Pokanoket or Wampanoag?: The Origins of Names

The Indigenous people who first interacted with the Pilgrims in 1621 identified themselves as Pokanoket, not Wampanoag. The widespread use of "Wampanoag" to describe this group is a colonial-era distortion that emerged after King Philip’s War (1675–1678), obscuring the true political and cultural identity of Massasoit Ousamequin’s people. Drawing on primary sources, linguistic analysis, and colonial-era records, this paper argues that the Pokanoket were a distinct nation and the political center of a larger confederation in southern New England. By contrast, "Wampanoag" was originally a geographic descriptor meaning "easterner", a general term that only later took on a political meaning through colonial reinterpretation and institutional erasure.

The history of Indigenous peoples, the original inhabitants of what is now the United States, has long been distorted by colonial narratives[1]. These stories, shaped to serve settler interests, persist today and continue to influence public understanding and institutional frameworks.The assumption that the Indigenous activism of the 1970s corrected these distortions is not only optimistic, it is misleading. It fosters a false sense of reassurance in the public eye, leading many to assume that the injustices of the past have been resolved and by extension, that there is no need to critically examine contemporary narratives or question the institutions that continue to shape them. This prevailing belief exists because Indigenous histories remain fragmented, often told by the very institutions that once sought their elimination, institutions that historically portrayed Indigenous peoples as obstacles, curiosities, or minor characters in the wake of Manifest Destiny.

In southern New England, the term "Wampanoag" has become a contested label, one that raises urgent questions about Indigenous identity, historical erasure, and political legitimacy.  The name "Pokanoket," once dominant in early colonial records, has been largely eclipsed by the more generic and state-sanctioned term "Wampanoag". This contemporary classification was once promoted by federal and state institutions to homogenize the diverse Indigenous peoples who inhabited the region. This shift is not accidental, as it reflects centuries of colonial pressure to rewrite Indigenous realities in more convenient, manageable terms. The consequences still reverberate for tribes like the Pokanoket, who refuse to be folded into the label “Wampanoag”, a term they view not only as inaccurate, but as an act of erasure. Instead, the Pokanoket Tribe continues the fight to reclaim its rightful place upon the ancestral land that remembers their name, even when the world has forgotten. To endure across generations, to speak their true name aloud, and to remain rooted in their oral traditions is not merely survival, it is an act of historical memory, intricately woven into the land, lineage, and identity of a people who refuse to be forgotten.

Language is central to this distortion. The term “Wampanoag” has often been applied anachronistically and broadly to describe surviving post-1675 Indigenous communities across southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island. These communities lived across southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island and shared similar cultural characteristics, languages, and kinship ties. However, many had distinct political identities, homelands, and leadership traditions before King Philip’s War. 

 Upon closer examination of the origins of the word “Wampanoag,” the historical record tells a more nuanced story. The Pokanoket Tribe once held sovereignty over vast parts of southern New England and their leader, Massasoit Ousamequin, famously entered into a defensive treaty with English settlers in 1621. Colonial-era journals, treaties, deeds, and maps consistently refer to Ousamequins people as Pokanoket. The broader and more unified use of the term “Wampanoag”  only appears more prominently in later periods, particularly after the upheaval of King Philip’s War and the fragmentation of the few surviving Indigenous communities.

Today, Wampanoag serves as an important contemporary Indigenous identity for several Native communities in southeastern New England. At the same time, the historical origins of the word, its evolving meanings, and its notable absence in many of the earliest colonial records invite closer examination. The ways Indigenous peoples have been identified have also been shaped not only by themselves, but by colonial governments and later federal institutions such as the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) and the Office of Federal Acknowledgment (OFA), which often rely on broader umbrella terms and administrative categories to organize complex Indigenous histories and relationships[2].. This process can sometimes flatten regional distinctions or local political identities that were more clearly recognized in earlier historical records. 

Rather than diminishing contemporary Indigenous identities, asking these questions encourages a fuller understanding of how names, identities, and political communities evolved over time. Historical inquiry is strongest when it leaves room for both continuity and change, especially when exploring why names such as Pokanoket, so prominent in seventeenth century sources, later became overshadowed by broader regional identities such as “Wampanoag”. 

Colonial Legacies & The Power of Naming

The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) is not a neutral institution operating outside of history. Its relationship with Indigenous peoples is shaped by a long and often painful legacy of federal policies that contributed to dispossession, forced assimilation, and the involuntary restructuring of surviving Indigenous communities. The 1887 Dawes Act fragmented Indigenous communal landholdings, contributing to the loss of millions of acres of tribal territory, while also weakening traditional political and kinship structures. Likewise, the federal boarding school system removed Indigenous children from their families and communities in an effort to suppress their languages, traditions, and cultural identities. This philosophy was openly articulated by individuals such as Richard Henry Pratt, founder of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, who described the goal as to “kill the Indian in him, and save the man,” reflecting an era in which assimilation into American society was viewed by many policymakers as both necessary and desirable[3].

This history raises important questions about the role of federal institutions in defining Indigenous identity today. The same government that once categorized, relocated, detribalized, or sought to assimilate Indigenous peoples now plays a significant role in determining federal acknowledgment and political recognition through agencies such as the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) and the Office of Federal Acknowledgment (OFA). While these systems provide an avenue for recognition, they are also administrative frameworks shaped by legal standards, historical documentation, and bureaucratic processes that may not always capture the full complexity of Indigenous continuity, kinship, diaspora, or self-identification. Given this history, should institutions that once contributed to the destruction of Indigenous nations be treated as the sole authority in defining Indigenous identity today? Perhaps it would be better to interpret their role with a measure of historical reflection and skepticism? 

This system plays a significant role in determining federal acknowledgment and political recognition. This reality presents a difficult historical tension. Agencies such as the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) and the Office of Federal Acknowledgment (OFA) were created to provide legal pathways for recognition, governance, and access to resources. Yet they also operate within institutional frameworks shaped by a long and often disruptive history of federal intervention in Indigenous life.

Reforms such as the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 and the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act of 1975 sought to restore tribal governance and reduce direct federal control. These changes marked important shifts in policy, but they did not erase the deeper historical legacy of dispossession, detribalization, or the uneven ways Indigenous communities were documented and categorized over time. As a result, the acknowledgment process continues to raise difficult questions about how Indigenous continuity is measured and who determines the standards of legitimacy, Indigenous people themselves or the government.

Some federally recognized tribes understandably view the BIA as an important partner in exercising sovereignty, securing resources, and maintaining government to government relationships. Others, particularly non federally recognized tribes, experience the process very differently and view it as a system that can privilege certain forms of documentation or continuity while overlooking histories shaped by displacement, diaspora, intermarriage, or deliberate colonial disruption. 

The experience of the Nipmuc Nation illustrates some of these tensions. Despite extensive historical documentation, longstanding community continuity, and recognition by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the Nipmuc Nation was denied federal acknowledgment in 2004[4]. Meanwhile, other Indigenous peoples with arguably weaker claims or documentation have nonetheless secured federal recognition, raising important questions about the fairness and consistency of the acknowledgment process [5]. These realities invite an important question on naming. Should federal recognition be understood as the final authority on Indigenous identity, or as one framework among many for understanding Indigenous continuity, survival, and sovereignty? 

This is not merely a matter of paperwork or names. When we replace “Pokanoket” with “Wampanoag,” we are not just substituting one word for another, we are erasing memory, place, and sovereignty. Indigenous names are not interchangeable. They carry the weight of specific histories, geographies, and cultural meanings. Flattening those distinctions doesn’t unify, it erases. It supports a legacy of colonial control, determining which stories are remembered and which are silenced.

Colonization did more than displace Indigenous peoples or seize land. It also reshaped memory, altering how history was recorded, remembered, and passed on in the public imagination [6]. Over time, complex stories were often condensed into simpler narratives, some repeated so frequently that they came to feel unquestioned[7]. Yet beneath these familiar stories are voices, perspectives, and histories that are too often overlooked.

One such story is retold each November during Thanksgiving celebrations across the United States. Many Americans are taught that the “Wampanoag” welcomed the Pilgrims in the 1620s. While this understanding contains elements of truth, it also reflects a broader simplification of a far more complex Indigenous political landscape. Colonial records from the period more often identify Massasoit Ousamequin and the people of Sowams as Pokanoket, alongside neighboring Indigenous communities with their own distinct political identities and territories. Yet, this raises an important historical question regarding how politically diverse Indigenous world become remembered under a single, broader name?

But how do we know who greeted the Pilgrims? And what sources should we rely upon when answering that question? Today, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) and its Office of Federal Acknowledgment (OFA) recognize contemporary Wampanoag Tribes of New England for an answer. To many, this may suggest a settled historical understanding of who the Indigenous peoples of this region were at the time of first contact. Yet the seventeenth century colonial records paint an entirely different canvas. Primary sources such as Mourt’s Relation, colonial treaties, deeds, and early maps consistently identify Pokanoket, not the Wampanoag, as the people who made first contact with the English. This does not diminish the importance of contemporary Wampanoag identity, which carries deep meaning for many Indigneous communities today. Rather, it raises an important question on how did one name so well documented become replaced with another in public memory?

The difference between Wampanoag and Pokanoket is not semantic, it is political, cultural, and deeply personal. It is about who gets to be visible, who gets to speak, and who is consigned to the margins of history. Until this linguistic, cultural and historical erasure is corrected, the stories we tell will remain incomplete, distorted echoes of deeper truths.

