Roanoke - Bibliography

by Elizabeth Wambold (January 2004) and Edward J. Gallagher (May 2006)

Bess, Jennifer.  “Hakluyt’s Discourse of Western Planting.” Explicator 55.1 (1996): 3-5.

Looks at the Biblical references in the piece and the way in which Hakluyt uses them to his own ends, specifically as a means of slander and propaganda against Spain -- exposing a national psyche that is deeply invested in religious identification.

A Bibliography of Books, Pamphlets, and Articles on the Roanoke Island Colonies.  Roanoke Revisited: Heritage Education Program.  2002.  9 May 2006.   <https://www.nps.gov/fora/biblio.htm>.

Sections on primary works, secondary works, contemporary England, Sir Walter Raleigh, Indians, Archaeology, belles lettres, works for younger readers, and continuing representations.

Cave, Albert  A.  "Richard Hakluyt's Savages: The Influence of 16th Century Travel Narratives on English Indian Policy in North America."  International Social Science Review 60.1 (1985): 3-24.

"Readers hoping to find in Hakluyt's publications beguiling portrayal of noble savages living in pristine innocence in a virgin land have found only a few passages which fulfill their expectations.  While Hakluyt included in his collection a number of descriptions of America as a bountiful and unspoiled terrestial paradise, most of these panegyrics spoke of the promise of the land, not of its peoples. . . . It can be argued that despite his moderate advice on dealing with the Indians, Richard Hakluyt's image of the 'savage,' his bogeyman Indian, subtly tainted the English relationship to the real Indians on the colonial frontier."

Fitzmaurice, Andrew.  "The Moral Philosophy of Tudor Colonisation." Humanism and America: An Intellectual History of English Colonisation, 1500-1625.  Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2003.  50-57.

The dual ends of glory and profit  presented as the ends of establishing a community in Roanoke shift markedly to conquest and profit in Guiana, though, Raleigh still asserts, the profit is for the common good not personal and selfish gain.

Fuller, Mary C.  "Early Ventures: Writing under the Gilbert and Ralegh Patents."  Voyages in Print: English Travel to America, 1576-1624.  Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1995.  16-54.

Contrasts celebratory works supporting Gilbert's expedition, but written beforehand, with Hariot's first-person account.  "Unlike the poems which argued that Gilbert's voyages brought moral grandeur through suffering, [Hariot's] Report was focused, authoritative, and scientific, setting its information against unhappy colonists who indulged in empty or idle criticisms of the colony."

Greene, Jack P.  The Intellectual Construction of America: Exceptionalism and Identity from 1492 to 1800.  Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 1993: 36-48.

"In [his] utilitarian analysis of the potential benefits of American plantations, Hakluyt was both the heir of nearly a century of European perceptions and the herald of virtually every one of the themes that would dominate English thought about the colonies for the next two centuries.  The basic image he conveyed to his audience depicted America as a large and fruitful country available for the taking by the enterprising and the bold.  In this image, Amerindians, like the land and other resources of America, were essentially passive objects who had no integrity or selfhood of their own and whose own priorities and objectives ordinarily demanded no consideration and had to be taken into account only when they represented an obstacle to English designs."

Hadfield, Andrew.  "Thomas Harriot and John White: Ethnography and Ideology in the New World."  The Arts of 17th Century Science (2002): 199-216.

Harriot's work was designed to contribute to scientific understanding and to encourage colonization.  But, as the Adam and Eve illustration and the conclusion indicate, "scientific questions could not be considered without reference to religious issues, an ethnography that was also theological."  This meant that the English needed to rethink their own identities and historical genealogy in order to meet the challenge of the New World."

Hill, Christopher.  "Ralegh: Science, History, and Politics."  Intellectual Origins of the English Revolution Revisited.  Oxford: Clarendon P, 1997.  118-200.

Broad-ranging assessment of Raleigh. Especially pertinent here is his "adoption of an aggressive imperialist foreign policy" (section v).

Horning, Susan Schmidt.  "The Power of Image: Promotional Literature and Its Changing Role in the Settlement of Early Carolina."  North Carolina Historical Review 70.4 (1993): 365-400.

Looks at the way in which promotional literature influenced colonization.  Talks a lot about the way in which the two Richard Hakluyts' writings formed the beginnings of promotional literature and how, while it may not have achieved its ultimate goal during the time, it became a lasting source of information that many later writers harken back to.

Kupperman, Karen Ordahl.  Roanoke: The Abandoned Colony.  Totowa: Rowman & Littlefield, 1984.

Documents the Roanoke voyages and colonies in detail -- exploring both English and Native sides of colonial tension.  Suggests the way in which negative aspects of the first colony (such as the violence towards the natives) were repressed from the public discourse, thus causing more problems for the second colony, and focuses on the English view of the colony as a means of assisting piracy.

