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90-863: Like others of Iroquoian language and culture, the tribes would raid and feud with fellow Iroquoian tribes. They were generally wary of rival Algonquian -speaking peoples, such as those who inhabited Canada to the East, along the St. Lawrence Valley basin . Iroquoian tribes were later known to historians for the fierce ways in which they waged war. A largely agrarian society, the Neutral Confederacy developed farmsteads that were admired and marveled over by European leaders writing reports to their sponsors. The Neutral Confederacy were primarily engaged in hunting; they traded with others through furs and animal skins. The largest group identified as Chonnonton ('keepers of

180-481: A Catholic mission settlement just south of Montreal that was occupied primarily by converted Mohawk who had migrated north from New York. In 1674 identifiable groups of Neutrals were recorded among its population. It can be presumed that many of their descendants are still living there today. In later wars between Britain and France, the Caughnawaga people, many of whom had converted to Catholicism, were allies of

270-645: A family of Indigenous languages of the Americas and most of the languages in the Algic language family are included in the group. The name of the Algonquian language family is distinguished from the orthographically similar Algonquin dialect of the Indigenous Ojibwe language (Chippewa), which is a senior member of the Algonquian language family. The term Algonquin has been suggested to derive from

360-402: A gorge roughly parallel to the current Grand River. Evidence of the "buried gorge" of the previous river has been found when wells have been drilled. Rather than finding water-bearing bedrock at a depth of a dozen metres or less, the path of the buried gorge can be found with overburden of dozens of metres. The Laphroaig site ( AgHa-54 ) on the lower Grand River shows evidence of occupation in

450-656: A loose confederacy of peoples who moved west in the 1720s, fleeing lands invaded by Iroquois, and settled in present-day Ohio . The Mingo were among tribes who later fought the Americans in the Northwest Indian Wars for the Ohio Valley (1774–95). During the 1840s, they were among the tribes removed to Oklahoma and Indian Territory west of the Mississippi River. Neutral descendants are among

540-449: A noun, that it must be a purely linguistic characterization. Anthropological linguists have conversely argued the strong connection between animacy and items viewed as having spiritual importance. Another important distinction involves the contrast between nouns marked as proximate and those marked as obviative . Proximate nouns are those deemed most central or important to the discourse, while obviative nouns are those less important to

630-590: A patent under the Great Seal, issued by Lieutenant Governor Simcoe, and bearing date January 14, 1793 ... The original extent of the tract was 694,910 acres, but the greater part of this has been since surrendered to the Crown, in trust, to be sold for the benefit of these tribes. And some smaller portions have been either granted in fee simple to purchasers with the assent of the Indians, or have been alienated by

720-459: A single word. Ex: ( Menominee ) paehtāwāēwesew "He is heard by higher powers" ( paeht - 'hear', - āwāē - 'spirit', - wese - passivizer, - w third-person subject) or ( Plains Cree ) kāstāhikoyahk "it frightens us". These languages have been extensively studied by Leonard Bloomfield , Ives Goddard , and others. Algonquian nouns have an animate/inanimate contrast: some nouns are classed as animate , while all other nouns are inanimate . There

810-578: A variety of projectile point types, one distinct type, the Innes point, was associated with the Grand River drainage basin and took its name from a type site a few kilometres west of Brantford , which sits on the lower Grand River. Due to high water levels at the start of the Late Archaic, sites which are today located inland up the river may once have been true shoreline sites, similarly to

900-504: A winter among the Nation, during 1625–1626. A Franciscan Récollet , Father Joseph de La Roche Daillon , spent time with the Nation in 1626 and estimated the population as 40,000 at that time. About 14 years later, Brébeuf and Chaumonot visited 18 Neutral Confederacy settlements and stayed in ten villages. By that time, the estimated population was only "about 12,000 people and 4,000 warriors in about 40 villages and hamlets". After destroying

990-542: Is Owaashtanong-ziibi . A. Jones, the General Surveyor of Upper Canada reported the name of the river among the Mississaugas to be ' O-es-shin-ne-gun-ing' , and he wrote "the one that washes the timber down and carries away the grass and the weeds" as the meaning of the name. The Grand River watershed consists of all the land that drains into the Grand River through tributary creeks and rivers such as

