Was there a Powhatan prophecy that predicted the arrival of enemies from the east?
Outside Historic Jamestowne, 2016
There were actually two prophecies, as I'll explain below. But first, here are my musings on prophecies ...
Prophecies are only fascinating when they are accurate. Prophecies that don't hit are quickly forgotten, which is nice for prognosticators. There are ways to boost the success rate of a prophecy. One way is to be vague enough so the prophecy can apply to several different outcomes. It's also good to deliver the prophecy orally, so later the details of what was said are debatable. To ensure a perfectly accurate prophecy, you can even make it after the event has occurred. Such an extreme measure is rarely required, though, as the public is typically as eager to see a prophecy hit as the prognosticator (assuming they are not its victims) and will make allowances. This is especially true of historical prophecies, and people will validate the accuracy of an ancient prophecy even if it didn't exactly hit on the nail.. Bonus points are awarded for prophecies that were ignored or misinterpreted in their time.
Does any of that apply to the Powhatan case? Maybe, maybe not..
Many of the books on the Jamestown story tell of a Powhatan prophecy that foretold the cataclysmic events that would befall the native population in the 1600s. Here's the prophecy according to David Price (2003), from Love & Hate in Jamestown.
The idea of a prophecy foretelling the arrival of the English is interesting, but we have to ask ourselves if there really was such a prophecy in advance of the English, and also how well does the prophecy match up with events in the early 1600s? While thinking about these questions, I stumbled on a similar prophecy attributed to the Aztecs about the arrival of invaders from the East, which pointed to the coming of the Spanish. Camilla Townsend, who wrote about both the Aztecs and Pocahontas, is skeptical of the prophecy in the case of the Aztecs, and it's worth checking to see if her reasoning also applies to the Powhatan situation. At the risk of mixing information about these two very different cultures, I will quote Townsend's 2015 writings about the Aztecs.
Camilla Townsend (2015), Malintzin's Choices:
The key point here is "a culture in which omens were often retroactively sought to explain a recent tragedy." Were the Powhatans also such a culture? And could the Powhatan 'prophecy' have been made retroactively to explain the English conquest? If it was made retroactively, who is responsible, the Powhatans or the English? In the case of the Aztecs, Townsend says it was the Indians themselves. In the case of the Powhatan prophecy, she allows for the possibility that either the Powhatans or the English could have made it up:
Camilla Townsend, Pocahontas and the Powhatan Dilemma (2004):
Before I attempt to answer the questions I've posed above, a clarification needs to be made about the "Powhatan prophecy." Authors who write about the Jamestown story don't typically emphasize this point, but William Strachey, our source for this topic, actually wrote about two separate Powhatan prophecies. Historians apparently find that needlessly complicated and tend to write about one or the other in order to make their point. There's nothing terribly sinister about that, but in order to assess the accuracy of the prophecies, we have to look at Strachey's actual words and in doing so we find that the two prophecies specify different conditions. Strachey's actual account is as follows:
Prophecies are only fascinating when they are accurate. Prophecies that don't hit are quickly forgotten, which is nice for prognosticators. There are ways to boost the success rate of a prophecy. One way is to be vague enough so the prophecy can apply to several different outcomes. It's also good to deliver the prophecy orally, so later the details of what was said are debatable. To ensure a perfectly accurate prophecy, you can even make it after the event has occurred. Such an extreme measure is rarely required, though, as the public is typically as eager to see a prophecy hit as the prognosticator (assuming they are not its victims) and will make allowances. This is especially true of historical prophecies, and people will validate the accuracy of an ancient prophecy even if it didn't exactly hit on the nail.. Bonus points are awarded for prophecies that were ignored or misinterpreted in their time.
Does any of that apply to the Powhatan case? Maybe, maybe not..
Many of the books on the Jamestown story tell of a Powhatan prophecy that foretold the cataclysmic events that would befall the native population in the 1600s. Here's the prophecy according to David Price (2003), from Love & Hate in Jamestown.
