The search results below contain listings from our website. To search our library and museum collections catalogs, please visit the Collections page.
Time Period
16,000 BCE to 1622 CE
Image
At the time of the great northern glaciers, Native Americans followed the game they hunted to Virginia. Ten thousand years later, as the cold of the Ice Age gave way to a warmer, drier climate, they relied also on foraging and farming. After about 900 CE they settled into villages that united into chiefdoms. In 1607, in pursuit of opportunity in a new world, English settlers intruded into an eastern Virginia chiefdom of thirty-two tribes (15,000 to 20,000 people). Its leader then was Wahunsenacawh, whom the new settlers called by his title, Powhatan.
Time Period Chapter
Contact and Conflict
Image
The first settlers were welcomed by the Indians with ceremony. However, following Capt. John Smith’s return to England...
Time Period Chapter
Exploration of the New World
Image
Initially, European nations were searching for a water route to the Far East, not a New World.
Time Period Chapter
Wandering, Foraging, and Farming
Image
Over more than 16,000 years, Indians in Virginia transitioned from nomadic bands of hunter gatherers to sedentary...