Author’s Note
To those who have glimpsed the complex social structure and spirituality of the woodland Indians it should come as no surprise to learn that Skanawati was an actual Iroquois chief of the 18th century. As reflected in these pages, he alone faced the difficult challenge of being both a war chief and a peace chief, with the added responsibility of being an Onondaga and head of the turtle clan, which underscored his duty to protect the traditions and spiritual well being of his people. Although this tale of the Skanawati chief is fiction, it was in part inspired by an account from the historian Francis Parkman, who described an early war between the Iroquois and their traditional foes the Hurons during which the Skanawati chief entered the enemy’s territory as a peace emissary r