This surely raises urgent questions for the telling of Indigenous history. Should we continue to seek answers from the very systems that once worked to erase them? Or should Indigenous peoples reclaim the power to name themselves, to remember on their own terms, and to speak in their own voices? The narratives of Indigenous peoples remain incomplete, not because they have ended, but because they are still unfolding in resistance, in revival, and in the unyielding refusal to be forgotten.

Primary Source Evidence

Was Wampanoag the historic name used by the Indigenous people in 1620? The short answer is no. Let us examine primary sources and accounts of those who were here and experienced first hand what we now call history.  According to the definition of the Bulletin Handbook of the American Indians, the Wampanoag are clearly described as one the principal tribes that existed in New England before colonization[8]. Yet, there is no historical evidence that supports this statement. There is no documented evidence from colonial primary sources which clearly and distinctly indicates that Wampanoag was a term used for the Indigenous people who “greeted” the Mayflower settlers in 1621 and inhabited the surrounding area [9]. Nor is Wampanoag the name that Massasoit Ousamequin would have identified himself, his people with, or the confederation he was the “Grand Sachem” of in the early 17th century. Furthermore, there is no historical evidence of any pre-colonial Indigenous nation that used the term “Wampanoag” in any geo-political sense regarding sovereignty or territory in southern New England.

What we do know is that the Indigenous people of southern New England identified exclusively with clearly defined and distinct territorial domains. Despite contemporary misconceptions, the people of southern New England by the dawn of the 17th century lived in settled agricultural societies whose people have been carefully cultivating the land that provided their subsistence for generations. In sum, the people and the land they cultivated were often one and the same. These boundaries were often referred to as sachemships, and often took their names and identified with the primary settlement of their leading sachem (chief) and surrounding countryside, though it's important to note that not all tribes, bands or clans had a sachem. Edward Winslow (1595-1655) was one of the original passengers aboard the Mayflower, and would establish himself amongst the leading figures of Plymouth Colony. Regarding these sachemships Winslow writes:

”Every sachim knoweth how far the bounds and limits of his own country extendeth; and that is his own proper inheritance. Out of that, if any of his men desire land to set [plant] their corn, he giveth them as much as they can use, and sets them their bounds...The great sachims or kings know their own bounds or limits of land, as well as the rest. All travellers or strangers for the most part lodge at the sachim’s. When they come, they tell them how long they will stay, and to what place they go; during which time they receive entertainment, according to their persons, but want not…”[10]

One name that is mentioned to describe Massasoit Ousamequin and his people within the first fifty years of English colonization are documentations of anglicized variations of the word Pokanoket (also known as Sowams), which translates to “the cleared land.” Different variations of the more popular term that is used today are recorded as Pocanet, Pauquunaukit, Pawkanokick, Pawconocket, Pokonokeuck, Pocanaokit and Pokanokick. While today contemporary borders would not align with the exact territorial boundaries of the Pokanokets, it would completely encompass the following municipalities:

• Barrington, Bristol, Warren, and East Providence Rhode Island

• Rehoboth, Seekonk, Somerset, and Swansea, Massachusetts

Some historians have argued that parts of modern day Raynham, Norton, Attleborough, Dighton, and Taunton, Massachusetts as well as Cumberland, Pawtucket, and Providence, Rhode Island would have been part of this territory or at least under Massasoit's direct influence[11].

In 1619, captain Thomas Dermer was accompanied by the now infamous Squanto, traveled through the sachemship of Namasket of what is now Middleboro Massachusetts, and wrote of Pokanoket in his account of the journey.  Here his guide Squanto, “dispatched a messenger a dayes journey further west to Pocanaokit which bordereth on the sea; whence came to see me two Kings, attended with a guard of fiftie armed men"[12]. Significantly, Dermer identifies Pocanaokit not merely as a place, but as a political center whose leaders exercised regional authority and military influence.

Yet some historians and Indigenous communities have interpreted these early references differently. A common argument holds that Pokanoket referred only to a territory or seat of power, while Wampanoag was the broader tribal identity of the people whom Massasoit Ousamequin led and who later entered into relations with the Pilgrims in 1621. From this perspective, colonial writers may have emphasized local tribes without fully understanding broader Indigenous identities or relationships. So let us now entertain the possibility that these individuals were mistaken about the name of these people. Some have argued that reference to Pokanoket is an error of colonial authors who failed to take into account accurately the true names of the Indigenous people they encountered. 

This debate continues into the present. Representatives of contemporary Wampanoag communities have, at times, publicly questioned the use of Pokanoket as a distinct tribal identity. They claim that Wampanoag was the name of the tribe that Massasoit hailed from and whom treated with the Pilgrims in 1621.For example, in a Cape Cod Times article published on December 1, 2010, Mashpee Wampanoag cultural officer and historian Ramona Peters stated that “Pokanoket refers to a territory, not a tribe[13]".Such interpretations does raise an important question for us to ponder. Were colonial observers misunderstanding Indigenous political organization, or were they accurately recording a more localized and politically diverse Indigenous world than later historical narratives sometimes acknowledge? The answer matters, because how we interpret these names shapes our understanding of sovereignty, identity, and who exactly encountered the English in the earliest years of colonization.

While these colonial narratives did clearly have a bias, as all authors do to some degree, these early primary sources in the first half of the 17th century offer unique insight of southern New England. This is primarily because Europeans traders, surveyors, and fishermen have been exploring these lands likely a century before, with notable individuals such as Giovanni de Verrazzano in 1524 preceding the “Plymouth Rock” landing. These accounts were created at a time when English colonists were not the hegemon of New England. The need for accurate information was vital for their survival in the first half of the 17th century when the New England colonies were at their most vulnerable. By the time Plymouth Colony was founded, Europeans already possessed a growing, though imperfect, body of knowledge about the peoples and geography of the region.

Furthermore, one would think that Plymouth Colony Governor John Carver and his associates, when they signed what history would know as the Treaty of Peace (1621) with Massasoit Osamequin, that they would bother to learn the name of the people with whom they were now in a defensive alliance. To assume they during such a high stakes meeting they would record the wrong name is a difficult proposition to readily accept. Following the treaty, both Edward Winslow and William Bradford wrote in Mourt’s Relation (1622): 

“We cannot yet conceive but that he [Massasoit] is willing to have peace with us, for they have seen our people sometimes alone two or three in the woods at work and fowling, when as they offered them no harm as they might easily have done, and especially because he hath a potent adversary the Narragansets, that are at war with him, against whom he thinks we may be some strength to him, for our pieces [guns] are terrible unto them"[14].

The passage reveals something often overlooked in simplified Thanksgiving narratives. Massasoit Ousamequin and his people were not passive figures welcoming newcomers into an empty land. They were political actors navigating a dangerous regional landscape, entering into a strategic alliance at a moment of vulnerability. If the English understood enough to recognize Massasoit’s political position, military concerns, and regional rivals such as the Narragansett, it is worth asking whether they also understood the name and identity of the people with whom they had allied. 

This account demonstrates the necessity that names and territorial boundaries had in Plymouth colonies precarious odds of survival in the 1620’s. For an error caused by casual generalizations could be detrimental, if not fatal, to the colony. For example, the Narragansetts under their Sachem Canonicus famously greeted the Pilgrims with a quiver of arrows wrapped in snake skin, which they correctly interpreted as a bellicose rather than benevolent gesture. Winslow reinforced this notion by writing, “Of this sort is Massassowat, our friend, and Conanacus, of Nanohigganset, our supposed enemy."[15]. How then could the settlers of Plymouth colony correctly identify the names of those hostile to their existence but not their allies? If Wampanoag is the correct name for Massasoit's people then perhaps we need to only corroborate further primary sources from the period? If Wampanoag was indeed the proper name for Massasoit’s people, then one would reasonably expect this term to appear widely across the journals, letters, histories, and government records of 17th-century New England? But that is not the case. Instead, those sources overwhelmingly refer to Massasoit, his sachemship, and his people as Pokanoket.

All of the primary colonial sources from the first fifty years of Plymouth Colony point toward a remarkably consistent pattern. Accounts from 17th century explorers, settlers, governors, and historians whether it be Thomas Dermer, Edward Winslow, William Bradford, Roger Williams. John Carver, John Winthrop, Steven Hopkins, Daniel Gookin, John Josselyn or William Hubbard all confirm that Massasoit and his people identified exclusively as Pokanoket rather than Wampanoag. 

Edward Winslow in Mourt's Relations (1621) writes, “Tisquantum told us we should harley in one day reach Packonokick…From thence we went to Packonokick: but Massasoyt was not home”[16].

In Hubbard's History of New England it is stated that, “Massassoit … they brought down to the English at Plymith, though his place was at forty miles distance, called Swams, his country called Pokanoket"[17].

Edward Winslow, in Good News (1623) wrote, “I hired one to go with all expediency to reach Puckanokick…our turn from Sawaams, or Puckanokick" [18].

John Josselyn in his Two Voyages (1663) documented that, “The Pokanokets live to the westward of Plimouth.’” He added, “Massasoit the great Sachem of the Plimouth Indians, his dwelling was at a place called Sowams” [19].

