Grades 5–12 | Aurora Homeschool Academy · BleuLearn Curriculum
This volume documents: Documented civilizations of the Americas before European contact — Cahokia (population approximately 20,000 at 1050 CE, larger than contemporary London), and the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Great Law of Peace. These civilizations were not primitive. They were sophisticated, self-governing, and documented.
Background context: The Haudenosaunee Confederacy — also called the Iroquois — united five nations (Mohawk, Onondaga, Cayuga, Oneida, Seneca) under a written constitution. Historians document that Benjamin Franklin studied this model while designing American governance. The Great Law predates the U.S. Constitution by approximately 300–450 years.
The Primary Source
The Document Says
Great Law of Peace, Haudenosaunee Confederacy, approximately 1100–1450 CE
Onondaga Nation archives. Available at onondaganation.org.
"The Lords of the Confederacy of the Five Nations shall be mentors of the people for all time... All the business of the Five Nations shall be conducted by the Confederate Lords of the Mohawks, the Onondagas, the Cayugas, the Oneidas, and the Senecas."
Apply the Four Questions
The Four Questions: (1) Who wrote it? (2) When? (3) What does it say? (4) Why does it matter? Use specific words from the document in every answer.
Q1 — Who created this law? Name the five nations. What was their documented relationship before the Great Law existed? What kind of authority does this document create?
Q2 — When? Approximately what century? What documented problem was it designed to solve? How does its existence before European contact change the claim that Indigenous peoples had no self-governance?
Q3 — What does it say? What form of governance does it describe? What does "mentors of the people for all time" mean as a governing principle? How does this compare to documents you know from American government?
Q4 — Why does it matter? Historians document that Benjamin Franklin studied this model. What does that tell you about who influenced American democratic governance? Why is this not in standard textbooks?
Claim–Evidence–Warrant
Write one paragraph: Make a claim about governance and civilization in pre-contact North America. Cite the Great Law of Peace as evidence. Explain the connection (warrant).
BleuLearn Pause
What does this primary source document that a textbook's description of the same event would not?
Archive Assignment
Access the Onondaga Nation archives (onondaganation.org). Find one additional article or law from the Great Law not in the excerpt above. Write it here and apply Question 3 to it:
Cahokia documented fact: At its peak around 1050–1100 CE, Cahokia (near present-day St. Louis) had a population of approximately 20,000 — larger than London at the same time. It covered approximately 6 square miles and had a central earthen mound larger than the base of the Great Pyramid at Giza. Source: Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site (cahokiamounds.org), a UNESCO World Heritage Site.