading role in the defeat and subjugation of the Neuter in 1651 and the Erie in 1656.

In 1652, the state of Maryland bought from the Susquehanna Indians all their land claims on both sides of Chesapeake Bay up to the mouth of the Susquehanna River.

That year, the Seneca Indians conspired with the Mohawk to destroy French settlements along the St. Lawrence River. Two years later, the Seneca sought peace with the French, likely due to their split with the Erie tribe. However, the Mohawk, unwilling to make peace as they planned an attack on the Huron, murdered two of the three Seneca ambassadors, with the third taken hostage by the French. This nearly ignited a war between the tribes, but ongoing foreign affairs prevented conflict.

On September 19, 1655, Fathers Chaumonot and Dablon left Quebec after receiving invitations to visit and view the Seneca Country, establish their French habitation, and teach the Seneca the articles of their faith.

In 1657, the Seneca tribe incorporated eleven different tribes into its political body by carrying out the League policy of adopting conquered tribes upon submission and the expression of a desire to live under the form of government established by the League.

In 1663, 800 Seneca and Cayuga warriors from the Confederation of the Five Nations were defeated by the Minqua, aided by the Marylanders. The Iroquois did not terminate their hostilities until famine reduced the Conestoga so much that in 1675, when the Marylanders disagreed with them and withdrew their alliance, the Conestoga was entirely subdued by the Five Nations, who thereafter claimed a right to the Minqua lands to the head of Chesapeake Bay.

In 1677, the English allied with the Iroquois League, called the “Covenant Chain.”

In 1763, at Bloody Run and the Devil’s Hole, on the Niagara River about four miles below the falls, the Seneca ambushed a British supply train on the portage road from Fort Schlosser to Fort Niagara, with only three escaping from a force of nearly 100. The Seneca also ambushed a British force composed of two companies of troops who were hastening to the aid of the supply train, of whom only eight escaped the massacre.

In 1768, the English renewed their alliance with the Iroquois when Sir William Johnson signed the Treaty of Fort Stanwix. This treaty helped the British gain the Iroquois’ trust, as they believed the British had their best interests in mind. In contrast, the Seneca disliked the Americans because they often ignored the Treaty. The Iroquois were especially angry about American expansion into the Ohio Territory. Despite this intrusion, the Americans respected the Iroquois’ skills in warfare and tried to keep them out of their conflict with the British.

The Seneca Tribe, before the American Revolution, had a prosperous society. The Iroquois Confederacy ended the fighting amongst the war-based Iroquois tribes and allowed them to live in peace with each other. Yet, despite this peace amongst themselves, the Iroquois tribes were revered as fierce warriors and were reputed to control a large empire that stretched hundreds of miles along the Appalachian Mountains. However, although the Seneca and Iroquois tribes had ceased fighting each other, they continued raids on outsiders, their European visitors.

Despite the Iroquois continuing raids on their new European neighbors, the Iroquois tribes established profitable relationships with the Europeans, especially the English.

When the American Revolution began in 1775, the Seneca chose to side with the British. One of the earliest battles the Iroquois were involved in occurred on August 6, 1777, in Oriskany. During the battle, Native Americans led a brutal attack against the rebel Americans, where they “killed, wounded, or captured the majority of patriot soldiers.”

Afterward, the Iroquois were involved in numerous other battles, including the Cherry Valley Massacre and Battle of Minisink, which were carefully planned raids on a trail “from the Susquehanna to the Delaware Valley and over the Pine Hill to the Esopus Country.”

Although the Iroquois were active participants, the Seneca, like Governor Blacksnake, were highly fed up with the brutality of the war, which included the killing of women and children at the Cherry Valley massacre and the clubbing of surviving American soldiers at Oriskany.

However, the raids continued on American settlements in New York, with the Iroquois tribes not only attacking and plundering the American colonists but also setting fire to the Oneida and Tuscarora settlements. The attacks continued until their allies had caved in and surrendered.

In 1782, the Iroquois finally stopped fighting when British General Frederick Haldimand recalled them “pending the peace negotiations in Paris.”

With the Iroquois League dissolved after the American Revolution, the Seneca settled in new villages along Buffalo Creek, Tonawanda Creek, and Cattaraugus Creek in western New York. The Seneca, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Mohawk, as allies of the British, were required to cede all their lands in New York at the end of the war, as Britain ceded its territory in the Thirteen Colonies to the new United States. The late-war Seneca settlements were assigned to them as their reservations in the Treaty of Fort Stanwix in 1784. Although the Oneida and Tuscarora were allies of the rebels, they were also forced to give up most of their territory.

On July 8, 1788, the Seneca and some Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, and Cayuga tribes sold their rights to land east of the Genesee River in New York.

On November 11, 1794, the Seneca and other Iroquois nations signed the Treaty of Canandaigua with the United States, agreeing to peaceful relations.

On September 15, 1797, at the Treaty of Big Tree, the Seneca sold their lands west of the Genesee River, retaining ten reservations. The sale opened up the rest of Western New York for settlement by European Americans.

Approximately 358 Seneca of Sandusky reached the Elk River in present-day Delaware County, Oklahoma, in the summer of 1832. About 258 members of the Mixed Band of Seneca and Shawnee arrived later that year. Following negotiations with the Stokes Commission in December 1832, the tribes readjusted their reservation boundaries and joined as “the United Nation of Senecas and Shawnees.”

On January 15, 1838, the U.S. and some Seneca leaders signed the Treaty of Buffalo Creek, which required the Seneca to relocate to a tract of land west of Missouri. However, most refused to go.

In 1848, most of the Seneca in New York formed a modern, elected government, the Seneca Nation of Indians.

Despite their leaders’ pro-Confederate stance, most Seneca and Shawnee spent the Civil War years as refugees in Kansas. The U.S. government separated the Seneca from the Shawnee in 1867.

During the 1870s and early 1880s, the Seneca in Oklahoma received newcomers from Canada and New York, including Cayuga, Mohawk, and more Seneca. In 1890, the population was roughly 255.

Today, the Seneca culture and values remain strong and intact. Language, song, art, dance, and sports are all vital aspects of their culture.

In 2007, the Seneca language was rated “critically endangered,” with fewer than 50 fluent speakers, primarily the elderly. However, efforts began to preserve and revitalize the language.

In the 21st century, more than 10,000 Seneca live in the United States, which has three federally recognized Seneca tribes. Two are centered in New York: the Seneca Nation of Indians, with five territories in western New York near Buffalo, and the Tonawanda Seneca Nation. The Seneca-Cayuga Nation is in Oklahoma, where their ancestors were relocated from Ohio during the Indian Removal. Approximately 1,000 Seneca live in Canada, near Brantford, Ontario, at the Six Nations of the Grand River First Nation. They are descendants of Seneca who resettled there after the American Revolution, as they had been allies of the British and forced to cede much of their lands.

 

©Kathy Alexander/Legends of America, updated June 2025.

Also See:

Indian Wars

Native American Photo Galleries

Native Americans – First Owners of America

Native American Tribes List

Sources:

Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture
Hodge, Frederick Webb; The Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico. Bureau of American Ethnology, Government Printing Office. 1906.
Seneca Nation
Wikipedia