A Native American people, the Mahican (or Mohican) traditionally lived along the Hudson River in what is now northern New York State. The name Mahican means “wolf,” but they were also known to the Dutch and English as the River Indians.
The Mahican lived in protected areas of 20 to 30 houses, which were usually built on hills and enclosed by stockades. They also lived in enclosed villages set between cornfields and woodlands. The largest village was Schodac at the site of present-day Albany, New York. Each village contained as many as 16 bark-covered dwellings, which housed about three related families.
Each Mahican village was governed by a chief, who inherited his position. He was assisted by a council of men elected by the people of the village.
The Mahican hunted in the region's forests and fished in its rivers and lakes. The women also grew corn (maize), beans, and squash and gathered wild plant foods, including the sweet syrup of the maple tree. The Mahican used birch trees to make light canoes, in which they traveled on nearby rivers.
The Mahican first came into contact with non-Indians when Dutch traders came to the region in the early 1600s. The Dutch became the allies of the Mohawk, who were enemies of the Mahican. Armed with guns they had obtained from the Dutch, the Mohawk drove the Mahican from their homeland. After scattering to several locations, many of the Mahican settled among other Native American peoples and eventually became absorbed into these tribes. The decline of the Mahican as an independent people probably inspired U.S. author James Fenimore Cooper's classic novel The Last of the Mohicans, which was published in 1826.
One group of Mahican headed to what is now western Massachusetts. In the 1730s missionaries arrived in Mahican settlements and tried to convert them to Christianity. They built a church and a school around which the village of Stockbridge grew up. The Mahican in the area became known as the Stockbridge Indians.
The Stockbridge Indians sided with the American colonists in the American Revolution (1776–83). After the war, however, the United States government allowed settlers to overrun Stockbridge territory. Left landless, the Stockbridge Indians moved first to New York State, then to Indiana, and finally to Wisconsin. There they were joined by several families of the Munsee branch of the Delaware (Lenni Lenape) tribe. The Stockbridge and Munsee Indians were granted a reservation in Wisconsin in 1856. About 2,200 Stockbridge Indians lived in Wisconsin in the late 20th century.
