In 1613, Pocahontas was captured during the First Anglo-Powhatan War. The peace was tenuous at best, and relations slowly devolved, leading to war.Īnother misconception is that Pocahontas was willingly traded to the English.Īnother misconception is that Pocahontas was willingly traded to the English. Don’t worry – these exchanges were common, and served as a way of learning customs and forging relationships between the groups. It was an interesting period for the two groups, and the colonial leaders even agreed to an exchange – they presented Powhatan with a young 13-year old boy, Thomas Savage, and Powhatan sent a young man named Namontack in return. There wasn’t any romantic relationship between Pocahontas and Smith, either. Historians have uncovered that if a Native American chief honored a man – the way Smith was honored by Powhatan – there wouldn’t be a threat to his life. Smith also wrote that Pocahontas warned him of a plot against his life. As an emissary, she brought food to the settlers and negotiated the release of Powhatan prisoners in 1608. Pocahontas saved Smith’s group time and time again. Pocahontas began visiting Jamestown along with Powhatan’s envoys, in an attempt to bridge some peace between the two starkly different cultures. Some historians even believe that Smith was never in any danger at all, and this was just a ceremony he went through. The reason Smith’s account is debated is that he wrote different versions of this first meeting. Pocahontas saved him by placing her head on his, preventing the attack. It’s seen in Smith’s account, too.Īpparently, when Smith first met Powhatan, his head was placed on two stones and a warrior was prepared to kill him. Before I dismiss her relationship with John Smith as a silly historical romanticization, I should mention that the misconception that Pocahontas saved his life isn’t recent at all. Pocahontas was just a nickname, meaning “playful”, thanks to her curious and inquisitive nature.īorn in approximately 1596, Amonute was Powhatan’s daughter, and he ruled more than 30 Algonquian-speaking tribes, in the area that would later become Jamestown, Virginia. Her real name is Amonute, and her more private name was Matoaka. There isn’t much evidence of Pocahontas rescuing the soldier at all.įirst off, Pocahontas is just a nickname.įirst off, Pocahontas is just a nickname.
However, the idea that Pocahontas turned her back on her own people to single-handedly help ‘bridge’ two cultures is not historically true. Maybe because stories of star-crossed lovers are bound to fascinate humanity. This idea, that Pocahontas turned allies with the English, is one that captured the public’s imagination for centuries. Tales have been spun about her rescuing John Smith, an English adventurer, from certain execution. Her true history is very different, and much darker. We know Pocahontas to be a young woman who fell in love with a European settler and eventually dove off the cliffs of Virginia. Pocahontas seems to be immortalized thanks to the Disney rendition and to countless history books.