2. Settling
• The Puritans believed that the untamed nature was both evil
and seductive, and exposure to it would transform a man into
an Indian
• Colonists worked hard to transform the landscape to resemble
England, which they regarded as God’s blueprint for human-
improved nature
• The natives were highly effective at horticulture, using the
squashes to protect vines, and corn stalks to grow beans up
• To ease hunting, the Indians would burn the forest twice a
year, much less damaging than present day wildfires. This is
because regular burning clears deadwood, as well as makes it
easier to track and hunt prey, or ride through the forest
3. Labor
• Algonquin labor division was based on gender, not class. Men
would hunt, fish, go to war, and make tools, whereas women
would farm, gather, raise children, and build and maintain
their homes. In fact, native women spent less time working
than colonial women
• Compared with colonists, the natives demanded little from
nature, and extracted much less from their environment
• The Natives were mobile, and moved cyclically with the year,
whereas the colonists were sedentary and needed space to
rear livestock
• Puritans believed that their god gave them the land, and the
Indians were to be expelled for their “pagan indolence”
4. Contracts
• Leading colonists offered goods to the Indians in
exchange for them signing deeds to their land away
• Natives and colonists did not view the deeds the same
way, colonists were to take the land, and the Indians
believed they meant an offer to share the land
• The natives expected to continue to hunt and fish the
way that they always had
• While some Indians were tried for killing and eating
livestock from the colonists farms, the colonists never
recognized the Indian’s corn fields as belonging to the
native people
