An engraving of Pocahontas made while she was in London in 1616. She is shown as both the daughter of the Powhatan chief and as Rebecca Rolfe, the Christian wife of a respectable English colonist.
As the ‘age of Discovery’ developed – England began to expand in the world and colonise places.
In the 1600s, religious English people (known as Puritans) arrived in America and began to take over the land (colonise) from ‘Native Americans’ who lived there. They called it Virginia.
The impact of European invasion of the Americas was terrible for the Native Americans and some estimates say that over 90% of them died.
In one of the wars fought between the English ‘settlers’ and the Native Americans – in 1614 –peace was eventually agreed between the Powhatans (a Native American nation) and the English colonists.
As a symbol of this peace, colonist John Rolfe married the daughter of the Powhatan chief, Pocahontas, who had been kidnapped (stolen and imprisoned) by the English settlers for this purpose.
Pocahontas was forced to convert to Christianity and even travelled to England where she met the Bishop of London and possibly even King James I.
John Chamberlain, one of King James I’s courtiers (advisers), saw the engraving of her and wrote that it was ‘a fine picture but of no fair lady’.