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1080-501: Is concentrated at lakeshore sites located at river mouths ; no known site of this type, however, has been located on the Grand River. No evidence of fish at upland sites has been found, suggesting a pattern of seasonal upland hunting and lowland fishing. Tincombe points out, however, that fishing may still have occurred on the upper Grand River, notwithstanding a lack of surviving remains at sites. He further proposes areas around Caledonia and Brantford as persistent places of occupation in

1170-500: Is incorrect, and that Central Algonquian (in which he includes the Plains Algonquian languages) is a genetic subgroup, with Eastern Algonquian consisting of several different subgroups. However, this classification scheme has failed to gain acceptance from other specialists in the Algonquian languages. Instead, the commonly accepted subgrouping scheme is that proposed by Ives Goddard (1994). The essence of this proposal

1260-405: Is ongoing debate over whether there is a semantic significance to the categorization of nouns as animate or inanimate, with scholars arguing for it as either a clearly semantic issue, or a purely syntactic issue, along with a variety of arguments in between. More structurally inclined linguistic scholars have argued that since there is no consistent semantic system for determining the animacy of

1350-678: Is sometimes said to have included the extinct Beothuk language of Newfoundland , whose speakers were both in geographic proximity to Algonquian speakers and who share DNA in common with the Algonquian-speaking Miꞌkmaq . However, linguistic evidence is scarce and poorly recorded, and it is unlikely that reliable evidence of a connection can be found. The Algonquian language family is known for its complex polysynthetic morphology and sophisticated verb system. Statements that take many words to say in English can be expressed with

1440-448: Is that Proto-Algonquian originated with people to the west who then moved east, although Goddard did not attempt to identify a specific western urheimat for Proto-Algonquian in his 1994 paper. By this scenario, Blackfoot was the first language to branch off, which coincides well with its being the most divergent language of Algonquian. In west-to-east order, the subsequent branchings were: This historical reconstruction accords best with

1530-551: The Conestogo , Speed , Eramosa , Irvine and Nith rivers. The Grand River has Southern Ontario's largest watershed. Because the watershed is an ecosystem with natural borders, it includes and crosses many municipal boundaries and can be considered a transitional area between Southwestern Ontario and the Golden Horseshoe region that surrounds the west end of Lake Ontario . Its headwaters are near Dundalk in

1620-513: The County of Brant (1920) said that the hunting grounds of the Attawandaron ranged from Genesee Falls and Sarnia and south of a line drawn from Toronto to Goderich . During their travels, Jean de Brébeuf and Pierre Joseph Marie Chaumonot gave each Neutral village a Christian name. The only ones that are mentioned in their writings were Kandoucho , or All Saints, the nearest to

1710-752: The Huron , meaning 'people whose speech is awry or a little different'. The Iroquois called them Atirhagenrat (Atirhaguenrek) and Rhagenratka. Some of the tribes of the Neutral confederacy included the Aondironon, the Wenrehronon, and the Ongniaahraronon. They spoke Iroquoian languages but were culturally distinct from the Iroquois and competed with them for the same resources. The French called

1800-559: The Huron Nation ; Onguioaahra , on the Niagara River; Teotongniaton or St. William, in the centre of their country; and Khioetoa , or St. Michel (near what is now Windsor, Ontario). Reville described their territory as having been heavily forested and full of "wild fruit trees of vast variety," with nut trees, berry bushes, and wild grape vines. "Elk, caribou, and black bear; deer, wolves, foxes, martens and wild cats filled

1890-547: The Maliseet word elakómkwik ( pronounced [ɛlæˈɡomoɡwik] ), "they are our relatives/allies". Speakers of Algonquian languages stretch from the east coast of North America to the Rocky Mountains . The proto-language from which all of the languages of the family descend, Proto-Algonquian , was spoken around 2,500 to 3,000 years ago. There is no scholarly consensus about where this language

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1980-582: The Mascouten or "Fire Nation", who were believed to live in what is present-day Michigan . In 1616, the Neutral Confederacy had an estimated 40 villages and 4,000 warriors. In 1641, after a serious epidemic, the Jesuits counted 40 Neutral villages, with about 12,000 people. The nation was unable to survive the changes. In the 1650s, after the Iroquois Wars , they dispersed. One source indicates that

2070-777: The Mohawk nations of the Iroquois destroyed the smaller Neutral tribe in the 17th century, in the course of attacking and severely crippling the Huron /Wyandot. The Iroquois were seeking to dominate the lucrative fur trade with the Europeans. It was during this warfare that the Iroquois attacked the Jesuit outpost of Sainte-Marie among the Hurons . The Jesuits abandoned the mission after many Wyandot and numerous priests were killed here. To survive, remnants of The Neutral tribe migrated in 1667 to La Prairie ( Caughnawaga or Kahnawake ),

