[Before Europeans]
Our ancestors arrived here several thousand years ago.
The Wabanaki peoples occupy a vast territory of lakes, rivers and mountains.
To the south, this territory is bordered by a large body of water that white men call the Atlantic.
To the north is the Great River and, beyond that, our Algonkian allies and cousins.
To the east is the land we share with our Mi’kmaq and Malecite brothers,
while on the other side of the Rivière aux Iroquois, where the sun sets, is the Iroquois Nation.
The lifeways and ways of thinking of the Iroquois are very different from ours.
We move about our territory with the changing of the seasons, going from mountains to plateaux, to valleys and to the sea, in order to hunt and fish.
We plant corn at the beginning of the summer and harvest it in fall.