Oratam

Oratam (or Oritani)
Hackensack leader
Personal details
Resting place	Sicomac, Wyckoff, NJ

Oratam (or Oritani) was sagamore, or sachem, of the Hackensack Indians living in northeastern New Jersey during the period of early European colonization in the 17th century. Documentation shows that he lived an unusually long life (almost 90 years) and was quite influential among indigenous and immigrant populations.

The Hackensacks were a sub-group of the Unami, or Turtle Clan, of the Lenni-Lenape, numbering close to a thousand. They occupied the territory called Ack-kinkas-hacky (various spellings include Achkinhenhcky, Achinigeu-hach, Ackingsah-sack). Essentially a sedentary, agricultural society, the Hackensacks set up seasonal campsites and practiced companion planting, hunting, trapping, fishing, and shell-fishing. They maintained a village near the Tantaqua (Overpeck Creek), while their council fire was located at Gamoenpa (Communipaw). Their territory roughly corresponds to the Upper New York Bay, Newark Bay, Bergen Neck, the Meadowlands, and the Palisades, in Hudson and Bergen Counties.

During Oratam's chieftaincy, the region was settled by New Netherland Dutch, an amalgam of northern Europeans. The New Netherland Dutch arrived in 1633, establishing Pavonia, with homesteads and ports at Paulus Hook, Communipaw, Harsimus, and Hoboken. Other settlements were Achter Col and Vriessendael. In 1661, the region was given a municipal charter and named Bergen.

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