Meaning

noun a member of the Iroquoian people formerly living along the Mohawk River in New York State

noun the Iroquoian language spoken by the Mohawk

noun haircut in which the head is shaved except for a band of hair down the middle of the scalp

originFrom Dutch Mohawk. An exonym, probably from Narragansett Mohowaúgsuck, Mauquàuog, meaning “they eat (animate things)”, “cannibals”. The phoneme /m/ is not present in the Mohawk language; the Mohawk autonym is Kanienʼkehá꞉kaʼ (Kanienkehaka, Kanyenkehaka).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0