Virginia Adventure, The : Roanoke to James Towne: An Archaeological and Historical Odyssey
- Book Review,
by IVOR NOEL HUME
From Publishers Weekly
In an elegantly written tour de force of history and archeology, Hume (Martin's Hundred) tells a dark tale of two cities. One, the earliest English colony in North America, Roanoke Island, off North Carolina, was settled briefly in 1584 by a colonizing expedition organized by Sir Walter Raleigh; a subsequent group of colonists disappeared without a trace by 1590. Jamestown, Va., the first permanent English settlement in America, founded in 1607, was plagued by greedy, feuding administrators, bad management from London, disease, starvation, the colonists' "self-defeating slothfulness," and their paralyzing fear of Indians and of one another, according to Hume, chief archeologist at Colonial Williamsburg. Enlivened by period engravings, paintings, maps, photographs of sites and artifacts, this saga of Anglo-Native American relations shattered by English arrogance and disdain is peopled with astonishing figures like British captain Samuel Argall, who kidnapped Algonquian chief Powhatan's daughter Pocahontas and held her for ransom, and sinister Spanish diplomat/spymaster Pedro de Zuniga who did his best to scuttle the English adventure. BOMC selection. Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
In his latest book since Martin's Hundred (LJ 3/15/82), Hume, chief archaeologist at Colonial Williamsburg for 35 years, brings his diverse talents to bear on the historical archaeology of the Roanoke and James Fort (later James Towne) settlements. Drawing extensively on firsthand accounts and other textual sources, he conjures up the feel of the Elizabethan experience that gave life to these settlements. His rendering of settlers and Indians is robust, often tragic, and rich in insight based on his own study of the period. Equally enthralling is his ability to move the reader back and forth in time. Hume also includes masterly and generous accounts of the history of the excavation of these sites and offers his well-informed views on where future work needs to be done. Written with wit, compassion, and tremendous attention to detail, this is historical archaeology at its best. It should appeal to a wide audience of lay readers and scholars interested in the beginning of British American culture in the New World.Joan Gartland, Detroit P.L.Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
Grounding his story in documentary and fragmentary archaeological evidence, British archaeologist Hume (Martin's Hundred, 1982) tantalizingly reconstructs the history of the earliest English settlements in America. The British drive for colonies grew out of England's 16th- century rivalry with Spain; hence the earliest English settlements in America were planted in the midst of the ``Terra Florida'' that explorers had claimed for the Spanish crown. After some abortive attempts to create an English foothold in the New World, Sir Walter Raleigh sent more than 100 English colonists under gentleman-artist John White to lay claim to the land the Elizabethans called ``Virginia.'' They landed in Roanoke, in what is now North Carolina, in July 1587. After establishing a fort and colony, White and some members of the group returned to England. When several more English ships arrived in Roanoke in 1589, the colony had vanished with few, cryptic traces. Hume painstakingly reviews the sparse evidence, both from contemporary journals and from modern forays over the site, of the Lost Colony: Almost surely, the settlers were massacred by Indians, although little evidence exists today either of their presence at Roanoke or of their fate. Similarly, Hume tracks the more successful but often tragic history of the Jamestown settlement from its birth in 1607, using artifacts and journals of the period to trace the colony's growth from its unpromising beginning as a small disease-ridden group of adventurers into a prosperous community. Hume focuses particularly on the relationship between the settlers and the Indians, which went from mutual idealization to demonization within a few years. This culminated in the 1622 slaughter by the Indian chief Opechancanough of English settlers in the area around Jamestown and an English backlash against the natives that spelled the ultimate doom of their culture. Hume breaks little novel historical ground, although he eloquently recounts the archaeological record and brings alive the lost settlements of the early American past with wit and style. (164 illustrations) (Book-of-the-Month Club selection) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Review
"Ivor Noel Hume is one of the world's most elegant speakers and writers speakers and on archaeology. His record of successful work in this field is brilliant and America is fortunate that he has spent so much of his time digging up our historical record. Now he has written about his experiences in tidewater Virginia in the areas where our national history began. His book is graceful, witty; well presented and informative. He adds a new dimension to the Williamsburg area."
-- James A. Michener
"Martin's Hundred provides a lively narrative of modern ingenuity. We follow a sleuth and his expert staff through all the false starts and shrewd hunches of a thrilling 'find.' We discover along the way that archaeology today requires the cooperation of an international community of scientists. And ultimately, we augment our understanding of early American agriculture, early American warfare, and the tragic initial contact between Europeans and Indians in colonial times."
-- Michael Kammen, author of Mystic Chords of Memory
"Martin's Hundred balances scholarship and popular reporting...an exceptionally handsome book."
-- Peter S. Prescott, Newsweek
"No one interested in archaeology, early America, or detective investigations should miss this fascinating volume. Noel Hume's well illustrated and elegant foray into the past is, quite simply one of the best books on American archaeology yet written."
-- Brian Fagan, Washington Post Book World
"Ivor Noel Hum unfolds a fascinating tale with the flair of a mystery novel....[His] beautiful use of language conveys the challenge and excitement of the detective work that is leading archaeologists and historians toward a better knowledge of English Colonial life in Virginia."
-- Stanley South, Christian Science Monitor
Review
"Ivor Noel Hume is one of the world's most elegant speakers and writers speakers and on archaeology. His record of successful work in this field is brilliant and America is fortunate that he has spent so much of his time digging up our historical record. Now he has written about his experiences in tidewater Virginia in the areas where our national history began. His book is graceful, witty; well presented and informative. He adds a new dimension to the Williamsburg area."
-- James A. Michener
"Martin's Hundred provides a lively narrative of modern ingenuity. We follow a sleuth and his expert staff through all the false starts and shrewd hunches of a thrilling 'find.' We discover along the way that archaeology today requires the cooperation of an international community of scientists. And ultimately, we augment our understanding of early American agriculture, early American warfare, and the tragic initial contact between Europeans and Indians in colonial times."
