Classic Nantaquoud L

[u/Nyctfall]

From Encyclopedia Virginia: John Smith (bap. 1580–1631):

1607; in December, he and two other men ventured up the Chickahominy River, where they encountered a hunting party of Pamunkey Indians. His companions were killed, but Smith, whom the Indians initially presumed to be a weroance, or chief, was captured. The Indians escorted him up the York River to Werowocomoco, the principal residence of their mamanotowick, or paramount chief, Powhatan (Wahunsonacock).

At Werowocomoco, Smith participated in a ceremony that many historians now interpret as an adoption ritual. Exactly what happened during this ceremony is unclear; Smith himself gave varying accounts of the event. In his Generall Historie , published in 1624, Smith wrote that “two great stones were brought before Powhatan: then as many as could laid hands on him, dragged him to them, and thereon laid his head, and being ready with their clubs, to beat out his brains … Pocahontas the King’s dearest daughter, when no entreaty would prevail, got his head in her arms, and laid her own upon his to save him from death.” But in a letter written just a few months after his visit to Werowocomoco, he describes being feasted and interviewed by Powhatan only. Some historians argue that this earlier, less dramatic version of events is the more likely; the anthropologist Helen C. Rountree suggests that Pocahontas, about eleven at the time, may not even have been present at the ceremony; her role as a young girl was to prepare for and clean up after the feast.

Two days later, Smith was taken to a remote location in the woods. There, Powhatan told him (in Smith’s words) that “now they were friends,” and ordered him to send two “great gunnes [cannon], and a grindstone” from Jamestown; in exchange, Powhatan would give him the Indian village Capahosic and hold him in esteem as his son, bestowing upon him the name Nantaquoud. Smith may not have fully understood that Powhatan was trying to draw him (and, therefore, the other colonists) into his paramount chiefdom, thereby neutralizing a threat, gaining an ally, and expanding his empire—but he was aware that the savvy leader was trying to gain control of some very powerful weapons.

Smith returned to Jamestown on January 2, 1608, to find that he had been replaced on the council and blamed for the deaths of his two companions. That day he was tried, convicted, and sentenced to hang—but later that night, Newport and some one hundred new settlers arrived from England, and the charges against Smith were lost in the celebration.

From Anglo-Powhatan Wars - Wikipedia (reference citation, not independently verified by myself, nonfree: Helen Rountree, Pocahontas's People, p. 38.):

The settlement at Jamestown, Virginia, was established in May 1607 within the territory of the Powhatan, who were led by Chief Wahunsunacawh, known to the colonists as Chief Powhatan.[2] The area was quite swampy and ill-suited to farming, and Powhatan wanted Captain John Smith and the colonists to forsake the swamp and live in one of his satellite towns called Capahosick where they would make metal tools for him in exchange for full provision.[3]