2160-569: The Onondaga , Oneida , and St. Lawrence Iroquoians . It was superior for toolmaking to other local chert varieties around the St. Lawrence Lowlands. That important resource was used to make spearheads and arrowheads and so gave the Neutrals the power to maintain their neutrality. Once the neighbours began receiving firearms through trade with the Europeans, however, the possession of the flint grounds

2250-740: The Petun Nation and may have had shared ancestry. The Jesuit Relations in 1652 describes tattooing among the Petun (also called the Tobacco Nation) as well as the Neutrals: "And this (tattooing) in some nations is so common that in the one which we called the Tobacco, and... the Neutral. I know not whether a single individual was found, who was not painted in this manner, on some part of the body." The Museum of Ontario Archeology describes

2340-584: The Plateau region of Idaho and Oregon or the Rocky Mountain-Great Plains boundary of Montana , dropping off subgroups as people migrated. Goddard also points out that there is clear evidence for pre-historical contact between Eastern Algonquian and Cree-Montagnais, as well as between Cheyenne and Arapaho–Gros Ventre. There has long been especially extensive back-and-forth influence between Cree and Ojibwe. It has been suggested that

2430-539: The Princess Point complex ( c.  500 CE – 1000 CE) are strongly associated with the Grand River by archaeologists. Princess Point sites cluster heavily along the river's length, where the focus and concentration of Princess Point people shifted from their earlier territory around Princess Point near Hamilton . Princess Point people were attracted to the fertile Grand River floodplains , in common with other peoples engaging in maize horticulture around

2520-719: The Seven Years' War , the Grand River Valley remained largely unoccupied and largely uncharted. An explorers' map in 1669 showed the River as being called the Tinaatuoa or Riviere Rapide. A 1775 map shows it as Urse, a name which also appeared on a 1708 map and on Bellin’s Carte des Lacs of 1744. The d’Anville map of 1755 shows the river Tinaatuoa but adds the words Grande River at its mouth. Other 18th Century names were Oswego and Swaogeh. In 1792, Simcoe tried to change

2610-673: The archaeologist Mary Jackes. The demise of the Neutral Confederacy occurred in spite of reports by the French, who first met it, "in 1610 as strong, healthy and numerous. They lived in the most fertile and warmest part of Ontario. They were determined to remain neutral in the conflicts between the Iroquois from south of the Great Lakes and the Ontario Iroquoians who lived to the north of the Neutral. They throve on trade, rather than war." Jackes re-examined French reports including

2700-430: The "Eastern Great Lakes" languages – what Goddard has called "Core Central", e.g., Ojibwe–Potawatomi, Shawnee, Sauk–Fox–Kickapoo, and Miami-Illinois (but not Cree–Montagnais or Menominee) – may also constitute their own genetic grouping within Algonquian. They share certain intriguing lexical and phonological innovations. However, this theory has not yet been fully fleshed out and is still considered conjectural. Algonquian

2790-526: The 16th and 17th centuries, the Grand River valley was inhabited by the Neutral people . This was a name given to them by European settlers, as they refused to side with either the Iroquois or the Petun tribes during their conflicts in the area. An Iroquoian people, they had close trade and cultural relations with other Ontario Iroquoian societies such as the Huron and Petun . The Wyandot , another distinct Iroquoian-speaking nation, who resided northeast of

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2880-662: The 1950s and 1960s, there was a tendency for archaeologists in eastern North America to identify sedentarization with progress on a conceptual level. Some sites may have had a number of distinct occupations, occurring in different seasons and for different purposes. Nevertheless, there is a broad grouping of sites into warm-weather, lowland sites characterized by ground stone tools and fishing equipment, or cold-weather, upland sites with abundant scrapers and projectile points, possibly indicating fall and winter deer hunting activities. Evidence of Late Archaic fishing activities in Ontario

2970-710: The Algonquian languages is their direct-inverse (also known as hierarchical ) morphosyntactic alignment , distinguishing between an unmarked voice where the subject outranks the object in a person hierarchy and a marked voice where the opposite relation obtains. Because Algonquian languages were some of the first with which Europeans came into contact in North America, the language family has given many words to English . Many eastern and midwestern U.S. states have names of Algonquian origin ( Massachusetts , Connecticut , Illinois , Michigan , Wisconsin , etc.), as do many cities: Milwaukee , Chicago , et al. Ottawa ,

