Neutral Indians

The Neutral Confederacy or Neutral Nation or Neutral people were a Iroquoian-speaking North American indigenous people, who lived near the northern shores of Lake Ontario and Lake Erie on the west side of the Niagara River west of the Tabacco Nation (Wenrohronon or Wenro). Related to the Iroquois Confederation to their southeast and to the Huron peoples also living around Lake Ontario, the Erie people of the south shore of Lake Erie, the Tabacco people situated east of Lake Erie and the Susquehannocks of Central Pennsylvania, like the others of Iroquoian culture, the tribes would raid and feud with fellow Iroquoian tribes when they weren't gaming and engaging in friendly competitions, and generally possessed of wary relations with rival Algonquian peoples, such as inhabited the Canada to the East along the Saint Lawrence valley drainage catchment. While the Iroquoian tribes were later known to historians for the fierce ways they waged of war, they were also cultures who far more often played competitive games, a largely agrarian society with farms admired and marveled over by European leaders writing reports home. While not well known today in post-plagues and warfare indigenous populations, the Neutral tribes are confirmed to have comprised about 40 permanent settlements.

The largest group referred to themselves as Chonnonton ("Keepers of The Deer") - partly due to their practice of herding deer into pens. Another group, the Onguiaahra ("Near the big waters" or possibly "The Strait") populated the more southern Niagara Peninsula and are the origin of the word "Niagara". The Chonnonton territory contained large deposits of flint, which was a valuable resource for sharp tools, fire starting and, eventually firearms and was a primary reason they managed to trade simultaneously with the oft-warring Huron and Iroquois.

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