The pattern extends well beyond early travel accounts and personal journals. Official colonial records from the seventeenth century repeatedly identify Massasoit’s homeland and political community as Pokanoket. In the second volume of the Plymouth Colony Records, (1641), and page 23, Pocanacutt is mentioned as a country while in the fourth volume of Plymouth Colony Records, (1662), there are several references to “Philip, Sachem of Pockanockett" [20].  Even the Minutes of The Commissioners of the United Colonies in September 1644 mention Poccanokick alias Sowamsett within notes of the meeting, further linking the political center of Sowams with the broader territorial identity of Pokanoket.[21] Then we have Daniel Gookin who was the Commissioner of the Praying Indians of Massachusetts Bay Colony and a colleague of the Puritan missionary John Eliot in the later half of the 17th century. His comprehensive account of New England's Indigenous people are amongst the most detailed colonial records of the period. Regarding the major pre-colonial Indigenous people that existed prior to colonization (1620) he observed:

“…The principle nations of the Indians, that did, or do, inhabit within the confines of New England are five: 1: Pequots; 2. Narragansitts; 3. Pawkunnawkuts [Pokanokets]; 4. Massachsetts; and 5. Pawtucketts…”[22].

Gookin’s observation is notable not only for what it includes, but also for what it does not. For no mention is made of the Wampanoag. Writing only decades removed from first contact and with extensive knowledge of Indigenous communities in southern New England, he identified the Pawkunnawkuts (Pokanokets) among the major Indigenous nations of the region. The broader term Wampanoag, so familiar today, is notably absent from his classification. This absence does not necessarily disprove the existence of wider cultural or linguistic relationships among eastern Algonquian peoples but it does lead us back to this central question. If Wampanoag was the identity of Massasoit’s Ousamequins people in the 17th century, how do we explain its absence in the earliest documentary records while Pokanoket appears so consistently?   

Further evidence is visually depicted in A Map of New England, By John Seller, Hydrographer to the King (1675), which was a map created by John Seller, a prominent English cartographer and hydrographer, around the late 17th century. This map is significant for its portrayal of New England during the early colonial period. It clearly depicts “Pokanoket Country” and “King Philip Country” in the land west of Plymouth colony as the images below indicate.[23]

After examining these contemporary sources can it still be said with any degree of credibility that all of these colonial authors and cartographers were wrong? Did they all make the same mistake? Taken together, these sources reveal a pattern that is difficult to dismiss. If Wampanoag had been the name by which Massasoit Ousamequin and his people were known to English colonists in the first half of the 17th century, one might reasonably expect it to appear regularly in the colonial record. Yet, in source after source, the people of Massasoit’s homeland are consistently described as Pokanoket. This does not necessarily diminish the importance of Wampanoag as a contemporary identity or broader regional term, but it does raise important historical questions about when, how, and why that broader name later came to overshadow Pokanoket in popular memory.  

Perhaps the Indigenous accounts provide the insight that is further needed to clarify the confusion over the historic role of the Pokanoket. Nattawayhunt, sachem of the Quaboag Nipmucs, would have recognized the authority of the Pokanokets, especially given that one of his daughters was married to Massasoit Ousamequin. This kinship connection helps explain why Massasoit, “in his old age came hither, and was for a time ruling sachem at Quabaug” (present-day Brookfield, MA) in the late 1650s. [24] As his eldest son and heir, Wamsutta, assumed the responsibilities of leadership as the new Massasoit, while his father chose to spend his final years among his wife’s people.  Through marriage, diplomacy, and alliance, the leading families of southern New England were deeply interconnected. Would Weetamoo, one of the most politically influential Indigenous leaders of her generation, not have known the name and identity of her husband’s people, her kin, and the political community with whom she and the Pocasset would later stand during the conflict that became King Philip’s War?

For in 1661, Uncas, sachem of the Mohegans, raided the Quaboag Nipmucs, killing, taking captives, and looting property despite their recognized alliance with Massasoit Osamequin and the Massachusetts colony. In response, Wamsutta, identified in colonial records as “sachem of Sowamsett”, a clear reference to the Pokanoket, asserted that the Quaboags were under his authority and declared he had waged war against Uncas that same summer. {25} The Massachusetts General Court backed Wamsutta’s claim and warned Uncas to cease hostilities or face military retaliation. While Pokanoket oral history attest that Wamsutta was successful in this military endeavor, no colonial document records a direct battle. However, Uncas’s raids ceased, and the Quaboags never submitted or paid tribute to the Mohegans. This strongly suggests that Massasoit Wamsutta successfully defended Pokanoket interests in the interior and that Uncas recognized the reach and resistance of Pokanoket leadership.

Chikataubut, sachem of the Massachusett, was a contemporary of Massasoit Ousamequin, the great sachem of the Pokanoket Confederacy. While each led distinct tribal groups, their appearance together in colonial records indicates a degree of diplomatic familiarity between the two. In March 1621, Massasoit signed a treaty with Plymouth Colony, pledging peace and mutual defense. Later that year, on September 13, Chikataubut joined eight other Indigenous leaders in signing the Instrument of Submission to King James I. [26] Massasoit did not attend, having already formalized relations with the colony but one of his brothers, Quadequina, signed on his behalf. Chikataubut’s inclusion among the signers supports the view that he was one of the “confederates” Massasoit referred to earlier that year, reflecting a loose regional alliance shaped by shared interests in diplomacy and defense.

In 1621 and again in early 1622, Massasoit Ousamequin demonstrated his alliance with Plymouth Colony by warning Edward Winslow of a planned attack by the Massachusett, which involved Chikataubut’s people. [27] These warnings not only helped the English avoid potential disaster but also revealed Massasoit’s political foresight and regional influence. His actions suggest that, despite leading separate nations, he actively monitored neighboring sachems and used diplomacy to strengthen his own position as a central figure in both intertribal and colonial affairs. It is therefore not unreasonable to presume that Chikataubut resented Massasoit Ousamequin after the events of 1622, and would not have forgotten how the Pokanokets had foiled his people’s plans.

The same questions might also be asked of the Narragansetts under Canonicus and Miantonomi, long standing rivals of the Pokanoket. Historical records consistently show that the area now known as Barrington, Rhode Island, was referred to by both the Pokanokets and Narragansetts as Sowams (also spelled Sowamset), which was an Indigenous name that identified the region as a significant cultural and political center long before English colonization. [28] Even centuries later, Tecumseh, the great Shawnee leader who sought to forge a pan-Indian alliance across the Ohio River Valley, Great Lakes, and beyond to resist U.S. expansion wrote of the Pokanokets saying:

“Where today are the Pequot? Where are the Narragansett, the Mohican, the Pokanoket, and other powerful tribes of our people? They have vanished before the avarice and oppression of the white man, as snow before the summer sun… Will we let ourselves be destroyed in our turn, without making an effort worthy of our race? Shall we without a struggle, give up our homes, our lands, bequeathed to us by the Great Spirit? The graves of our dead and everything that is dear and sacred to us? I know you will say with me, Never! Never!” [29]

Indigenous and colonial sources from the seventeenth century and beyond indicate that Wampanoag was not the terminology used to describe the people who interacted with Plymouth Colony in the 1620s. Rather, the documented records consistently identifies Massasoit Ousamequin, his homeland, and his tribe as Pokanoket. In this context, the retrospective application of Wampanoag to the earliest decades of Plymouth Colony reflects a later regional categorization rather than the political language of that time. Recognizing this distinction does not diminish the importance or legitimacy of contemporary Wampanoag identity. Instead, it underscores the need to revisit early sources and ask how historical memory, colonial interpretation, and later governmental frameworks reshaped the names by which Indigenous peoples of southern New England came to be understood. 

Furthermore, an increasingly popular contemporary interpretation suggests that Pokanoket was merely a village, territorial seat, or local district within a broader “Wampanoag Confederation.” At first glance, this explanation may appear compelling, particularly given the widespread use of Wampanoag as a modern regional identity. Yet when examined through a historiographical lens, the evidence from the 17th century points toward a more complex reality.

The earliest documentary record does not consistently describe Pokanoket as simply a place or subordinate locality. Rather, Indigenous and colonial sources repeatedly refer to Pokanoket as both a distinct people and tribe. This can be exemplified through records of its sachems, territorial boundaries, diplomatic relationships, and regional influence.The interpretation of Pokanoket as only a village or location finds scarce support in the earliest sources. Therefore it too is also incorrect for the same reasons that Wampanoag is not the most accurate terminology for the time period in question. Instead, the historical record consistently presents Pokanoket  not merely as a place or village, but as a distinct tribe, people and pre-colonial geopolitical entity. 

Even the word Pokanoket today is an anglicized version of the word whose meaning has been generalized for the convenience of English speaking authors who documented and categorized what they saw fit to record. This  has led to variations such as Pocanacutt, Puckanokick, Pockanockett, and Pawkunnawkut in the earlier written records. Like many Indigenous names recorded by English writers, these differences reflect attempts to transliterate Indigenous pronunciations into English rather than evidence of an unfamiliar or insignificant place. Far from diminishing Pokanoket identity, these recurring references across time reveal the persistence of a people whose name remained recognizable despite the distortions and inconsistencies of colonial spelling.