3060-796: The American War of Independence, the Crown purchased land from the Mississaugas in Upper Canada to award as grants to Loyalist refugees as compensation for their property losses in the colonies. Loyalists from New York, New England and the South were settled in this area, as the Crown hoped they would create new towns and farms on the frontier. In the 19th century, many new immigrants came to Upper Canada from England, Scotland, Ireland and Germany seeking opportunity. Settlements were popping up all over Southern Ontario, and many colonists coveted

3150-544: The British Crown for help, as they had promised aid for allies. In gratitude for their assistance during the war, the Crown awarded the Iroquois land in Upper Canada. Brant led Mohawk from the Upper Castle and families of the other Six Nations to Upper Canada. They first settled at what is present-day Brantford, where Brant crossed, or ‘forded’ the Grand River. It was also called Brant's Town. Not all members of

3240-483: The French explorers and Coureurs de bois came to the region in search of fur and other items of value to Europeans, the Grand River Valley was among the last areas of southern Ontario to be explored. Since the French worked closely with their Native allies in the acquisition of fur and trading of European goods for it, they went only where the natives resided. Even after the English conquered New France in 1760 during

3330-694: The French. The Iroquois League in New York then was neutral or sided with the British. Because different nations were on different sides in this war, it was difficult for the Iroquois nations to adhere to the Great Law of Peace and avoid killing each other. They managed to avoid such bloodshed until the American Revolution (1775–83). Other descendants of the Neutrals may have joined the Mingo ,

3420-751: The Grand River flows from Dundalk to Lake Erie with numerous tributaries flowing into it: The Conestogo River joins the Grand at the village of Conestogo just north of Waterloo . The Eramosa River joins the Speed River in Guelph . The Speed River joins the Grand in Cambridge . The Nith River joins the Grand in Paris . Prior to the most recent glaciation—the Laurentide —an earlier river flowed through

3510-538: The Grand River valley, had long competed to remain independent of their enemy the Iroquois Confederacy , a powerful alliance of five nations based around the Great Lakes in the present central and western New York state area. Caught in between, the Neutrals paid dearly for their refusal to ally. Historical accounts differ on exactly how the Neutral tribe was wiped out. The consensus is that the Seneca and

3600-627: The Grand River, '' O:se Kenhionhata:tie'' means "Willow River," for the many willows in the watershed. During the 18th century, the French colonists named it '' Grande-Rivière . It was later renamed as Ouse River by John Graves Simcoe for the River Great Ouse near his childhood home in Lincolnshire on the east coast of England. The anglicized form of the French name has remained in common use. The Ojibwe name for Grand River

3690-594: The Hurons, the Iroquois attacked the Neutrals. Around 1650, during a period that is now loosely referred to as the Beaver Wars , referring to the theft of furs, the Iroquois Confederacy declared war on the Attawandaron. Some historians state that the Iroquois destroyed the Neutral society, which ended as a separate entity in 1651. However, the Neutral population had already been reduced by diseases such as smallpox and measles carried by Europeans. By 1652,

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3780-521: The Iroquois had also destroyed the Huron, Petun and Erie Nations. Some of the Neutrals were incorporated into Seneca villages in upstate New York, and others were absorbed into various other societies. The Kenjockety family, one of the last known families to trace their ethnicity to the Neutrals, still lives among the Senecas. Anthropologist Jackes discussed the year 1651 as particularly significant: "during

3870-530: The Ivan Elliot site was 4,000; the Neutrals lived in longhouses and used the village for about 20 years. Another nearby site, on the McPhee farm, owned by Raymond Reid, was excavated in 1983. The village had a population of about 1,000 around 1500–1530. The Neutral Confederacy decline and eventual end can be attributed to genocide. The final catastrophe that led to its end by the early 1650s was investigated by

3960-622: The Jesuit Relations and the artefacts found in the Grimsby site. When grounds were prepared for a new housing development in Grimsby, Ontario, in 1976, a Neutral Confederacy burial site was uncovered in sheltered embayment of the Niagara Escarpment. The excavation by Kenyon was closed after only two months in 1977, and the skeletons were reburied near the original site. It was estimated that over 100 bodies were recovered at

