Chenango Confederacy: Difference between revisions

The Chenango peninsula has had a documented human presence dating back thousands of years, with the first urban settlements emerging around 300-200 BC. The two Chenango peoples of the Chenango Confederacy share the same origin myth, which relates a story by which the peoples now living in the Confederacy migrated far from the south fleeing a variety of natural disasters which were a sign of displeasure and judgment upon that area by [[M%27acunism#Earth_as_lifegiver|Makuahine]]. Historians and scholars posit a number of theories regarding these origin myths, with the two predominant theories being either a factual remembered migration from central [[Crona]] to Cusinaut prior to the [[Nysdran Collapse]] or a primarily mythical explanation of the story influenced by other origin stories common throughout the Nysdra. Geneticists have proven a DNA link between the peoples of the Chenango peninsula and central Crona, with shared genes with [[Varshan]]i people, though some have attributed this to medieval and later interactions between Cusinaut and central Crona. Whatever the case, the two Chenango peoples now occupying the Confederacy - and, by centuries of intermarriage, most of the Island Honeoye as well - almost certainly diverged from a common ancestral people that settled the peninsula in the first milennium BC. The divergence of the Great and Little Chenango is not generally understood, though origin myths for each peoples dispel the concept of a common ancestor and instead portray their particular culture as the lone descendant of the ancient migrants with the other being either already settled in the area or foreign interlopers who accumulated there over time. In any case, the distinct Little and Great Chenango peoples both have evidence of being separate cultures by about the 700s AD based on different material cultures and the written record of Varshani and proto-Algosh travelers to the area.

===Medieval period===

The [[Occidental]] [[Timeline_of_major_world_events#Medieval_history|medieval period]] broadly coincides with the period of political consolidation in what is today the Chenango Confederacy. Semi-nomadic and nomadic tribal peoples which circled the peninsula during antiquity while forming the antecedents of modern Great and Little Chenango people gradually began to settle into small cities, eschewing tribal leadership for settled polities modeled after the [[Quetzenkel|Quetzen]] peoples. The impetus for the change was almost certainly the limited influence of the [[Quetzenkel#Early_history|Quetzen thalassocracy]], which established the city of Mahatnoy in and around [[1143]]. The Quetzen largely introduced urban living patterns to the indigenous peoples of the peninsula, who began to emulate the Quetzen. The Quetzen also introduced the Quetzo-Varshani style of recorded history, greatly revolutionizing not only the Chenango conception of the world but also later scholarly abilities to investigate the period. Mahatnoy itself would gradually transform from a Quetzen colony into a Great Chenango city as nomads abandoned their former way of life to adopt agricultural lifestyles in and around the city. This transformation was primarily demographic at first, with the political separation of Mahatnoy from the rest of the thalassocracy coming in the late 1200s. By 1300, the Great and Little Chenango had formed about fourteen distinct city-states with a large number of semi-nomadic peoples (referred to historically as the "outsiders") existing in the space between them and providing both arms and labor for the cities on a contractual basis.