The Meherrin and Nottoway were separated from the Iroquoian-speaking tribes to the north and the west, but were physically close to other Iroquoian-speaking tribes in North Carolina, especially the Tuscarora.
Five Iroquois tribes in New York, from the Mohawks on the east to the Senecas on the west, formed a powerful confederacy that deterred English expansion west of the seacoast and threatened their Native American neighbors to the south. These northern tribes would send hunters on long expeditions south into the Virginia Piedmont in the fall, where deer, turkeys, and other game were more plentiful than in the tribes' local area. The hunters on these expeditions were not committed to peace with the Virginian colonists, and often these "raids" created alarm among the English settlers on the frontier.
The Cherokee who occupied southwestern Virginia also spoke and Iroquoian language. Their first contact with Europeans may have been when Fernando de Soto explored up from Florida. In the colonial era, Virginia's primary trade with the Cherokee was based on expeditions from Petersburg sponsored by Abraham Wood (the New River was initially named "Wood's River"). Later, trade routes focused on Occoneechee, now a state park in Virginia.