 Colonial References to Massasoit’s People (Pre-1675)

Pokanoket: People, Place, & Confederation

Topographically, the local Algonquin dialects for the names of the people who lived within the borders of a sachemship or region were often recorded using “uck” as a plural ending for groups of people. This practice would mean that in Winslow's Mourt's Relations (1623), the “Namascheucks” would have likely translated into the “men of Namaschet.” Massasoit's people would have been designated as “Pokonekuck” or “the men of Pokanoket" [31]. Meanwhile, the suffix “ick” and “ack” would suggestively indicate a place meaning that the recording of “Pokonokick” would indicate a geographic location. [32] Edward Winslow, who sought to understand the language and translate what he heard phonetically, made this distinction. Yet, as the English grew to dominate the region, the linguistic contrast between the people of a place and the place itself became more generalized in the colonial narrative, leading to the term Pokanoket being used today. The phenomenon is not unusual in history. Just as France may refer to a country while French refers to its people, or how Rome came to signify not only a city but also the Roman people and empire, so too could Pokanoket simultaneously signify a homeland, a political entity, and the people who belonged to it. Rather than undermining Pokanoket identity, this linguistic fluidity may help explain why colonial writers sometimes used the term in overlapping ways while still recognizing it as a distinct Indigenous polity. 

Having established that the Pokanoket were both a distinct people and a tribe rooted in a specific geographic locality, we may now turn to the next historical misconception that has shaped their representation in the record. For there is evidence that clearly indicates the Pokanokets were not just a tribe but the nucleus of a much larger regional confederation. The Treaty of Peace, signed between the Pokanokets and Pilgrims on March 22, 1621 stated: “He [Massasoit] should send to his neighboring confederates to certify them of this, that they might not wrong us, but might likewise be comprised in the conditions of peace”. [33] Here the Pilgrims acknowledged that the influence Massasoit Ousamequin of the Pokankets held over this confederation would help insulate Plymouth colony during its earlier decades. Again we look to the historical account of Gookin to identify the territorial boundaries of this confederation built around the Pokanokets. He wrote:

“The Pawkunnawkutts were a great people heretofore. They lived to the east and northeast of the Narragansitts; and their chief sa|chem held dominion over divers other petty sagamores; as the saga|mores upon the island of Nantuckett, and Nope, or Martha's Vine|yard, of Nawsett, or Mannamoyk, of Sawkattukett, Nobsquasitt, Mattakees, and several others, and some of the Nipmucks. Their coun|try, for the most part, falls within the jurisdiction of New Plymouth colony. This people were a potent nation in former times; and could raise, as the most credible and ancient Indians affirm, about three thousand men. They held war with the Narragansitts; and often joined with the Massachusetts, as friends and confederates against the Narragansitts. This nation, a very great number of them, were swept away by an epidemical and unwonted sickness, An[in the years] 1612 and 1613, about seven or eight years before the English first arrived in those parts, to settle the colony of New Plymouth…". [34]

Clearly, Gookin identified and understood this large political landscape. Secondary sources also indicate the influence of the Pokanoket and their expansive boundaries. For example, Rhode Island historian Thomas Bricknell wrote: 

“The territory of the Pokanokets, of whom Massassoit was the chief sachem, originally extended, as we have stated, from Cape Cod on the east, to the Narragansett Bay on the west, and from the Narragansett Bay and the Atlantic Ocean on the south to the southern boundary of the Massachusetts, the tribe which occupied the territory to the south and west of Boston. The Pokanokets, who formerly numbered about three thousand warriors, were divided into several minor tribes or villages, each under the rule of a petty chief or sachem”.[35]

Massasoit Ousamequin was both the sachem of the Pokanokets and the head of a larger confederation which contained some sixty tribes, bands and clans in southern New England. [36]

Despite being greatly weakened politically, socially, economically, and even spiritually by the devastation brought by the Great Dying (1616-1619), in which between 70 to 90 percent of the Indigenous people within this confederation perished due to the introduction of smallpox, yellow fever, or leptospirosis from European traders, Massasoit Ousamequin and his heirs Wamsutta (alias Alexander) and Metacom (alias Phillip) retained influence over what remained of this weakened confederation in the decades following 1620.

Yet Gookin and other colonial witnesses attest in their writings that Massasoit Ousamequin and the Pokanokets remained a power in the region, retaining their influence up until King Philip’s War. Moreover, the Plymouth Colony Records and subsequent land deeds show that the Indigenous signatories consistently identified themselves as Pokanoket, as the following example below illustrates.[37]

In sum, the evidence, both Indigenous and colonial, challenges the modern narrative that the Pokanoket were merely a location or village. Instead, they were a people with a distinct identity, serving as the epicenter of a once powerful confederation. Misinterpretations of their identity reflect the erasure of Indigenous nuances in colonial records, rather than the reality of 17th-century New England.

Linguistic Origins of “Wampanog"

Now that we have established that the Pokanokets were the people who historically occupied the area of what would become Plymouth colony, the next topic to address is the origins of this term Wampanoag and how it is often conflated with the history of the Pokanokets. Re-examining the historical record, there appears to be no credible evidence from any primary sources in which the term “Wampanoag” is given any notion of being a political or social organization until the start of King Philip's War in 1675. However, there is evidence in a linguistic rather than political manner of the existence of the term “Wampanoag” prior to this conflict. Within the correct historical context in pre-colonial southern New England, the use of the word “Wampanoag” was a simple linguistic term of reference having no distinct geographical or political connotations.

The Eastern Algonquian is a branch of the larger Algonquian language family that share significant similarities due to their common ancestral roots. These languages were historically spoken by Indigenous peoples of what is now the northeastern regions of the United States and parts of eastern Canada.This includes the Massachusett, Narragansett, Mohegan, Pequot, Abenaki, Pennacook, and Pokanoket. It was commonly understood that the Indigenous people of southern New England spoke a similar dialect, that became more distinguished the further one ventured from one tribal land to another. The same could be said for many of the Indigenous nations along the east coast of the contemporary United States.

Accordingly, the core linguistic understanding of “Wampanoag” can be found in the research of academics, anthropologists and scholars.  Blair Rude’s “Raising Wampano from the Dead” asserted that the term “Wampanoag” is derived from the proto-Algonquian “wa-panwi”, which translates into “it dawns” with the common connotation of “easterner.” [38]  Ives Goddard comes to a similar conclusion in his research that Wampanoag was specifically derived from the proto- Eastern Algonquian word “‘Wapanoo’, meaning easterner which directly relates to the Munsee Delaware term ‘Waapan’ for “it dawns.” [39] Thus, it can be understood that the term “Wampanoag”, was a local variation of “easterner" used amongst the Eastern Algonquian-speaking tribes of eastern New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. 

In the writings of Roger Williams, who spent considerable time with the Narragansett documenting their language, customs, and beliefs, we find references that further support the geographic meaning of the term “Wampanoag”. Notably, Williams makes no mention of Wampanoag as the name of a distinct tribal group, even though the Narragansett were the political and territorial rivals of Massasoit Ousamequin, the leader of the Pokanoket. This absence is striking and indicates that the term “Wampanoag” was not used by the Narragansett to refer to their neighbors, the Pokanokets. What Williams does record is the term Wampanand, meaning “Eastern God,” a derivative of Wompan or “east.” [40] This linguistic evidence supports the conclusion that while Wampanoag was not an Indigenous term or identity used for a specific tribe, a Narragansett speaker would have recognized its meaning based on the shared Eastern Algonquian linguistic structure.

Indeed, variations of the word Wampanoag can be found in dialects of Indigenous people in Delaware all the way to Maine are referenced by European explorers navigating the area in the 17th century. [41]  Variations of this term depended upon the dialect and geographic location of these people. Some of the names include (woban) “daybreak”, (aki) “land”, Wobanaki (ag), “Easterner” or  “from where the daylight comes."[42]Other variations include Wobanakkiak, Wabanaki, and Wapanacki, with the Natick word for full day light being “wompan” which all share linguistic roots to the term Wampanoag. Furthermore, it is important to note that “Wabanaki” and “Abanki” are direct variations of the same name and there was a Wabanaki Confederation in their historic territory, just not in southern New England. [43]

The English were not the only European explorers to survey this area, as the Dutch from New Amsterdam (New York) navigated through the Hudson and Quinnipiac rivers and made their way into Narragansett Bay, eager to gain an advantage in the fur trade. One Dutch explorer Adriaen Block (also spelled Adrian Block) was notable for his explorations of the northeastern coast of North America in the early 17th century. In The Figurate Map of Adrian Block (1614), the name “Wapanoos” is drawn over an area east of the “Pequats” (Narragansett Bay) as if the Dutch explorer was under the impression that all the tribes beyond this point were “easterners"[44]This is likely due to the fact that Blocks Indigenous guides were not native to the region and thus used the term “Wampanoos” or “easterner” to designate the tribes that inhabited the area around Narragansett Bay. 

Figurate Map of Adrian Block (1614)

References 

“Adriaen Block’s 1614 Map of Long Island Sound and the Connecticut River,” Colonial Wars of Connecticut, accessed February 21, 2025, https://www.colonialwarsct.org/1614.htm?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

NYC99, “Adriaen Block’s 1614 Map of Long Island and Surrounding Areas,” NYC99, accessed February 21, 2025, http://www.nyc99.org/1600/block.html.

