Wahunsenacawh biography of christopher

Leader of the Powhatan Confederacy (c. 1547–c.

Wahunsenacawh biography of christopher

1618)

Powhatan (c. 1547 – c. 1618), whose proper name was Wahunsenacawh (alternately spelled Wahunsenacah, Wahunsunacock, or Wahunsonacock), was the leader of the Powhatan, an alliance of Algonquian-speaking Native Americans living in Tsenacommacah, in the Tidewater region of Virginia at the time when English settlers landed at Jamestown in 1607.

Powhatan, alternately called "King" or "Chief" Powhatan by English settlers, led the main political and military power facing the early colonists, and was probably the older brother of Opechancanough, who led attacks against the settlers in 1622 and 1644.

He was the father of Matoaka (Pocahontas).

Name

In 1607, the English colonists were introduced to Wahunsenacawh as Powhatan and understood this latter name to come from Powhatan's hometown near the falls of the James River near present-day Richmond, Virginia.^[2]

Seventeenth-cent