The tribe numbers approximately 500 members, 80 percent of whom live within ten miles (16 km) of the tribe's original village. The tribe's chief is Robert "Two Eagles" Green, who advised the filmmakers and appeared in the film in a non-speaking role in The New World. He also provided large numbers of wild turkey feathers and deer antlers for the purposes of costuming the American Indian characters in the film. Green is a resident of Clearview Heights, a district of Fredericksburg, Virginia, and is originally from White Oak, Virginia. His son Jason also appears in the film, as a Powhatan warrior.
The tribe's language, in the Algonquian language family, is no longer spoken, but some tribal members are interested in revitalizing the language with the help of audio and printed materials prepared by the linguist Blair Rudes for The New World in an effort to reconstruct the Algonquian language as it was spoken in coastal Virginia in the early 17th century.
At the time of the settlement of Jamestown, the chief of the Patawomeck was Japazeus. The tribe was friendly with the English colonists (Captain Samuel Argall in particular) and provided crucial assistance to them during the "starving time" between 1609 and 1612. It is believed that Pocahontas was captured while visiting the Patawomeck village in the spring of 1613. John Smith said that, upon his arrival in 1608, there were of corn growing along the Potomac River.
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Last updated on Tuesday August 12, 2008 at 18:22:05 PDT (GMT -0700)
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