Indians 101: Iroquois ceremonies regarding death

In all cultures there are rites of passages which mark changes in status. These rites of passage include coming of age ceremonies to mark the transition from youth to adulthood, marriage ceremonies to mark the transition to married status, and funeral ceremonies to celebrate the change from living to dead. Funeral ceremonies reflect beliefs and attitudes about death and help heal the void in the social fabric caused by death. Briefly described below are some of the Iroquois ceremonies and beliefs regarding death.

First, a note on the designation Iroquois which is used in referring to the Iroquois language family and in referring to the Iroquois Confederacy. The term Iroquois comes from the French modification of the Algonquian word Irinkhoiw which means “real adders.” The members of the Iroquois Confederacy refer to themselves collectively as Haudenosaunee in reference to the longhouses in their villages which serve as communal and ceremonial buildings. While the designation Iroquois is often used to refer to the Five or Six Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy, it should be remembered that not all Iroquois-speaking nations in the Northeast were members of the Confederacy.

In this essay, Iroquois will be used as meaning the Indian nations comprising the Haudenosaunee: Seneca (the big hill people, or the people of the big mountain); Cayuga (the people at the landing, in reference to portaging a canoe); Mohawk (the people of the flint, in reference to the flint quarries in their territory); Onondaga(the people of the hill, in reference to the hill where a woman long ago had appeared to give the people corn, beans, squash, and tobacco); and Oneida (the people of the standing stone, in reference to the supernatural stone which followed them).

Souls

When a person dies, the spirit or “ghost” of the deceased is still present for ten days. After ten days, a feast is held and the spirit then leaves, traveling along the Milky Way, the Path of the Souls. Seneca archaeologist Arthur Caswell Parker, in his book Red Jacket: Seneca Chief, writes:

“In the religious belief of the Seneca, the souls of the dead are relieved of their suffering, as they are borne into the upper world, by the knowledge that their friends have cared.”

Condolence Ceremonies

Death tears the social fabric and to mend this fabric, condolence ceremonies are held. Historian Matthew Dennis, in his book Cultivating a Landscape of Peace: Iroquois-European Encounters in Seventeenth Century America, writes:

“The Condolence served to restore the mystic power, or orenda, of the group, which was diminished by the death of even one person.”

The ceremony allows the people to live in peace and health.

There are two kinds of condolence ceremonies: the Big Condolence ceremony which is held when a chief (sachem) dies, and Family Condolence Ceremony which is held when a clan member dies.

Big Condolence Ceremony

The League of Iroquois Nations originated through a vision received by Deganawida (The Peacemaker) and articulated through the great Mohawk orator Hiawatha. In his 1851 book League of the Ho-Dé-No-Sau-Nee or Iroquois, Lewis Henry Morgan writes:

“At the institution of the League, fifty permanent sachemships were created, with appropriate names; and the sachems who held these titles were vested with the supreme powers of the confederacy.”

These 50 permanent offices were filled from the member nations. Each of the sachems takes as his name the title of the sachemship. Lewis Henry Morgan explains:

“When an individual was made a sachem, upon the death or deposition of one of the fifty, his name was ‘taken away,’ and the name of the sachemship held by his predecessor was conferred upon him.”

When one of the sachems dies, the Big Condolence Ceremony is held. In this ceremony, the founding of the League is told and ceremonially re-enacted in five connected rituals: Journeying on the Trail; Eulogy of Roll Call of the Chiefs; Welcome at the Wood’s Edge; Requickening Address; and Six Songs of Farewell. The ceremonies express the principles of union and reciprocity, and the creation myth of the Iroquois and the prophet Deganawida. These ceremonies are held in the fall or winter as it is felt that the ritual can be destructive to growing seeds and plants. The Iroquois condolence ritual involves a renewal of commitment to order and reason.

The Requickening Address symbolically restores life to the people in the form of the newly installed chief. In the Iroquois Confederacy, while the bearer of an office dies, the office never dies. In their book The Encyclopedia of Native American Religions, Arlene Hirschfelder and Paulette Molin report:

“The address is delivered by a speaker for the clearminded side of the tribe and one for the bereaved side. Each section describes a hurt arising from grief caused by death, then mentions that the hurt affecting those present is either removed or healed and the people restored to their former condition.”

In the Big Condolence Ceremony, the six Iroquois nations are divided into two groups (moieties): the Older Brothers (Mohawk, Onondaga, and Seneca) and the Younger Brothers (Oneida, Cayuga, and Tuscarora). The group to which the deceased chief belonged is the bereaved and the other group is the clearminded. Arlene Hirschfelder and Paulette Molin report:

“The clearminded tribes are obliged to console the mourners. The ceremony is given by the ‘clear’ moiety to the ‘mourning’ moiety.”

Family Condolence Ceremony

Iroquois society is based on matrilineal clans: people are born into their mother’s clan. According to historian José António Brandão (1999: 26), in his book “Your Fyre Shall Burn No More” Iroquois Policy toward New France and Its Native Allies to 1701:

“The rules and obligations of the clans affect almost every aspect of Iroquois life, from where a person lived in a village to whom he or she could marry, when to wage war, and who would mourn his or her death.”

With regard to the Family Condolence Ceremony or Tenth Day Feast, Arlene Hirschfelder and Paulette Molin report:

“Ten days after the burial of the deceased, a condolence is given in the home or in the longhouse by members of the opposite moiety from that of the deceased to console the family of the deceased.”

Arlene Hirschfelder and Paulette Molin also explain:

“On the 10th day, the spirit, ghost or soul of the deceased leaves and travels along the path of the soul to the afterlife.”

Food is passed around and the deceased is given a portion of it. This ceremony is much shorter than the Big Condolence Ceremony.

Some families may also have an additional feast for the dead. Arlene Hirschfelder and Paulette Molin report:

“Sometimes families have a one-year feast at which the dead is ‘fed’ one more time. It occurs on the first anniversary of death, for it is believed that the soul of the dead returns to earth on this day. This one-year feast is less formal.”

Feast of the Dead

The Feast to the Dead (Chanters for the Dead) is held annually or semiannually. This is a ceremony for the dead of the entire village and is conducted by a special society of women. It is an all-night ceremony which begins with a tobacco invocation to the dead, followed by special songs and dances. According to Anthony Wallace, in his chapter on the Longhouse Religion in the Handbook of North American Indians:

“The dancing is often clockwise rather than the customary counterclockwise, for these dances are for the dead, and the dead are believed to dance also.”

Arlene Hirschfelder and Paulette Molin report:

“Since there is a belief that the dead are among the living during these rituals and that they return to their former homes to eat food, food offerings are left for them.”