Browse Items (23 total)

In 17th century Virginia the tense relations between Indigenous nations and white settlers were marked by three series of wars between 1610 and 1646. While there were three separate phases, the root cause of these wars was the same: continued English…

Late in the 19th century, some Virginians became interested in preserving historic buildings and landscapes that documented the state's illustrious past. White women led the effort to establish the Association for the Preservation of Virginia…

Pocahontas was the daughter of Powhatan, the powerful paramount chief of the Algonquin Indians in eastern Virginia, which the Indigenous Virginians called Tsenacomoco. She was about eleven years old when the English colonists arrived in 1607.…

The annual payment of tribute by Virginia's Indians has been a long-standing practice that still occurs today. In 1646, Necotowance, "the King of the Indians" as the English referred to him, signed a treaty to end the third Anglo-Indian War. Annual…

Thomas West (1576–1618), the twelfth Baron De La Warr, was appointed by King James I in 1606 to be part of the royal council that oversaw the Virginia Company of London. He monitored the situation in the Virginia colony from England and may have…

This photograph shows a deerskin mantle that was believed to have been presented by Paramount Chief Powhatan (whose given name was Wahunsonacock) to Captain Christopher Newport of the Virginia Company in 1608. The mantle is embroidered with shells…

In 1906, Robert Baden-Powell presented this bust of John Smith to the Commonwealth of Virginia. Although best known as the founder of the Boy Scout movement, Baden-Powell was also an artist of considerable skill. The family of Baden-Powell's mother…

This map is attributed to Captain John Smith (1580–1631) and is one of the earliest representations of Virginia. Smith began a three-month exploration of the Chesapeake Bay and its adjacent waterways in June 1608. He interacted with Indigenous…

Sir Walter Raleigh (ca. 1552–1618) was an English explorer, soldier, writer, and a favorite at the court of Queen Elizabeth I, who granted him a charter to explore North America. Although he sponsored the attempts in the 1580s to colonize Roanoke…

This map engraved by Theodor de Bry (1528–1598) was published in 1590 to accompany his reprint of Thomas Harriot's A Brief and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia, which he issued in Latin, German, French, and English to ensure the book…