Oneida People - The People of The Standing Stone

The People of The Standing Stone

The name Oneida is the English mispronunciation of Onyota'a:ka. Onyota'a:ka means "People of the Standing Stone". The identity of the People of the Standing Stone is based on a legend in which the Oneida people were being pursued on foot by an enemy tribe. The Oneida people were chased into a clearing within the woodlands and suddenly disappeared. The enemy of the Oneida could not find them and so it was said that these people had turned themselves into stones that stood in the clearing. As a result, they became known as the People of the Standing Stone.

In older legends, the Oneida people identify as the "Big Tree People". Not much is written about this and Iroquoian elders would have to be consulted on the oral history of this identification. This may correspond to other Iroquoian notions of the Great Tree of Peace and the associated belief system of the people. Historians and anthropologists believe that the Iroquois Confederacy was formed about the early fifteenth century, among the five major Iroquoian-speaking peoples in New York.

Individuals born into the Oneida Nation are identified according to their spirit name, or what most outsiders now call an Indian name, their family unit, and their clan. The people have a matrilineal kinship system, in which children are born into the mother's clan and have their social status and identity within it. Their mother's elder brothers have important roles in raising them, as they belong to the same clan; their biological father, of a different clan, does not have the same status. Each gender and family unit within a clan has particular duties and responsibilities. Clan identities are derived from the Creation Story of the Onyota'a:ka peoples. The Oneida people identify with three clans: the Wolf, Turtle or Bear.

Although colonizing forces tried to assimilate the Native Americans of North America into their culture, the majority of the Oneida Nation who descend from the Oneida Settlement can still identify their clan. Historically, the Oneida took captives during warfare and absorbed them into their nation by adoption. As European colonists entered the area, the Oneida sometimes adopted Europeans as well and assimilated them. The act of adopting is primarily a responsibility of the Wolf clan, so many adoptees are identified as Wolf.