Gannentaha: The 17th Century French Jesuit Mission Ste. Marie among the Iroquois Haudenosaunee at Onondaga Lake

Seventeenth-century North America was truly a new world for both the European and indigenous First Nations native cultures that interfaced upon that spectacular wilderness theater. For both the native people and the European, this stage forged new understandings from all things thought familiar to previous generations. Throughout this historical period were episodes that defined the era, episodes that captured the essence of the human spirit, and episodes that abase a work of fiction.

One such episode that proved an epoch of the era was the 1656 French Jesuit mission embassy among the Haudenosaunee-Iroquois. This was the mission Ste. Marie established in the heart of Iroquoia, at a place known and revered by the Iroquois for its spiritual and political significance--Gannentaha.

The Ste. Marie mission proved as a captivating geopolitical choke point of its era. Its story remains an intriguing historical human drama, a hallmark cultural interface event, an inspirational faith journey story, and an audacious act of perseverance and courage within a larger historical saga.

The Ste. Marie de Gannentaha episode is an enduring story to be told and remembered beyond the generation of those who lived it.