Interpretations of Blocks explorations have led some to believe there is evidence of "Wampanoag" being used to describe a tribe. Yet in such studies of early colonial cartography and Indigenous history, small editorial decisions can have outsized consequences. One such example lies in the interpretation of Johan de Laet’s Nieuwe Wereldt (1625), a seminal Dutch account of the geography and Indigenous peoples of northeastern North America.  In the 1909 English edition of Johan's work Narratives of New Netherland, 1609–1664, historian J. Franklin Jameson made a crucial and revealing interpretive choice by replacing Johan de Laet’s Dutch references to the “Narragansetts” and the tribe east of them called the “Horicans” as “Narragansetts” and “Wabankis,” respectively, thereby introducing the northern Wabanaki Confederacy into a geographic context where it did not belong onto groups who never belonged to it. [45] Jameson’s decision reflects the approach of many nineteenth and early twentieth century scholars who assumed that Wampanoag was the correct designation and routinely replaced or “corrected” what they perceived as errors in earlier sources. This underscores a broader problem in historical scholarship as editorial interventions are never neutral and can shape public understanding for generations.

17th & 18th Century Use of the Term Wampanoag

The origins of the “Horicans” illustrate how fluid and inconsistent early European spellings could be. As E. M. Ruttenber notes in Footprints of the Red Men (1906), 

“Horikans was written by De Laet, in 1624, as the name of an Indian tribe living at the head waters of the Connecticut. On an ancient map Horicans is written in Lat.  41, east of the Narragansetts… Moricans is written west of the Connecticut, and Horikans on the upper Connecticut in latitude 42. Morhicans is the form on Carte Figurative of 1614–16, and Mahicans by the Dutch on the Hudson … The several forms indicate that the tribe was the Moricans or Mourigans of the French, the Maikans or Mahikans of the Dutch and the Mohegans of the English.” [46]

In short, the “Horicans” were not a separate tribe at all, but simply different spellings for the Mahican or Mohegan peoples who lived along the Hudson and Connecticut River valleys, and most importantly, they were not “Wampanoag”.

Further linguistic evidence similarly demonstrates how European writers often collapsed unique Algonquian distinctions into oversimplified forms. E. M. Ruttenber notes that Wompompeag was an early Mohegan term from which the word “wampum” developed, and Roger Williams likewise explained that wompom meant “white,” referring to the white shell beads used in diplomacy and trade. Ruttenber also cites the Deed of July 11, 1661, in which the place name Wompenanit appears to describe “the utmost end eastward” of the Montauk Peninsula, what we now call Montauk Point on Long Island in present day New York. The derivatives of -wompi (white, bright, daylight) and -anit (“to be more than”) signified not only the farthest geographic east but also cosmological concepts of light, the east, and spiritual power.[47] Taken together, these examples suggest that roots such as wompan, wompan, or waapan carried broader meanings associated with whiteness, daylight, dawn, and the east. These terms demonstrate that what the English would later generalize as “Wampanoag” (“easterners”) was in fact part of a larger Algonquian pattern of geographic naming.

King Philip War And Its Wampanoag Legacy

By the late seventeenth century, the term had become standardized as “Wampanoag,” a usage reinforced in part by western tribes allied with the English, who applied it to describe their eastern neighbors.[49] The term was likely introduced into English by Mohegan and Pequot allies, who fought alongside colonial forces and used it as an outsider's name for the more distant easterly Algonquian speakering tribes, such as the Pokanoket. English soldiers and writers, unfamiliar with the internal distinctions amongst Indigenous groups, adopted “Wampanoag” as a convenient label for all Indigenous forces aligned with Po Metacom (King Philip).

Over time, colonial authorities and writers began applying the term more broadly to describe the various Algonquian-speaking groups inhabiting southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Importantly, these Indigenous guides were not incorrect because from their perspective, those Algonquian-speaking peoples to the east could rightly be called “easterners”.Yet geography and political identity are not always the same. English soldiers, officials, and chroniclers, often unfamiliar with the internal distinctions among Indigenous nations, increasingly adopted Wampanoag as a convenient umbrella term for the various Indigenous communities aligned with Po Metacom (King Philip) during the conflict. In wartime especially, distinctions that had once mattered politically, such as Pokanoket, Pocasset, Namasket, or Sakonnet, were more easily collapsed into broader categories intelligible to colonial observers. Thus the term “Wampanoag” became effortlessly misappropriated from its original definition as a generalized descriptive term, not a particular people, a geographic rather than political designation. 

TThe meaning of Wampanoag shifted dramatically during King Philip’s War (1675–1678). While the Great Dying had already cleared the way for English colonization in southern New England, it was this conflict that secured their dominance at the expense of the region’s free and independent Indigenous nations. The war marked an epochal turning point as it created the conditions for the misappropriation of “Wampanoag” as a tribal name. It would forever change how Indigenous peoples came to be described within colonial memory and language. 

Before the war, colonial records overwhelmingly identified Indigenous peoples through the names of specific sachemships, political communities, or local homelands such as Pokanoket, Pocasset, Nemasket, Sakonnet, and others. Massasoit Ousamequin and his descendants were consistently associated with Pokanoket or described simply as “Massasoit’s people”, or in a less positive manner “Philips Indians". Yet during and after the conflict, English chroniclers increasingly adopted Wampanoag as a broader collective designation, at times applying it to the various Algonquian-speaking peoples east of the Narragansetts who had rallied under the leadership of Po Metacom (King Philip).

War has a way of simplifying identities. Distinctions that once mattered deeply to Indigenous peoples themselves, kinship ties, local sachemships, territorial homelands, and political autonomy, became less visible in English accounts shaped by military conflict and colonial administration.  In this way, “Wampanoag” hardened in the colonial vocabulary as the collective name for the various Indigenous peoples who rallied under Massasoit Metacom (King Philip) banner, even though in his own signatures in treaties and land deeds he continued to identify himself as Pokanoket[50]

Captain James Oliver’s account of the Great Swamp campaign (1675) and Increase Mather’s A Brief History of the War with the Indians in New England (1676) both employ “Wampanoag” or its variants to describe their enemy. [51] Yet, notably, William Hubbard writing just a year later in his Narrative of the Indian Wars in New-England (1677) reverted to calling Metacom (King Philip) both the "Sachem of Mount-Hope” and “chief Sachem of Pokanoket”.[52]   In this sense, “Wampanoag” emerged within colonial vocabulary as an increasingly common wartime designation, a term that entered the English colonial vocabulary usage amid the turmoil of King Philip’s War. As war intensified, distinctions that had once been politically meaningful, Pokanoket, Pocasset, Sakonnet, Nemasket, and other sachemships, became less visible in colonial narratives focused on military alliances and perceived enemies. This reclassification subplanted the intricate kinship networks, settlements, and territorial identities by which the Indigenous peoples of southern New England had long defined their distinct polities in the seventeenth century.[53]

Words, like the peoples and cultures they represent, evolve over time, and Wampanoag is a compelling example of such transformation. Its historical meaning was fundamentally reshaped at the onset of King Philip's War, a conflict that determined the fate of both the Indigenous peoples and the New England colonies and, by extension, the future United States. During this period, the term “Wampanoag” began to take on new meaning, and this change was largely driven by the English colonizers rather than by the Indigenous peoples themselves. While much academic scholarship has focused on the significance of this war, it remains underappreciated in the public narrative. Too often, it is reduced to a simple struggle between “settlers” and “Indians,” obscuring the complexity of Indigenous political alliances, regional rivalries, and the profound transformation in identity, language, and power that followed in its aftermath. 

In fact, the colonists were not fighting a unified coalition of all the Indigenous nations of New England. Prior to the outbreak of the war in 1675, a number of Indigenous tribes and communities had sought protection from the English and chose not to fight against them in the conflict.In reality, the English colonists were not fighting a unified coalition of all the Indigenous nations of New England. By the outbreak of King Philip’s War in 1675, Indigenous communities across the region responded to the conflict in markedly different ways, shaped by their own political interests, rivalries, kinship obligations, and strategies for survival.

Prior to the war, a number of Indigenous communities had already sought the protection of the English and chose not to join Metacom’s resistance. These groups included the Nausett, Poamett, Mannamoiicke, Wequchutt, Ashemiutt, Sakatuckett, Nobscussett, Mattakeesett, Mannomett, Caukochise, and Masphee communities of Cape Cod and its surrounding region. [54] Other tribes made the decision to remain neutral, side with the English, or oppose the conflict for reasons specific to their own interests. [55] The conflict itself drew in separate factions of Indigenous people from Narragansett, Niantic, Nipmuc, Pequot and Mohegan, to the remnants of the Pokanoket Confederation and the Praying Indian communities along eastern Massachusetts.of eastern Massachusetts whose loyalties and circumstances were often deeply complicated. Some Indigenous peoples fought alongside Metacom, others against him, yet nearly all were choosing the path they believed offered the best chance of survival amid the competing pressures of Indigenous resistance, and colonial subjugation during this unparalleled conflict. 

 During the war, acts of inhuman treatment became common, and often the colonists did not distinguish between Indigenous peoples who fought with Metacom (King Philip) and those who remained neutral or fought with the English. Colonial authorities and soldiers frequently failed, or refused, to distinguish between Indigenous communities allied with Metacom and those who remained neutral or fought alongside the English. [56] Suspicion, fear, violence as well as retaliation blurred political distinctions and last lasting scars on Indigenous and colonel memory. In this environment, the complex political landscape of Indigenous New England was increasingly compressed into simplified categories, helping broader labels such as Wampanoag gain traction in colonial language while obscuring the local identities and alliances that had long defined Indigenous life in southern New England.

