The Native Americans
Teresa Oakley
In the 1670s the first sightings of Native Americans was life-changing for the English and to the natives. It’s said in many History books that the English in that time period had no idea there was another country which is now the United States, and that there were other people the Native Americans. In the book, New England’s Prospects, by author William Wood, published in 1634, he talks about and describes his first sightings of Native Americans. They were very timid, curious, and friendly people he wrote. They had a society established like the English, they had somewhat a religious view with king and queen authority like the English had, and women didn’t have a political view in much either. However the way they had everything was way different from the English.
Of what William Wood had described the Native Americans, they were all very timid and mysterious spiritual people, and their living style was very interesting. When the English first arrived they didn’t go see them first, they waited till they were confronted. The Native Americans however were very curious of the sighting of the English and everything they brought. William writes that; (they took the first Ship they saw for a walking Hand), Ch. (9), this could be said that the Native Americans were very much new to all the new inventions the English had and they didn’t know what to think of it. Also the Native Americans appearances were very curious to the English which William describes precisely. They all had mostly fair skin, dark hair, strong type bodies. All the men had hair, but no beards because they thought it would make them look like an English Bastard which William writes about. That shows that the Natives wanted to be different than the English. Also William describes that the Indians thought the English had strange inventions like the plow, which they thought was from the devil. When they first seen a ploughman using the plow to dig up the land they were shocked. As he wrote, Indians thought the land was sacred and to the English they thought that was strange.
What also William Wood writes about what he seen is that Women did a lot more work than the men did, and they weren’t treated fairly but they were allowed to divorce. They had many jobs like planting corn and making houses which was brutal. William describes the difficulties like they would hide corn in a ditch covered from hogs and their husbands; (they put their corn here and cover it from the inquisitive search of their voracious husbands who would eat up their own portion). That shows that husbands