Lorant, Stefan, ed.  The New World: The First Pictures of America.  New York: Duell, Sloan & Pearce, 1946.

A collection of original documents, reproductions of John White’s watercolors, and reproductions of the engravings made by Theodore De Bry from John White’s paintings.  Documents include accounts and journals from Barlowe, Lane, Grenville, White, and Hariot, along with some biographical material on White and Hariot.

Mackenthun, Gesa.  "Books for Empire: The Colonial Program of Richard Hakluyt."  Metaphors of Dispossession: American Beginnings and the Translation of Empire, 1492-1637.  Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1997.  22-70.

"It is [Hakluyt's] almost invisible strategy of tampering that I examine at some length in the following sections.  Precisely because of their infrequency and near invisibility, Hakluyt's interventions into some of the texts he collected can be read as symptomatic passages within the emerging English discourse of colonialism, passages where the texture of the narratives forms knots and flaws that may give us insight into some hidden fears and motives of European colonialism."

---.  "The Politics of Colonial Representation."  Metaphors of Dispossession: American Beginnings and the Translation of Empire, 1492-1637.  Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1997.  141-92.

Explores how the representational strategies in Hariot and Raleigh contribute "to the emergence of an English colonial identity, and "examines the ways in which both texts seek to emancipate themselves from the Spanish example even while imitating it in important ways."

Oberg, Michael Leroy.  "This New Found Land."  Dominion and Civility: English Imperialism and Native America, 1585-1685.  Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1999. 8-47.

"Walter Ralegh, Thomas Hariot, and Richard Hakluyt, as part of their metroplitan vision, had called for the fair and just  treatment of the New World inhabitants.  Only through, these means, they recognized, could a colony be planted in a distant and foreign land.  Only through these means could Indians be assimilated into a Christian, English New World empire.  Yet to people his colony, Ralegh sent soldiers, men who lived by violence and whose beliefs about 'savage' peoples had been forged along the marshlands of the empire.  Seldom were men of this cast of mind capable of sharing [their] broader vision."

Pennington, Loren.  “The Amerindian in English Promotional Literature.” The Westward Enterprise: English Activities in Ireland, the Atlantic, and America 1480-1650.  Ed. K. R. Andrews, N. P. Canny, and P. E. H. Hair.  Liverpool: Liverpool UP, 1978. 175-94.

Talks about the tensions between portraying the natives as kind, so as to attract settlers, and as barbarous, so as to create interest and means of justifying their displacement.  Also discusses the way the English used other literature, such as accounts of Spanish conquest, to their purposes.

Porter, H.C.  The Inconstant Savage: England and the North American Indian 1500-1660.  London: Gerald Duckworth and Co, 1979.

See specifically the chapter entitled “That Part of America called Ossomocomuck 1584-1590” dealing with the Roanoke voyages.  Of particular interest here is the portion that talks about religion, describing the native’s religion, how the settlers felt this could be realigned to suit their purposes (have them embrace the Christian god), and the native’s interpretation of the settlers (thinking of them as men from the afterlife, often attributing illnesses that killed them – most likely European diseases to which they were not immune – as punishment for offending the whites).

Quinn, David B., ed.  New American World: A Documentary History of North America to 1612.  Vol. 3. New York: Hector Bye, 1979.

A collection of primary documents with a large section of Roanoke-related material.  Includes many narratives as well as letters of correspondence and papers planning out the voyages.  Mentioned individuals include Richard Hakluyt (elder and younger), Walter Raleigh, Amadas and Barlowe, Ralph Lane, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Christopher Carleill, Francis Drake, and more.  Comprehensively covers most all the major documents as well as numerous others.

---.  The Roanoke Voyages.  2 vols.  London: Cambridge, UP 1995.

A collection of original documents including charters and parliamentary proceedings, letters and correspondences of Sir Walter Raleigh, narratives about the colonies, ships logs, etc.  Some of the people included are Thomas Hariot, John White, Sir Francis Drake, John Hooker, Richard Hakluyt, Ralph Lane, Robert Hallett, and John Watts.  Aside from the English writers, there are also letters and correspondences from the Spanish in regard to relations with the English.  Towards the end of the second volume there is a fairly large collection of Indian words and meanings.

---.  Set Fair for Roanoke: Voyages and Colonies, 1584-1606.  Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 1985.

Looks at the Roanoke colonies and surrounding events.  A very pertinent chapter is “Englishmen and Native Americans,” which gives both sides, documenting what the English understood of the natives as well as (to the extent it is available) what the natives thought of the English -- showing reasons why relationships flourished in some instances and failed in others.