- "One of Powhatan's priests had delivered a Delphic prophecy: A nation would arise from the Chesapeake Bay and overcome his empire. After consulting with his council of advisers, Powhatan duly ordered the extermination of the Chesapeake tribe, which became extinct that day. The English, of course, had themselves come from the Chesapeake Bay; soon Powhatan and his advisers would have to decide whether it was the English who were the objects of the prophecy, and if so, what to do about them." Citing Strachey (1612) p. 101.
The idea of a prophecy foretelling the arrival of the English is interesting, but we have to ask ourselves if there really was such a prophecy in advance of the English, and also how well does the prophecy match up with events in the early 1600s? While thinking about these questions, I stumbled on a similar prophecy attributed to the Aztecs about the arrival of invaders from the East, which pointed to the coming of the Spanish. Camilla Townsend, who wrote about both the Aztecs and Pocahontas, is skeptical of the prophecy in the case of the Aztecs, and it's worth checking to see if her reasoning also applies to the Powhatan situation. At the risk of mixing information about these two very different cultures, I will quote Townsend's 2015 writings about the Aztecs.
Camilla Townsend (2015), Malintzin's Choices:
- "The children of the Aztec elites—who were those the Spanish taught to write—probably wanted to come up with a reasonable explanation as to why their previously awe-inspiring fathers and uncles had been so roundly defeated. Eventually, they began to claim that there had been terrifying omens before the events, that the god called Quetzalcoatl had long been expected from the east in the year One Reed (1519), and that the Spaniards were therefore perceived to be divine.
The story of the omens appears in Book Twelve of the Florentine Codex—a text prepared under the direction of Bernardino de Sahagún, a Franciscan friar, in the School of Tlatelolco, where Indian noblemen were educated in the Roman alphabet and Christianity. The omens the students mention bear an interesting affinity to those of certain Greek and Latin texts that would have been in the school library. Why, however, would they have been so eager to make the mental leap of believing that similar omens had convinced their forebears of what was to come? We must remember that they came from a culture in which omens were often retroactively sought to explain a recent tragedy. More specifically, as the sons and grandsons of priests and other noblemen, they probably had frequently come face-to-face with popular resentment of—and their own discomfort with —the fact that their forebears had been caught off guard, to put it mildly. p, 46.
The key point here is "a culture in which omens were often retroactively sought to explain a recent tragedy." Were the Powhatans also such a culture? And could the Powhatan 'prophecy' have been made retroactively to explain the English conquest? If it was made retroactively, who is responsible, the Powhatans or the English? In the case of the Aztecs, Townsend says it was the Indians themselves. In the case of the Powhatan prophecy, she allows for the possibility that either the Powhatans or the English could have made it up:
Camilla Townsend, Pocahontas and the Powhatan Dilemma (2004):
- "... at about the same time as the Jamestown colonists arrived, Powhatan made war on the Chesapeakes and in a most unusual move chose to exterminate them all. It was said that he had no choice: a prophecy supposedly had it that he would otherwise meet his doom at the hands of a people coming from the Chesapeake Bay. But it was the self-satisfied English who wrote about this prophecy, fancying themselves the destroyers and pitying the chief for mistakenly imagining that the prophecy referred to the Chesapeakes. There may never have been any such prognostication. Or if there was, perhaps Powhatan’s priests made it in order to justify their sovereign’s politically necessary action." p. 11.
