Building a Home

Wampanoag : English Colonist

Wampanoag Houses in the 1600s

In the 1600s, both Wampanoag men and women took part in the building and making of a home. They were willing and happy to work together. By working together they knew the houses would be well made. Working together also made the People in the village a strong community.

The Wampanoag lived with a close spiritual connection to the land. They believed that The Creator made their People out of the Earth and the trees, with whom they shared the breath of Life. When they went to gather what they needed from the Earth to build their homes, they connected with Mother Earth in a good way and gave thanks for what they gathered.

Wampanoag children learned spiritual ways of connecting to The Creator and Mother Earth from their parents, family members and the elders. In Wampanoag villages, the elders were most respected for their long lives and their wisdom. By watching and helping the adults, the children learned how to build houses as well.

Saplings (young trees) were gathered in the spring to build frames for the houses. The men took the trees, and peeled the bark from the saplings. It took 40 saplings to make the frame of a small house, or up to 200 saplings for a large one. The bark was split and used to lash the frame together.

Wide sheets of bark taken from large, older trees covered some houses while cattail mats covered others. With prayers of thanksgiving, the women gathered cattails from the swamps and marshes in late summer. The reeds were then dried in the sun. When they were ready, the women sewed the cattails into large, double-sided mats. The mats were laid over the frame of the house to channel the rain away and keep the inside warm and dry.

The women also wove mats of bulrush, another kind of plant that came from the marshes. These mats took a longer time to weave and were often decorated and dyed red and black. They were then put up all around the inside of the homes. Bulrush mats helped the keep the house warm during the cold New England winter.

Wampanoag houses had a hole built into the very top of the house. This hole allowed the smoke of the indoor fire to escape. Sheets of bark above this hole kept the rain or snow from coming in. The family living there changed the position of this cover when it was needed.

Wampanoag houses were built in a round shape because that is best to heat or cool the house evenly. This circular shape also represented many things in Creation that are circular, like the cycles of Life.

Once built, the houses belonged to the women. In the Wampanoag way, this is because they gave birth to the children, who were the future of the People and must be protected and nurtured. The men lived with their families in the houses and were responsible for providing for them and protecting them as well.

Wampanoag People built their homes in this same way for thousands of years, but today live in modern homes. In the Wampanoag Homesite at Plimoth Plantation, Native staff members build homes in this old, traditional way. They have discovered that the homes are as cozy and comfortable as they were in the days of long ago.

English Colonist Houses in the 1600s

A Good Roof Over Their Heads: The English Colonists Build Their Town
Imagine arriving in a strange land after a long sea voyage. Imagine that it is the middle of winter and freezing cold. You are weak and tired from seasickness and just want a warm house on dry land. Now imagine that you have to build that house first!

This is what the English colonists (or “Pilgrims” as they are sometimes called today) had to do when they sailed to New England on the Mayflower in 1620. The colonists knew there were no English towns where they were going. They were prepared to build their own houses. But they were not prepared to build those houses in the middle of winter!

The colonists did not plan to arrive in Plymouth so late in the year. There were many delays, including a leaky ship Mayflower was supposed to travel with and a disagreement with the people who helped pay for the voyage. It took almost 2 months until they finally set sail for the last time. That was September 5, 1620. Mayflower didn't arrive in Plymouth until December.

Once the colonists arrived in Plymouth, they started to build their town right away. They had brought tools with them, and nails and iron hardware. The rest of what they needed the land had to provide. The men went to the woods and cut down trees. They used other axes to chop and trim the trees from round to square. Then they fit these pieces together so that they became a frame. This gave shape and strength to the house.

The colonists had thatched roofs on their houses to keep the sun, wind and rain out. To make them, they cut grasses and reeds from the marshes, and bundled and carried them back to their house. Then they fastened them in layers to the roof. To make the walls of the house, they built a framework of sticks called wattle within the house frame. They took clay, earth, and grasses and mixed them together with water to make a mortar called daub. They pushed the daub into the wattle until it filled the wall and made a smooth surface on the inside.

For the outside of the house, the colonists cut down trees and split the wood to make thin boards called clapboard. The clapboards were then nailed together over the frame of the house. It usually took between two and three months to make a house, from framing it, to covering it with clapboards, to making the wattle and daub, and then to thatching it. Work on the finishing touches sometimes went on for a few more months even after the family had started living inside of it.

When the houses were finished, they were not very large. Many only had one room. The colonists did their cooking, eating, and sleeping, as well as other work, in this room. The women cooked around a hearth, where small fires were lit. The fire from the hearth provided heat during the winter months. The fire also provided light at night. Candles and oil lamps were sometimes lit too. If there was a chimney, it was built of timber and clay and clapboards just like the rest of the house.

Most of the houses had only a few small windows that closed with a wooden shutter. The floors were hard-packed earth. Some houses had a storage space above the first floor, called a loft. These spaces were used to store food and other goods, like dried herbs from the garden, bundles of corn from the field, or even beds. They used ladders to climb up to the loft.

The English colonists had a very difficult time that first winter, as they were building their town. About half of the men, women and children who sailed on Mayflower died from sickness brought on by the cold and wet weather, not having a warm house to live in. However, they had built 11 new houses by the next winter. The town began to grow, and the colonists finally had a good roof over their heads.

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