Quinn, David B., and Alison M. Quinn, eds.  A particuler discourse concerninge the greate necessitie and manifolde commodyties . . . known as Discourse of Western Planting.  London: Hakluyt Society, 1993.

Richard Hakluyt’s Discourse of Western Planting in its entirety.  A long and detailed introduction provides information on Hakluyt’s life, where he received his information, the historical context of the paper -- completely  framing this important work in regard to why it was written and what work it was supposed to accomplish.

--.  The First Colonists: Documents on the Planting of the First English Settlements in North America, 1584-1590.  London, Oxford UP, 1973.

A collection of primary documents, many of which are written by Richard Hakluyt the younger and John White -- primarily narratives, although some, such as Hakluyt’s, are renditions of what he has heard written in narrative form.

Roanoke Colonies Research Office.  Ed. E. Thomson Shields, Jr.  1993.  10 May 2006.   <https://www.ecu.edu/rcro/>.

"The Roanoke Colonies Research Office was created in 1993 as a clearinghouse for information related to all aspects of study regarding the Roanoke Colonies.  Fields of study include areas such as anthropology, American studies, archaeology, biology, history, geography, literature, and Native American studies."

Roanoke Revisited: Heritage Education Program.  2002.  9 May 2006.   <https://www.nps.gov/fora/roanokerev.htm>.

Curriculum unit.  This web site takes you through the colonies’ history step by step.  It is broken up into eight different units (five historical and three critical).  Each historical unit is full of links for additional information to supplement the general overview.  The depth of detail makes it a very comprehensive site.  Each of the critical sections has a bibliography full of primary and secondary materials.

Scanlan, Thomas.  Colonial Writing and the New World, 1583-1671: Allegories of Desire.  New York: Cambridge UP, 1999: 50-67.

Hariot's Briefe and True Report is a promotional pamphlet.  Hariot "had to recognize the value of fear" as a tool of controlling the Indians, but he suggests that the colonists will be able to rule by "fear and love."  "By offering visual confirmation of the loving nature of the people and the material bounty of the place," however, De Bry's engraved edition is a quite different reading experience: "By Europeanizing the Indians, DeBry implicitly suggests that the process of transforming Indian culture is possible and that it has already begun. . . . . Indian culture is simply a lesser developed version of English culture."

Seed, Patricia.  "Houses, Gardens, and Fences: Signs of English Possession in the New World."  Ceremonies of Possession in Europe's Conquest of the New  World, 1492-1640.  Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1995.  16-40.

Seed "explores the array of ceremonies that Europeans performed to enact their  taking possession of the New World."   "Accounts of English occupation of the New World usually begin by describing ordinary house-building activity."  The English constructed their right to occupy the New World on "building houses and fences and planting gardens."  "The action of the colonists in the New World was planting"; the colonies were "plantations."  "Planting the garden was an act of taking possession . . . . It was not a law that entitled Englishmen to possess the New World, it was an action which established their rights."

Sweet, Timothy.  "Economy, Ecology, and Utopia in Early Colonial Promotional Literature."  American Literature 71.3 (1999): 399-427.

This article looks at ways terms such as “commodity” and “waste” are used in literature aimed at promoting colonization, mentioning Roanoke-related figures such as Richard Hakluyt the Younger, whose Discourse of Western Planting served to outline the benefits of English colonization, and noting one of the main benefits as providing the English with all the commodities they were currently relying on trade with other countries for.  In addition to this, reports such as Hariot’s A Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia promise new goods that were available no other place in the world.  This piece shows how men such as these justified the taking of such commodities by referring to the land as being in a state of waste when in the hands of the natives, who were not utilizing it to its full potential.

Williams, Robert A., Jr.  The American Indian in Western Legal Thought: The Discourses of Conquest.  New York: Oxford UP, 1990.

Chapter four deals directly with the Roanoke voyages and the events and discourses leading up to them,  introducing Walter Raleigh, one of the main proponents of English expansion, whose “views of Britain’s proper foreign policy were imperialistic, aggressively anti-Spanish, and intimately connected with his views on economic policy” (175).  One of his main associates, Richard Hakluyt, wrote Discourse of Western Planting in an attempt to forward this movement, a document which outlines the way English colonization can be successfully achieved.

Wright, Louis B.  "Richard Hakluyt: Preacher and Imperialist."  Religion and Empire: The Alliance between Piety and Commerce in English Expansion, 1558-1625.  Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 1943.  33-57.

Hakluyt, the Apostle of Empire, "had a vision and a mission.  His life was consecrated to the great task of arousing his countrymen to opportunities overseas and the duty of Englishmen to seize vast sleeping empires for their sovereign and their God. The quiet labors of this man of religion exerted a greater influence on English expansion than the deeds of any other single Englishman in the sixteenth century."