Abstract

During Late Prehistoric times, there was a large Iroquoian population in northern New York, just east of Lake Ontario and south of the St. Lawrence River. Nineteenth and early twentieth century accounts describe at least 75 village sites in this region. Sometime during the late 15th or early 16th centuries, the region was abandoned. Warfare, European diseases, and climatic change have all been suggested as factors involved in this abandonment. Current research seeks to trace population shifts during the 14th century through to the abandonment in order to document whether this depopulation was sudden or gradual and whether any trend of population nucleation or dispersion was present. Trends in site size, natural defensibility, and the elevation of settlements will also be considered.