who settled the area that eventually became known as new york
History of New York (state)
The first peoples of New York are estimated to have arrived around 10,000 BC . Around 800 AD , Iroquois ancestors moved into the area from the Appalachian region . The people of the Point Peninsula Complex were the predecessors of the Algonquian peoples of New York . By around 1100 , the distinct Iroquoian - speaking and Algonquian - speaking cultures that would eventually be encountered by Europeans had developed . The five nations of the Iroquois League developed a powerful confederacy about the 15th century that controlled territory throughout present - day New York , into Pennsylvania around the Great Lakes . For centuries , the Mohawk cultivated maize fields in the lowlands of the Mohawk River , which were later taken over by Dutch settlers at Schenectady , New York when they bought this territory . The Iroquois nations to the west also had well - cultivated areas and orchards .
The first peoples of New York are estimated to have arrived around 10,000 BC . Around 800 AD , Iroquois ancestors moved into the area from the Appalachian region . The people of the Point Peninsula Complex were the predecessors of the Algonquian peoples of New York . By around 1100 , the distinct Iroquoian - speaking and Algonquian - speaking cultures that would eventually be encountered by Europeans had developed . The five nations of the Iroquois League developed a powerful confederacy about the 15th century that controlled territory throughout present - day New York , into Pennsylvania around the Great Lakes . For centuries , the Mohawk cultivated maize fields in the lowlands of the Mohawk River , which were later taken over by Dutch settlers at Schenectady , New York when they bought this territory . The Iroquois nations to the west also had well - cultivated areas and orchards .