Wampanoag Nation
 |
|
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| (2000+) | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Bristol County, Massachusetts, Dukes County, Massachusetts, Barnstable County, Massachusetts, Mashpee, Massachusetts and Nantucket, Massachusetts | |
| Languages | |
| English, historically Wôpanâak | |
| Religion | |
| Wampanoag spirituality, Christianity | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| other Algonquian peoples |
The Wampanoag /ˈwɑːmpənɔːɡ/, also called Massasoit and also rendered Wôpanâak, is a Native American people in North America. They were a loose confederacy made up of several tribes. Many Wampanoag people today are enrolled in two federally recognized tribes, the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe and the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head, or four state-recognized tribes in Massachusetts.
In the beginning of the 17th century, at the time of first contact with the English, the Wampanoag lived in southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island, a territory that encompassed present-day Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket islands. Their population numbered in the thousands due to the richness of the environment and their cultivation of corn, beans and squash. Three thousand Wampanoag lived on Martha's Vineyard alone.
From 1615 to 1619 the Wampanoag suffered an epidemic, long suspected to be smallpox. Early twenty-first century research has suggested that it was leptospirosis, a bacterial infection also known as Weil's syndrome or 7-day fever. It caused a high fatality rate and nearly destroyed the society. Researchers say that the losses from the epidemic were so large that English colonists were more easily able to found their settlements in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in later years. More than 50 years later, the King Philip's War (1675–1676) of Indian allies against the English colonists resulted in the deaths of 40 percent of the surviving tribe. Most of the male Wampanoag were sold into slavery in Bermuda or the West Indies. Many women and children were enslaved by colonists in New England.
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Wikipedia