Whose Land This Is

It's been a low-key Thanksgiving for me. I spent part of it reading this New Yorker article by historian Philip Deloria, which reminded me of facts I've heard and written about before, plus a few new ones. For instance, I don't think I've heard before that Massasoit was a title rather than a name (the leader of the Wampanoag people's name was Ousamequin), or that he and his men arrived at the Plymouth feast because they had heard the Europeans' celebratory gunshots and thought their settler allies were under attack.

I also visited the site native-land.ca to see just whose land I'm living on now and whose I grew up on. Here's the Twin Cities:


For those not familiar, Anishinabewaki is a more authentic name for the Ojibwe (or Chippewa, sometimes so-called). Oceti Ŝakowiŋ translates as "the Seven Council Fires" and encompassed the Eastern Dakota, the Western Nakota and the Lakota, sometimes called the Sioux. (Some details on these groupings here.) Wahpekute is one of the Eastern Dakota groups or tribes. My understanding is that Minnesota had been Dakota land for thousands of years, with the Ojibwe migrating into the area about 300 years ago. There was some conflict between the tribes but also trade and cooperation at various points. The area where the Mississippi joins the Minnesota River (near the center bottom of this map) was an important place of meeting and trading. Later, the Mississippi became a treaty border with the U.S., which is why Saint Paul is an older city than Minneapolis.

And this is central New York:


My home town and where I went to school is right on the edge of overlapping Susquehannock and Onondaga territories, though close to several other Haudenosonee nations (which I learned as Iroquois back in the day). Haudenosonee means "People of the Longhouse." The house I grew up in is fully within Onondaga territory.

Whose land are you on?