Pontiac was born around 1720 in what is now northern Ohio. At the 
age of thirty-five, he became chief of the Ottawas, and an influential 
Indian leader in the Woodlands region. Under Pontiac's leadership, 
the Algonquian-speaking tribes of the Northwest-the Ottawa, 
Chippewa, Potawatomi, and Miami-formed a league similar to the 
Iroquois Confederacy. He is shown addressing the council in this 
nineteenth-century painting. Pontiac had been friendly with the 
French, but allowed British troops to enter his territory after their 
victory in the French and Indian War. Conflicts flared up with British 
settlers, however,  and Pontiac organized the series of attacks known 
as Pontiac's Rebellion or Pontiac's Conspiracy. He made peace with 
the British in1766. Three years later he died, probably murdered by 
an Indian in the pay of the British.