Pocahontas is remembered as the Powhatan Native American woman who saved the life of Englishman John Smith and married John Rolfe. Learn more at Biography.com. read more
On her visits to the fort, Pocahontas was seen cart-wheeling with the young English boys, living up to her nickname of "playful one." The English knew Pocahontas was the favorite daughter of the great Powhatan, and was consequently seen as a very important person. read more
After Smith’s return to England, Pocahontas disappears for several years from the historical record. She may have married an Indian, resumed her proper name of Matoaka (“Pocahontas” was a nickname), and shunned the English, who, under Sir Thomas Dale, were at war with Powhatan. read more
According to the anthropologist Helen C. Rountree, Pocahontas "revealed [her secret name] to the English only after she had taken another religious—baptismal—name, Rebecca". Pocahontas's Christian name, Rebecca, may have been a symbolic gesture to Rebecca of the Book of Genesis who, as the mother of Jacob and Esau, was the mother of two "nations", or distinct peoples. read more