Museum Displays Pocahontas' Earrings - Yahoo! News
"LONDON - A pair of mussel shell earrings set in silver and believed to be among the only surviving possessions of legendary American Indian princess Pocahontas went on display at a London museum Friday in their first public showing since 1907.
Each earring is formed of a double mussel-shell, the rare white kind found on the eastern shore of the Berings Strait. They are set in silver rims, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and are worth approximately $500,000.
Pocahontas, daughter of Chief Powhatan of the Algonquin Nation, gained fame for keeping peace and serving as an 'ambassador' between American Indians and British settlers.
Little is known with any certainty about her, but her life has been memorialized in stories, songs and images.
By legend, she saved Capt. John Smith from execution in 1607 before being captured by the English in 1612 and used as a pawn in dealing with her father. She converted to Christianity in 1613 and married tobacco planter John Rolfe a year later.
She sailed for London in 1616 to great fanfare in a trip aimed at obtaining funding for a Jamestown Christian school for American Indian children. She may have received the earrings during that trip. She died in 1617 and was buried at St. George's Church in Gravesend, near London.
The earrings were handed down through the Rolfe family and now belong to the Association for Preservation of Virginia Antiquities.
'She is often referred to as an ambassador between two cultures. You can see her coming (to London) and dying here and being buried here as evidence of that, as sort of a link between the two countries,' said Bly Straube of the Virginia antiquities group.
Legend has it that Pocahontas' link to the colonists began when she flung herself over Smith"
Pocahontas, Powhatan, Opechancanough: Three Indian Lives Changed by Jamestown
Each earring is formed of a double mussel-shell, the rare white kind found on the eastern shore of the Berings Strait. They are set in silver rims, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and are worth approximately $500,000.
Pocahontas, daughter of Chief Powhatan of the Algonquin Nation, gained fame for keeping peace and serving as an 'ambassador' between American Indians and British settlers.
Little is known with any certainty about her, but her life has been memorialized in stories, songs and images.
By legend, she saved Capt. John Smith from execution in 1607 before being captured by the English in 1612 and used as a pawn in dealing with her father. She converted to Christianity in 1613 and married tobacco planter John Rolfe a year later.
She sailed for London in 1616 to great fanfare in a trip aimed at obtaining funding for a Jamestown Christian school for American Indian children. She may have received the earrings during that trip. She died in 1617 and was buried at St. George's Church in Gravesend, near London.
The earrings were handed down through the Rolfe family and now belong to the Association for Preservation of Virginia Antiquities.
'She is often referred to as an ambassador between two cultures. You can see her coming (to London) and dying here and being buried here as evidence of that, as sort of a link between the two countries,' said Bly Straube of the Virginia antiquities group.
Legend has it that Pocahontas' link to the colonists began when she flung herself over Smith"
Pocahontas, Powhatan, Opechancanough: Three Indian Lives Changed by Jamestown
posted by Helen Campbell @ 1:57 AM
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