Before I attempt to answer the questions I've posed above, a clarification needs to be made about the "Powhatan prophecy." Authors who write about the Jamestown story don't typically emphasize this point, but William Strachey, our source for this topic, actually wrote about two separate Powhatan prophecies. Historians apparently find that needlessly complicated and tend to write about one or the other in order to make their point. There's nothing terribly sinister about that, but in order to assess the accuracy of the prophecies, we have to look at Strachey's actual words and in doing so we find that the two prophecies specify different conditions. Strachey's actual account is as follows:
William Strachey (1612) The Historie of Travaile Into Virginia Britinia, p. 101 [source]
- "There be at this tyme certayne prophesies afoot amongst the people inhabiting about us, of which Powhatan ya not meanly jealous and careful to divert the construction and danger which his priests contynually put him in feare of. [It is] not long since that his priests told him how that from the Chesapeack Bay a nation should arise which should dissolve and give end to his empire, for which, not many yeares since (perplext with this divelish oracle, and divers understanding thereof), according to the ancyent and gentile customs, he destroyed and put to sword all such who might lye under any doubtful construccion of the said prophesie, as all the inhabitants, the weroance and his subjects of that province, and so remaine all the Chessiopeians at this daye, and for this cause, extinct.
Some of the inhabitants, againe, have not spared to give us to understand, how they have a second prophesie likewise amongst them, that twice they should give overthrow and dishearten the attempters, and such straungers as should invade their territories or labour to settle a plantation among them, but the thyrd time they themselves should fall into their subjection, and under their conquest; and sure in the observacion of our settlement, and the manner thereof hitherto, we maye well suppose that this their apprehension may fully touch at us. I leave to expresse the particulars unto another place, albeyt, let me saye here, straunge whispers (indeed) and secrett at this hower run among these people and possesse them with amazement, what may be the yssue of these straung preparations landed in their coasts, and yearly supplyed with fresher trouppes."
To recap the differences, the first prophecy specifies a nation arising from the Chesapeake Bay who are not necessarily strangers, but who will end the Powhatan empire. The second prophecy speaks of three attempts by foreigners (strangers) who will invade the Powhatan territory and conquer the Powhatans on the third try. In most writings on the Jamestown story, these two prophecies are consolidated into one single prophecy that contain the selected details from either or both that the author finds most compelling.
So, were the Powhatans a culture that used omens to retroactively explain a recent tragedy? Perhaps, but I have to say right away that I have no evidence for that either way, and I have to leave the question open in case evidence for or against it turns up. On the other hand, we do know (or more precisely, we are told by historians) that the Powhatans were frequent makers of prophesies, so prophecies like those mentioned by Strachey seem reasonable enough. James Horn says this about the role of priests in Powhatan society:
From James Horn, A Land as God Made It (2005).
If the prophecies were made up after the fact, who would have done so, and why? It seems unlikely to me that the Powhatans, after wiping out the Chesapeaks, would have felt the need to explain or justify themselves to the English by making up a retroactive prophecy. On the other hand, perhaps they would have done so to justify their actions to neighboring tribes. On the possibility that Strachey made the prophecies up on his own, I don't see it as likely. Townsend says the "self-satisfied English" placed themselves in the prophecy, but this is an imprecise statement. It was an individual, Strachey, who said it, and what would have been his motivation for aggrandizing the English in 1609, when the colonists had such a weak hold on only a small piece of Powhatan territory? I think it's more likely that he reported the information as accurately as he could. Helen Rountree has this to say about Strachey's overall credibility: (1989), "he had a wider and more detailed curiosity about Indian life than any other writer of his time." (The Powhatan Indians of Virginia, p. 4).
Strachey wrote about prophecies fairly early in the Jamestown story, and before it was clear that the colony would succeed. It seems unlikely to me that he viewed the colonists as destroyers of the Powhatan confederation--at the time, the Powhatans still held the upper hand. (And if the English originated the prophecies, then it was they who were the prescient ones.) But I'm more inclined to think that Strachey did not invent the prophecies and spoke of what he'd heard from the natives to explain the fearful and suspicious attitudes he observed among them, which is exactly how he explained it.
Assessing Prophecy #1
The first prophecy was of a nation arising from the Chesapeake Bay that would end Powhatan's rule. Strachey wrote, "...his priests told him how that from the Chesapeack Bay a nation should arise which should dissolve and give end to his empire ..."
1) Was prophecy #1 made prior to English arrival?
