'58 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1916. 



One of the most important results of Mr. Hewitt's field studies is 

 the demonstration that, contrary to all available written records and 

 various printed accounts, there were never more than 49 federal 

 civil chiefs of the League of the Iroquois, and that the number 50, 

 due to misconception of the meaning of ordinary terms by Thomas 

 Webster of the New York Onondaga, who died about 30 years ago, 

 is modern and unhistorical. This false teaching has gained credence 

 because it arose only after the dissolution of the integrity of the 

 League of the Iroquois in the years following its wars with the 

 United States, when most of the tribes beca^me divided, some remov- 

 ing to Canada and some remaining in New York btate, a condition 

 which naturally fostered new interpretations and newer versions of 

 older legends and traditions. 



Mr. Hewitt also recorded a Cayuga version of the so-called Dekan- 

 awida tradition, comprising 130 pages of text, dictated by Chief 

 John H. Gibson, which purports to relate the events that led to the 

 founding of the League or Confederation of the Five Iroquois tribes 

 and the part taken therein by the principal actors. In this inter- 

 esting version Dekanawida is known only by the epithet " The 

 Fatherless," or literally " He Who is Fatherless," which emphasizes 

 the prophecy that he would be born of a virgin. In this version 

 " The Fatherless " • is represented as establishing among the 

 Cayuga tribesmen the exact form of government that later he 

 founded among the Five Iroquois tribes. It is said that the Cayuga 

 selfishly limited the scope of that form of government, and therefore 

 its benefits, to the Cayuga people alone, for the Cayuga statesmen did 

 not conceive of its applicability to the affairs and welfare of all men. 

 And so, this tradition affirms, it became needful that " The Father- 

 less " return to the neighbor tribes of the Cayuga to establish among 

 them the Leag-ue of the Five Tribes of the Iroquois, which was de- 

 signed to be shared by all the tribes of men. This event is men- 

 tioned in the other Dekanawida versions. 



This Cayuga version also purports to explain the origin of the 

 dualism lying at the foundation of all public institutions of Iroquois 

 peoples, by attributing the first such organization among the Cayuga 

 to two persons who were related to each other as " Father and Son," 

 or "Mother and Daughter," and who agreed to conduct public 

 affairs jointly. This statement of course is somewhat wide of the 

 mark, because it does not explain the existence of similar dualisms 

 among other tribes such dualisms resting commonly, in the social 

 organization, on the dramatization of the relation of the male and 

 female principles in' nature. 



Mr. Hewitt was also able to confirm another radical exegesis of a 

 part of the installation ceremony of the League of the Iroquois 

 as first proposed by himself. This deals with the significance and 



