MOHAWK  , a tribe of

North American Indians, the chief people of the Iroquois confederacy . The name probably means " man-eaters "; they call themselves Kaniengehaga, " flint people." Their villages were in the valley of the Mohawk river, New York . Their territory extended northward to the St Lawrence and southward to the Delaware river and Catskill Mountains . They were thus early in touch with Dutch and English, and were the first Indians to obtain firearms . In the War of Independence they fought with the English, and finally took refuge in Canada, where most of them have remained . See INDIANS, NORTH AMERICAN . For Mohawk cosmology see 21st Annual Report Bureau Amer . Ethnol . (1899-1900) .