Handsome Lake

Handsome Lake (Cayuga language: Sganyadái:yo, Seneca language: Sganyodaiyo) (Θkanyatararí•yau• in Tuscarora) (1735 – 10 August 1815) was a Seneca religious leader of the Iroquois people. He was a half-brother to Cornplanter, a Seneca war chief.

Handsome Lake, a leader and prophet, played a major role in reviving traditional religion among the Haudenosaunee (People of the Longhouse), or Six Nations Iroquois Confederacy. He preached a message that combined traditional Haudenosaunee religious beliefs with a revised code meant to revive traditional consciousness to the Haudenosaunee after a long period of cultural disintegration following colonization. This message was eventually published as the "Code of Handsome Lake" and is still practiced today.

Handsome Lake was born as Hadawa'ko ("Shaking Snow") around 1735 in the Seneca village of Canawaugus, on the Genesee River near present-day Avon, New York. Very little is known of his parents; his mother, Gahonnoneh, later had an affair with a Dutch fur trader and gunsmith, resulting in the birth of Handsome Lake's half-brother, Cornplanter. Handsome Lake was born into the Turtle clan of his mother, as the Iroquois have a matrilineal kinship system. He was eventually adopted and raised by the Wolf clan people. Born during a time when the Seneca nation was at its peak of prosperity through fur trading, Handsome Lake witnessed the gradual deterioration of his society. Other well-known relatives in Handsome Lake's family included Governor Blacksnake, Red Jacket and Half-Town.

In 1794 he signed the U.S. treaty with the Six Nations (known as the Pickering Treaty). He visited Washington, D.C. with Cornplanter in 1802.

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