4050-516: The Late Archaic, due to a high concentration of consecutively dated sites from that period. One especially significant site, the Johnson Flats site ( Borden AgGx-214), is located on a former bar in the Grand River near Caledonia. Discovered in 1994, the site contains materials dating to the Early, Middle, and Late Archaic periods, as well as the later Princess Point complex . The people of

4140-491: The Neutral Confederacy has been extinct for more than three centuries, little is known about the Neutrals' language. Mithun (1979:145, 188–189) cites Jesuits pointing out that the Neutral language was different from the Wendat language, in that the Neutrals were "vne Nation differente de langage, au moins en plusieurs choses" (Thwaites 21.188) / "a Nation different in language, at least in many respects" (Thwaites 21.189). Mithun further cites work by Roy Wright (Mithun 1979:160) where

4230-438: The Neutral Confederacy hunted not only deer but also elk, moose, beaver, raccoons, squirrels, black bear, fox and muskrat. The remains of catfish, whitefish, salmon and trout were also common at many of the sites. In 1983–1985, another site was excavated. One of the largest Attawandaron villages, the location covered 13 acres of the Badenoch section of Puslinch, on the east side of Morriston, Ontario . The estimated population of

4320-432: The Six Nations moved north. Remnants of the past confederacy live today throughout New York state, some on federally recognized reservations. In 1784 the British Crown awarded to the Six Nations the " Haldimand Tract ", a tract of land "six miles deep from each side of the river beginning at Lake Erie and extending in that proportion to the [source] of the said river." Much of this land was later sold or otherwise lost to

4410-543: The Six Nations. A portion of this tract near Caledonia, Ontario , is the basis for the 2006 Caledonia land dispute , in which the Six Nations filed a land claim with the government. The Six Nations reserve south of Brantford, Ontario, is what remains of the Haldimand Tract. Throughout the 19th century, many Anglo-Canadian settlements developed along the Grand within former Six Nations territory, including Waterloo , Berlin (now Kitchener ), Cambridge , Paris , Brantford , Caledonia , Dunnville and Port Maitland . After

4500-455: The Sun") who led several raids against the Mascouten (or "The Fire Nation"), who lived in territory in present-day Michigan and Ohio . A 1627 report called him the chief of all of the nation (Neutrals). Tsouharissen died around 1646. Within a generation (by the early 1670s), all of the nearby first nations, the Erie, the Huron, Neutrals, Tobacco tribes, and even the fierce Susquehannocks would all fall between rampaging epidemic diseases or in

4590-465: The bloody Beaver Wars between themselves and/or to the last tribe standing with any significant military power, the Iroquois . The Neutrals quarried Onondaga chert from the Onondaga Limestone formation in their lands. Prior to European contact, they used this chert as a tool stone for arrowheads , bifaces , and other weapons and tools. This extended into the protohistoric and post-contact periods, and has been documented at sites associated with

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4680-444: The capital of Canada , is named after the Algonquian nation, the Odawa people . For a more detailed treatment of geographical names in three Algonquian languages, see the external link to the book by Trumbull. Grand River (Ontario) The Grand River , formerly known as the River Ouse , is a large river in Ontario , Canada. It lies along the western fringe of the Greater Golden Horseshoe region of Ontario which overlaps

4770-425: The conflicts between the Iroquois from south of the Great Lakes and the Ontario Iroquoians who lived to the north" and thrived through active trading instead of war, although the Huron nation aggressively worked to prevent trade between the Neutrals and the French.     The chief of 28 villages, villas, and towns in the last years of the Neutral confederacy was named Tsouharissen or Souharissen ("Child of

4860-415: The deer'), partly because of their practice of herding deer into pens, a strategy used while hunting. Another group, the Onguiaahra ('near the big waters' or possibly 'the strait' – or something else, see Niagara Falls § Toponymy ), populated the more southern Niagara Peninsula and allegedly account for the origin of the word "Niagara". The Chonnonton territory contained large deposits of flint, which

4950-448: The designation of the Grand as a Canadian Heritage River . The Grand Valley Dam, located near the village of Belwood , helps to control the flow of water, especially during periods of spring flooding. The dam, completed in 1942, is commonly referred to as Shand Dam , named for a local family who were displaced by filling of the dam's reservoir, Lake Belwood . With a watershed area of 7,000 square kilometres (2,700 sq mi),

5040-491: The discourse. There are personal pronouns which distinguish three persons, two numbers (singular and plural), inclusive and exclusive first person plural , and proximate and obviative third persons. Verbs are divided into four classes: transitive verbs with an animate object (abbreviated "TA"), transitive verbs with an inanimate object ("TI"), intransitive verbs with an animate subject ("AI"), and intransitive verbs with an inanimate subject ("II"). A very notable feature of