Political Identity & Modern Implications

While the history of King Philip’s War is well documented, it is equally important to recognize the profound fear, anger, and hostility many English colonists directed toward the Pokanokets, the people of Massasoit Metacom (King Philip). In colonial memory, the Pokanokets were widely blamed for initiating the conflict, and in the aftermath, their political identity appears to have undergone a form of damnatio memoriae, a condemnation of memory imposed by the victors through violence, displacement, and historical erasure.

This colonial practice of name suppression had precedent. Following the Pequot War (1636–1637), the 1638 Treaty of Hartford formally outlawed the use of the Pequot name, declaring, “The Pequots shall no more be called Pequots but Narragansetts and Mohegans.”[57] The suppression of Indigenous political identities was not merely symbolic. It functioned as a strategy of colonial control, severing peoples from the names, territories, and sovereignties that had once defined them.

 The Pokanokets faced a similar fate after King Philip’s War. Many Pokanoket warriors captured by colonial forces were executed, while others were sold into slavery and transported to the Caribbean, Iberia, and beyond. [58] Those who escaped the jaws of death were embraced by the cold arms of enslavement and indentured servitude as the Pokanokets were scattered into the four directions. Surviving women and children were likewise bound into servitude or exile, as court records in Plymouth detail. [59] Contemporary accounts by Increase Mather and William Hubbard emphasize the executions and the widespread dispersal of captives, while later historians such as Jill Lepore have shown how colonial retaliation fell especially hard upon those who were associated with Metacom and his own people, reducing the Pokanokets to fragmented remnants scattered across New England and the Atlantic world.[60]

 In the aftermath, as Daniel Gookin observed, Pokanoket survivors were absorbed into neighboring communities including the Nipmuc, and Niantic-Narragansetts or fled north into Abenaki country, scattering the people once united under Massasoit Metacom's (King Philip) authority. [61] Yet survival came with difficult choices. Praying Indian communities, themselves under intense colonial suspicion, military oversight, and surveillance, were in little position to openly shelter Pokanoket refugees associated with Metacom’s resistance. Colonial authorities increasingly failed, or refused, to distinguish between allied, neutral, and hostile Indigenous peoples, meaning that any community suspected of aiding Pokanoket survivors risked collective punishment, removal, or dissolution. [62]

 In such an environment, older political identities became increasingly dangerous to maintain openly. Geographic or regional terms gradually replaced more localized political names, not necessarily by choice, but through the pressures of survival among dispersed and vulnerable communities. This transformation was not simply linguistic. It reflected the harsh realities of colonial violence, displacement, and adaptation in a world where preserving one’s people sometimes required reshaping how one was known. 

During and after the war, the term Wampanoag became a label used by English colonists and later historians to describe an aggregate of various Indigenous groups, such as the Pokanoket, Massachusetts, Narragansett, Nipmuc, and others whom Massasoit Metacom (alias King Philip) sought to unite under his leadership. [63] While the word itself predated the war as a linguistic and directional term associated with “easterners,” its transformation into a broader political label appears to have been  coined by the English during the war. Wampanoag evolved into a generalized term that not only referred to those who fought against the English but also, over time as memories of the past blended into stories told to surviving generations, it became synonymous with the Indigenous peoples of southern New England. As W. F. Gookin aptly noted regarding this transformation, “It is one of the ironies of history that the most easterly of them, the Christian Indians of the Cape and the Islands, are now also known by the name [Wampanoag] used for the tribes that refused to aid [King Philip] in 1675.”[64]

It was not until nearly 300 years later, in 1928, that Indigenous communities including Mashpee, Gay Head (Aquinnah), Herring Pond, and Assonet, reorganized under the renewed political identity of the Wampanoag Nation. In this sense, the 20th century Wampanoag Nation represents a post-contact political reorganization rooted in Indigenous resilience and survival, rather than a direct continuation of the political terminology most consistently used in 17th century sources. Those sources in question consistently identify Massasoit Ousamequin’s people as Pokanoket. The adoption in the 20th century of the “Wampanoag Nation” reflects Indigenous survival and political reorganization in the face of colonial erasure, rather than continuity with 17th century Indigenous self-identification. [65] It is crucial to distinguish between the term Wampanoag as it was used in 1620, 1675 and its later political meaning in 1928. In the early 17th century, Massasoit Ousamequin, his people, the surrounding Indigenous nations, and the first generation of English settlers all understood who the Pokanokets were. Wampanoag evolved over time into a broader regional and political identity shaped by centuries of colonial disruption and Indigenous adaptation.

In conclusion, the historical evidence establishes that the tribe that “greeted the Pilgrims” in 1621 were known in their own time as "Pokanoket," not "Wampanoag." Recognizing this distinction does not diminish the meaning of contemporary Wampanoag identity, nor the sovereignty of Indigenous communities who carry that name today. Rather, it asks us to reconsider how names change over time and how colonial conflict, historical memory, and later scholarship shaped the language through which Indigenous peoples of southern New England came to be understood. While "Wampanoag" has become a dominant label in contemporary discourse, it is a term whose meaning has been drastically altered by colonial pressure and in doing so, obscured the true original names and identities of the Indigenous peoples of southern New England.

Understanding and respecting these distinctions is essential to acknowledging the complex and often painful history of colonization. While this information may be new to some, one must understand that in historiography when the evidence changes, so must the thesis.  It requires a willingness to follow the evidence wherever it leads. To ignore the “veto power” of primary sources and accept popular contemporary narratives without question is irresponsible and dangerously ahistorical, for it risks transforming history into myth, however well intentioned. For these reasons today, there remains widespread confusion between the histories of the Pokanoket and the Wampanoag.

We must recognize the necessity of decolonizing our minds and reclaiming the names of our ancestors, rather than accepting the terms imposed upon us by our colonizers. Before we were Wampanoag, we were Pocasset, Sakonnet, Nemasket, Chappaquiddick, Manomet, Saukatucket, Pokanoket, and we still are. We hold on to the names and identities of the people who welcomed strangers to our shores. And when these strangers became conquerors, we continued to hold onto our name for generations in defiance. The Pokanokets are still here, and so long as our people remember who we are, we can never truly be conquered, and our story will never be erased from the pages of history.

© 2026 The Seven Crescents

Strong Turtle of Pokanoket.

 All rights reserved.

End Notes

1.  Jean M. O’Brien, Firsting and Lasting: Writing Indians Out of Existence in New England (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2010); Philip J. Deloria, Playing Indian (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998); Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States (Boston: Beacon Press, 2014); Colin G. Calloway, The Scratch of a Pen: 1763 and the Transformation of North America (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006); Ives Goddard, “The Use of Exonyms in Algonquian Language Contact,” International Journal of American Linguistics 52, no. 3 (1986): 361–63; Daniel K. Richter, “War and Culture: The Iroquois Experience,” William and Mary Quarterly 40, no. 4 (1983): 528–59.

2.  David E. Wilkins and Heidi Kiiwetinepinesiik Stark, American Indian Politics and the American Political System, 4th ed. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2017); Renée Ann Cramer, Cash, Color, and Colonialism: The Politics of Tribal Acknowledgment (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2005); Charles Wilkinson, Blood Struggle: The Rise of Modern Indian Nations (New York: W. W. Norton, 2005); Russell Thornton, “Tribal Enrollment and Blood Quantum: The Definition of Identity in Changing Societies,” American Indian Quarterly 7, no. 3 (1983): 3–26.

3.  Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States (Boston: Beacon Press, 2014), 198–204; David Wallace Adams, Education for Extinction: American Indians and the Boarding School Experience, 1875–1928 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1995), 3–5; Eva Marie Garroutte, Real Indians: Identity and the Survival of Native America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003), 26–33.

4. United States Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Summary under the Criteria and Evidence for Final Determination Against Federal Acknowledgment of the Nipmuc Nation, 69 Fed. Reg. 55766–55768 (Sept. 16, 2004); see also Jean O’Brien, Firsting and Lasting: Writing Indians Out of Existence in New England (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2010), 152–156.

5. Renée Ann Cramer, Cash, Color, and Colonialism: The Politics of Tribal Acknowledgment (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2005); David E. Wilkins and Heidi Kiiwetinepinesiik Stark, American Indian Politics and the American Political System, 4th ed. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2017); Mark Edwin Miller, Forgotten Tribes: Unrecognized Indians and the Federal Acknowledgment Process (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2004); Barbara A. Leitch, “Federal Acknowledgment of American Indian Tribes: The Historical Development of a Legal Concept,” American Indian Law Review 9, no. 2 (1981): 249–90.

6. Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History (Boston: Beacon Press, 1995), 26–29.

7. Aníbal Quijano, “Coloniality of Power, Eurocentrism, and Latin America,” Nepantla: Views from South 1, no. 3 (2000): 535.

8. W. F. Gookin, "Massasoit's Domain: Is 'Wampanoag' the Correct Designation?" Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 12.

9.  Edward Winslow, Mourt’s Relation (London: John Bellamie, 1622); Edward Winslow, Good News from New England (London: William Bladen, 1624), 20; William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation, 1620–1647, ed. Samuel Eliot Morison (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1952); Daniel Gookin, Historical Collections of the Indians in New England (Cambridge, MA: Samuel Green, 1674), 12–13; Ives Goddard, “The Use of Exonyms in Algonquian Language Contact,” International Journal of American Linguistics 52, no. 3 (1986): 361–63; Blair A. Rudes, “Resurrecting Wampano,” in Papers of the Twenty-Ninth Algonquian Conference, ed. David H. Pentland (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba, 1998), 268–69; Jean M. O’Brien, Firsting and Lasting: Writing Indians Out of Existence in New England (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2010); David J. Silverman, Faith and Boundaries: Colonists, Christianity, and Community among the Wampanoag Indians of Martha’s Vineyard, 1600–1871 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005).