Probably, as Powhatan eliminated the Chesapeaks before the English arrival. However, we have to leave room for a tiny bit of doubt about a retroactive prophecy made by the Powhatans after the arrival of the English that told of them defeating the Chesapeaks. The prophecy was certainly made prior to English success in dominating the Powhatans.
2) Did the Powhatan's make this prophecy retroactively to explain a prior event?
It seems unlikely that the Powhatans would have felt the need to excuse or explain themselves to the English, but they may have made the prophecy retroactively to defend their actions among neighboring tribes. However, we have no evidence that this happened.
3) Did the English (or Strachey) make it up?
Probably not, as it's difficult to see a motive for doing so. However, we don't really know.
4) Did the prophecy hit?
Yes. We can say the English colonists 'arose from the Chesapeak Bay', making this an accurate prediction after the Powhatans had misidentified an earlier rival as the object of the prophecy..
Assessing Prophecy #2
The second prophecy was of a series of invasions by strangers that the Powhatans would defeat twice, but fail to defeat on the third attempt. Strachey wrote, "... they have a second prophesie likewise amongst them, that twice they should give overthrow and dishearten the attempters, and such straungers as should invade their territories or labour to settle a plantation among them, but the thyrd time they themselves should fall into their subjection, and under their conquest ...."
1) Was prophecy #2 made prior to English arrival?
We don't know exactly when it was made, but it was definitely reported before the outcome was known. So basically, yes, it was made prior to the event it describes.
2) Did the Powhatans make this prophecy retroactively to explain a prior event?
No, because the Powhatans hadn't yet been defeated at the time Strachey reported this.
3) Did the English (or Strachey) make it up?
Again, it's difficult to see a motive for doing so. However, we don't really know. A red flag is Strachey saying "to settle a plantation among them." It's hard to imagine the Indians prophesying a "plantation," as they wouldn't have known what that was. But this is likely a problem of Strachey's translation of what the Indians meant. For example, if the Indians told of the prophesied invaders planting corn on tribal lands, then Strachey may have described that as a "plantation," reflecting what he knew rather than what the Indians would have imagined.
4) Did the prophecy hit?
The prophecy was mostly accurate, but we don't clearly understand the meaning of "attempters" here. We may assume the Chesapeaks fit the profile well enough to be considered rivals worthy of being destroyed, but who were the second "attempters"? The colonists at Roanoke might be a candidate, but since we don't know for a fact that the Powhatans destroyed them, we can't say for sure. Anyway, the prophecy hits in the sense that the Powhatans were defeated in the end, but the identity of one of the three "attempters" is a little vague.
To conclude, while allowing some doubt about Strachey's account, I think it's very possible there were prophecies that originated with the Powhatans prior to or at the same time as the arrival of the English that predicted the demise of the Powhatan confederation, and which, by coincidence, turned out to be accurate. The Powhatans had been seeing mysterious arrivals from across the ocean for decades, and it does not seem unlikely that Powhatan priests would have sought to explain and prognosticate as required by their positions as holy men and advisors.
So, were the Powhatans a culture that used omens to retroactively explain a recent tragedy? Perhaps, but I have to say right away that I have no evidence for that either way, and I have to leave the question open in case evidence for or against it turns up. On the other hand, we do know (or more precisely, we are told by historians) that the Powhatans were frequent makers of prophesies, so prophecies like those mentioned by Strachey seem reasonable enough. James Horn says this about the role of priests in Powhatan society:
From James Horn, A Land as God Made It (2005).
- "When important decisions, such as whether to go to war, were made, custom demanded that chiefs take advice from their counselors and priests. Counselors (“cawcawwasoughs” or “cockerouses”) were usually drawn from village elders, warriors, and priests, and at a district level might include some town werowances. Priests were the principal buttress of the chief’s authority, their avowed ability to foresee the future making them indispensable in providing political decisions. “When they intend any warres,” Smith noted, “the Werowances usually have the advice of their Priests and Conjurers, and their Allies and ancient friends, but chiefely the Priests determine their resolution.” Strachey put it more forcefully, remarking that priests “at all tymes” governed “and direct[ed] the Weroances … in all their accions.”