-- Michael Kammen, author of Mystic Chords of Memory
"Martin's Hundred balances scholarship and popular reporting...an exceptionally handsome book."
-- Peter S. Prescott, Newsweek
"No one interested in archaeology, early America, or detective investigations should miss this fascinating volume. Noel Hume's well illustrated and elegant foray into the past is, quite simply one of the best books on American archaeology yet written."
-- Brian Fagan, Washington Post Book World
"Ivor Noel Hum unfolds a fascinating tale with the flair of a mystery novel....[His] beautiful use of language conveys the challenge and excitement of the detective work that is leading archaeologists and historians toward a better knowledge of English Colonial life in Virginia."
-- Stanley South, Christian Science Monitor
Book Description
For thirty-five years, as writer, lecturer, and chief archaeologist at Colonial Williamsburg, Ivor Noel Hume has enlivened for us the material culture of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century America. After his warmly praised book Martin's Hundred, he now turns to the two earliest English outposts in Virginia -- Roanoke and James Towne -- and pieces together revelatory information extrapolated from the shards and postholes of excavations at these sites with contemporary accounts found in journals, letters, and official records of the period. He illuminates narratives that have a mythic status in our early history: the exploits of Sir Walter Ralegh, Captain John Smith, and Powhatan; the life and death of Pocahontas; and the disappearance of the Roanoke colony. He recounts a recent important excavation at Roanoke where he and his colleagues found the work site of a metallurgist named Joachim Gans, whose findings about the mineral wealth of Virginia helped to convince London merchants that America was a worthy risk This is an account of high and low adventure, of noble efforts and base impulses, and of the inevitably tragic interactions between Indians and Europeans, marked by greed, treachery, and commonplace savagery on both sides. The astonishment of this history is that despite bad luck, bad management, and bad blood, the English presence in America persisted and the Virginia settlements survived as the birthplace of a country founded on English law and language.With clarity, authority, and elegant wit, Noel Hume has enhanced our understanding of the historical forces and principal players behind England's first perilous ventures into the New World, and proved again that he is without a doubt one of the great interpreters of our early colonial past.
From the Inside Flap
For thirty-five years, as writer, lecturer, and chief archaeologist at Colonial Williamsburg, Ivor Noel Hume has enlivened for us the material culture of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century America. After his warmly praised book Martin's Hundred, he now turns to the two earliest English outposts in Virginia -- Roanoke and James Towne -- and pieces together revelatory information extrapolated from the shards and postholes of excavations at these sites with contemporary accounts found in journals, letters, and official records of the period. He illuminates narratives that have a mythic status in our early history: the exploits of Sir Walter Ralegh, Captain John Smith, and Powhatan; the life and death of Pocahontas; and the disappearance of the Roanoke colony. He recounts a recent important excavation at Roanoke where he and his colleagues found the work site of a metallurgist named Joachim Gans, whose findings about the mineral wealth of Virginia helped to convince London merchants that America was a worthy risk This is an account of high and low adventure, of noble efforts and base impulses, and of the inevitably tragic interactions between Indians and Europeans, marked by greed, treachery, and commonplace savagery on both sides. The astonishment of this history is that despite bad luck, bad management, and bad blood, the English presence in America persisted and the Virginia settlements survived as the birthplace of a country founded on English law and language.
With clarity, authority, and elegant wit, Noel Hume has enhanced our understanding of the historical forces and principal players behind England's first perilous ventures into the New World, and proved again that he is without a doubt one of the great interpreters of our early colonial past.
From the Back Cover
"Ivor Noel Hume is one of the world's most elegant speakers and writers speakers and on archaeology. His record of successful work in this field is brilliant and America is fortunate that he has spent so much of his time digging up our historical record. Now he has written about his experiences in tidewater Virginia in the areas where our national history began. His book is graceful, witty; well presented and informative. He adds a new dimension to the Williamsburg area."-- James A. Michener"Martin's Hundred provides a lively narrative of modern ingenuity. We follow a sleuth and his expert staff through all the false starts and shrewd hunches of a thrilling 'find.' We discover along the way that archaeology today requires the cooperation of an international community of scientists. And ultimately, we augment our understanding of early American agriculture, early American warfare, and the tragic initial contact between Europeans and Indians in colonial times."-- Michael Kammen, author of Mystic Chords of Memory"Martin's Hundred balances scholarship and popular reporting...an exceptionally handsome book."-- Peter S. Prescott, Newsweek"No one interested in archaeology, early America, or detective investigations should miss this fascinating volume. Noel Hume's well illustrated and elegant foray into the past is, quite simply one of the best books on American archaeology yet written."-- Brian Fagan, Washington Post Book World"Ivor Noel Hum unfolds a fascinating tale with the flair of a mystery novel....[His] beautiful use of language conveys the challenge and excitement of the detective work that is leading archaeologists and historians toward a better knowledge of English Colonial life in Virginia."-- Stanley South, Christian Science Monitor
About the Author
Ivor Noel Hume was born in London and studied at both Framlingham College and St. Lawrence College in England. In 1949 he joined the staff of the Guildhall Museum in London as an archaeologist. He moved to Colonial Williamsburg as chief archaeologist in 1957 and subsequently became director of Williamsburg's Department of Archaeology. Mr. Noel Hume is an honorary research associate of the Smithsonian Institution, a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, and a past vice-president of the British Society of Post-Medieval Archaeology. He is the author of ten previous books, including Here Lies Virginia and Martin's Hundred. In 1992, for contributions to British cultural interests in Virginia, he was named an Officer of the British Empire. He lives in Williamsburg, Virginia.
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