From the Mohican lands were Troy grew, the Hudson River and Atlantic seaboard, the Hoosac River, Lake Champlain, the St. Lawrence River, the Mohawk River, the Great Lakes, and were all within reach – even in prehistoric times.
In 17th and 18th centuries, Manhattan, New England, New France, and the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) nations became increasingly accessible as New York’s road network spread.
European settlement of the area began across the Hudson ten miles south after the construction of Fort Orange by the Dutch in 1624. Beginning in 1630 land extending more than twenty miles around the fort on both sides of the river was negotiated from Indigenous people for merchant Kiliaen van Rensselaer’s feudal manor, Rensselaerswijck…