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Mohegans are a Native American people in Connecticut; the majority are associated with the Mohegan Indian Tribe, a federally recognized tribe living on a reservation in the eastern upper Thames River valley of south-central Connecticut. It is one of two federally recognized tribes in the state, the other being the Mashantucket Pequot. There are also three state-recognized tribes: Schaghticoke, Paugusett, and Eastern Pequot. At the time of European contact, the Mohegan and Pequot were a unified tribal entity living in the lower Connecticut region, but the Mohegan gradually became independent. In 1637, European colonists destroyed the fort at Mashantucket and forcibly disbanded the Pequot nation during the Pequot War. Thereafter, under the leadership of Uncas, a ''sachem,'' the Mohegan were understood to be a separate tribal nation.〔 Uncas' name is meant to be Wonkus, which translates to fox. The word ''Mohegan'' (pronounced ) translates in their respective Algonquin dialects (Mohegan-Pequot language) as "People of the Wolf".〔(The Mohegan Tribe: Heritage - Our Traditions and Symbols )〕 Over time, the Mohegan gradually lost ownership of much of their tribal lands and their tribal status. In 1978, Chief Rolling Cloud Hamilton petitioned for federal recognition of the Mohegan. Descendants of his Mohegan band operate independently of the federally recognized nation. In 1994 a majority group of Mohegans gained federal recognition as the Mohegan Tribe of Indians of Connecticut (MTIC).〔("Mohegan Event Timeline, 1933 to present" ), Mohegan Tribe of Indians of Connecticut, official website〕 They have been defined by the United States government as the "successor in interest to the aboriginal entity known as the Mohegan Indian Tribe."〔("25 USC § 1775 - Findings and purposes" ), ''Mohegan Nation (Connecticut) Land Claim Settlement Act'' (1994), Legal Information Institute, Cornell University Law School, accessed 12 January 2013〕 The same year, under an act of Congress, the United States took land into trust to serve as a reservation for the Tribe. Most of the Mohegan people in Connecticut today live on the Mohegan Reservation at near Uncasville in the Town of Montville, New London County. The MTIC operate one of two Mohegan Sun Casinos on their reservation in Uncasville. ==History== The Mohegan Indian Tribe was historically based in central southern Connecticut. While originally part of the Pequot people, it gradually became independent and served as allies of English colonists in the Pequot War of 1637, which broke the power of that formerly dominant tribe in the region. In reward, the English gave Pequot captives to the Mohegan. The continuously occupied Mohegan homelands in Connecticut include landmarks like Trading Cove on the Thames River, Cochegan Rock, Fort Shantok, and Mohegan Hill, where the Mohegan founded a Congregational Church in the early 1800s. In 1931, the Tantaquidgeon family built the Tantaquidgeon Indian Museum on Mohegan Hill to house tribal artifacts and histories. Gladys Tantaquidgeon (1899-2005) served for years as the Tribe's medicine woman and unofficial historian. She studied anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania, and worked for a decade with the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Returning to Connecticut, she operated this museum for six decades. It was one of the first museums to be owned and operated by Native Americans. In 1933 John E. Hamilton, a.k.a. Chief Rolling Cloud, was appointed as a Grand Sachem by his mother, Alice Storey, through a traditional selection process based on heredity. She was a direct descendant of Uncas, the great 17th-century leader of the Mohegan Nation, and of Tamaquashad, Sachem of the Pequot Nation. In Mohegan tradition, the position of tribal leadership was often hereditary through the maternal line. John Hamilton was a key figure among Native American leaders initiating late twentieth century land claims suits. Tribes in the Northeast had long interaction with European Americans, which had resulted in many of them becoming nearly landless. Settlement of land claims suits in the late 20th and 21st centuries was related to federal recognition for a number of Indian nations, particularly for the so-called "state tribes." These were tribes along the East Coast who had been recognized by the English Crown long before individual colonial or state governments had been established. But, as these Native people lost control of their traditional lands and were not assigned formal reservations, they started to lose the sovereign legal status associated with recognition by federal and state governments and institutions. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Mohegan people」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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