Natural / Environmental Change
Colonial Period
Metacomet
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Metacomet was a Wampanoag chief in the mid 1600s. In 1675 he launched an attack on the Puritans of Massachusetts Bay Colony over land claims.
The size of the Massachusetts Bay colony grew in the 1640s and 1650s. To accommodate the growing population, the colonists moved further west into Wampanoag territory to find resources. Because the Europeans were moving onto their land, depleting resources, and forcing the Wampanoags further inland, Matcomet, also known as King Philip, and his fellow warriors attacked to defend their traditional homeland and assert their rights.
This drawing shows an artist’s take on a meeting between Metacomet and the colonists.
Native Americans and Europeans had different beliefs about how land should be used. The Native Americans believed that people had a special relationship with the land and did not own it, but instead simply used it responsibly. In contrast, the Europeans believed land was meant to be used, exploited, and owned by people. So, when the Europeans saw how Native Americans used the land, they believed that they could take it because the Native Americans did not “own” it.
By owning the land and introducing new farming techniques, the Europeans changed the layout of the land and its ecosystems. For instance, beavers, large bears, cougars, panthers, and other animals once thrived in New England . But a combination of ecosystem change and hunting (for skins like those seen here) severely decreased the population of these animals and sometimes led to outright extinction.
This painting, created in the mid 1800s, shows what an artist imagined Plymouth , Massachusetts to look like in 1620. The artist depicts a rocky, hilly terrain complete with large trees and vegetation. According to the studies of environmental historians like William Cronon, this was not far from the truth. Massachusetts in the 17 th century was a densely forested region.
This is a picture of Massachusetts in the 1900s. Years of invasive farming techniques changed the physical layout of the land. Much of what was once dense forest became, over time, a flatter land that was more suitable to the agricultural needs of the area’s inhabitants.
