BUFFALO SOCIETY OF NATURAE SCIENCES 281 



the migrating Senecas. This migration would be stopped by 

 the Onondagas who had already made their settlements in Cen- 

 tral New York. It is quite possible, however, that these condi- 

 tions were reversed, and that the Iroquoian people whom Cartier 

 met on the St. Lawrence were Hurons, who were then at war 

 with the New York Iroquois who had already occupied their 

 present seat. The most probable conjecture, however, is that 

 the Senecas, at least, came from the west, and were a branch of 

 the Hurons, (1). 



The Country of the Senecas, Nun-da-wa-o-no-ga as they 

 themselves called it, or Sonnontouan as the French called it, com- 

 prised the Valley of the Genesee River and the region eastward 

 nearly as far as Cayuga Lake. Before the Neutral War in 1650 

 some of their villages lay west of the River, but these frontier 

 settlements were withdrawn across the Genesee during that war. 

 On Sanson's map of 1656 their country is located well east of the 

 Genesee. After the war with the Neutrals the Senecas seem to 

 have re-occupied the region west of the Genesee River; vil- 

 lages sprang up along the Niagara River and one, Otinawatawa, 

 as far west as the head of Lake Ontario. These were probably 

 only temporary bases for hunting parties. In the opening years 

 of the 18th century parties of Senecas crossed the divide between 

 the Genesee and the Allegany Rivers and established villages 

 along the headwaters of the Allegany. 



Like the other members of the Iroquoian family the Senecas 

 lived in villages composed of ' 'long houses' ' , the largest being 

 "50 or 60 feet long, with 13 or 14 fires in one house". In 1656 

 their country contained "two large villages and several small 

 ones, besides the Huron village called "St. Michel", (2). 



In 1677 and 1678 Wentworth Greenhalgh was sent by Gov- 

 ernor Andros to visit the Senecas. He reported as follows: ' 'The 

 Senecques have 4 towns, viz. Canagora, Tiohatton, Canoenda and 

 Keinthe; Canagora and Tiohatton h^e within 30 miles of ye lake 

 ffrontenacque, and ye other two ly about four or five miles apiece 

 to ye southward of these, they have abundance of corn; none of 

 their towns are stockadoed", (3). 



i. Bureau Ethnology. Hand-book American Indians, P. 587. 



2. Father L,e Jeune in Jes. Rel., 1656, Vol. 44, Burrows edition. 



3. Journal of a Tour to the Indians of Western New York. Quoted in 

 Doc. Rel. to Col. Hist, of N. Y., Vol. Ill, P. 251. 