More generally, priests were vital intermediaries between the people and spiritual forces that infused earthly society. They read the omens and advised accordingly on preparations for a hunt or a fishing expedition; they sought to influence the weather, bringing rain or quelling storms; and they fulfilled the role of healers through their knowledge of herbs and certain curative techniques. On occasion, priests would seek a secluded place deep in the woods or on “some desolate promontory Toppe” where they called upon Okeus and other deities for guidance. William Strachey observed that the Indians were much given to “straunge whispers” which “run among … [them] and possesse them with amazement [about] what maie be the yssue of these straunge preparations, landed on their Coasts.” According to the Powhatan Uttamatomakkin, Okeus had forewarned the great chief’s priests about the arrival of the English sometime before they appeared in the Chesapeake Bay. [17]." p. 20
If the prophecies were made up after the fact, who would have done so, and why? It seems unlikely to me that the Powhatans, after wiping out the Chesapeaks, would have felt the need to explain or justify themselves to the English by making up a retroactive prophecy. On the other hand, perhaps they would have done so to justify their actions to neighboring tribes. On the possibility that Strachey made the prophecies up on his own, I don't see it as likely. Townsend says the "self-satisfied English" placed themselves in the prophecy, but this is an imprecise statement. It was an individual, Strachey, who said it, and what would have been his motivation for aggrandizing the English in 1609, when the colonists had such a weak hold on only a small piece of Powhatan territory? I think it's more likely that he reported the information as accurately as he could. Helen Rountree has this to say about Strachey's overall credibility: (1989), "he had a wider and more detailed curiosity about Indian life than any other writer of his time." (The Powhatan Indians of Virginia, p. 4).
Strachey wrote about prophecies fairly early in the Jamestown story, and before it was clear that the colony would succeed. It seems unlikely to me that he viewed the colonists as destroyers of the Powhatan confederation--at the time, the Powhatans still held the upper hand. (And if the English originated the prophecies, then it was they who were the prescient ones.) But I'm more inclined to think that Strachey did not invent the prophecies and spoke of what he'd heard from the natives to explain the fearful and suspicious attitudes he observed among them, which is exactly how he explained it.
Assessing Prophecy #1
The first prophecy was of a nation arising from the Chesapeake Bay that would end Powhatan's rule. Strachey wrote, "...his priests told him how that from the Chesapeack Bay a nation should arise which should dissolve and give end to his empire ..."
1) Was prophecy #1 made prior to English arrival?
Probably, as Powhatan eliminated the Chesapeaks before the English arrival. However, we have to leave room for a tiny bit of doubt about a retroactive prophecy made by the Powhatans after the arrival of the English that told of them defeating the Chesapeaks. The prophecy was certainly made prior to English success in dominating the Powhatans.
2) Did the Powhatan's make this prophecy retroactively to explain a prior event?
It seems unlikely that the Powhatans would have felt the need to excuse or explain themselves to the English, but they may have made the prophecy retroactively to defend their actions among neighboring tribes. However, we have no evidence that this happened.
3) Did the English (or Strachey) make it up?
Probably not, as it's difficult to see a motive for doing so. However, we don't really know.
4) Did the prophecy hit?
Yes. We can say the English colonists 'arose from the Chesapeak Bay', making this an accurate prediction after the Powhatans had misidentified an earlier rival as the object of the prophecy..
Assessing Prophecy #2
The second prophecy was of a series of invasions by strangers that the Powhatans would defeat twice, but fail to defeat on the third attempt. Strachey wrote, "... they have a second prophesie likewise amongst them, that twice they should give overthrow and dishearten the attempters, and such straungers as should invade their territories or labour to settle a plantation among them, but the thyrd time they themselves should fall into their subjection, and under their conquest ...."
1) Was prophecy #2 made prior to English arrival?
We don't know exactly when it was made, but it was definitely reported before the outcome was known. So basically, yes, it was made prior to the event it describes.