5130-453: The eastern portion of southwestern Ontario, sometimes referred to as Midwestern Ontario, along the length of this river. From its source near Wareham, Ontario , it flows south through Grand Valley , Fergus , Elora , Waterloo , Kitchener , Cambridge , Paris , Brantford , Ohsweken , Six Nations of the Grand River , Caledonia , and Cayuga before emptying into the north shore of Lake Erie south of Dunnville at Port Maitland . One of

5220-422: The existence of many villages southwest of Hamilton, comprising a Neutral Confederacy, which he believes to have been centred at the Walker site and was presided over by the chief Souharissen. Noble was instrumental in excavating and documenting other Neutral sites in Thorold , Grimsby , and Binbrook . Reports from those and other Southern Ontario sites near Milton ( Crawford Lake ) and Oakville have indicated that

5310-422: The final Iroquois onslaught...the Neutral fled into the woods and dispersed for the last time ... The years of famine and disease no doubt contributed to the rout".  The last reference to the Neutrals as an independent society is from the fall of 1653. A historical mention in 1864 refers to the "Huron de la nation neuter" and "Hurons neutres" (neutral Hurons). The Neutral Confederacy had much in common with

5400-402: The frontier of the Mohawk Valley had resulted in massacres and atrocities on both sides, aggravating anti-Iroquois feelings among the colonists. Without consultation or giving the Iroquois a place in negotiations, the British ceded their land in New York to the new United States. The Iroquois were unwelcome in the newly created nation. After the war, Six Nations leader Joseph Brant appealed to

5490-431: The latter notes from the Neutral name given to Chaumonot that the Neutral language did not have sound changes that distinguish Wendat from other Northern Iroquoian languages. Hanzeli (1969), referencing Thwaites (21:228–230), notes Brébeuf and Chaumonot considered Neutral different enough from Wendat to write a separate Neutral grammar and dictionary, now lost. The Southwold Earthworks , near St. Thomas, Ontario , contains

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5580-426: The latter part of the Early Archaic period . During the Late Archaic period ( c.  4500 RCYBP to c.  2800 RCYBP), water levels in Lake Erie and Lake Ontario were higher due to drainage reasons as the land continued to deglaciate . The people of the Late Archaic were mobile hunter-gatherers who had not yet developed ceramics . While Late Archaic people in what is now southern Ontario used

5670-454: The name of Grande Riviere to Ouse, after a river in England and the Thomas Ridout map of 1821 shows "Grand R or Ouse". Simcoe failed because the name Grand River had been in common usage for some time by then. Apart from large numbers of Tuscarora and Oneida , who mainly allied with the American colonists, the other four nations of the Iroquois Confederacy sided with the British during the American War of Independence . Warfare throughout

5760-432: The nearest Great Lake , which is why most of them are small), thus giving it more distance to take in more water from tributaries . The river's mostly rural character (even when flowing through the edges of Waterloo and Kitchener), ease of access and lack of portages make it a desirable canoeing location, especially the stretch between West Montrose and Paris . A number of conservation areas have been established along

5850-460: The north shore of Lake Erie from the Niagara Peninsula to the Detroit River, perhaps as far north as Toronto in the east and Goderich in the west." They had population concentrations on the Niagara Peninsula and in the vicinity of the present-day communities of Hamilton and Milton , Ontario. In addition to this main territory, there was a single population cluster to the east, across the Niagara River , near modern-day Buffalo , New York , which

5940-440: The north. The Grand River flows south-south-east. Luther Marsh, a 52-square-kilometre wetland on the upper Grand, is one of the largest inland wetlands in southern Ontario and provides habitat for waterfowl, including least bittern and black tern , and amphibians . It is also an important staging area during bird migrations . The importance of the watershed (7000 square kilometers or 2600 square miles) has been recognized by

6030-440: The observed levels of divergence within the family, whereby the most divergent languages are found furthest west (since they constitute the earliest branchings during eastern migration), and the shallowest subgroupings are found furthest to the east (Eastern Algonquian, and arguably Core Central). This general west-to-east order is compatible with the proposal from J.P. Denny (1991) that Proto-Algonquian people may have moved east from

