First Look at Werowocomoco, Powhatan Capital Artifacts

By Matt Poms Friday, May 14, 2010

Visitors to the Historic Triangle are often quite familiar with the area’s more well-known colonial capital of Williamsburg. But it is another regional capital that the Jamestown Settlement is spotlighting with a new exhibit opening Saturday. Werowocomoco: Seat of Power will run through Nov. 15, and traces the history of Werowocomoco — the center of the Powhatan regional chieftancy for centuries — from its rise around 1200 AD to its abandonment, shortly after the English settled Jamestown, in 1609.

“What we did here was set up an exhibit to reinforce the idea of Werowocomoco as Virginia’s other capital,” said Dr. Thomas Davidson, Senior Curator for the Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation, during a press conference Friday. “It’s looking at the past in a little bit of a different way. It’s shifting focus from what Virginia means to Jamestown, to Jamestown within the context of the Virginia that was already there and developed before 1607.”

The site, which lies across the York River in Gloucester County, was discovered in 2002 on the property of Robert and Lynn Ripley. Excavation has continued under a team of archaeologists from the College of William and Mary, and the exhibit marks the first time that artifacts from the dig will be displayed in a public museum setting.

The Ripleys, academic scholars and Virginia Native American leaders have all been involved in the project.

“Werowocomoco was not approached in the traditional way that archaeology has been done,” Davidson said. “From the beginning, the Ripleys were very concerned that the Virginia Indian community be involved in all aspects of the project, including the decision-making. Werowocomoco is not something that university professors with no relationship to the community are doing. The excavation, the research itself, becomes part of the process, becomes part of a public education. It’s almost become a rallying point for the Virginia Indian community’s interest in its past.”

The exhibit, located upstairs in the Special Exhibition gallery, greets visitors with an imposing model of Wahunsenecawh, the powerful Powhatan leader who interacted with Captain John Smith on his initial arrival at Jamestown. Displays trace the history and evolution of the site, while a diorama of the area during Wahunsenecawh’s rule fills the center of the room.

The model highlights the settlements distinctive features, including the Yehaca, or great house, which sheltered Wahunsenecawh, and surrounding ceremonial earthworks that date from 1200 AD.

“This is unprecedented for Virginia,” Davidson said. “The use of earthworks to signify the importance of sites is quite common in other parts of the world, but this is really the first indication we have that an analogous process was going on in the Virginia coastal plain.”

The site was also the scene of the first major interactions between the English and Native Americans in the area. Smith was taken captive and held at Werowocomoco, establishing a relationship that was key to the eventual discovery of the site, centuries later.

Archaeologists examining the Ripleys’ property found copper that was traced to similar finds at Jamestown.

“It’s clearly European copper. It’s clearly identical to the copper they are finding at Jamestown,” Davidson said. “This is the material cultural link between the two civilizations. It’s not so much trade copper as it is gift copper. It’s part of a ceremonial gift exchange that is documented in John Smith’s writings.”

Werowocomoco was eventually abandoned under Wahunsenecawh due to rising tensions with the English nearby. The capital was moved westward to a more protected location at Oropax, on the Chickahominy River. The original site became an English plantation, and the earthworks and other structures gradually succumbed to natural erosion.

Now, thanks to the efforts of the archaeological team led by William and Mary anthropology professor Martin Gallivan, it will be brought back to life. The Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation expects roughly 400,000 visitors to peruse the exhibit before it’s conclusion.

“The most remarkable thing about this is not the reinforcement of the historical story, but a recognition of this other story that is a precursor story about how large political, social creations like the Powhatan chieftaincy came to the coastal plain of Virginia,” Davidson said. “It created a different kind of process from what normally is done.”

The exhibition opens to the public on Saturday, May 15, in conjunction with Jamestown Day events at Jamestown Settlement and Historic Jamestowne, and runs through November 15. Admission is free for residents of James City and York counties and the City of Williamsburg.