10. Edward Winslow, Good Newes from New England (London: William Jones, 1624), 62-63, accessed [12, 04, 2024], https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/66332/pg66332-images.html.

11. Rehoboth North Purchase, 1641 and Taunton North Purchase, 1649, in Jeremy Dupertuis Bangs, Indian Deeds: Land Transactions in Plymouth Colony, 1620–1691 (Cambridge, MA: General Society of Mayflower Descendants, 2002); Nathaniel Morton, New England’s Memorial (Cambridge, MA: S.G. and M.J., 1669), 80–83; Samuel Hopkins Emery, The History of Taunton, Massachusetts (Syracuse, NY: D. Mason & Co., 1893), 31–32; John Daggett, A Sketch of the History of Attleborough (Attleborough, MA: John S. Daggett, 1894), 5–7; John Daggett, History of Norton, Massachusetts (Norton, MA: John Daggett, 1837), 4–6; Thomas W. Bicknell, A History of Barrington, Rhode Island (Providence: Snow & Farnham, 1898), 30–34; Daniel Gookin, Historical Collections of the Indians in New England (Cambridge, MA: Samuel Green, 1674), 12–13; Colin G. Calloway, New Worlds for All: Indians, Europeans, and the Remaking of Early America (Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1997).

12. Thomas Dermer, Letter of Thomas Dermer: Describing His Passage from Maine to Virginia, A.D. 1619 (New York: [s.n.], 1841), 350, accessed [Month Day, Year], http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.gdc/gckb.010.

13. Cape Cod Times. “Wampanoag Peace Treaty Commemorated on New $1 Coin.” Cape Cod Times, December 1, 2010.

14. William Bradford and Edward Winslow, Mourt's Relation: A Journal of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, 1622. Part I, ed. Dwight B. Heath (New York: The New York Public Library, 1963; The Plymouth Colony Archive Project, 2007), 59, accessed May 1, 2025, http://www.histarch.illinois.edu/plymouth/mourt1.html.

15.  Edward Winslow, Good Newes from New England (London: William Jones, 1624), 62-63, accessed [5/10/ 2024], https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/66332/pg66332-images.html.

16. W. F. Gookin, "Massasoit's Domain: Is 'Wampanoag' the Correct Designation?" Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 13.

17. Rev. William Hubbard, A General History of New England from the Discovery to MDCLXXX (Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1848), as quoted in Thomas Williams Bicknell, A History of Barrington, Rhode Island (Providence: Snow & Farnham, 1898), 97. 

18. W. F. Gookin, "Massasoit's Domain: Is 'Wampanoag' the Correct Designation?" Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 13.

19. John Josselyn, An Account of Two Voyages to New-England Made During the Years 1638, 1663, ed. William Veazie (Project Gutenberg, 2022), accessed July 1, 2024, https://www.gutenberg.org/files/66922/66922-h/66922-h.htm.

20. W. F. Gookin, “Massasoit’s Domain: Is ‘Wampanoag’ the Correct Designation?,” Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 13.

21. W. F. Gookin, “Massasoit’s Domain: Is ‘Wampanoag’ the Correct Designation?,” Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 13.

22. Daniel Gookin, Historical Collections of the Indians of New England, ed. James P. Baxter (Cambridge: The Prince Society, 1866)

23. Seller, John. A Mapp of New England. London: John Seller, 1675. Harvard Map Collection. Accessed May 28, 2025 https://collections.leventhalmap.org/search/commonwealth%3A7h14b081v.

24.  J. H. Temple, History of North Brookfield, Massachusetts: Preceded by an Account of Old Quabaug, Indian and English Occupation, 1647–1676 (North Brookfield, MA: Town of North Brookfield, 1887), 23

25.  J. H. Temple, History of North Brookfield, Massachusetts: Preceded by an Account of Old Quabaug, Indian and English Occupation, 1647–1676 (North Brookfield, MA: Town of North Brookfield, 1887), 44–46

26. The Compact with the Charter and Laws of the Colony of New Plymouth, ed. William Brigham (Boston: Dutton and Wentworth, 1836), 111–112, https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?cc=evans;idno=N03341.0001.001;node=N03341.0001.001:11;rgn=div1;view=text.

27. Edward Winslow, Mourt’s Relation: A Journal of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, ed. Dwight B. Heath (Bedford, MA: Applewood Books, 1963), 84–90; Edward Winslow, Good News from New England (London: William Bladen and John Bellamie, 1624), in Chronicles of the Pilgrim Fathers of the Colony of Plymouth, from 1602–1625, ed. Alexander Young (Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1841), 292–301; William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation, 1620–1647, ed. Samuel Eliot Morison (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1952), 94–108.

28.  Rhode Island Historical Preservation & Heritage Commission, Historic and Architectural Resources of Barrington, Rhode Island: A Preliminary Report (Providence: Rhode Island Historical Preservation Commission, 1993) 5. 

29.  Dee Brown, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West, 1st paperback ed. (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2007), 1.

30.  Roger Williams to John Winthrop Sr., ca. 1637–1638, in Glenn W. LaFantasie, ed., The Correspondence of Roger Williams, 1629–1653, vol. 1 (Providence: Brown University Press, 1988), 149; Roger Williams to John Winthrop Jr., September 28, 1640, in Correspondence, vol. 1, 209; Roger Williams to John Winthrop Sr., 1649, in Correspondence, vol. 2, 423.

31.  Edward Winslow, Mourt’s Relation (London: John Bellamie, 1622), 80–81; John Eliot, The Indian Grammar Begun (Cambridge, MA: Marmaduke Johnson, 1666), introduction; Roger Williams, A Key into the Language of America (London: Gregory Dexter, 1643), 27–30; Ives Goddard, “Eastern Algonquian Languages,” in Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 15, Northeast, ed. Bruce G. Trigger (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1978), 70–77; Blair A. Rudes, “Resurrecting Wampano,” in Papers of the Twenty-Ninth Algonquian Conference, ed. David H. Pentland (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba, 1998), 268–69; Kathleen J. Bragdon, Native People of Southern New England, 1500–1650 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1996), 27–31; W. F. Gookin, “Massasoit’s Domain: Is ‘Wampanoag’ the Correct Designation?” Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 12.

32.  W. F. Gookin, "Massasoit’s Domain: Is ‘Wampanoag’ the Correct Designation?" Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 12.

33. William Bradford and Edward Winslow, Mourt's Relation: A Journal of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, 1622, Part I, ed. Dwight B. Heath (New York: The New York Public Library, 1963; The Plymouth Colony Archive Project, 2007), accessed [September 19, 2024], http://www.histarch.illinois.edu/plymouth/mourt1.html.

34. Daniel Gookin, Historical Collections of the Indians in New England (Boston: Belknap and Hall, 1792), 8, https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?cc=evans;c=evans;idno=N18748.0001.001;view=text;rgn=div2;node=N18748.0001.001:5.2

35. Thomas Williams Bicknell, A History of Barrington, Rhode Island (Providence: Snow & Farnham, 1898), 30-34.

36. Daniel Gookin, Historical Collections of the Indians in New England (Cambridge, MA: Samuel Green, 1674), 12–13; Edward Winslow, Good News from New England (London: William Bladen, 1624), 20; Nathaniel Morton, New England’s Memorial (Cambridge, MA: S.G. and M.J., 1669), 80–81; Jeremy Dupertuis Bangs, Indian Deeds: Land Transactions in Plymouth Colony, 1620–1691 (Cambridge, MA: General Society of Mayflower Descendants, 2002); Kathleen J. Bragdon, Native People of Southern New England, 1500–1650 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1996); Colin G. Calloway, New Worlds for All: Indians, Europeans, and the Remaking of Early America (Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1997).

37. Arnold, F. A. The Narragansett Historical Register: A Magazine Devoted to the Antiquities, Genealogy, and Historical Matter Illustrating the History of the Narragansett Country or Southern Rhode Island. Vols. 3–4. Providence, RI: Narragansett Historical Publishing Company, 1884–1886, 238.

38. Blair Rudes, “Resurrecting Wampano (Quiripi) from the Dead: Phonological Preliminaries,” Anthropological Linguistics 39, no. 1 (Spring 1997): 4.

39. Ives Goddard, "The Ethnohistoric Implications of Early Delaware Linguistic Materials," Man in the Northeast 1 (1971): 14-26.

40. Roger Williams, A Key into the Language of America: Or, an Help to the Language of the Natives in That Part of America Called New-England (London: Gregory Dexter, 1643), 116.

41.  Ives Goddard, “Eastern Algonquian Languages,” in Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 15, Northeast, ed. Bruce G. Trigger (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1978), 70–77; Ives Goddard, “The Use of Exonyms in Algonquian Language Contact,” International Journal of American Linguistics 52, no. 3 (1986): 361–63; Blair A. Rudes, “Resurrecting Wampano,” in Papers of the Twenty-Ninth Algonquian Conference, ed. David H. Pentland (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba, 1998), 268–69; John Eliot, The Indian Grammar Begun (Cambridge, MA: Marmaduke Johnson, 1666), introduction; William Wood, New England’s Prospect (London: John Dawson, 1634), 74–76.