6120-546: The people "Neutral" ( French : la Nation neutre ) because they tried to remain neutral in the many wars between the confederacy of the Huron tribes and the nations of the Iroquois Confederacy . During the late 16th and the early 17th centuries, the territory of the Attawandaron , as they were called by the Huron Nation, was mostly within the limits of present-day southern Ontario . The Museum of Ontario Archaeology summarizes that territory as follows: they "inhabited dozens of villages in Southwestern Ontario stretching along

6210-407: The people now known as the Seneca in Oklahoma. After the desolation of the Neutral tribe, the Iroquois Confederacy used the Grand River Valley as a hunting ground and trapping territory. Though the Six Nations (by then including the Tuscarora ) held the territory by right of conquest, they did not settle it, apart from a limited presence on the northern and western shores of Lake Ontario . When

6300-528: The phenomenon of site stratification observed on Lake Huron. This phenomenon is also observable in reference to Lake Erie. For example, the Canada Century site (located on the Welland River ) lies 17 kilometres (11 mi) north of the Lake Erie shore, but may once have been significantly closer. Due to the absence of ceramics, it is difficult to date Archaic sites. It is generally believed that sites were occupied seasonally, though there are notable exceptions to this. The archaeologist Chris Ellis argues that in

6390-403: The powerful Iroquois Five Nations Confederacy, who were also Iroquoian speakers. That dissolved in 1639, with devastating effects, particularly to the Wenrohronon. The Wenrohronon made an alliance with the Huron , who were located farther away and could not offer much support. Traveling south from Midland, Ontario , Étienne Brûlé passed through the Attawandaron territory circa 1615 and spent

6480-587: The prize Grand River Valley. The 1846 Gazetteer relates the history of the First Nations of the area as follows: "In 1784, Sir F. Haldimand ... granted to the Six Nations and their heirs for ever, a tract of land on the Ouse, or Grand River, six miles in depth on each side of the river, beginning at Lake Erie, and extending to the head of the river. This grant was confirmed, and its conditions defined, by

6570-406: The reasons included "wars, diseases and famine". The remaining members became a part of various other Iroquoian nations. Historical records kept by the French do not discuss the Neutrals as a nation or confederacy after 1672. The Neutrals' name for themselves was Chonnonton , or 'people of the deer', or, more precisely, 'the people who tend or manage deer'. They were called '' Attawandaron'' by

6660-530: The remains of a precontact Neutral village and is a National Historic Site of Canada . It is known for conspicuous earthworks, which were rare in southern Ontario, and are well preserved. The Museum of Ontario Archaeology in London, Ontario , is located adjacent to the Lawson site . It is another 500-year-old Neutral village which has been under study since the early 1900s. An Ontario historical plaque commemorates

6750-521: The river, and are managed by the Grand River Conservation Authority . The Grand Valley Trail stretches 275 km along the river's valley between the town of Dundalk and Lake Erie . In 1669 the indigenous name '' Tinaouatoua'' was recorded by Galinée . A 1945 book about the Grand River recorded the spelling ' Tinaatoua' and attributed it to the Seneca , though its sources are unclear. The Mohawk name for

6840-625: The same time. Floodplains provided rich soils for cultivation, as well as easy access to riverine resources. Indeed, early evidence of lake sturgeon fishing on the Grand River has been discovered at the Cayuga Bridge site, which is also associated with the Princess Point complex and dated to AD 700–900. Thousands of fish remains were also unearthed at the Porteous and Holmedale sites near Brantford, which date to around AD 1000. By

6930-511: The scenic and spectacular features of the river is the falls and Gorge at Elora . The Grand River is the largest river that is entirely within southern Ontario's boundaries. The river owes its size to the unusual fact that its source is relatively close to the Georgian Bay of Lake Huron , yet it flows southwards to Lake Erie, rather than westward to the closer Lake Huron or northward to Georgian Bay (most southern Ontario rivers flow into

7020-478: The separate main articles for each of the three divisions. Eastern Algonquian is a true genetic subgrouping. The Plains Algonquian and the Central Algonquian groups are not genetic groupings but rather areal groupings. Although these areal groups often do share linguistic features, these commonalities are usually attributed to language contact . Paul Proulx has argued that this traditional view

7110-522: The site "is among a cluster of Attawandaron villages in this part of the region". In 1976, a Neutral Confederacy cemetery was unearthed in Grimsby, Ontario . The area that now comprises Morriston in Puslinch, Ontario is said to have been inhabited by the Neutral Confederacy, in a village of 4,000. This region may have had the largest Neutral Confederacy settlement in Ontario, at one time. Onondaga chert

