The Iroquois Confederacy - known as Haudenosaunee in their own language - was a North American group of nations with common language and culture. They were based in what is now upstate New York and consisted originally of five nations: Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida and Mohawk. The confederacy had a written constitution and a currency system making them the most advanced state in North America upon the arrival of the Europeans.
