Monacan Indian Nation Seal.
The Monacan tribe is one of several Native American tribes recognized by the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. The Monacan Tribe has not been recognized as an Indian tribe by the federal government. They are located primarily in Amherst County, Virginia near Lynchburg, Virginia. As of 2009, there were approximately 2,000 members of the tribe. There are satellite groups in West Virginia, Maryland, Tennessee and Ohio.
The contemporary Monacan people claim ancestry to the historic Monacan tribe, first recorded in 1607 in Virginia, which was related to the Siouan Tutelo, Saponi and Occaneechi tribes.
When the English first explored the James River in May 1607, they learned that the James River Monacan (along with their northern Mannahoac allies on the Rappahannock River) controlled the area between the Fall line in Richmond and the Blue Ridge Mountains, who were hostile to the Powhatan confederacy. They called their territory Amai Amañuhkañ (“The Country of the People of the Land”). The weroance Parahunt, son of paramount chief Powhatan, persuaded Captain Christopher Newport not to continue beyond the falls into Monacan country. The determined Newport made an expedition into their country in November 1608. On a 40-mile (64 km) march, the English found two Monacan towns, called Massinacak and Mowhemenchough'. Unlike the Powhatan, who had given the English lavish welcomes, the Monacan largely ignored them and went about their business. The English captured their chief and forced him to conduct them around his kingdom. On November 26, 1608, Peter Wynne, a member of Newport's exploration party to the Monacan villages, wrote a letter to John Egerton, informing him that some members of Newport's party believed the pronunciation of the Monacans' language resembled "Welch", which Wynne spoke, and asked Wynne to act as interpreter.
Mowhemencho, their easternmost outpost, was between Bernard's Creek and Jones Creek in the eastern tip of Powhatan County, while Massinacak (Mahock) was at the mouth of Mohawk Creek, a mile south of Goochland. Their capital was Rassawek, at the point within the two branches, Point of Fork, of the upper James and Rivanna Rivers. Tributary to them were the Monahassanugh (later Nahyssan, i.e. Tutelo), whose town was near Wingina, and Monasukapanough (later Saponi), living near Charlottesville. All these groups were closely related with the Siouan Manahoac to the north.
In 1656 several hundred Nahyssan, Mahock, and 'Rechahecrians' (possibly Erie) threatened both the Powhatan tribes and the English by camping near the falls. A combined force of English and Powhatan was sent to dislodge them in a bloody battle in which the Pamunkey chief Totopotomoi was slain.
The Monacan towns of Mowhemencho and Mahock were still in the area in 1670, when they were visited by John Lederer and Major Harris, who found that the men possessed muskets. Lederer recorded their tradition that they had settled in the area on account of an oracle 400 years earlier, having been driven from the northwest by an enemy nation. They told him they had found it occupied by the Doeg, whom they eventually displaced, in the meantime teaching them the art of growing corn. Another Monacan tradition he records as follows: "From four women, viz. Pash, Sepoy, Askarin, and Maraskarin, they derive the race of mankinde; which they therefore divide into four tribes, distinguished under those several names."
At the time of Lederer's visit, the tribe had about 30 bowmen, out of a total population of perhaps 100. Lederer also noted the towns of Sapon and Pintahae on the Staunton River; Swanton considers this last to be a Nahyssan village, which Batts and Fallam recorded as Hanahaskie in 1671. The Nahyssan settled on an island at the junction of the Stanton and Dan Rivers, above the Occaneechis, around 1675.
In 1677, the Monacan chief Surenough was one of several native signatories to the Treaty of Middle Plantation following Bacon's Rebellion. The English and Pamunkey encountered them, and the Manahoac, on the Upper Mattaponi and North Anna rivers in 1684.
By 1699, they had abandoned their homeland. The former site of Mowhemencho was occupied by French Huguenot pioneers. First promised land at Jamestown, they were forced above the falls on the James River when they came in 1700. They renamed the village "Manakin-Town".
Although a few Monacan lingered in the area as late as 1702, the core remnant seems to have merged with the Nahyssan and other closely related Virginia Siouan tribes, by then known generally as Tutelo-Saponi. Under this collective name, the travels of the bulk of the tribe may be traced to North Carolina (1702), back to Virginia (Fort Christanna, 1714). They headed north to join the Iroquois for protection, and were noted in Pennsylvania (Shamokin, by 1740); and in New York (Coreorgonel) by 1753, where they joined the Cayuga. They participated with them in the American Revolutionary War as allies of the British against the colonists. After the war, the Monacan went with the Iroquois to Canada. They were settled at the (Six Nation Reserve of the Grand River First Nation) in present-day Ontario. Their settlement Tutelo Heights was noted in 1779. By the early 20th century, their descendants in Ontario had been largely absorbed by the Cayuga tribe through intermarriage.
In the early 1980s, Peter Houck, a local physician, published Indian Island in Amherst County, in which he speculated that the free people of color in the region during the antebellum era were descendants of the Monacan tribe. While this population had been claiming an Indian identity since the turn of the 20th century, Houck was the first to link some of them to the Monacan Tribal identity. Prior to Houck's book, most people claiming Native American ancestry in that vicinity had identified as Cherokee. Many of the local families continue to claim Cherokee instead of Monacan ancestry.
In 1988, the Monacan Tribe incorporated as a nonprofit organization, and in 1989, the tribe was officially recognized by the State of Virginia. Other tribes recognized by the state include the Chickahominy, Eastern Chickahominy, Mattaponi, Nansemond, Pamunkey, Rappahannock, Upper Mattaponi, Patawomeck, Nottoway, and Cheroenhaka (Nottoway) tribes. The Monacan Tribe has not been recognized as an Indian tribe by the federal government, although they have sought such recognition.*
EB
Kin 52: Yellow Cosmic Human
I endure in order to influence
Transcending wisdom
I seal the process of free will
With the cosmic tone of presence
I am guided by the power of intelligence.
The cosmos appears differently according to the level of perception, intelligence, and evolution that a particular organism may have reached.*
*Star Traveler's 13 Moon Almanac of Synchronicity, Galactic Research Institute, Law of Time Press, Ashland, Oregon, 2016-2017.
The Sacred Tzolk'in
Anja Chakra (Gamma Plasma)
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