7200-509: The site, which was occupied by Neutrals in the 1500s. About 1000 to 2000 people lived in longhouses in the fortified community. Scientific excavation was first completed in 1921–1923, when the site was owned by the Lawson family. The searches have recovered 30,000 artifacts and the remains of 19 longhouses. Some of the longhouses and the pallisade have been reconstructed. The McMaster University professor William Noble has excavated and documented

7290-493: The society as "semi-nomadic", living in villages for about 20 years before abandoning a site after depleting the game and the soil of the area. A historian in 1997 stated that the Nation "also made use of hamlets, agricultural field cabins, specialized camps ... and cemeteries. Another source describes the Neutrals as a "hunter-gatherer society who lived in longhouses that sheltered multiple families". Research conducted by anthropologist Mary Jackes states that they remained neutral "in

7380-542: The time. "Natural disruption, disease, famine and years of severe weather would have been sufficient to begin population decline. Intensifying war, with many killed, taken captive or forced to become refugees, led to almost complete population collapse." Jackes suggested that this burial site "had significance and that it was a place of refuge... especially for women and children." Algonquian languages The Algonquian languages ( / æ l ˈ ɡ ɒ ŋ k ( w ) i ə n / al- GONG -k(w)ee-ən ; also Algonkian ) are

7470-430: The winter of 1626–1627. Daillon visited 28 Neutral villages, including the capital, which the French referred to as Nôtre Dame des Anges. The fertile flats of the various oxbows that Big Creek makes three miles from its mouth at Grand River , were ideal for long-term settlement. Noble uses the term "Neutralia" to designate the concentration of Iroquoian -speaking natives in the area. F. Douglas Reville's The History of

7560-474: The woods." According to the City of Waterloo, Ontario , the indigenous people who lived in the area in the precontact era included the Neutral Confederacy. In 2020, a site in nearby Kitchener, Ontario was found to include artifacts from an Iroquioan village that was inhabited circa 1300 to 1600. Archeologists found some 35,000 objects including stone tools and a 4,000 year old arrowhead. Another source states that

7650-511: Was a dialect of Iroquoian. They believed that all three groups had once been a part of a single group. Their neighbours, the Wendat (Wyandot, or Huron) Nation referred to the Neutrals (Chonnonton) impolitely as "Attawandaron," meaning "Those whose speech is awry" because their dialect was different. (Apparently, the Chonnonton referred to the Wendat by the same term.) Because the language of

7740-450: Was a valuable resource for sharp tools, fire-starting and, eventually, firearms, which, as a primary resource, allowed them to trade simultaneously with often-warring Huron and Iroquois tribes. Since they were not at war with the Huron or the Iroquois in 1600, Jesuits travelling in the area of what is now Hamilton, the lower Grand Valley and Niagara, called them the Neutrals. However, the confederacy had feuds with an Algonkian people called

7830-400: Was much less of an advantage. Flints were still used in trade for the flintlocks on guns. The Neutral continued to trade commodities such as maize , tobacco , and black squirrel and other high-grade furs for steel axes, glass beads, cloaks, conch shells, gourd containers, and firearms. Records left by Jesuit priests in the 1600s indicate that the Neutral language was similar to Huron and so

7920-734: Was plentiful in Neutral lands due to the presence of the Onondaga Limestone formation. This tool stone was also available to the Five Nations Iroquois in their own lands, but not to other neighbouring peoples. The Neutral territory marked the furthest northern and western extent of useable chert deposits, even though the Onondaga Limestone runs further. The Neutrals had an alliance with the Wenrohronon , also Iroquoian-language people, to defend against

8010-444: Was spoken. This subfamily of around 30 languages is divided into three groups according to geography: Plains , Central , and Eastern Algonquian . Of the three, only Eastern Algonquian constitutes a true genetic subgroup. The languages are listed following the classifications of Goddard (1996) and Mithun (1999). Extinct languages are marked with †, and endangered languages are noted as such. For dialects and subdialects, consult

8100-539: Was west of the Wenro people. – Souharissen was the warrior chief who lived in a village called Ounontisatan, which was visited by the French in 1625-1626. His trade agreement with the Neutral people provided protection for them by his warriors. The principal headman took on and defeated the Fire Nation in what is present-day Michigan . The Recollect priest Joseph de la Roche Daillon lived with him for five months in

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