Colonial Native American Women

As the great migration from Europe to the United States began there was a major discovery made when the new settlers found that there were already people living on the newly discovered lands. "Before the arrival of the white man, North America was inhabited by a mere 600,000 Indians. They were divided into innumerable tribes, speaking many different languages" (M. Gibson, The American Indian, p.9). These tribes differed in many ways, such as in their cultural and societal traits, clothing and appearance, religious ceremonies, and the roles of each member of the tribe. The roles of women in each of these areas played an important part in distinguishing between the unique tribal lines.
The settlers were unable to understand the cultural traits of these new people. At first contact the Indians were seen as being anywhere from gentle to barbaric. The treatment of the women in the tribes was foreign to the Europeans. The first reaction to the women in the tribes was of awe. Although many of the early visitors to New England were captivated by the beauty of the Indian women, they soon discovered that the Indian warriors, especially the Narragansetts, were very jealous of their wives' honor and reacted violently to any familiarity. The

Although few histories of the European settlements in North America in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries have acknowledged it, women played a key role in the development of the North American colonies. The first European outposts (St. Augustine, Jamestown, Quebec, Montreal, New Amsterdam) were composed exclusively or primarily of men. Since these settlements were envisioned as military or trading ventures, that fact is hardly surprising, but the absence of a substantial number of European women among the first settlers had a lasting impact on those societies' subsequent histories.

The Native American women were well respected and given plenty of freedom. They had specific roles to play in the village or tribe and took care of many responsibilities. Some saw the native women as being abused or dominated by the men of the society. Women, in fact, were very important to the Native society. They were often taught from an early age to work in the home and even the fields. " In Spring, both men and women worked in the fields planting the crops, but thereafter the women were expected to do all the hoeing on their own" (M. Gibson, p.29). In addition to the duties in the crops, the women were expected to care for the home, their children, and of their family. Chief Standing Bear of the Sioux tribe wrote: "Women's work was to cook for the family, keep the teepee in order, and sew the clothing of the household members" (M. Gibson, p.36) The women erected and maintained the materials for housing and also did all the domestic work inside the dwellings. Women were also given the unique freedom among some tribes of torture. They would tie their captives to poles in the middle of camps and slowly torture them to death. They sang war songs and teased and taunted their captives in order to show that their bodies can be broken in many ways. Among the plains Indians the women