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Coastal
Plain Indians
The
once mighty Powhatan chiefdom was reduced to a tributary status,
being required to make yearly payments to the colonial government
as a sign of dependence. They also lost all lands between the York and Blackwater
Rivers.
In 1677, another treaty was made with the colonists.
The Indians along the coast lost their remaining land and
were confined to small reservations.
Many of the tribes were extinct by 1722.
The Rappahannock tribe lost its reservation shortly after
1700; the Chickahominy lost theirs in 1718.
These groups and the Nansemond, who sold their reservation
in 1792, faded from public view.
Only the Pamunkeys, Mattaponis, and an Eastern Shore group
kept reservations, although their land constantly shrank in
size.
Some
native people wanted to keep the traditional lifestyles, while others
accepted white culture. Powhatan religion and language, central
aspects of the culture, were gradually replaced by Christianity
and English.
The people still raised crops, hunted, and fished. Cash
crops, like cotton, were added, and
livestock, such as chickens, cows, and hogs, became commonplace.
Log and plank houses replaced the bark and mat-covered
oval houses, and traded iron implements quickly replaced stone tools.
However, the native ceramic technology of vessels and pipes
remained vibrant, adapting to European shapes and functions.
Nottoways and
Meherrins. Two groups distinct from the
Powhatans, the
Nottoways and Meherrins, lived in the Coastal Plain of Virginia.
They spoke dialects of the Iroquoian language and lived
along the Nottoway and Meherrin Rivers.
Like the coastal Algonquians, the people farmed and hunted,
and their houses were similarly interspersed among fields of crops.
Unlike members of the Powhatan chiefdom, however, the Nottoways
and Meherrins lived as tribes in autonomous villages, with a local
chief holding little sway beyond the village.
The
Nottoways and Meherrins remained relatively undisturbed by the
English settlements expanding from Jamestown.
But, by 1650, the fur trade increased their contact with
the settlers.
Then in the 1677 treaty, they too, lost their land and
became tributaries of the colony.
The Nottoways and Meherrins set up reservations along the
Nottoway River in Southampton County.
By the late 1700s, the Meherrins had lost their
reservation, but the Nottoways still held theirs.
It
appears from court records and related documents that the Indian
populations in the Coastal Plain dropped from a height of 20,000
to about 1,800 by 1669 due to warfare and diseases introduced by
Europeans.
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Click
image to enlarge
A
coastal village included rows of oval homes, nearby corn fields,
and ceremonial fire and dance circle. (Credit: De Bry's engraving)
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