Pamunkey

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Distribution of the tribes in Virginia around 1610

Pamunkey is the name of an Indian tribe in the northeastern United States who lived on the river of the same name in Virginia and still owns a reservation there , but whose language is no longer spoken. In the 17th century, the Pamunkey were part of the Powhatan Confederation and were one of the largest and leading tribes in the alliance.

Name and area of ​​residence

The name Pamunkey is the English form of an Algonquin word and could mean mysterious place or place of a secret . The Virginia Algonquians spoke different dialects of the same language, most of which are now extinct. The tribe was native to the lower reaches of the Pamunkey River in the coastal region of Chesapeake Bay at the beginning of the 17th century. The present 3.6 km² reservation is within this traditional tribal area in King William County , Virginia.

Way of life

The Pamunkey's life revolved primarily around food gathering, which consisted of hunting, fishing, and collecting wild herbs. Around a quarter of the demand was also covered by growing corn, beans, melons and pumpkins. Since they did not use fertilizer, they had to move the fields and villages at least every 10 years so that the soil could recover. The river was the main route of transport and the main source of food. Here the men fished with river weirs from reed, fishhooks, nets and arrows, which were connected to the bow with a ribbon. They caught perch, herrings, whitefish, vendace, allis shad and sturgeon. Water birds such as wild geese, ducks and turkeys have also been shot or captured. In the fall there were large numbers of grouse called sora (Porzana carolina) and the Pamunkey had developed a special fishing method. They built a so-called sora horse , a container made of clay or wicker that was attached to a post or in a boat. A light was lit in this container at night, which magically attracted the birds. When circling the light, the Indians could easily kill them with long sticks. The Pamunkey built arched longhouses from a framework of curved tree saplings covered with mats. The houses had two doors made of movable mats, a hole in the ceiling to ventilate smoke and an open fire in the middle. Mat-covered raised platforms along the walls served as sleeping quarters. Chiefs and members of the upper class preferred bark-covered houses.

Political organization and jurisdiction

There is a report on this from 1894: While the executive is exercised by the Weroance or tribal chief, a tribal council takes on legislative and legal functions. In the past the chief was elected for life, but today male citizens elect a chief and four council members every four years. The voting method is remarkable. The tribal council proposes two candidates. The voters of the first candidate throw a kernel of corn into the ballot box, while the second candidate is elected by throwing a bean. Whoever receives the most corn kernels or beans is considered elected.

Weroance and the tribal council act as judges and jury , sit on lawbreakers in court or try to settle disputes between citizens. The tribal court has jurisdiction over all cases on the reservation, except murder. Any homicide cases will be tried in the King Williams County County Court. All residents of the reserve are subject to tribal laws.

history

The first contact with Europeans was around 1570, mostly with the English, who appeared on the coast at ever shorter intervals in the following years. In 1607 the English founded by Captain John Smith , the Jamestown colony , which lay amid the dominion of the Powhatan Confederacy and had around 14,000 members at that time. Peaceful trade and ties were undermined by the increasingly imperious and demanding tone of the English colonists. During his explorations of the Chesapeake Bay area, Captain John Smith confiscated various corn stores when he was unable to acquire the corn through trade. The Indians realized that the English demands increased in scope and arbitrariness and their respect for Indian sovereignty decreased.

The Powhatan Confederation's benevolent policy then changed. In 1608 the Powhatan Wars began . On March 22, 1622, the Indians, led by the Pamunkey chief Opechancanough , raided the English settlements and killed 350 colonists in a coordinated attack. Jamestown Colony survived this onslaught and retaliated. In sum, the attack provided real justification for waging an ongoing war against the “treacherous savages”.

The colonists continued harassment of their Indian neighbors for over 10 years, destroying the crops and food supplies of the Pamunkey and their neighbors. A relationship of trust never returned even as overt hostilities subsided. A 1632 law threatened severe punishment for a settler who voluntarily spoke to an Indian and did not immediately take him to the English commander.

Another war broke out when Opechacanough led an attack against the colonists on April 18, 1644. Nearly 500 colonists were killed in this attack. After two years the war ended with the capture of Opechacanough by Governor Sir William Berkely . In the treaty of October 1646, conditions were stipulated that significantly reduced the size of the Indians' residential area and restricted their freedom of movement. The captured Opechanacough died when one of the English guards shot him from behind.

After the defeat of the Powhatan Confederation, English expansion continued. In 1652 the royal rule over the colony loosened, the white population grew faster and the colonists illegally seized land at the estuaries, which broke the contract of 1646. The result was renewed conflicts with the indigenous people. The Indian gardens along the Virginia Rivers were among the most sought-after lands for the colonists looking for new land to grow tobacco. The Pamunkey as neighboring Indians were increasingly the cause of English surveillance and were referred to as tributary Indians , in contrast to foreign Indians such as the Susquehannock , the Monacan and others across the settlement line, with whom the English increasingly came into contact through trade and exploration.

During this time, arrangements were made to set up reservations for the Indians and to regulate trade and the exchange of goods with them. After the Bacon's Rebellion in 1676, in which the Pamunkey sided with Governor Berkeley, a peace treaty was signed with the participating Indian tribes in 1677 in the name of King Charles II . Some of them, such as the Queen of the Pamunkey Cockacoeske , rewarded Charles as a token of affection for their steadfastness in the face of Bacon's unjustified attacks . At the same time, the reservation on the lower reaches of the Pamunkey River, which was allocated in 1658, was confirmed.

Todays situation

The approximately 3.6 km² (900 acres ) Pamunkey Indian Reservation is located on the Pamunkey River, about 30 km northwest of the city of West Point in Virginia. Approximately 2.2 km² (550 acres) of this is forested swamp or otherwise unsuitable for agriculture. While the arable land is divided among the residents, the rest is divided into six areas or hunting areas and leased annually to the highest, mostly white, provider. There are currently 28 Pamunkey families living on the reservation and other tribesmen can be found in neighboring Richmond , as well as throughout the state of Virginia and the United States. In 1979 the Pamunkey Indian Museum was built on the grounds of the reservation in the style of a traditional long house, in which the original way of life and the history of the Pamunkey is presented. The museum also contains an exhibition on the tribe's pottery craft.

The tribe is led by a chief and a six-member tribal council (council), which is elected every four years by the tribal members in the traditional manner described above. However, the method has since been modified somewhat. Today you take corn kernels and peas in the vote, whereby a corn kernel means yes , while a pea is counted as no . The 2000 US census found 347 tribesmen. The Pamunkey chief is currently Kevin Brown.

See also

List of North American Indian tribes

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Pamunkey, Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved January 20, 2009 .
  2. ↑ a b c d e f Bruce G. Trigger (Ed.): Handbook of North American Indians. Volume 15: Northeast. Chapter: Seventeenth-Century Indian Wars. P. 95f.
  3. ^ Census 2000, American Indian Tribes. (PDF; 145 kB) Retrieved January 22, 2009 .
  4. ↑ Pamunkey, History. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on January 30, 2009 ; Retrieved January 22, 2009 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / indians.vipnet.org