Native Encampment

Staten Island is within Lenapehoking, the ancestral lands of the Lenape people. For generations, bands of Lenape people lived here in seasonal settlements. The Native Encampment opened in 2022. It is a recreation of a 17th century Northeast Woodland Native Encampment. With the addition of this Native Encampment to this site, visitors can explore the histories of the Raritan, Hackensack, and Tappan tribes of the Lenni-Lenape who lived on Staten Island for generations before European colonization and continue to call it home.

Native people lived in structures made from natural materials, including longhouses and wigwams. Palisade walls were also constructed to create outposts for safe trading, and to guard against enemies. Large tree trunks were buried in the ground, standing upright in a tight formation to create a perimeter.

In the 1600s, the Dutch colony of New Netherland sought to expand into Staten Island, which resulted in a series of bloody wars between the Dutch and the Lenape. This palisaded encampment depicts the settlement of a Lenape band that is on a defensive footing, protecting themselves.

The encampment features the work of several artists from the Native American community, including David Bunn Martine (Shinnecock/Montauk,Chiricahua Fort Sill Apache), and Annawon Weeden (Mashpee Wampanoag/Pequot/Narragansett).

The encampment includes a wigwam dwelling and several outlying structures and is activated during Open Village season, as well as special programs throughout the year.