[38 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



Labor and burdens may have been the condition of the Indian 

 woman. She may seem to have been a creature only and not a 



mpanion of the red man. yet by comparison with the restric- 

 tions, to characterize it by no stronger term, obtaining among 

 llized people, the Iroquois woman had a superior position and 

 superior rights. 



By political rights she held power in making nominations and 

 had a voice in ail public councils. 



By social rights she negotiated marriages and governed house- 

 holds. 



By maternal right she controlled her own offspring and be- 

 stowed the clan title of her name upon their descendants forever. 



By civil right she ruled in domestic convocations of clan dis- 

 putes, of law and order. 



By religious right she had the controlling authority in all cere- 

 monies of condolence, or festival and bv right of confederacy law 

 she possessed lands and properties with the sole right to bequeath 

 them to whomsoever she might choose. 



As the woman of today stands advocate and petitioner of her 

 own cause, should she not offer an oblation of gratitude to the 

 memory of the Iroquois Indian who called the earth his " mighty 

 mother" and who. through a sense of justice, rendered to the 

 mothers of his people the rights maternal, political, social, civil, 

 religious and of land ! 



All these were an Iroquois woman's rights. 



ORIGIN OF THE WAMPUM BELT 



Previous to the confederation of the Five Nations the Xew York 

 State Iroquois Indians were subjects of the Adirondacks. a family 

 branch of the Algonquins who inhabited territories on the northern 

 side of the St Lawrence river near the present location of Mon- 

 treal. Originally, as one nation, they were few in number yet as 

 they multiplied and. by example of the Adirondacks. became 

 learned in the arts of husbandry and the strategies of war. thev 

 were ambitious of the ownership of the country and made war upon 

 the Adirondacks by whose overpowering numbers they were van- 

 quished. Defeated, and to escape extermination, they fled and, 

 their traditions say. passing along the St Lawrence river entered 

 Lake Ontario and coasted for a time on its eastern shores. Even- 

 tually they moved on to what is now the central portion of the 

 State of Xew York where they met and conquered all the tribes 

 resident in that territory which became their sole possession and, 

 subsequently, the government seat of their colossal confederacy. 



