It is, I believe, very dangerous to generalize about these things at any
time but especially when considering a time so remote from our own. Outrage
always reflects social and cultural prejudices that don't travel well in
time, space, or between elites and non-elites. On the frontier, as noted by
William Byrd, many lived "for generations without benefit of law or clergy."
Legal marriage in 17th century Carolina, where there were no clergy and
precious few European women, consisted of telling one's neighbors of one's
intent (seven was, I believe, the magic quantity of informed neighbors
needed to meet the law).
Some of the wonderfully well informed VA historians on this list might
address the legal process of inflicting elite ideas of marriage and race on
the workers of the colony. Again, my feeble recollection is that VA passed
a law barring Indians from legal and political life only in 1691. According
to Leaming (1995), that also was the last year a non-Anglicized Indian name
appeared in Virginia's colonial records. I've often thought this to be a
final punctuation mark in VA's declaration of independence from what
previously had been their Native American hosts.
I suspect that the taboo against miscegenation which seems to have grown
stronger after the end of slavery, when one could no longer, legally, simply
'go through the cabins' is as often as not, applied to our view of a
history that was a good deal more tolerant than are we.
-----Original Message-----
From: Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Jessica Welton
Sent: Wednesday, February 28, 2007 12:49 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Pocahontas's Wedding questions
> Well, we all know that what was considered 'outrageous' socially
> and vocally was frequently common behind closed doors.... but then
> I guess that wasn't marriage by the European definition. Some DNA
> testing of the old Virginia families would be fascinating (at least
> to me!)
So later in time, it might have become more common....but still into
the early 1800s it was considered outrageous for a Native to marry a
white...
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