A D V E N T U R E
Indian Villages
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Many Native American Indians of the Northeast were divided into groups referred to as bands, villages or tribes.  When the Europeans first made contact with the Lenape Indians, they observed them living in communities made up of one or more bark and grass-covered longhouses or wigwams.
 
The Lenape Indians lived in varied lands including beaches, marshes, deep forests, river valleys and rocky highlands which provided them with the natural resources to sustain them.  As each season changed, many groups came together at waterfalls or rivers and formed large camps to trap, net or spear fish migratory fish like salmon, shad and herring.  The farmland indians often joined to form small camps to gather wild strawberries or hunt deer or bear. 
 
In the Spring, they moved to small communities where the soil was rich and planted crops like corn, beans and squash.  Some people stayed at the shore gathering fish and shellfish or making beads from shells. 
 
When winter came, the people returned to their longhouses or wigwams and congregated around council fires or sat around cooking fires, eating, telling stories and dancing long into the night.  The men hunted deer and bears or trapped muskrat, otter and other furry animals they could use for food and clothing.  They worked, played and prayed together until they moved again in Spring. 
LENAPE TALES AROUND THE FIRE
 
 
During the winter, the Lenape Indians shared many tales around the fires warming their longhouses and wigwams,  They told stories of homour, love, ghosts, magic and spirits.  Many of the tales were so well-loved that they were told over and over again and passed on through the generations.
 
The tale of The Three Lost Boys and Mesingw was a story often shared comparing the three lost boys to the people of Lenapehoking who went through a troubled time of death and despair.  During this time, the tribe becomes lost like the boys who strayed far from home.  The boys were terrorized by horrible winds and this mirrored the fears of the Lenapes who felt threatened to be forever scattered like the leaves falling in the Fall season. 

L O N G H O U S E S
30 - 200 Feet Long
15 - 25 feet high
 
 
 
 
Could hold as many as 100 people
 
 
 
 
 
 
Some were longer than a football field
 
 
 
Villages of longhouses were built next to flat hilltops, located close to fresh water and firewood
 
 
 
 
 
Iroquois villages had 12-200 longhouses
 
 
 
 
 
1000 people might live in 1 village
 
 
 
 
 
Each village was surrounded by a tall wooden wall called a stockade
 
 
 
 
 
Stockades protected  villages from enemy raids
 
 
 
 
Villages were replaced by new ones every 10 to 20 years due to dirt, soot from fires, mice and insects
 
 
 
 
 
New villages were built close to old ones.
 
 
 
 
 
Old villages were left to fall into ruin
 
 
Ceremonial longhouses were built to hold council meetings, plays, songs and dances
  • Built facing in different directions so that it was hard for flames to jump from house to house when there was a fire.
  • Families of longhouse were related through the women and were all part of same family group or clan.
  • It took careful planning to build a longhouse:
    • Building a longhouse took many days
    • Men and boys cut young trees down easily to make the frame for the house
    • Large trees took many hours to cut down after repeatedly burning the trunk and chopping it with stone-headed axes
    • Bark was peeled in large sheets up to 8 feet long which were wetted to prevent cracking.
    • The bark was stacked one on top of the other and large rocks placed ontop helped them dry flat.
    • After the land was cleared of brush and trees, poles were dug into holes around the designated area and were tied with horizontal poles around the frame using strips of bark.
    • Boys climbed to the tops of vertical poles to tie more poles across the top and create a dome shaped arch.
    • Women and children helped attach bark walls by punching holes through each slab with awls made of bone.  Bark cords slipped through the holes and tied the slabs together in long sheets.
    • Men tied the sheets to the outside of the frame, making sure they overlapped to prevent leaks during rainstorms.  Bark shingles were placed on the roof.
    • Sometimes outside walls were pained with red and black pictures of animals, birds and people.   Clan members might have hung carved wooden totems (a symbol of a clan's animal spirit) over doorways.
Inside the Longhouse:
 
  • Two doorways at each end were covered with deer hides, or bark slabs on wooden hinges.
  • Each door opened into a small room where extra food and supplies for winter.  In the summer, the walls were removed to make front and back porches.
  • A large aisle ran down the center from one end to the other.  Ffire pits were located here with a smoke hole in the roof above.
  • No windows
  • Dirt floor
  • 2--3 wooden platforms were hung like shelves on the inside walls which were used for sitting, sleeping and storage
  • Wooden poles and hooks above the platforms hung clothing, tools and weapons.
  • Each family in the clan had its own room  or compartment along one wall of the longhouse and shared a cooking fire in the center of the aisle.

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