Attended a fascinating
talk and discussion today by Dr. Joe Stahlman, a scholar and researcher of Tuscarora descent currently working as Director of the Seneca-Iroquois National Museum-Onöhsagwë:De' Culture Center. Drawn together by the circulation of two recently commissioned wampum belts, each recording an old treaty, he shared practices of reconciliation and peace making, mused about the erasure of indigenous contributions to American political and intellectual life, contributions still valuable and perhaps more needed than ever. The talk seems to have been one he would have gladly given to the organizers of the upcoming semiquincentennial of the United States, if they had asked him during the planning stages, rather than as a late-invited guest to an already scripted celebration - an invitation he declined. I hadn't realized how close this anniversary is - 2026! - but will accept Stahlman's invitation to think about it in terms of the 1613 Two Row Wampum, explained beautifully
here:
The Haudenosaunee explained to the Dutch that they did not use paper to record their history. They would make belts made of white and purple wampum shells. The Haudenosaunee made a belt to record this agreement. The belt has two purple rows running alongside each other representing two boats. One boat is the canoe with the Haudenosaunee way of life, laws, and people. The other is the Dutch ship with their laws, religion, and people in it. The boats will travel side by side down the river of life. Each nation will respect the ways of each other and will not interfere with the other. “Together we will travel in Friendship and in Peace Forever; as long as the grass is green, as long as the water runs downhill, as long as the sun rises in the East and sets in the West, and as long as our Mother Earth will last.”
