Two clubs, two perspectives: Haudenosaunee material culture at Audley End

Summer was the season for war among the Haudenosaunee (or Iroquois) people during the eighteenth century. Young warriors sought recognition and status by joining and eventually leading war parties into battle. They carried a small bedroll of personal belongings, a musket, powder horn, small bag of ammunition, a knife in a sheath that hung from the neck, and a tomahawk or ball-headed war club. The war club was the symbol of the warrior’s identity. Carved with specific motifs and designs, it could be ‘read’ by other Native peoples and, as a result, it became a warrior’s calling card, recording his