the south of them, they were acutely aware of—indeed, often respectful of—
their Native American neighbors, on whom they depended for food and
instruction. Because they often did not understand the nature of Indian
society or government, they explained it in the only terms they knew,
European titles and offices. They found “kings” everywhere they went.
They were also struck by how much the Indian villages reminded them of
English villages. Later historians, whose contemporary Native Americans
were the semi-nomads of the Great Plains, forgot these early accounts. It
was “politically correct” to portray all Indians as nomads to whom land
had little value; this explained and partly justified colonial land-grabbing. It
is only recently that we have revised our vision of the northeastern Indians
to see them, as indeed they were, as settled villagers and farmers to whom
land was supremely important. In some ways, our most valuable legacy of
the very early times is the collection of what survived of the drawings made
in 1585 by John White. They enable us to come as close as we ever will to
seeing how the native population actually looked and in what they lived.
For the growing Atlantic coastal colonies of Englishmen, Scots, Irish,
Germans, and others who were absorbed into what modern writers call
British America, relatively abundant records exist. From the very early
days, William Bradford is one of the most important chroniclers. His and
other early accounts were concerned primarily with their tiny societies:
how communities ruled themselves; drew up laws; developed legislatures,
courts, and administrations; and, above all, worked their lands. While they
focused on local events and papers, they had also to deal with their British
patrons and crown authorities. It was not until nearly the end of the nine-
teenth century that the first historian tried to make use of the British
records. Alexander Brown’s The First Republic in AmericaandThe Genesis
of the United Stateschallenged scholars to go back to original documents,
because, he argued, the British had suppressed some of the important
information in the published materials. Partly stimulated by him, a virtual
industry began to assemble and make available all the papers that survived.
Until fairly recently, these and other colonial records focused attention
on the creation of institutions and the promulgation of laws and regulations
by the settlers and away from relations with the native peoples. “Serious” his-
torians paid little attention to the way people lived in the new environment.
Introduction xi