Tadodaho
Tadodaho was a Native American Hoyenah (sachem) of the Onondaga nation before the Deganawidah and Hiawatha formed the Iroquois League, or "Haudenosaunee".
[1] Depending on the speaker's dialect and the writer's orthography, other versions of the name include Adodarhoh, Atartaho, Atotarho, Tatotarho, Thatotarho, and Watatohtahro.
[2][3][4] In the 1883 work The Iroquois Book of Rites, edited by Horatio Hale, the term Atartaho is said to signify "entangled".
[10] Hiawatha and Deganawidah walked with the chiefs of the Cayuga, Mohawk, Oneida, and Onondaga peoples to Canandaigua Lake while singing a song called the "Peace Hymn".
[12] Tadodaho joined the League of the Great Peace and was given the title of "firekeeper" of the confederacy; he was chairman of the council of nations.
[18][19] The Tadodaho in New York State is the spiritual leader of the Haudenosaunee, Six Nations that includes the Cayuga, Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Seneca, and Tuscarora people.
[20] Many of the Iroquois live in Canada, where their ancestors moved after the American Revolutionary War, as they were allies of the defeated British.
[citation needed] Along with other Native American leaders, the Tadodaho is responsible for maintaining the history of the Haudenosaunee people.
[22] According to tradition, when the previous Tadodaho dies, a council of chiefs from the Haudenosaunee chooses a leader from the Onondaga people.
[22] As Tadodaho in 1968, George A. Thomas demanded the return to the Iroquois of 25 wampum belts that were held by the New York State Museum.
"[23]An anthropologist described the conflict as "the great wampum war", and the issue affected the relationship between the Iroquois people, the New York State Museum, and academia.
[24] He was highly respected for his spiritual leadership and, when he died in 1996,[25] his death was mourned by Native Americans across the United States.
[20] He had served as Tadodaho for over 25 years during a period of major changes among the Iroquois and other Native American nations, who have been reasserting sovereignty.
[citation needed] In 2005, Hill led a group of Onondaga to file papers in United States federal court claiming land ownership over 4,000 square miles (10,000 km2) in Upstate New York.
In May 2013, Tadodaho Hill sent a letter to several Iroquois communities in an effort to guide their relation to the Confederacy and its traditional principles.
