 |
This article may be inaccurate in or unbalanced towards certain viewpoints. Please improve the article by adding information on neglected viewpoints, or discuss the issue on the talk page. |
Powhatan's Chimney is located at present day Wicomico, in Gloucester County, Virginia, USA.
Powhatan's Chimney was long considered clue to the site of Werowocomoco, a capital village of Chief Powhatan in what is now Virginia. According to English colonist Captain John Smith, Werowocomoco was located on the north side of the York River about 25 miles from where the river divided at West Point, Virginia at the time the Jamestown Settlement was established in 1607. Soon after in 1609, Chief Powhatan relocated his capital to a more inland location for better security. The exact location of Werowocomoco was lost through changes in settlement patterns. The Powhatan Confederacy and its people were largely displaced by English settlers by the middle of the 17th century.
Legend tells that Powhatan's Chimney was from a house that Smith built at Werowocomoco for Chief Powhatan. The chimney's collapse in 1888 led to the growth of a preservation movement, and the founding of the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities (APVA). This organization reconstructed the chimney in the 1930s. [1]
In 1977, an archaeologist found ground-surface artifacts at a site further west on the York River on Purtan Bay. He determined they indicated a late Woodland/early European contact-era settlement. In 2002 current landowners permitted an archaeological survey of their property. It revealed extensive artifacts on what may have been a 50-acre settlement, with habitation from 1200 CE to the 1600s. Archaeologists and anthropologists believe this is the site of Werowocomoco.[2] Since 2003, a team of archaeologists and other researchers have been working there. They and the landowners initiated consultation with the Virginia Council on Indians to plan and execute excavations on the site. Representatives of local Native American tribes, who are among the descendants of the Powhatan Confederacy, continue to advise and are part of the team.[3] Excavation at the site since 2003 have revealed evidence of a large village, including two 200 foot-long, curved, earthwork ditches built 1000 feet from the river bank about 1400 CE, two hundred years before English settlement.[4] In 2006 the Werowocomoco Archeological Site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). Excavations will continue. Scholars hope to find more evidence about the political nature of the chiefdom.
Both the newly identified site on Purtan Bay and Powhatan's Chimney are located within an area which the Native Americans may have considered as Werowocomoco, as their meaning was a general area of lands and not a specific place.[5]
References
- ^ "Powhatan Chimney", Gloucester History
- ^ JOHN NOBLE WILFORD, "Virginia Site Is Considered Possible Home Of Pocahontas", New York Times, 7 May 2003, accessed 22 Aug 2009
- ^ JOHN NOBLE WILFORD, "Virginia Site Is Considered Possible Home Of Pocahontas", New York Times, 7 May 2003, accessed 22 Aug 2009
- ^ Suzanne Seurattan, "Werowocomoco ditches date back to at least early 1400s", College of William and Mary, 9 Aug 2004, accessed 22 Sep 2009
- ^ Board of Supervisors Meeting, Gloucester County, VA, Nov. 8, 2006
 |
This Virginia-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)
