27 
The third wampum record (Plate I, figure 3) was known to Chief Loft 
as the record of the Three Sisters. Its hereditary keeper was a woman 
who bore the title of Konwahtjonhontjon, and it had been handed down in 
Chief Loft’s maternal family for many generations. The last woman to 
bear the title was his sister, who left no female heir so that the true line 
of succession is now extinguished. 
The record contains a little over 900 beads, all drilled from both ends 
like the beads in the other two records. They hang in eleven pendants, 
six long ones of white beads only and five short ones of purple beads. 
Their origin and significance as given by Chief Loft are as follows: 
Many generations ago the Mohawk clans lived in separate villages, 
Bear people in one village, Turtle in another, and Wolf in a third. In a 
village of the Wolf clan there lived three beautiful maidens who could not 
meet without quarrelling. They quarrelled so constantly that at last a 
pious, middle-aged woman named Konwahtjonhontyon, “Forsaken Fire- 
side,” resolved to reform them. She approached each girl individually 
and said to her, “Come tomorrow to my wigwam at such and such a time. 
I have something to show you.” Each girl visited her wigwam at the stated 
hour, and to her surprise met the other two girls there also. But before 
they had time to quarrel with one another Konwahtjonhontyon said to 
them “I am glad that you have come. Now I will show you something”. 
She led them to her plantation, and showed them corn, beans, and squash 
all growing together in the same mound, “Look”, she said, “The Great 
Spirit gave us these foods, and your forefathers discovered that if they 
planted them all in the same hillock they would all grow without injuring 
one another and yet each would maintain its individuality. They are three 
sisters that grow together in harmony. You three girls must live in the 
same way. Now go home, and in three days come back to my wigwam, 
when I will explain to you a wampum string that I am making”. 
The girls returned in three days and the woman showed them this 
wampum string. The five dark strings represent the five nations of the 
Iroquois, three of the six white strings the three girls. “Now”, said the 
woman, “If any of you breaks the rules that are laid down for your con- 
duct, I will replace a white bead with a dark bead in that white string 
hanging beside the string that represents you. Then you will be disgraced 
throughout the whole village”. 
The girls went away, and the woman kept the string in her possession. 
Other girls in groups of three entered upon a similar sisterhood until it 
spread throughout the whole of the five tribes of the confederacy. At 
some public festival, or meeting of the council, three girls would join 
hands before the keeper of the record, Konwahtjonhontyon, and hear her 
proclaim the rules of the sisterhood; that each girl must live in peace, in 
love, and in charity with her two sisters, must help them at ail times, and 
must observe the same conduct towards other sisterhoods or groups of 
three. Each girl then made her vow in front of all the people. 
The sisterhoods never formed an organized society; they remained 
voluntary groups of three, all separate, but all bound by the same rules. 
Today the young Iroquois girls no longer follow the customs of their 
parents or wish to enter into such sisterhoods; and the record no longer 
