HIST 223 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: The Jesuit Relations, Feud
Week 9
October 24th, 2016
Wendat (Huron) and French
•the Wendat had no writing system, so our sources are archaeology, oral tradition, european
texts (i.e., Jesuit Relations, Samuel de Champlain), manuscripts, administrative letters,
linguistic documents
•Huron is the French name for the Wendat
Iroquoian Nations of the Northeast
•semi-sedentary villagers with maize based agriculture
•Erie, Wenroronon, Neutral, Tionnontate
•Iroquois-Five Nations-Haudenosaunee
•Wendat-Huron-first distinct tribes
•these nations congregated in Georgian bay-Lake Simcoe region, moving from dispersed
locations across South Ontario in the 16th C
•strategic placement for trade with other larger nations
Wendat Way of Life
•longhouses, villages, palisade surrounding
•inside the longhouses were fires surrounded by each family, bunks were to either side
•inside the longhouses was quite smokey
•outside the villages were agriculture fields, which moved outwards as fields became less
fertile
•Women’s responsibilities included agriculture, children, household work…they did a lot
•very important work, responsible for most of the food in the village
•Men’s responsibilities included hunting, fishing, clearing fields, making canoes, politics, war,
trade…
•War: not made for territory or resources rather prestige and vengeance
•Trade: about reciprocal gifts, no markets; the family had best trade routes and traded/shared
routes with allies only
•Clans: kinship and extended kin
•uncles had very important roles because a lot of the time you didn’t know your biological
father…only your biological mother and siblings
•fictive kin were important parts of the family and community
•Enemy or friend?
•Chiefs: some worked in relation to war, others in relation to civil life; + councils
•No coercion for chiefs=importance of speeches + reputation (generosity + warrior status)
•convincing the rest of the men to your way of thinking/plan/idea
•Ethic of tolerance and generosity (i.e, hospitality,feasts, etc.), everyone had right to own ideas
(even women and children)
•the problem of dealing with conflict and violence: blood vengeance, “covering the dead”
•mostly peaceful and supposed to be in control of their emotions
•could only kill sorcerers and enemies, not allies or other Wendat
•if you killed outside of the accepted boundaries, you owed a gift to the family of the victim
(covering the death) to ease their pain and grief
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