In 1995, Tuscarora artist Raymond Skye had a dream. Far from the figurative sense in which westerners "have a dream," Skye's was an oldfashioned, Spirit-speaking vision. The ancestors took him on a journey through the past and into the future. As he stood with the Old Ones on a hill overlooking the ages, their silence made him realize that it was to be his privilege to present the sacred traditions, culture and history of his people to the wider world. Acting on the Spirit message, he pulled together a team of Iroquoian Keepers (oral traditionalists), scholars and Elders, as well as musicians, writers and photographers, each adding his or her own special knowledge to a one-disk repository of the wisdom of the Haudenosaunee (League Iroquois).

The uniqueness of The Great Peace is, therefore, that the people, themselves, speak their own understanding of their own traditions in their own voices, as opposed to being represented by cadres of western scholars whose appraisals of the Haudenosaunee culture have, to date, stood as the only sources publicly available. The most noted living Elders and Keepers shared their knowledge for this CD-ROM, including Cayuga Chief Jake Thomas, the greatest Iroquoian Keeper of the twentieth century, who died shortly after having made his contributions to The Great Peace.

All told, there are some 3,000 screens of wisdom as the Elders present it, in terms of values, traditions, and education. The various sections of tradition, especially the Creation Tradition and the traditions of the Great Law of Peace, allow users to select the level of sophistication s/he desires at the entry point. The Great Peace thus serves students of varying levels of knowledge and understanding, from grade schoolers through college students and scholars. Neither is the element of orality, so central to Iroquoian culture, ignored. The most honored Haudenosaunee leaders speak to viewers one-on-one through the medium of the screen, personal address being the only proper way to transmit tradition.

Not secondary to the intellectual content is the artwork that accompanies it. The menu screen provides visual access through a triptych, with details in each painting acting as hot links that lead viewers ever more deeply into the subsections. Skye's expert renderings add immeasurably to the mood projected by each section. His visions of war were haunting, while the aching depiction of Sky Woman standing on the Back of Turtle, as Turtle Island (North America) was being formed, was breath-taking. That painting, coupled with the Mother's voice behind, reciting Creation, invaded my spirit, lingering long after the screen had dissolved.

I recommend The Great Peace: A Gathering of Good Minds to libraries across Turtle Island, and beyond.

Barbara A. Mann, Ph.D.
Department of English Literature and Language
University of Toledo