2) Did the Powhatans make this prophecy retroactively to explain a prior event?
No, because the Powhatans hadn't yet been defeated at the time Strachey reported this.
3) Did the English (or Strachey) make it up?
Again, it's difficult to see a motive for doing so. However, we don't really know. A red flag is Strachey saying "to settle a plantation among them." It's hard to imagine the Indians prophesying a "plantation," as they wouldn't have known what that was. But this is likely a problem of Strachey's translation of what the Indians meant. For example, if the Indians told of the prophesied invaders planting corn on tribal lands, then Strachey may have described that as a "plantation," reflecting what he knew rather than what the Indians would have imagined.
4) Did the prophecy hit?
The prophecy was mostly accurate, but we don't clearly understand the meaning of "attempters" here. We may assume the Chesapeaks fit the profile well enough to be considered rivals worthy of being destroyed, but who were the second "attempters"? The colonists at Roanoke might be a candidate, but since we don't know for a fact that the Powhatans destroyed them, we can't say for sure. Anyway, the prophecy hits in the sense that the Powhatans were defeated in the end, but the identity of one of the three "attempters" is a little vague.
To conclude, while allowing some doubt about Strachey's account, I think it's very possible there were prophecies that originated with the Powhatans prior to or at the same time as the arrival of the English that predicted the demise of the Powhatan confederation, and which, by coincidence, turned out to be accurate. The Powhatans had been seeing mysterious arrivals from across the ocean for decades, and it does not seem unlikely that Powhatan priests would have sought to explain and prognosticate as required by their positions as holy men and advisors.
I am not often one to quote Paula Gunn Allen (2004), Pocahontas-Medicine Woman-Spy-Entrepreneur-Diplomat, but this case appears to be right up her spiritual alley:
My comment:
Gunn Allen misses the opportunity to take a victory lap over the Powhatans' fairly accurate prophecies and instead regales us with her shower thoughts on numerology. Why the significant number of the English is relevant here is unclear, as it was the Powhatans who made the prophecies, not the English. And did the English really have a "profound belief in the magical properties of the number three," or just a casual superstition to that effect? No matter; Gunn Allen sees spirituality at work in the numbers here, and she's going to run with it.
- "There had been prophecy known among the tsenacommacah since it was said, ancient times. As the English writer and adventurer William Strachey reported in 1610 during a visit he made to Jamestown {Strachey quotes; see original above].
In other words, this ancient prophecy was a heads-up: the days of the Powhatan Alliance were numbered. It let them know that even though the first two attempts would be foiled by the Native residents, still the 'invaders' would triumph. For the English, the 'third time' would be the charm,' like in an English folktale. Had they been aware of the aliens' profound belief in the magical properties of the number three, that alone might have given the Algonquins a hint: these would not be of any Native Nations, but invaders so foreign that even their magic numbers were not the same. For among most of the inhabitants of the Americas, four is the sacred number, and so, among them, 'the fourth time is the charm.' " p. 34, 35
"The Powhatan prophecy had foretold of three invasions and Smith and the Virginia Company were the third and biggest threat. For the Powhatans and their allies had already wiped out the first two;: Roanoke's 'Lost Colony' in 1587 and another botched attempt north of Chesapeake in approximately 1595, about the time Pocahontas was born." p. 39
My comment:
Gunn Allen misses the opportunity to take a victory lap over the Powhatans' fairly accurate prophecies and instead regales us with her shower thoughts on numerology. Why the significant number of the English is relevant here is unclear, as it was the Powhatans who made the prophecies, not the English. And did the English really have a "profound belief in the magical properties of the number three," or just a casual superstition to that effect? No matter; Gunn Allen sees spirituality at work in the numbers here, and she's going to run with it.
"The Chesapeake Indians and the Powhatan Prophecy" article by Bernice Latou; Owlcation, updated February 20, 2018
(C) Kevin Miller 2018
Updated April 8, 2018
Updated April 8, 2018