42. W. F. Gookin, “Massasoit’s Domain: Is ‘Wampanoag’ the Correct Designation?,” Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958); 14.

43. Sylvia Kasprycki, “Ethnic Names and Identities: The Case of the Abenaki,” Anthropos 97, no. 1 (2002): 115–27; Colin G. Calloway, The Western Abenakis of Vermont, 1600–1800 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1990); Emma Anderson, The People of the Dawn: The Wabanaki Confederacy (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999); Harold Prins, “Children of Gluskap: Wabanaki Indians on the Eve of the European Invasion,” in American Beginnings: Exploration, Culture, and Cartography in the Land of Norumbega, ed. Emerson W. Baker, Edwin A. Churchill, Richard D’Abate, Kristine L. Jones, Victor A. Konrad, and Harald E. L. Prins (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994), 85–102.

44.  W. F. Gookin, "Massasoit's Domain: Is 'Wampanoag' the Correct Designation?" Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 14.

45.  J. Franklin Jameson, ed., Narratives of New Netherland, 1609–1664 (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1909), 77–78.

46.  E. M. Ruttenber, Footprints of the Red Men: Indian Geographical Names in the Valley of Hudson’s River, the Valley of the Mohawk, and on the Delaware (Albany, NY: New York State Education Department, 1906), 236–37.

47.  E. M. Ruttenber, Footprints of the Red Men: Indian Geographical Names in the Valley of Hudson’s River, the Valley of the Mohawk, and on the Delaware (Albany, NY: New York State Education Department, 1906), 236–37; Roger Williams, A Key into the Language of America (London: Gregory Dexter, 1643), 165–66; J. Hammond Trumbull, The Composition of Indian Geographical Names (Hartford: Case, Lockwood & Brainard, 1870), 24–25; William Wallace Tooker, Indian Place-Names on Long Island and Islands Adjacent (New York: Putnam’s, 1911), 250–51; “Deed of July 11, 1661,” in E. B. O’Callaghan, ed., The Documentary History of the State of New York, vol. 1 (Albany: Weed, Parsons, 1849), 763.

48. E. M. Ruttenber, Footprints of the Red Men: Indian Geographical Names in the Valley of Hudson’s River, the Valley of the Mohawk, and on the Delaware (Albany, NY: New York State Education Department, 1906), 236–37; J. Hammond Trumbull, The Composition of Indian Geographical Names (Hartford: Case, Lockwood & Brainard, 1870), 24–25; William Wallace Tooker, Indian Place-Names on Long Island and Islands Adjacent (New York: Putnam’s, 1911), 250–51; Roger Williams, A Key into the Language of America (London: Gregory Dexter, 1643), 165–66.

49. Lincoln Newton Kinnicutt, Indian Names of Places in Plymouth, Middleborough, Lakeville and Carver, Plymouth County, Massachusetts: With Interpretations of Some of Them (Worcester, MA: Commonwealth Press, 1909), 36.

50.  William Hubbard, The Present State of New England (London: Thomas Parkhurst, 1677), 23–25; Increase Mather, A Brief History of the War with the Indians in New-England (Boston: John Foster, 1676), 5–7; Records of the Colony of New Plymouth in New England, ed. Nathaniel B. Shurtleff and David Pulsifer, vol. 5 (Boston: William White, 1856), 251–52; Ives Goddard, “The Use of Exonyms in Algonquian Language Contact,” International Journal of American Linguistics 52, no. 3 (1986): 361–63; Blair A. Rudes, “Resurrecting Wampano,” in Papers of the Twenty-Ninth Algonquian Conference, ed. David H. Pentland (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba, 1998), 268–69; Jill Lepore, The Name of War: King Philip’s War and the Origins of American Identity (New York: Vintage, 1998), 22–24; Jean M. O’Brien, Firsting and Lasting: Writing Indians Out of Existence in New England (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2010), 45–47.

51. Captain James Oliver, “Letter to Governor Leverett,” December 27, 1675, in The Colonial Records of Massachusetts, vol. 5 (Boston, 1856), 56–58; Increase Mather, A Brief History of the War with the Indians in New England (Boston, 1676), 6–7.

52. William Hubbard, A Narrative of the Indian Wars in New-England (Boston, 1677), 45-52.

53.  Kathleen J. Bragdon, Native People of Southern New England, 1500–1650 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1996), 13–14; Daniel R. Mandell, King Philip’s War: Colonial Expansion, Native Resistance, and the End of Indian Sovereignty (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010), 8–10;and Neal Salisbury, Manitou and Providence: Indians, Europeans, and the Making of New England, 1500–1643 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982), 141–42.

54. John G. Erhardt, The History of Rehoboth, Seekonk, East Providence, Pawtucket, & Barrington, vol. 2, Seacunke 1645–1692 (Seekonk, MA: J. G. Erhardt, 1983), 238.

55. Increase Mather, A Brief History of the War with the Indians in New-England (Boston: John Foster, 1676), 12–14; William Hubbard, A Narrative of the Troubles with the Indians in New-England (Boston: John Foster, 1677), 25–27; Records of the Colony of New Plymouth in New England, ed. Nathaniel B. Shurtleff and David Pulsifer, vol. 5 (Boston: William White, 1856), 252–53; Jill Lepore, The Name of War: King Philip’s War and the Origins of American Identity (New York: Vintage, 1998), 75–80; Yasuhide Kawashima, Igniting King Philip’s War: The John Sassamon Murder Trial (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2001), 130–35; Daniel R. Mandell, King Philip’s War: Colonial Expansion, Native Resistance, and the End of Indian Sovereignty (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010), 83–90.

56.  Daniel R. Mandell, King Philip’s War: Colonial Expansion, Native Resistance, and the End of Indian Sovereignty (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010), 116–122; Lisa Brooks, Our Beloved Kin: A New History of King Philip’s War (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2018), 217–232; Daniel J. R. Madsen, “The Sovereignty of Transmotion in a State of Exception: Lessons from the Internment of ‘Praying Indians’ on Deer Island, Massachusetts Bay Colony, 1675–1676,” Transmotion 1, no. 1 (2015): 6–29; Daniel Gookin, “An Historical Account of the Doings and Sufferings of the Christian Indians in New England,” in Archaeologia Americana, vol. 2 (Cambridge, MA: Folsom, Wells, and Thurston, 1836), 459–526. 

57.  William Hubbard, The Present State of New England (London: Thomas Parkhurst, 1677), 23–25; Increase Mather, A Brief History of the War with the Indians in New-England (Boston: John Foster, 1676), 5–7; Records of the Colony of New Plymouth in New England, ed. Nathaniel B. Shurtleff and David Pulsifer, vol. 5 (Boston: William White, 1856), 251–52; Jill Lepore, The Name of War: King Philip’s War and the Origins of American Identity (New York: Vintage, 1998), 3–6, 143–47; “Treaty of Hartford, 1638,” in Charles J. Hoadly, ed., Records of the Colony and Plantation of New Haven, from 1638 to 1649 (Hartford: Case, Tiffany & Co., 1857), 29; John Mason, A Brief History of the Pequot War (Boston: S. Kneeland & T. Green, 1736), 27–30; Alfred A. Cave, The Pequot War (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1996), 156–59; Jean M. O’Brien, Firsting and Lasting: Writing Indians Out of Existence in New England (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2010), 45–47; Ives Goddard, “The Use of Exonyms in Algonquian Language Contact,” International Journal of American Linguistics 52, no. 3 (1986): 361–63; Blair A. Rudes, “Resurrecting Wampano,” in Papers of the Twenty-Ninth Algonquian Conference, ed. David H. Pentland (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba, 1998), 268–69.

58.  Increase Mather, A Brief History of the War with the Indians in New-England (Boston: John Foster, 1676), 7–9.

59. Records of the Colony of New Plymouth in New England, ed. Nathaniel B. Shurtleff and David Pulsifer, vol. 5 (Boston: William White, 1856), 251–53.

60.  Increase Mather, A Brief History of the War with the Indians in New-England (Boston: John Foster, 1676), 7–9; William Hubbard, A Narrative of the Troubles with the Indians in New-England (Boston: John Foster, 1677), 44–46; Jill Lepore, The Name of War: King Philip’s War and the Origins of American Identity (New York: Vintage, 1998), 142–47.

61.  Daniel Gookin, Historical Collections of the Indians in New England (Cambridge, MA: Samuel Green, 1674), 12–13.

62. Daniel Gookin, Historical Collections of the Indians in New England (Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 1792), 431–459; Linford D. Fisher, “Indian Surrenderers During and After King Philip’s War,” Ethnohistory 62, no. 1 (Winter 2015): 33–60; Nathaniel B. Shurtleff and David Pulsifer, eds., Records of the Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England, vol. 5, 1674–1686 (Boston: William White, 1854), 55–60, 94–99, 112–118.

63. W. F. Gookin, "Massasoit's Domain: Is 'Wampanoag' the Correct Designation?" Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 14.

64.  W. F. Gookin, "Massasoit's Domain: Is 'Wampanoag' the Correct Designation?" Bulletin of the Massachusetts Archaeological Society 20, no. 1 (1958): 14.

65. Edward Winslow, Good News from New England (London: William Bladen, 1624), 20; Jill Lepore, The Name of War: King Philip’s War and the Origins of American Identity (New York: Vintage, 1998), 142–47; Jean M. O’Brien, Firsting and Lasting: Writing Indians Out of Existence in New England (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2010), 45–47.