The Seneca, known in their own language as the O-non-do-wa-ga (The People of the Great Hills) are one of the original five nations that comprise the Hau-de-no-sau-nee, the People of the Longhouse, known as the Iroquois Confederacy. The other nations are the Mohawk, the Oneida, the Onondaga, and the Cayuga. The Tuscarora joined the Confederacy in 1721, after migrating from North Carolina.
The Seneca people primarily occupied the Genesee River valley, as well as western New York, particularly after absorbing the Erie and Neutral nations.
At the time of the American Revolution, what is now Genesee County was a small
part of Seneca territory. While the Haudenosaunee attempted to remain neutral
in what was described as “a fight between brothers,” conflict on
the New York frontier eventually made that impossible. In 1779, General George
Washington sent soldiers under the command of Generals John Sullivan and James
Clinton through Seneca territory as part of a scorched earth policy to prevent
the Senecas from siding with the British. At that time, the Senecas were the
largest and most powerful of the six nations of the Iroquois Confederacy.
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