Description
The Chowanoc, who historically lived near the Chowan River in North Carolina. At the time of the first English contact in 1580s, they were a large and influential tribe and remained so through the mid-17th century. At the time of Sir Walter Raleigh's colonization efforts from 1584 to 1590, the Chowanoac were probably the most powerful of the Carolina Algonquians. After warfare, in 1677 English colonists set aside a reservation for the tribe near Bennett Creek. The Chowanoc suffered high mortality due to infectious disease, including a smallpox epidemic in 1696. Descendants of the Chowanoc merged with the Tuscarora in the early 18th century. The name Chowanoc has also been spelled Chawanook, Chowanock, Chowanoke, and Chawwonock. They are also known as the Chowanoc Confederacy.[\ Thename is Algonquian and translates as "they of the south" or "southerners".
Language
The Chowanoc, also Chowanoke, are an Algonquian-speaking Native American tribe who historically lived near the Chowan River in North Carolina.
Culture
The Chowanoc had settlements from north of the confluence of the Chowan and Meherrin Rivers to the mouth of the Chowan River. Smaller towns were likely built along Bennett Creek and tributaries of the Meherrin and Wiccacon Rivers. Their villages, farms, and fisheries were bounded by their Iroquoian Mangoak (later Tuscarora) neighbors south and west of Salmon Creek in Bertie County, their Algonquian Weapemeoc neighbors east of Rockyhock Creek in Chowan County, and their Algonquian Nansemond and Iroquoian Nottoway, Meherrin, and Wyanoke neighbors north of the convergence of the Meherrin and Blackwater Rivers on the present North Carolina-Virginia border. The swampy lowlands of these watercourses were shared "hunting quarters" for these various groups of Woodland Indians.