The True Story of Pocahontas
Historian Camilla Townsend separates fact from fiction, as a new documentary premieres about the American Indian princess
By Jacqueline Mansky
March 23, 2017
Pocahontas might be a household name, but the true story of her short but powerful life has been buried in myths that have persisted since the 17th century.
To start with, Pocahontas wasn’t even her actual name. Born about 1596, her real name was Amonute, and she also had the more private name Matoaka. Pocahontas was her nickname, which depending on who you ask means “playful one†or “ill-behaved child.â€
Pocahontas was the favorite daughter of Powhatan, the formidable ruler of the more than 30 Algonquian-speaking tribes in and around the area that the early English settlers would claim as Jamestown, Virginia. Years later—after no one was able to dispute the facts—John Smith wrote about how she, the beautiful daughter of a powerful native leader, rescued him, an English adventurer, from being executed by her father.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/true-story-pocahontas-180962649/
